Marshall Islands, going under.  Photo: Agence-France Press

Unafraid to make his findings public, US climate scientist Michael E. Mann has become a favourite target of climate change deniers.   For anyone interested in a livable future, he’s worth reading.

In the March 2014 issue of Scientific American he analyses the latest reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and counters predictably comforting distortions in the mainstream US media.

Michael Mann concludes that the situation is not without hope, but argues that hope is rapidly fading.  “Destructive change has already arrived in some regions.  In the Arctic, loss of sea ice and thawing permafrost are wreaking havoc on indigenous peoples and ecosystems.  In low-lying island nations, land and freshwater are disappearing because of rising sea levels and erosion.”

Read the full article here.

For an inside look at science and climate disruption, see Bold Scientists: dispatches from the battle for honest science, coming from Between the Lines, autumn 2014.