Climate Change & Henry Thoreau
This virtual Climate Speaker Series event was held on October 6, 2020.
In conversation with Richard Primack:
Walden Warming: Climate Change Comes to Thoreau’s Concord
Henry David Thoreau was a climate change scientist! Most noteworthy, plants in Concord are also changing in abundance due to a warming climate. This work has received extensive media coverage as an example of the biological effects of climate change and is now being extended to the neglected autumn season. What would Thoreau tell us to do about global warming if he were alive today?
Richard Primack takes us on a climate science journey, more than 150 years in the making.
About Richard Primack
Richard Primack is a Professor of Biology at Boston University with a specialization in plant ecology, conservation biology, tropical rain forest ecology, and climate change biology. He is the author of three widely used conservation biology textbooks; local co-authors have helped to produce 38 translations of these books with local examples. For nine years, he was the Editor-in-Chief of the journal Biological Conservation and served as the President of the Association for Tropical Biology and Conservation. His research has appeared in the New York Times, the Boston Globe, National Geographic, and other publications, and he is often interviewed on National Public Radio. Primack also frequently gives talks and writes for the general public on issues of climate change and ecology, most recently the popular book Walden Warming: Climate Change Comes to Thoreau’s Woods.
About the Climate Speaker Series
Mount Auburn Cemetery’s Climate Speaker Series provides a platform for local researchers, academics, public officials, business and non-profit leaders, and volunteer organizations to share with the public their work to investigate, mitigate, and adapt to the threats of our warming climate.
Funding for this program was provided in part by the Massachusetts Cultural Council.
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