Professor Tim Flannery- an Australian scientist
Climate Change Warrior
"It is absolutely wrong to degrade some individuals to enrich others"."It is wrong and immoral to degrade our children's future to enrich ourselves".
School Resources on Tim's
website Video
of a talk to schools.
Photo by Adam Bruzzone
Tim Flannery
Scientist, explorer, author
" To educate people on new thinking about our environmental challenges"
Tim Flannery is one of Australia’s leading thinkers and writers. An internationally acclaimed scientist, explorer and conservationist, Tim’s books include the definitive ecological histories of Australia (The Future Eaters) and North America (The Eternal Frontier). He has published more than 100 peer-reviewed papers.
As a field zoologist he has discovered and named more than thirty new species of mammals (including two tree-kangaroos) and at 34 he was awarded the Edgeworth David Medal for Outstanding Research. His pioneering work in New Guinea prompted Sir David Attenborough to put him in the league of the world’s great explorers and the writer Redmond O’Hanlon to remark, “He’s discovered more new species than Charles Darwin.”
He is a regular contributor to The New York Review of books and The Times Literary Supplement and has edited and introduced many historical works, including The Birth of Sydney, The Diaries of William Buckley and The Explorers. He received a Centenary of Federation Medal for his service to science and in 2002 he became the first environmentalist to deliver the Australia Day address to the nation.
Tim Flannery spent a year as professor of Australian studies at Harvard, where he taught in the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology. In Australia he is a leading member of the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists, which reports independently to government on sustainability issues.
A familiar voice on ABC Radio, NPR and the BBC for more than a decade, he is also known to viewers of the Documentary Channel as writer-presenter on the series The Future Eaters (1998), Wild Australasia (2003), Islands in the Sky (1992) and Bushfire (1997). He was a principal consultant on the SBS series The Colony (2004) and is currently Australian consultant-presenter for the international series ATLAS.
Formerly director of the South Australian Museum, Tim is chairman of the South Australian Premier’s Science Council and Sustainability Roundtable; a director of the Australian Wildlife Conservancy; and the National Geographic Society’s representative in Australasia. In April 2005 he was honoured as Australian Humanist of the Year. He will take up a position at Sydney's Macquarie University mid 2007.
Tim Flannery was named Australian of the Year the day before Australia Day on 25th January 2007.
Tim's latest book We Are The Weather Makers has made a most credible contribution to the science and the actions needed to mitigate mankind's most serious mistake for the sustainability of planet Earth.
"While it sounds an appropriately urgent warning about the impact of climate change on ecological systems, Flannery's is not in any sense a narrow book. Indeed, as well as being clear and readable it is heroic in scope, ranging from the physical and biological sciences to electoral politics and practical remedies. It concludes on a positive note with the small things we can all do to slow down the changes before they become catastrophic ... If you are not yet convinced of the gravity of the problem, or our capacity to solve it, you should buy and read this compelling book."
Video
We Are the Weathermakers: Tim Flannery Discusses Climate Change
Tim Flannery, one of the world's leading writers on climate change, talks to Melbourne secondary school students about global warming and what can be done about it. The talk, presented by the Centre for Youth Literature and Text Publishing, marks the launch of We Are the Weathermakers, the young-adult edition of his acclaimed book on climate change, The Weathermakers.
Interview with Ed Voves
Your new book explores in great detail how the escalating use of fossil fuels is causing global warming. However, you begin your book from a very personal perspective, reflecting on the implications of global warming on your own family and, by extension, the entire human family. I call the bond between generations the 'chain of deepest love.' I have been thinking of that even more since I wrote the book. Ultimately, global warming is a moral problem rather than a purely scientific or economic one. We are enriching ourselves by the use of fossil fuels in ways that degrade and imperil the future of our children, grandchildren and all future generations.The more I think about it, the situation is like that of the people who launched the anti-slavery campaign in the late 1700’s. One of the group’s leaders, William Wilberforce, is a great hero of mine. When they began their efforts, people were getting rich by degrading the lives of the slaves brought over from Africa to work on the plantations in the West Indies and America. It must have seemed hopeless at first, faced by the opposition of corrupt parliaments and wealthy merchants and planters. Yet, these Abolitionists changed the world by the force of their moral argument and I believe that moral argument will win the day and lead to solutions for global warming. Actually, the two causes, the abolition of slavery and stopping global warming are closely linked. In the 1800’s, the labor of slaves was replaced by steam-powered machines powered by coal and oil. Now, the use of these fossil fuels is confronting us with a moral dilemma and I am confident we will make the right choice.""It is absolutely wrong to degrade some individuals to enrich others".
"It is wrong and immoral to degrade our children's future to enrich ourselves".
Flannery says sky may need to change colour to fight climate change
ABC Report
Posted
Updated
Tim Flannery: says climate change is accelerating at an alarming rate. (File photo) (7:30 Report)
Former Australian of the Year and climate change activist Tim Flannery has come up with a novel solution to climate change, which he says could change the colour of the sky.
Professor Flannery, who has written extensively on environmental issues, spoke at a business and sustainability conference in Parliament House today and suggested a plan to pump sulphur into the atmosphere in order to repel the sun's rays.
He says the process is called "solar dimming".
"It would change the colour of the sky," he told Australian Associated Press.
"It's the last resort that we have, it's the last barrier to a climate collapse."
"We need to be ready to start doing it in perhaps five years time if we fail to achieve what we're trying to achieve."
He says radical action has to be taken because of the extremely high speed with which climate change is happening.
"The current burden of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere is in fact more than sufficient to cause catastrophic climate change," he said.
"Everything's going in the wrong direction at the moment, timelines are getting shorter, the amount of pollution in the atmosphere is growing."
He also urged Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's Government to reverse its decision to means test the $8,000 rebate on solar panels, made in last week's Federal Budget.