Session 4: Tuesday, 10 January 2023, 1:30-3:00 PM MT

Colorado Convention Center - Mile High Ballroom 2B/3B

The U.S. policy process struggles in the face of large and rapid global changes that are being driven by technological advancement, societal disruption, and wide-spread environmental degradation. People access and trust incompatible sources of information which leads to conflicting certitude of the basic facts that underlie key societal issues. This Presidential session will convene leaders from the AMS community and beyond to explore how scientists, and the AMS community in particular, might contribute to evidence-informed decision-making and a more highly-functional democratic society. 

The potential for scientists to contribute to evidence-informed decision-making might involve, for example: 1) providing evidence itself (e.g., observations and science); 2) equipping the public to demand the appropriate use of evidence in the policy process (i.e., a public that understands the basics of the scientific process and the value of scientific evidence in decision-making); 3) helping to ensure the media to accurately informs the public; 4) contributing to a policy process that rewards and encourages good-faith efforts to serve public interest and that discourages the misuse or disregard of information; and 5) humility to understand the limits of science in decision-making (e.g., evidence can inform value-laden decisions but cannot resolve them).

Session C0-Chair: Co-chairs: Paul Higgins, AMS, Washington, DC  [email protected]; Elisabeth Cohen, TTU/COMET, Denver, CO, [email protected]; Pamitha Weerasinghe, Former Democratic Professional Staff, U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, Erie, CO, [email protected]

Panelists: Deserai Anderson Crow, PhD, Department of Environmental Studies, University of Colorado, Denver, CO; Seth Borenstein, Associated Press, Washington, DC; Amy Clement, PhD, Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric, and Earth Science, University of Miami, Miami, FL; Grecthen Goldman, PhD, Office of Science and Technology Policy,Executive Office of the President, Washington DC; Aaron Salzberg, PhD, Director, The Water Institute, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC; Ana Unruh-Cohen, PhD, Staff Director, US House Select Committee on the Climate Crisis (2019-2022), Washington, DC