Radical solutions and consistent imaginations

Abstract

This final chapter weaves together the threads outlined in this book. It shows that entertaining the thought of climate engineering requires particular imaginative and epistemological frameworks that are structurally embedded through epistemological, cultural, and political traditions. Specifically, this chapter shows how it requires a clear field of vision that relies on specific reductions of the social and geophysical complexity of the climate, climate change, and climate engineering. As such, it ties together the epistemological debates in Chapter 4, the political debates in Chapter 5, and the normative disagreements in Chapter 6. It addresses different assumptions about the understanding of climate systems, following assessments of technological prowess. Most importantly, it teases out not only historical (dis)continuities around climate engineering practice, but it also shows how ‘seeing’ different continuities and ruptures leads to fundamentally different positions on climate engineering. Rather than answer what it means to consider climate engineering, it reverts to asking the question: what sort of belief systems are most prominent in climate engineering research? And what does that mean for the future (political and scientific) development of climate engineering?