Someone suggested that Suss Müsik repost our contributions to the weekly Disquiet Junto projects, because they enjoy reading the explanations of the tracks. While you’re reading the original post, make sure you check out the other contributors’ works as well.
Suss Müsik of late has been studying the art of technoscientific semiotics. Don’t be too impressed. Most of the concepts befuddle and confuse Suss Müsik’s tiny brain.
According to a paper written by Zachary Horton, humans make sense of our environment by reducing everything to a transcribable surface. The sky, the land, the ocean — these vast entities represent forms of media that must be collapsed, in order to achieve comprehension of our place within the greater Anthropocene.
Freezing and thawing play a large part in our understanding of climate change. According to IPCC lead author and climate scientist Richard A. Betts, CO2 levels in the Earth’s atmosphere are currently 50% higher than pre-industrial levels. Barring massive carbon removal over the coming decades, the melting of sea ice and rise in reflective temperatures will result in a global increase of four degrees Celsius (and possibly 10 to 15 degrees at the poles).
Grim stuff, indeed. Professor Betts takes great care, however, to emphasize that different models present nuances of uncertainty. The core message is that everything is getting warmer; how quickly that is happening—and what actions we need take for the short-term and extended future—are the variables to be reconciled.
For this piece, Suss Müsik “thawed” two synth washes that had been “frozen” in time since 2006. These were broken into rhythmic shards using grain synthesis, metaphorically representing the splitting of sea ice into melting and floating fragments. The vocal is a refactored recording of Professor Betts’ 2009 speech for the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, hosted by Oxford University Centre for the Environment.
The use of Professor Betts’ speech is covered under a Creative Commons license and is “free for reuse, remixing and redistribution in education worldwide.” The use of this material is intended to promote broader interest in learning more about the scientific evidence supporting our planet’s climatological transformation.