Business Daily Folgen

What is our ethical duty to eliminate carbon emissions? Was Swedish teen activist Greta Thunberg right to express such anger at the UN Climate Action Summit in New York this week?Justin Rowlatt asks leading moral philosopher Peter Singer, professor of bioethics at Princeton University, whether someone driving a petrol- fuelled car can really be held responsible for increasing the risk of drought in Africa. And why should we give up taking long-haul flights, if the tiny amount of carbon emissions that saves will make practically no difference in the grand scheme of things?Plus climatologist Emily Shuckburgh explains why she is not despondent about climate change - despite seeing the effects first-hand on polar research trips - and how a new institute she is heading at Cambridge University is generating a lot of excitement among academics.Producer: Laurence Knight(Picture: Dead cow in drought-struck Kenya; Credit: muendo/Getty Images)

Just how bad will it get if the world fails to get to grips with climate change?On day two of the UN Climate Action Summit in New York, Justin Rowlatt speaks to David Wallace-Wells, author of the apocalyptic book Uninhabitable Earth, which lays out the dire predictions of climatologists for the coming decades if humanity continues to put ever more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere unabated.Yet despite the potentially terrifying outlook, it remains very difficult to motivate politicians and the public to take meaningful action to cut emissions. Why is that, and how might that change? Kelly Fielding is a social psychologist at the University of Queensland in Australia, and has some of the answers.Producer: Laurence Knight(Picture: Dead bumblebee from the cover of Uninhabitable Earth by David Wallace-Wells; Credit: FXseydlbast/Getty Images)

The Swedish teenage activist Greta Thunberg explains how she aims to get the world's governments gathered for the UN Climate Action Summit in New York to take meaningful action on global warming.Justin Rowlatt speaks to her about her ambitions for her transatlantic trip, and whether one person can really make that much of a difference. In order for her mission to succeed, it will mean rebuilding the global economy from the ground up, including the phasing out of most of the oil and gas industry. John Hofmeister, the former president of Shell's US subsidiary, claims the big oil companies are ready and willing to do their part, if the politicians will only give them the green light.Producer: Laurence Knight(Picture: Greta Thunberg testifies at the US Congress in Washington DC; Credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images)