Saving the World From Bad Ideas

In this episode of Saving the World from Bad Ideas, host Mark Lynas is joined by Dr. Siddhartha Roy, an environmental scientist who was among the first researchers to identify lead contamination in Flint, Michigan’s tap water. Dr. Roy discusses his team’s critical role in exposing the crisis and holding city officials accountable — as well as his subsequent less popular but data-driven research that created friction among his allies and the public. Drawing on millions of blood lead test results, this later work by Dr. Roy and his team challenged claims that widespread lead poisoning was responsible for rising rates of learning difficulties and brain damage among Flint’s children. Now a Maddox Prize recipient for these findings and his commitment to evidence-based thinking despite serious social pushback, Dr. Roy joins Mark in discussing the importance of remaining true to the science — even when it conflicts with strong emotional narratives and political and public pressure.

About WePlanet
WePlanet is an international movement campaigning for science-based solutions to the climate, nature and development crises. Through conversations like this one, we challenge bad ideas, spotlight better ones, and make the case for a more abundant, resilient and hopeful future.
 
Join the Conversation
podcast@weplanet.org | https://weplanet.org/podcast
Instagram: @weplanetinternational
X: @weplanetintl 
LinkedIn: WePlanet

In this episode of Saving the World from Bad Ideas, host Mark Lynas is joined by Olivia Boyd, Senior Engagement Lead at WePlanet, to discuss the campaign to end industrial krill fishing in Antarctic waters. Olivia explains how krill are a keystone species, supplying food and nutrients to whales, penguins and seals across Antarctica — but industrial trawlers, run by a Norwegian billionaire, are increasingly competing with wildlife for this vital food resource. And for what? Omega-3 health supplements and pet food… 
Join Olivia and the WePlanet team in pressuring retailers to stop the sale of krill pills and protect one of the planet’s last remaining great wildernesses. Sign the petition here → https://secure.weplanet.org/page/202721/petition/1

About WePlanet
WePlanet is an international movement campaigning for science-based solutions to the climate, nature and development crises. Through conversations like this one, we challenge bad ideas, spotlight better ones, and make the case for a more abundant, resilient and hopeful future.
 
Join the Conversation
podcast@weplanet.org | https://weplanet.org/podcast
Instagram: @weplanetinternational
X: @weplanetintl 
LinkedIn: WePlanet

We are deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Professor Lonnie Thompson, a pioneering ice core paleoclimatologist whose life’s work has been key to understanding Earth's recent climate history. Just a few weeks ago, we were honoured to welcome Lonnie onto our Saving the World from Bad Ideas podcast to discuss his remarkable career collecting ice cores from high mountains around the world to preserve their fast-vanishing ice for science and research. Watch Lonnie's conversation with Mark to learn more about his incredible career — including his recent expedition to collect ice cores from Huascarán in Peru, the tallest mountain in the tropics, whose ice contains a critical climate record. Our thoughts are with Lonnie’s family, friends and colleagues at the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center at this time. His passing at the age of 78 is a great loss for the scientific world, and he will be sorely missed.
https://byrd.osu.edu/news/ohio-state-mourns-loss-dr.-lonnie-thompson

Episode summary
In this episode of Saving the World from Bad Ideas, host Mark Lynas is joined by Professor Lonnie Thompson, an ice paleoclimatologist with The Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center at Ohio State University. In this episode, they discuss Lonnie’s legacy of over 50 years of strenuous expeditions traveling to tropical high mountain glaciers around the world, to take ice core samples that date back tens of thousands of years. Mark and Lonnie dive into the critical importance of these ice cores — some of which are the last remnants of mountain glaciers that have since melted away completely — as they hold records of greenhouse gases, temperatures, microbes and volcanic activity over Earth’s history that will continue to prove valuable to science for years to come.
“Probably this year or next, those glaciers will totally disappear. And the only ice from that part of the world is here in the freezers at Ohio State University. From these ice cores, we can go back thirty, forty thousand years and see how that has varied in the natural world. The ice records anything that's in the atmosphere.
And I can only imagine 20 years from now, there are things that we haven't even asked about, that will be important and only preserved in these frozen ice cores.”
Watch the film Canary, a full-length documentary that dives into Lonnie Thompson’s legacy of work: https://canary.oscilloscope.net/ 

About WePlanet
WePlanet is an international movement campaigning for science-based solutions to the climate, nature and development crises. Through conversations like this one, we challenge bad ideas, spotlight better ones, and make the case for a more abundant, resilient and hopeful future.
 
Join the Conversation
podcast@weplanet.org | https://weplanet.org/podcast
Instagram: @weplanetinternational & @savingtheworldpod
X: @weplanetintl 
LinkedIn: WePlanet

Episode summary 
In this episode of Saving the World from Bad Ideas, host Mark Lynas is joined by George Monbiot, columnist in The Guardian and environmental campaigner of worldwide renown, to discuss the return of bluefin tuna to British waters and the critical importance of protecting this wonderful marine megafauna from being exploited and killed by fishing. 
George isn’t just an academic expert — he tells Mark about his recent and ongoing exploits in a sea kayak, watching these incredible animals leap out of the water while chasing their prey. He and Mark then discuss how overfishing has depleted marine ecosystems around the United Kingdom and beyond and why the fishing industry escapes scrutiny while corporate lobbying and political inaction block meaningful change.
“We have a very storybook view of the fishing industry, but it's actually rife with multimillionaires and billionaires running these enormous boats and huge corporations. It's very, very concentrated. It's utterly ruthless. It hides just like farming does. We have these radical double standards when it comes to fishing and farming,” says George. 

About WePlanet
WePlanet is an international movement campaigning for science-based solutions to the climate, nature and development crises. Through conversations like this one, we challenge bad ideas, spotlight better ones, and make the case for a more abundant, resilient and hopeful future.
 
Join the Conversation
podcast@weplanet.org | https://weplanet.org/podcast
Instagram: @weplanetinternational & @savingtheworldpod
X: @weplanetintl 
LinkedIn: WePlanet

Episode summary 
In this episode of Saving the World from Bad Ideas, host Mark Lynas is joined by Roger Hallam, climate campaigner and co-founder of Extinction Rebellion, to discuss his evolution in climate activism and the case for mass civil resistance. Roger reflects on the successes and failures of Extinction Rebellion, his various arrests and time in prison, and his subsequent international campaigns. Mark and Roger discuss Roger’s most recent and controversial “4 Billion Dead” campaign, discussing the role of science communication about climate impacts at high levels of global heating. Roger argues that our political systems are failing to respond at the scale and speed required, and advocates for civil resistance, citizens’ assemblies and even solar geoengineering as possible responses to the planet’s escalating climate crisis.
“As a general rule, 99% of humans find courage through the community of collective action,” says Roger Hallam. “Then they radicalise through that experience and that can happen very quickly. As a general rule, if 3% of a population occupies a capital city for anything from 10 to 20 days, then you're rolling a dice on whether you get regime change or structural change in the regime. And we know that's what's necessary to slash carbon emissions at the present time.”
Join ‘4 Billion Dead’ for monthly campaigning and organizing Zoom calls at this link → 4billiondead.org

About WePlanet
WePlanet is an international movement campaigning for science-based solutions to the climate, nature and development crises. Through conversations like this one, we challenge bad ideas, spotlight better ones, and make the case for a more abundant, resilient and hopeful future.
 
Join the Conversation
podcast@weplanet.org | https://weplanet.org/podcast
Instagram: @weplanetinternational
X: @weplanetintl 
LinkedIn: WePlanet