ABSTRACT
A constellation of ontological and epistemological demands is putting the “objective knowledge” of the life sciences through its paces. Thus, a heterogeneous climate realism is emerging alongside the ideology of climate change skepticism. This chapter links climate realism to acts of representation that express ecological perspective, political scenes, and aesthetic atmosphere. It shows how these are geared toward a specific climate realism. The four postures are a starting point which give contour to climate realism and its possibilities: a strange stillness, psychogenic spasm, dancity, and reflexive carapace. Climate crisis has no focal cause, but rather is the cumulative effect of a slow and insidious progression of industrial history which has already initiated positive feedback loops in global environment patterns. The discourse of climate thus shares with ecology the entangled domain of scientific inquiry, aesthetic sensibility, and political governance.
