The intergenerational challenge of climate monitoring
We have few human institutions with the requisite longevity |
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How does one sustain open-ended measurements and model scrutiny when the result will be of greatest interest to future generations? Existing infrastructure is grossly inadequate to that end.
One needs a multi-decadal, century, open-ended, view. A few organizations persist for hundreds to order 1000 years, although the true continuity of any of them is highly debatable:
• Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches, 1000+ years;
• European Universities, 900+ years;
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US universities, hundreds of years;
• A handful of banks, 200 years maximum;
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The Hudson’s Bay Company, 200 years.
The churches all had schisms, and near-collapse. The ancient universities similarly underwent interregna and were generally founded for now-suppressed religious purposes.
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The Endowed Observation
