{"product_id":"climate-by-proxy-melissa-charenko-9780226844107","title":"Climate by Proxy: A History of Scientific Reconstructions of the Past and Future","description":"\u003cb\u003eHow twentieth-century scientists used proxies to understand historic climates, shaping scientific analyses of the past and the future.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Unlike our daily reckoning with the weather, our experience of climate must be mediated through tools that record the ebb and flow of climate over millions of years, such as computer models, instruments like thermometers, and organic and inorganic remains. \u003ci\u003eClimate by Proxy\u003c\/i\u003e by Melissa Charenko explores how scientists read the record of past climates and how their readings have engendered particular understandings of climate. Charenko focuses on the twentieth century, a period when scientists in Europe and North America began to believe that climate had a dynamic history worth studying. Scientists in this period developed several techniques to infer past climate from fossil pollen, tree rings, pieces of vegetation, and other organic remains imprinted upon by former climates. \u003ci\u003eClimate by Proxy\u003c\/i\u003e examines how these techniques helped shape notions of climate itself. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Charenko also shows how these varied interpretations of climate played an outsized role in explanations of human history and destiny. Geologists, botanists, ecologists, and other scientists interested in climate over long timescales routinely discussed how climate influenced plants, animals, and, notably, people. By following the scientists who reconstructed climate using the natural archives, \u003ci\u003eClimate by Proxy\u003c\/i\u003e demonstrates how material objects worked with scientists' perceptions of human groups to compel, constrain, and reinforce their understandings of climate, history, and the future.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Melissa Charenko\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0226844102\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780226844107\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e University of Chicago Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 11\/05\/2025\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 256\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback","brand":"Melissa Charenko","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":46927736865023,"sku":"9780226844107","price":35.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_e353fc65-f103-4128-b26a-2b2f5ad8f9cc.jpg?v=1749372806","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/climate-by-proxy-melissa-charenko-9780226844107","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}