The Impact of Anthropocentric Thinking on Climate Change Research

Introduction

Climate change has emerged as a critical scientific issue, generating interdisciplinary study, public discourse, and polarized policy debates. A dominant narrative attributes global warming to rising greenhouse gas emissions from human industrial activities. However, an anthropocentric bias may be limiting the recognition of geological forces such as volcanism as significant drivers behind climate dynamics. This article explores how our thinking about nature affects scientists’ approach to studying climate change.

Anthropogenic Global Warming Theory

The core theory of anthropogenic global warming rests on rising CO2 concentrations from fossil fuel combustion as a primary driver of increased atmospheric greenhouse trapping. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports have relied heavily on Sarmiento’s 1992 study that calculated volcanic degassing represented less than 1% of annual CO2 emissions compared to human sources.

Geochemical Evidence of Underestimated Geological CO2 Sources

Recent advancements in geochemical sampling and monitoring techniques have led to more comprehensive analyses across a wider array of volcanic sources. Results from the Deep Earth Carbon Degassing (DECADE) research project suggest global volcanic CO2 outputs may have been underestimated by orders of magnitude. Improved submarine sensors revealed surprisingly high concentrations of dissolved volcanic CO2 continuously leaking from previously unmapped sea-floor fissures and hydrothermal vents.

Psychological Underpinnings of Anthropocentric Bias

The predominance of the human-centric paradigm in climate science may stem from deeper psychological roots - our innate tendency towards an egocentric perspective. Piaget’s developmental psychology identified the “egocentric bias” as a natural trait in children to initially comprehend and interpret phenomena through their own individualistic lens before gaining capacity for decentration.

Ontological Foundations of Human/Nature Separations

The ontological divide between Western scientific traditions and indigenous relational worldviews highlights an even deeper philosophical dimension to anthropocentric biases dominating climate change research. Descola contrasts entrenched dualistic naturalism with animistic ontologies that extensionally distribute subjectivities across an innately interrelated continuum between humans and environmental forces/entities.

Reframing Priorities Around Earth System Drivers

The interdisciplinary synthesis presented here illuminates how fundamental anthropocentric biases have inherently limited climate research agendas to an overly human-centered accounting of environmental impacts. This egocentric framing has systematically underexplored and underestimated the potentially vastly greater influences of geological processes as drivers governing atmospheric greenhouse concentrations.

Conclusion

This paper has argued for the necessity of fundamentally reframing scientific assumptions, philosophical paradigms, and research priorities underlying investigations into climate change drivers. Climate science must evolve beyond entrenchment in human-centric emissions accounting to explore deeper cyclical mechanisms governing our planet’s greenhouse gas cycling and heat dissipation engine. Developing holistic eco-centric worldviews is vital for apprehending the deeper truths of how our planet operates.

References

Fischer, T.P., Arellano, S., Carn, S. et al. (2019). Comprehensive estimates on CO2 flux from both eruptive and diffuse volcanic emissions between 2005 and 2017. Scientific Reports.

Jia, X., Lynch, A., Huang, Y. et al. (2019). The influence of anthropocentrism on the inorganic synthesis: a historical perspective with future outlooks. Chemical Communications.

Piaget, J. (1954). The Construction of Reality in the Child. Basic Books.

Descola, P. (2013). Beyond Nature and Culture. University of Chicago Press.

Kenny, S. (2009). Cartesian Dualism. Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

Griffin, D. W., & Ross, L. (1991). Naïve realism in everyday life: Implications for social conflict and misunderstanding. In

Keywords

Climate change, Anthropocentric bias, Volcanism, Psychological underpinnings, Ontological foundations, Earth system drivers