From Smithsonian Magazine

EVENT: “Paleoclimate: Digging into the Past to Chart our Future” streaming live tonight on our Facebook page. The discussion begins at 6:45 PM EST. (not live now, but will be at 6:45PM EST)

In this special program, NASA Goddard director and earth scientist Gavin Schmidt and Penn State climate scientist Richard Alley discuss what makes our paleoclimate models so robust—and how they can be used to confidently predict the future.

As human activities drive Earth’s rapidly changing climate, there is an urgent need to build better models that help us predict and prepare for our future. These models need robust data that stretch far back in time. Enter: the fossil record—a storehouse of climate evidence that paleontologists are getting better and better at deciphering. Join us for an evening with two renowned researchers—Richard Alley, Evan Pugh Professor of Geosciences and an Associate of the Earth and Environmental Systems Institute at Penn State, and Gavin Schmidt, Director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies—as they talk about their exciting work weaving together paleoclimate data and computer models to understand the future. Following their talks, Rachel Gross, a science editor at Smithsonian.com, will moderate a discussion and audience Q&A.

This program is part of the National Museum of Natural History’s Earth’s Temperature History Symposium* on March 29-31, 2018.