Fans pick 100 books like Science as a Contact Sport

By Stephen H. Schneider,

Here are 100 books that Science as a Contact Sport fans have personally recommended if you like Science as a Contact Sport. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Climate Change

Genevieve Guenther Author Of The Language of Climate Politics: Fossil-Fuel Propaganda and How to Fight It

From my list on understand climate change.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a former Shakespeare scholar who became increasingly concerned about the climate crisis after I had a son and started worrying about the world he would inherit after I died. I began to do research into climate communication, and I realized I could use my linguistic expertise to help craft messages for campaigners, policymakers, and enlightened corporations who want to drive climate action. As I learned more about the history of climate change communication, however, I realized that we couldnā€™t talk about the crisis effectively without knowing how to parry climate denial and fossil-fuel propaganda. So now I also research and write about climate disinformation, too. 

Genevieve's book list on understand climate change

Genevieve Guenther Why did Genevieve love this book?

This book is the classic study that you must read if youā€™re going to understand how fossil fuel interests set out to create climate denial. Taking their playbook from the tobacco lobby, these interests hired unscrupulous researchers to do work that inspired doubt about climate science.

This book documents a core truth: climate change isnā€™t a tragedy; itā€™s a crime. This book will introduce you to the criminals and show you their MO. 

By Naomi Oreskes, Erik M. Conway,

Why should I read it?

14 authors picked Merchants of Doubt as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The U.S. scientific community has long led the world in research on such areas as public health, environmental science, and issues affecting quality of life. Our scientists have produced landmark studies on the dangers of DDT, tobacco smoke, acid rain, and global warming. But at the same time, a small yet potent subset of this community leads the world in vehement denial of these dangers. Merchants of Doubt tells the story of how a loose-knit group of high-level scientists and scientific advisers, with deep connections in politics and industry, ran effective campaigns to mislead the public and deny well-established scientificā€¦


Book cover of A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming

Steve M. Easterbrook Author Of Computing the Climate: How We Know What We Know About Climate Change

From my list on how scientists discovered global warming threat.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a university professor with a deep interest in the systems that shape our lives. In my previous job, I led a research team at NASA, studying software safety for the space shuttle and International Space Station. But after my kids were born, I started thinking about how climate change would affect their future, and I decided to switch my research to investigate how the computer models used to predict future climate change are developed and tested and how much we can trust their predictions. That was more than twenty years ago. Iā€™ve been working on climate change problems ever since, and Iā€™m keen to share what Iā€™ve learned.

Steve's book list on how scientists discovered global warming threat

Steve M. Easterbrook Why did Steve love this book?

This was the first (and still the best) book I ever read on how scientists collect and use the data for forecasting the weather and predicting climate change. I am particularly impressed with its scopeā€“it starts with early attempts by 17th and 18th-century scientists to agree on how to measure things like wind and rainfall and ends with todayā€™s world of satellites and computer models.

The book really brings alive the work of a massive network of scientists around the world collecting and analyzing observations about planet Earth.

By Paul N. Edwards,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Vast Machine as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The science behind global warming, and its history: how scientists learned to understand the atmosphere, to measure it, to trace its past, and to model its future.

Global warming skeptics often fall back on the argument that the scientific case for global warming is all model predictions, nothing but simulation; they warn us that we need to wait for real data, ā€œsound science.ā€ In A Vast Machine Paul Edwards has news for these skeptics: without models, there are no data. Today, no collection of signals or observationsā€”even from satellites, which can ā€œseeā€ the whole planet with a single instrumentā€”becomes globalā€¦


Book cover of The Great Ocean Conveyor: Discovering the Trigger for Abrupt Climate Change

Steve M. Easterbrook Author Of Computing the Climate: How We Know What We Know About Climate Change

From my list on how scientists discovered global warming threat.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a university professor with a deep interest in the systems that shape our lives. In my previous job, I led a research team at NASA, studying software safety for the space shuttle and International Space Station. But after my kids were born, I started thinking about how climate change would affect their future, and I decided to switch my research to investigate how the computer models used to predict future climate change are developed and tested and how much we can trust their predictions. That was more than twenty years ago. Iā€™ve been working on climate change problems ever since, and Iā€™m keen to share what Iā€™ve learned.

Steve's book list on how scientists discovered global warming threat

Steve M. Easterbrook Why did Steve love this book?

This book reads like a scientific detective story, and I found it hard to put down. Wally Broecker is one of the world's leading oceanographers, and in this book, he gives us an inside account of an incredible scientific discovery: the global ā€˜superhighwayā€™ of ocean currents that transport water around the entire planet over the course of a thousand years.

