Climate Change and Sustainability Science - Tim O´Riordan

7 Outubro 2022, 14:00 • João Guerra

• The role of climate change in creating tipping points which chaotically disturb the normally stabilizing natural processes of the Earth into wholly unexpected outcomes.

• The implications of combinations of tipping points for overwhelming human capacities and actions for reaching progressive means of achieving sustainability.

• The relationships between science and politics in creating the barriers to achieving sustainability science.

• The role of sustainability science in higher education and its purpose in this PhD course and in your research.

• Implications for your research when incorporating sustainability science into your work.

The politics of sustainability transition

30 Setembro 2022, 18:00 • João Guerra

Assessing Net Zero Plans in the Context of Sustainability Principles

23 Setembro 2022, 14:00 • João Guerra

Assessing Net Zero Plans (NZPs) in the Context of Sustainability Principles 

Introduction  COP 26, NDCs and NZPs :

Part 1. Dilemmas for Multi-Sector Governance

Part 2 .The Overarching Significance of Time

Part 3. Climate Justice

The 26th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change is planned to take place in Glasgow, UK between 1 & 12 Nov 2021, will be a critical event for reaching the global commitment to limit global temperatures rise to below 2 ⁰C,  a colossal test for governance, multi-sector coordination, and individual citizen engagement, COP 26 should provide for nations to lay out their national strategies to achieve net zero GHG emissions in two stages:

• In 2030 the UN will commit to its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to lead to a permanent human and ecological right to productive harmony with the Earth. 

• Every country will (should) declare its updated nationally determined contribution (NDC) that leads to net-zero GHG emissions by 2050.

Methods for empathetic interviewing in social Sciences

17 Setembro 2022, 11:00 • João Guerra

The scientific method must satisfy four key characteristics: 

• Logical:  Scientific inferences must be based on logical principles of reasoning: organized searching for realistic solutions to a problem 

• Confirmable:  Inferences derived must match with identifiable and provable  observed evidence. 

• Repeatable: Other scientists should be able independently to replicate or repeat a similar methodological approach and obtain similar, if not identical, results. 

• Scrutinizable:  The procedures used and the inferences derived must be acceptable to critical scrutiny (peer review) by other scientists and knowledgeable people. 

• Scope for novelty and unexpectedness.

Action research assumes that complex social phenomena are best understood by intervening or disturbing those engaged phenomena and observing the effects of those actions.  Here the researcher is usually an observer or an advisor or an organisational member embedded within a particular set of social relationships seeking a common or cooperative response to a real dilemma facing the social group being studied. The researcher’s choice of actions must be based on theory, which should explain why and how such actions may cause the sought after change.  The researcher observes the results of actions, modifying them as necessary, while simultaneously learning from the action and generating new theoretical insights about the target problem, the dynamics of the social group, or the effects of interventions.