Why our brains are bad at climate change | Nik Sawe

From Our Neurons to Yours

Contenuto fornito da Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford University, Nicholas Weiler, Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford University, and Nicholas Weiler. Tutti i contenuti dei podcast, inclusi episodi, grafica e descrizioni dei podcast, vengono caricati e forniti direttamente da Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford University, Nicholas Weiler, Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford University, and Nicholas Weiler o dal partner della piattaforma podcast. Se ritieni che qualcuno stia utilizzando la tua opera protetta da copyright senza la tua autorizzazione, puoi seguire la procedura descritta qui https://it.player.fm/legal.

6M ago 23:42

MP3•Pagina principale dell'episodio

This week on From Our Neurons to Yours, we're talking about the neuroscience of climate change with neuroeconomist Nik Sawe.

If you follow the science or the news, you know how big of a risk climate change is. Storms, coastal flooding, heat waves, extinctions, mass migration — the list goes on.
But — as you can probably also appreciate — it’s really hard to properly perceive that risk. It’s much easier to focus on today’s emergency, this week’s looming deadline, this quarter’s economic forecast — where the risks are objectively much smaller, but feel more pressing.
This is where neuroscience comes in: Why are our brains so bad at perceiving this existential, long-term risk to our society and our planet? And are there ways we could work with our brains' limitations to improve our decision-making around environmental issues and the future more broadly?
To answer this question, we spoke with Nik Sawe, a neuro-economist who uses brain imaging to study environmental decision making in the lab of Brian Knutson in the Stanford Department of Psychology. Nik is also a policy analyst at the think tank Energy Innovation, where he is working on policy avenues to reduce carbon emissions in the industrial sector.
References

Episode Credits

This episode was produced by Michael Osborne at 14th Street Studios, with production assistance by Morgan Honaker. Our logo is by Aimee Garza. The show is hosted by Nicholas Weiler at Stanford's Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute and the Knight Initiative for Brain Resilience.
Send us a text!

Thanks for listening! If you're enjoying our show, please take a moment to give us a review on your podcast app of choice and share this episode with your friends. That's how we grow as a show and bring the stories of the frontiers of neuroscience to a wider audience.
Learn more about the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute at Stanford and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

45 episodi

#Science #Fitness #Biology #Mental Health #Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute, Nicholas Weiler #Nicholas Weiler #Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute #Neuroscience #Brain #Mindfulness #Engineering #Medicine #Psychiatry #Neurology #Research #Psychology