While fascinating in its own right, the story is vital for understanding climate change, as the ocean operates as a planet-wide heat pump, and changes in the ocean circulation patterns bring dramatic and abrupt shifts in regional climates. 

By Wallace Broecker,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Great Ocean Conveyor as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Wally Broecker is one of the world's leading authorities on abrupt global climate change. More than two decades ago, he discovered the link between ocean circulation and climate change, in particular how shutdowns of the Great Ocean Conveyor--the vast network of currents that circulate water, heat, and nutrients around the globe--triggered past ice ages. Today, he is among the researchers exploring how our planet's climate system can abruptly "flip-flop" from one state to another, and who are weighing the implications for the future. In The Great Ocean Conveyor, Broecker introduces readers to the science of abrupt climate change while providingā€¦


Book cover of The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines

Steve M. Easterbrook Author Of Computing the Climate: How We Know What We Know About Climate Change

From my list on how scientists discovered global warming threat.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a university professor with a deep interest in the systems that shape our lives. In my previous job, I led a research team at NASA, studying software safety for the space shuttle and International Space Station. But after my kids were born, I started thinking about how climate change would affect their future, and I decided to switch my research to investigate how the computer models used to predict future climate change are developed and tested and how much we can trust their predictions. That was more than twenty years ago. Iā€™ve been working on climate change problems ever since, and Iā€™m keen to share what Iā€™ve learned.

Steve's book list on how scientists discovered global warming threat

Steve M. Easterbrook Why did Steve love this book?

This book pairs particularly well with Stephen Schneiderā€™s book, as it picks up where that book ends. When I met Michael and heard him talk about his experiences, I didnā€™t think this book would surprise me, but I still found it shocking. Michael is one of the worldā€™s leading climate scientists, and his work was fundamental in identifying the early signs of rising global temperatures in the 1980s and 1990s.

But in this book, itā€™s not the science that is shocking, but the behavior of politicians, lobbyists, and conspiracy theorists, who have turned their attacks on the science into personal and vindictive attacks on the scientists themselves. Michaelā€™s accounts of his battles against misinformation make for important reading for anyone who wants to understand why weā€™ve been so slow to act on climate change.

By Michael Mann,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The ongoing assault on climate science in the United States has never been more aggressive, more blatant, or more widely publicized than in the case of the Hockey Stick graph-a clear and compelling visual presentation of scientific data, put together by MichaelE. Mann and his colleagues, demonstrating that global temperatures have risen in conjunction with the increase in industrialization and the use of fossil fuels. Here was an easy-to-understand graph that, in a glance, posed a threat to major corporate energy interests and those who do their political bidding. The stakes were simply too high to ignore the Hockey Stick-andā€¦


Book cover of Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet

Bruce E. Johansen Author Of Nationalism vs. Nature: Warming and War

From my list on climate change and how to deal with it.

Why am I passionate about this?

I retired in 2019 after 38 years of teaching journalism,  environmental studies, and Native American Studies at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. About half of my employment time was set aside for writing and editing as part of several endowed professorships I held sequentially between 1990 and 2018. After 2000, climate change (global warming) became my lead focus because of the urgency of the issue and the fact that it affects everyone on Earth. As of 2023, I have written and published 56 books, with about one-third of them on global warming. I have had an intense interest in weather and climate all my life.

Bruce's book list on climate change and how to deal with it

Bruce E. Johansen Why did Bruce love this book?

Very probably the worldā€™s foremost organizer against global warming, Bill McKibben played a leading role in founding 350.org, a worldwide citizen-based, grass-roots solution for climate changes that already are well underway.

An eloquent writer and author of several other books that focus on humankindā€™s debt to nature, his role as an author on natural issues began in 1989 with The End of Nature. In October, 2009, McKibben took a leading role in organizing what CNN called ā€œThe most widespread day of political action in the planetā€™s history.ā€  

By Bill McKibben,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Eaarth as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Twenty years ago, with "The End of Nature", Bill McKibben offered one of the earliest warnings about global warming. Those warnings went mostly unheeded; now, he insists, we need to acknowledge that we've waited too long, and that massive change is not only unavoidable but already under way. Our old familiar globe is suddenly melting, drying, acidifying, flooding, and burning in ways that no human has ever seen. We've created, in very short order, a new planet, still recognizable but fundamentally different. We may as well call it Eaarth. That new planet is filled with new binds and traps. Aā€¦


Book cover of The Discovery of Global Warming

Jeffrey Bennett Author Of A Global Warming Primer: Pathway to a Post-Global Warming Future

From my list on the science, consequences, and solutions to global warming.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am an astronomer and educator (Ph.D. Astrophysics, University of Colorado), and Iā€™ve now been teaching about global warming for more than 40 years (in courses on astronomy, astrobiology, and mathematics). While itā€™s frustrating to see how little progress weā€™ve made in combatting the ongoing warming during this time, my background as an astronomer gives me a ā€œcosmic perspectiveā€ that reminds me that decades are not really so long, and that we still have time to act and to build a ā€œpost-global warming future.ā€ I hope my work can help inspire all of us to act while we still can for the benefit of all.

