Introduction to Climate Change

This course, for undergraduate students, has two major parts:

  1. The basic scientific principles of the earth’s climate.

  2. Human dimensions of climate change.

Scientific Principles of Climate Change:

For the first half of the semester, we will focus on the scientific principles of climate and natural climate change in earth???s past. This will be mathematical, using basic algebra. We do not use calculus or other advanced math in this class, but you should be comfortable with simple algebraic equations. We will then look at climate change in the last two centuries and what might happen over the next several centuries. We will emphasize examining the scientific evidence to understand what it can and cannot tell us.

Human Dimensions of Climate Change

For the second half of the semester, we will focus on the ways that climate change is likely to affect people???s lives over the rest of this century and what technological responses are being considered to reduce harmful impacts.


Course web site

Syllabus (PDF)


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