Climate Engineering and the Playing God Critique Laura M. Hartman* C limate engineering, also known as geoengineering, involves deliberate, large-scale manipulation of the earth’s atmosphere to counteract some of the effects of global climate change. The most extreme options for climate engineering are the most controversial, from seeding the ocean with iron on a massive scale in order to stimulate phytoplankton blooms that would absorb excess carbon to brightening the clouds for maximum reflectivity by spray- ing sulfate aerosols, mimicking the globe-cooling effect of a massive volcano (with the proviso that one must repeat the procedure regularly in order to maintain the effects). Continued warming trends and ever more dire modeling by climate sci- entists have in recent years shifted geoengineering from a taboo to a hotly debated topic for activists, policymakers, and scholars at both the national and interna- tional level. Geoengineering is no longer something out of science fiction, but has become a part of the international political wrangling surrounding global solu- tions to climate change. Critics point out that there are many good reasons not to engage in such climate engineering.  For starters, it raises a host of practical and political questions: Who would govern it? Who would pay for it? What happens if it has unintended effects? Who is to blame if those effects are harmful? Apart from these very real practical and political concerns, climate engineering also invites other types of critique. As philosopher Dale Jamieson points out, “The use of this term [geoengineering] alerts us to the fact that a proposed intervention in the climate system is one that, in the opinion of the speaker, requires a height- ened level of scrutiny.”  In other words, climate engineering interventions are *I wish to thank the audience members at the Geoengineering II session of the Association for Environmental Studies and Sciences, Washington, D.C., June , , for their helpful feedback. Also, special thanks to the National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Institute, “Extending the Land Ethic: Current Humanities Voices and Sustainability,” held at Northern Arizona University, June  to July , , which facilitated the development of this article. Ethics & International Affairs, , no.  (), pp. –. ©  Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs doi:./S 313 https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0892679417000223 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 3.82.53.229, on 05 Oct 2021 at 16:30:08, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at