Jeffrey's book list on the science, consequences, and solutions to global warming

Jeffrey Bennett Why did Jeffrey love this book?

Iā€™ve known for a long time that scientific understanding of global warming has a long history, but I didnā€™t know very many of the details.

This book filled the gaps in my knowledge, and reminded me that while we still have a lot to learn, the basic science behind global warming has been known for more than a century. I also really appreciate the way this book describes some of the many efforts that have been undertaken to call attention to this issue ā€“ many dating back to decades before most people had ever heard of it.

By Spencer R. Weart,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Discovery of Global Warming as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The award-winning book is now revised and expanded.

In 2001 an international panel of distinguished climate scientists announced that the world was warming at a rate without precedent during at least the last ten millennia, and that warming was caused by the buildup of greenhouse gases from human activity. The story of how scientists reached that conclusion-by way of unexpected twists and turns-was the story Spencer Weart told in The Discovery of Global Warming. Now he brings his award-winning account up to date, revised throughout to reflect the latest science and with a new conclusion that shows how the scientificā€¦


Book cover of Censoring Science: Inside the Political Attack on Dr. James Hansen and the Truth of Global Warming

Bruce E. Johansen Author Of Nationalism vs. Nature: Warming and War

From my list on climate change and how to deal with it.

Why am I passionate about this?

I retired in 2019 after 38 years of teaching journalism,  environmental studies, and Native American Studies at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. About half of my employment time was set aside for writing and editing as part of several endowed professorships I held sequentially between 1990 and 2018. After 2000, climate change (global warming) became my lead focus because of the urgency of the issue and the fact that it affects everyone on Earth. As of 2023, I have written and published 56 books, with about one-third of them on global warming. I have had an intense interest in weather and climate all my life.

Bruce's book list on climate change and how to deal with it

Bruce E. Johansen Why did Bruce love this book?

This book dissects the arguments of global-warming opponents through the scientific lens of Jim Hansen, who at the time it was published, directed the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS).

Hansen and Bowen finds the climate deniersā€™ opinions dangerous for their inaccuracies and ignorance of how the geophysical world works. For interpreting geophysical reality to those who didnā€™t want to hear it (or stood to lose money if such thinking became part of policy), Hansen became a target to some, and a hero to others.

Itā€™s not a common event to see a renowned scientist carried away from a protest in handcuffs. Hansen got used to it. 

By Mark Bowen,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Censoring Science as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Documents the Bush administration's censorship of a leading climatologist whose work demonstrated the significant dangers of global warming, in an account that explains the scientific principles behind global warming while identifying ways to prevent an imminent environmental disaster.


Book cover of Polar Bear, Why Is Your World Melting?

Julie Dunlap Author Of I Begin with Spring: The Life and Seasons of Henry David Thoreau

From my list on children's books about the climate crisis that wonā€™t scare their socks off.

Why am I passionate about this?

As a biology professor, I communicate frankly with adults about climate change, trusting them to comprehend the accelerating crisis. As a mom of Millennials, I channeled worries about their coping with wildfires, droughts, and extinctions into editing an anthology of young adultsā€™ climate essays. Grandchildren posed a new worry: how should climate realities be introduced to the newest generation? My attempt at that task is a biography of Thoreau, focusing on his 1850s nature observations that ecologists now use to assess 21st-century climate shifts. Luckily, other childrenā€™s book writers also offer stories, memoirs, and other approaches to inform without alarming young readers; the best inspire determination to craft a better future.

Julie's book list on children's books about the climate crisis that wonā€™t scare their socks off

Julie Dunlap Why did Julie love this book?

Facts matter to kids, of course, and library shelves groan with attempts to distill climate causes and effects down to child-sized volumes. For middle graders, visual encyclopedia-style nonfiction can work well, covering broad ranges of information from atmospheric chemistry to statistics on carbon emissions sources in photo-rich chunks. 

But Iā€™ve seen younger readers wince at graphic pictures of bleached coral or violent wildfires. Pen and acrylic drawings soften this bookā€™s approach, supporting student learning by avoiding traumatic imagery. The polar bear theme draws readers in yet gradually widens to encompass people and places affected near home.

