Alternative Rock Musicians and Climate Change Scientists Matt Palmer and Niall Robinson Bring Science to the Music Stage
Alternative Rock musicians and climate change scientists bring science to the Alternative Rock stage. Vocalist/Guitarist Matt Palmer and drummer Niall Robinson compose music exploring causality of sea-level rise, political propaganda, and human relationships. They are the Matt Palmer Band.
Transcript
Your positive, positive stories are everywhere.
Catherine:People and their positive action inspire positive achievements.
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Catherine:Hello, this is Catherine host of your positive imprint.
Catherine:The variety show featuring people all over the world whose positive actions
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Catherine:Your positive imprint.
Catherine:What's your PI.
Catherine:Glastonbury festival was held over in the United Kingdom.
Catherine:Just over this past weekend.
Catherine:There is a new laboratory stage that brought science to life.
Catherine:Climate change was among the topics that festival goers learned about through
Catherine:demonstrations, games and of course music, including music from the Matt Palmer band.
Catherine:Today's guests are members of the Matt Palmer band in England.
Catherine:Vocalist and guitarist Matt Palmer joins the show as well
Catherine:as drummer Niall Robinson.
Catherine:What's pretty awesome and very rad is that we're not going to
Catherine:talk just about music, but we're also going to talk about science.
Catherine:Matt is a climate scientist with a mega responsibility as lead author on the
Catherine:planet's most recently Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change known as IPCC.
Catherine:His role as a climate scientist is essential as the world moves
Catherine:forward with policies and changes.
Catherine:And Niall's background is in research and development where
Catherine:I believe algorithms, data and mathematics are part of his background
Catherine:as he works on innovative ways to turn data information, prototypes and models.
Catherine:Well, both Niall and Matt have lots to share regarding their music,
Catherine:work, their positive imprints.
Catherine:And I'm thrilled to have them both and to learn more about what they're
Catherine:doing, because I'm quite interested in their science and their research.
Catherine:Matt, Niall, welcome to your positive imprint.
Catherine:It's so good to have you here.
Matt Palmer:Thanks yourself.
Matt Palmer:Yeah, it's great to be here.
Catherine:well awesome.
Catherine:So I, found you actually through your music, so , and I'm always searching
Catherine:for, for different bands around the world and you two just happen to pop
Catherine:up because you're using music to help teach about science and what you do.
Catherine:So yay.
Niall:We we've been playing together for like, we've been
Niall:playing together for like 10 years.
Niall:I think Matt haven't we.
Matt Palmer:Be something like that.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:I was, I was thinking about it the other day and I was thinking,
Matt Palmer:wow, it has been quite a long time.
Niall:I was just gonna say we met, um, back when I worked in the
Niall:Hadley center, in the met office.
Niall:So the met office is a climate research Institute where Matt
Niall:works and I used to work.
Niall:And so Matt just walked over to my desk one day and said that you were looking for
Niall:a drummer and, uh, the rest is history..
Niall:Right.
Niall:Matt.
Niall:We just been jamming ever since in various bands.
Catherine:Oh my gosh.
Catherine:So how did you know he played the drums?
Catherine:Did he sit there and beat on his desk
Matt Palmer:and him yeah, he was always tapping out rhythm.
Matt Palmer:I just thought, oh, this guy must be a drummer.
Matt Palmer:No, I think, um, I think I heard it there's, there's actually a remarkable
Matt Palmer:number of musicians I've found in, particularly the MET office.
Matt Palmer:There seems to be a lot, I dunno how come scientists in general,
Matt Palmer:but, There seems to be a few.
Matt Palmer:I think he was playing in a band with another group at the MET office at the
Matt Palmer:time, and I just kind of heard, heard about this and uh so I just, and I needed
Matt Palmer:a drummer at the time and it's always, I mean, it's really fun actually, if
Matt Palmer:you've got more than one shared interest, you know, so it is, um, you know, makes
Matt Palmer:for lots of interesting conversations, uh, in music and, and science.
