Human intuition often does not lead to thoughtful long-term decision-making (1). In partial remedy to this, a long history of storytelling conveys messages about what is worth remembering, worth doing, or best avoided. Stories also help to shape visions of what is possible and desirable (2). Scientific models are used in the same way. For example, the modeling study by Cheung et al. (3) on page 1591 of this issue indicates that making the effort to keep global temperature increases to 1.5°C would minimize impacts on marine food security and resilience. The work is an important addition to the discussion of the costs and benefits of keeping the average global temperature rise to less than 2°C.
Author: Elizabeth A. Fulton