My special kudos for spreads that explain scientific concepts, like the greenhouse effect, with accurate prose and illustrations abounding with life. 

By Robert E. Wells,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Polar Bear, Why Is Your World Melting? as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In the Arctic, the summer ice is melting, making it hard for polar bears and their cubs to survive. Why is the world getting warmer? The heat of the sun is trapped by the "greenhouse" gases that surround Earthā€•carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and water vapor. If there is just the right amount of these trapped gases, the air is warm enough for plants, animals, and people to thrive. But now there is too much greenhouse gas, especially carbon dioxide. Polar bears, and all of us, are in trouble. Robert E. Wells shows why so much carbon dioxide is goingā€¦


Book cover of The Long Thaw: How Humans Are Changing the Next 100,000 Years of Earth's Climate

Jorge Daniel Taillant Author Of Meltdown: The Earth Without Glaciers

From my list on science from a cryo activist.

Why am I passionate about this?

Jorge Daniel Taillant is a cryoactivist, a term he coined to describe someone that works to protect the cryosphere, ie. the Earthā€™s frozen environment. Founder of a globally prized non-profit protecting human rights and promoting environmental justice he helped get the worldā€™s first glacier law passed in South America. He now devotes 100% of his time to tackling climate change in an emergency effort to slow global warming ā€¦ and to protect glaciers.

Jorge's book list on science from a cryo activist

Jorge Daniel Taillant Why did Jorge love this book?

As a climate activist and lover of glaciers and glaciation, I took a special interest in David Archerā€™s book, The Long Thaw. Archer takes us in and out of ice ages, explaining with surprisingly understandable prose just how ice ages are formed, their predictable cycles, why theyā€™re important, and how with current climate change trends and impacts, we just may have missed the onramp to the next one. That could put us into a Hothouse Earth scenario not seen since the times of the dinosaurs. Archer masterfully brings science to the layperson. If we think that the year 2100 is a marker in the sand for climate change, think again. Archer reveals that the chilling (or heating) reality of climate change just might be forever. 

By David Archer,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Long Thaw as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The human impact on Earth's climate is often treated as a hundred-year issue lasting as far into the future as 2100, the year in which most climate projections cease. In The Long Thaw, David Archer, one of the world's leading climatologists, reveals the hard truth that these changes in climate will be "locked in," essentially forever. If you think that global warming means slightly hotter weather and a modest rise in sea levels that will persist only so long as fossil fuels hold out (or until we decide to stop burning them), think again. In The Long Thaw, David Archerā€¦


Book cover of Our Final Warning: Six Degrees of Climate Emergency

Michael J. Albert Author Of Navigating the Polycrisis: Mapping the Futures of Capitalism and the Earth

From my list on books that help us make sense of the future.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a lecturer in Global Environmental Politics at the University of Edinburgh. My work is driven by the conviction that we need more thorough and realistic maps of possible futures in an increasingly turbulent and uncertain world. Ever since learning about the intersections between climate, energy, and economic crises, I have been fascinated by the question of how our future will unfold and how we might create more just and liveable futures from the wreckage of the present world. And I have been driven to bring down artificial disciplinary divides in order to integrate knowledge across the sciences and humanities in ways that can illuminate the possible pathways ahead. 

Michael's book list on books that help us make sense of the future

Michael J. Albert Why did Michael love this book?

As one can tell from the title, this is not a book for the faint-hearted. But it is a masterful and nuanced synthesis of climate and earth system science that details what is likely to happen if the climate crisis continues unabated.

I loved the way it shows us in a systematic, step-by-step fashion how each additional degree of planetary heating will disrupt our world and steadily push us towards the brink. And it does so in a way that is sensitive to geographical variation and uneven vulnerabilities between the global north and south. This is an essential guide to an over-heating world and a warning of what is to come if we fail to rapidly bring down emissions.  

By Mark Lynas,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Our Final Warning as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This book must not be ignored. It really is our final warning.

Mark Lynas delivers a vital account of the future of our earth, and our civilisation, if current rates of global warming persist. And it's only looking worse.

We are living in a climate emergency. But how much worse could it get? Will civilisation collapse? Are we already past the point of no return? What kind of future can our children expect? Rigorously cataloguing the very latest climate science, Mark Lynas explores the course we have set for Earth over the next century and beyond. Degree by terrifying degree,ā€¦


Book cover of Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Climate Change
Book cover of A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming
Book cover of The Great Ocean Conveyor: Discovering the Trigger for Abrupt Climate Change

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Interested in climate change, global warming, and climate fiction?

Climate Change 224 books
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