Niall:Being in a, band's a really good way to get to know people really
Niall:well really quickly, you know, you got to develop a lot of, kind of
Niall:trust and, uh, that sort of thing.
Niall:Don't
Matt Palmer:you?
Catherine:Oh, that's interesting.
Catherine:And you, you have a third member who's not here with us
Catherine:today, but your band was formed.
Catherine:So what was your intent when you began forming the band?
Matt Palmer:Um, so I guess, from my point of view, I had been in
Matt Palmer:bands and played music for a long time, but I'd never really, uh,
Matt Palmer:taken that sort of leap of faith to do something kind of myself, where I
Matt Palmer:was more of a central person in it.
Matt Palmer:I'd always been a guitar player, an occasional singer.
Matt Palmer:But, I guess I just had a collection of songs and, um, I felt it was the right
Matt Palmer:time to try to record something myself.
Matt Palmer:So I needed to assemble some people.
Matt Palmer:And I was very lucky to find, Niall, I didn't realize what a
Matt Palmer:great kind of, uh, uh, songwriting drummer he would turn out to be.
Matt Palmer:Cuz you don't know until you try these things.
Matt Palmer:, Alex was another friend.
Matt Palmer:I mean, I, I know lots of musicians, but I couldn't have, hoped for a
Matt Palmer:better group of people to work on it.
Matt Palmer:It was really fun.
Matt Palmer:Thanks,
Niall:Matt.
Niall:I'm just lucky to have somebody write great songs with play
Niall:along with, you know, like, uh, always been the drummer in a band
Niall:I'm used to kind of sitting in the back, just going along with, with whatever.
Niall:So you never know whether you're gonna be playing with somebody
Niall:who writes good songs or not.
Niall:It's a pleasure to, to play on songs that are great and
Niall:kinda mean something as well.
Catherine:Well, and they do mean something and your titles are
Catherine:actually quite interesting and we'll, we'll get to the titles.
Catherine:When you are writing music, you obviously have a message and it's
Catherine:a pretty profound, powerful message within your, your title itself.
Catherine:Who writes most of the music or is it a shared combination?
Matt Palmer:It's ultimately a shared combination in my view, but, I, I tend to
Matt Palmer:start with the initial idea if you like.
Matt Palmer:And, I write the lyrics, but I think, uh, Niall in particular has a
Matt Palmer:big role in shaping how it turns out.
Matt Palmer:I think the rhythm to everything is such an important bit.
Matt Palmer:It's probably the most fundamental part of any piece of music., yeah,
Matt Palmer:he made loads of great suggestions during the songwriting process.
Matt Palmer:We had a really fun, I think we had three sessions in the rehearsal studio,
Matt Palmer:, where we kind of shaped the songs.
Niall:Yeah, Matt's been very, yeah, Matt's been very modest just
Niall:for the avoidance of any doubt.
Niall:This is the Matt Palmer band, because these are Matt's songs, but yeah,
Niall:I've really enjoyed being in the studio with Matt and talking about
Niall:the production and the arrangement and, and that sort of thing.
Niall:But yeah, these are definitely Matt Palmer creations.
Niall:I'm sure.
Catherine:I have.
Catherine:A favorite just because, well, the title is, is pretty awesome.
Catherine:Well, they're all awesome titles, but one of them, I love the music
Catherine:and the words and it's, it kind of brings to me a very reflective mood
Catherine:and that's "chasing butterflies".
Catherine:I find that kind of a very reflective, song.
Niall:Correct me if I'm wrong Matt, but is "Chasing Butterflies", that's
Niall:that's a nod to something really nerdy as well since it's inspired
Niall:partly by butterfly effect and chaos theory and atmospheric physics.
Matt Palmer:Yeah, that's right.
Matt Palmer:So that's part of the reason it's called what it is.
Matt Palmer:There are connections to some of the, some of the science even, in that
Catherine:There's a part in 'chasing butterflies' that is very futuristic.
Catherine:What is life going to be like tomorrow?
Matt Palmer:It's an interesting time to reflect on things in general.
Matt Palmer:I think.
