Our Affair with El Nino: How We Transformed an Enchanting Peruvian Current into a Global Climate Hazard

By S. George Philander

Book Overview

Until 1997, few people had heard of the seasonal current that Peruvians nicknamed El Ni?o. But when meteorologists linked it to devastating floods in California, severe droughts in Indonesia, and strange weather everywhere, its name became entrenched in the common parlance faster than a typhoon making landfall. Bumper stickers appeared bearing the phrase "Don't blame me; blame El Ni?o." Stockbrokers muttered "El Ni?o" when the market became erratic.

What's behind this fascinating natural phenomenon, and how did our perceptions of it change? In this captivating book, renowned oceanographer George Philander engages readers in lucid and stimulating discussions of the scientific, political, economic and cultural developments that shaped our perceptions of this force of nature.

The book begins by outlining the history of El Ni?o, an innocuous current that appears off the coast of Peru around Christmastime--its name refers to the Child Jesus--and originally was welcomed as a blessing. It goes on to explore how our perceptions of El Ni?o were transformed, not because the phenomenon changed, but because we did. Philander argues persuasively that familiarity with the different facets of our affair with El Ni?o--our wealth of experience in dealing with natural hazards such as severe storms and prolonged droughts--can help us cope with an urgent and controversial environmental problem of our own making--global warming.

Intellectually invigorating and a joy to read, Our Affair with El Ni?o is an important contribution to the debate about the relationship between scientific knowledge and public affairs.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B007CKZKD8
• ISBN13: 9780691126227
• Release Date: May 2006
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.0" x 8.8"

Customer Reviews

The romance of wind and wave - and us

This beautifully conceived and rendered account of global weather systems is the best currently available. Philander is able to mix scientific and artistic elements with fluid elegance. He observes that recent intense El Nino events have led to a new awareness on this phenomenon. The focus, however, is both too limited and has been distorted by media. People have been led to believe that the sudden warming of waters off the Peruvian coast is an abnormal phenomenon. He points out that the El Nino and its obverse, La Nina are manifestations of a long-term oscillatory pattern. Neither are "deviations" from some perceived norm. In explaining the Southern Oscillation of shifting warm and cool waters in the Eastern Pacific, Philander turns to various art expressions. Weather predicting is often the butt of jocularity - we remember incorrect forecasts readily, blithely ignoring the recent advances in accuracy. He recognises this tendency, but reminds us that our growing population, illogical placement of urban centres and vested economic need to have good science applied to anticipating weather trends and events. Weather prediction, rarely, if ever, considered a "hard science" has made tremendous strides. The tricks nature can play on us means that we must extend our thinking beyond solid mathematics. We must utilise the techniques of the painter, the poet and even the musician in considering weather and climate. Forecasting the weather had flimsy beginnings. A thoughtful observer in one location might make accurate records. If nobody in neighbouring regions matched the work, it proved of little worth. The telegraph immeasurably added to the creation of communication links, as did the reports of ship captains bringing observations from long voyages. It was the integration of these bits of information through the intuitive methods of music or art that began to force new, expanded views of weather conditions. The local scene was too limited to provide a complete picture. Philander uses a musical metaphor to compare the weather in the British Isles with the California coast - a high-pitched violin or flute as contrasted with the notes of a cello or bassoon. Conditions in other areas, he says, push aside single instruments, stating "only a huge symphony orchestra can do justice to the music of this planet". Predictability, common in most "hard" sciences, must give way to the many forces that contribute to our weather. From the deep, cold currents moving at the sea bottom to the cycles of heat exchange in the atmosphere, subtle change can evoke monstrous events. Such occurrences are more common along our inhabited coastal areas, but may reach far inland. A long-standing sequence of disastrous famines in India led to one of the first investigations of just how the monsoon was generated. Although the first attempts to understand it failed, it led to better assessments of the roots of weather patterns. Many of these, including the mon