tradition of the profession—those who have inherited their methods and problems down from Hempel, Kuhn, Popper, van Fraassen, and so on—will likely find my discussion of the structure of the scientific project in Chapter One unsatisfying in virtue of the fact that it makes very little contact with the classic literature in the field. Mathematicians and physicists working in dynamical systems theory will likely find my discussion of dynamical complexity unsatisfying in virtue of its relatively informal and non-mathematical presentation. Practicing climatologists will likely find my discussion of Mann's work in particular (and the methods of climate science in general) unsatisfying in virtue of the fact that I am not myself a climatologist, and thus lack the kind of sensitivity and feel for the scientific vernacular that comes from years of graduate school spent simmering in the relevant scientific literature. Ethicists and political philosophers will likely find my discussion of the moral and social issues surrounding climate science's predictions unsatisfying in virtue of the fact that I (quite admittedly) know very little about the state of the ethics literature today, and thus will be presenting largely what I see as common-sense approaches to solving these problems that are as devoid of ethical theory as possible.
In short, no matter who you are, you're probably going to be deeply suspicious of what I have to say, particularly about the topic in which you specialize. Why, then, have I chosen to approach this project in the way that I have? Instead of leaving everyone upset, why not try to please a small number of people and make a deep contribution to just one of the issues I discuss here? There are a few answers to this that are, I think, related. Perhaps primarily, I'm concerned with philosophy's treatment of climate science generally, and a highly general approach is (I think) the best way to express this concern. As I've said, while there has been a not-insignificant
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