Matt Palmer:I was trying to guess when you were talking, which song that you were going
Matt Palmer:to talk about, cuz you were kind of giving us the, the backdrop and your
Matt Palmer:impressions and "chasing butterflies" is the one I thought you were gonna say.
Matt Palmer:I guess with a piece of music, what you hope is that the mood of the music, like
Matt Palmer:the reflective mood, uh, which I think is in that song, I would agree with you.
Matt Palmer:I think it does sound, it sounded to me reflective , and the lyrical content.
Matt Palmer:When it comes together, I think that's when a song really works.
Matt Palmer:"Chasing butterflies", is really inspired by the fact not, really
Matt Palmer:common knowledge, but, I have a disabled child, a disabled son
Matt Palmer:who's now 10 years old.
Matt Palmer:And he had a, he had a, an oxygen, deprivation, event a
Matt Palmer:few weeks after he was born.
Matt Palmer:And, um, oh dear.
Matt Palmer:He ended.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:Sadly he ended up with widespread brain damage and, , oh, I'm so sorry.
Matt Palmer:So , it's a bit of a, it is a bit of a heavy thing to drop into a conversation,
Matt Palmer:but I think the thing is that, um, chasing butterflies is really about, you know,
Matt Palmer:causality and cause and effect and, and not knowing what's gonna happen next.
Matt Palmer:And actually the things are in, in, in his situation.
Matt Palmer:I mean, you, you kind of have to go through that adjustment
Matt Palmer:process of getting used to that.
Matt Palmer:That idea, but actually you, you're just on a different
Matt Palmer:journey to what you were on.
Matt Palmer:And there are many, many positive things about him and his life and
Matt Palmer:the life that we have together.
Matt Palmer:But that, that is a big part of that, of that song for, for me, why I wrote it.
Catherine:Who produces your music?
Matt Palmer:So, Alex really, mixed all of the music that we did.
Matt Palmer:So it was just, it was a homemade thing.
Matt Palmer:We own the music.
Matt Palmer:That collection of songs was recorded a couple of years ago now.
Matt Palmer:COVID hit you know, the global pandemic and shut down we've
Matt Palmer:kind of been on pauses ever since.
Matt Palmer:Really.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:In terms of the songs themselves, that they're they're a collection and, and,
Matt Palmer:and some of them are very old songs like the song at the end 'complications' I
Matt Palmer:wrote that in my teens, I think.
Matt Palmer:The thing for me, that's always fascinating is you never really know
Matt Palmer:how the song is gonna turn, turn out.
Matt Palmer:You start off on a journey with it and you don't know the destination.
Matt Palmer:And often they are like dark coarse songs like things that you don't expect
Matt Palmer:to turn out the way that they might.
Matt Palmer:So 'The Flood' , I think is an example of one where I was a bit ambivalent about it
Matt Palmer:as a, as a song initially, I was super happy with how it turned out in the end.
Matt Palmer:"Politic Blues" is about, I mean, I guess now that I'm talking about it,
Matt Palmer:lots of things will probably resonate in today's political climate, as we
Matt Palmer:were kind of discussing before the show.
Matt Palmer:There's a lot of things going on in the world that probably do tap into
Matt Palmer:some of the content of the songs.
Matt Palmer:"Politic Blues" was really just about politics in life in general,
Matt Palmer:and not meaning in the big P political sense necessarily with
Matt Palmer:political parties and stuff.
Matt Palmer:But just how that somehow when you're constantly worrying about what people
Matt Palmer:think or whether you might offend someone, you know, it does take some
Matt Palmer:of the, um, it takes some, some, some of the joy of life is sometimes lost,
Matt Palmer:you know, the reckless abandon of just saying what's on your mind without
Matt Palmer:having to worry about, it all the time.
Matt Palmer:Well, I should say that like with, with all my lyrics, I try and
Matt Palmer:keep them a little bit ambiguous in that I like people to be able
Matt Palmer:to read their own thing into it.
Matt Palmer:I don't like it too prescriptive.
Matt Palmer:It's not always obvious exactly what I'm talking about.
