Event Host: The Ohio State University Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology; and Evolution and Ecology Graduate Students
Short Description: Harvard Senior Research Fellow Aaron M. Ellison discusses a rapid change, or “tipping point,“ in social, political or environmental conditions that can propel a system’s current state into a new state, a.k.a., a “regime shift.”
Harvard Senior Research Fellow Aaron M. Ellison discusses a rapid change, or "tipping point," in social, political or environmental conditions that can propel a system’s current state into a new state, a.k.a., a "regime shift."
Forecasting tipping points and forestalling or accelerating regime shifts are capturing scientists’ attention and not just because they present interesting mathematical and statistical challenges. These issues have become of urgent concern to a wide range of scientists and non-scientists alike, including world leaders, and policy and decision-makers.
But definitions and identification of tipping points and regime shifts presume a number of implicit assumptions about "how the world works." Ellison explains that more nuanced descriptions and understanding of ever-present changes in our socio-cultural-political-technological environment are necessary and require uncovering these hidden assumptions.
Ellison is Senior Research Fellow in Ecology at the Harvard Forest, a 1500-hectare outdoor classroom and laboratory for ecological research. He studies food web dynamics and community ecology of wetlands and forests, evolutionary ecology of carnivorous plants and response of plants and ants to global climate change.
Free Event