Matt Palmer:Mm-hmm but that leaves through, I think for people's interpretation and for
Matt Palmer:each person to kind of project their own story onto what I'm talking about.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:And,
Catherine:and I think that's important with songwriting, for me as
Catherine:a listener, because for one thing, the mood for each of us changes
Catherine:throughout different parts of our life.
Catherine:And so you could go, I could go back maybe to listening, to 'chasing butterflies'.
Catherine:In three years and my reflection is going to be different in three years.
Niall:Um, I guess I was just thinking about you talking about music and,
Niall:and linking it to your experience.
Niall:And I, I feel like I.
Niall:I have the kind of the opposite thing as well.
Niall:Music really takes me back to experiences.
Niall:That's indelibly linked to, I dunno if you guys get this at all, but certainly
Niall:I, I find like I tend to obsess about this is probably something to do
Niall:with my fiscal scientist background and my erotic drummer and stuff.
Niall:I tend to obsess about music and, uh, really takes me back to
Niall:whatever I was doing at the time.
Niall:I still, I was listening to physical graffiti by Led Zeppelin the, the other
Niall:day it took me right back to being 15 and playing one particular computer
Niall:game that I played at the same time.
Niall:I was listening to that back to back to back.
Niall:So yeah, there's something really sort of deep in your psyche about
Niall:emotional responses to music and, uh, what you associate with that as well.
Catherine:Yeah, and that's true.
Catherine:And it, and KISS, I used to listen to a lot of KISS so, um, because of the
Catherine:drummer so, anyway, , so when I listen to KISS, it does bring me right back
Catherine:to specific school dances or yeah.
Catherine:When, when we were walking from the house over to the record store to pick up the
Catherine:new album and then you open it up and the vinyl just smells so good and yeah.
Catherine:Saw as a, as a new record.
Niall:I dunno if this is, I dunno if this seems like a tenuous, uh, linking
Niall:up, but I think it's really nice that people like Matt there communicating about
Niall:different things, including I dunno their relationship to climate change through,
Niall:through different media now, cuz I, I think there's been a sort of, observation
Niall:of the climate change community
Niall:I suppose that for a long time there was sort of a lot of
Niall:really objective communication.
Niall:And I think there's an increasing recognition that there are lots
Niall:of ways to communicate now and different people respond to different
Niall:types of communication and you know, there's nothing invalid about
Niall:communicating through something
Niall:I dunno that people might consider pejoratively to be
Niall:touchy, feely like music.
Niall:You know, there's nothing unscientific per se about music.
Niall:Music is a communication media.
Catherine:Yeah.
Catherine:Well this that's a perfect segway to get into your work as climate
Catherine:scientists and as scientists in general.
Catherine:Who wants to go first and talk about their work?
Catherine:Niall?
Catherine:How about you go first?
Catherine:I think Matt, Matt is a good place to start and I can build on that.
Catherine:Okay, then Matt,
Matt Palmer:okay.
Matt Palmer:Yeah, sure.
Matt Palmer:, so I guess, a bit of background, I suppose, would be that I, I started out,
Matt Palmer:uh, my career really as an oceanographer.
Matt Palmer:, and, uh, I, I did a, I did a PhD at the national oceanography center in
Matt Palmer:south Hampton, and that was a mixture of, , going out on a research vessel,
Matt Palmer:taking, measurements of sea water, temperature, and sea water salinity.
Matt Palmer:That was kind of a bit of field work I did as part of my PhD, but then
Matt Palmer:the other part of the PhD was about modeling of the ocean and it was
Matt Palmer:the Indian ocean in, in particular.
Matt Palmer:And so I, I, I kind of did a bit of studying of this, of, of ocean circulation
Matt Palmer:that was kind of the subject of my PhD.
Matt Palmer:And then I joined the MET office, which they're well known in the
Matt Palmer:United Kingdom for being, , the kind of public weather service.
Matt Palmer:, but they actually have a climate research department that's been there since 1990.
Matt Palmer:, actually it kind of came about , the very first, , IPCC report is kind
Matt Palmer:of connected to the birth of the Hadley center for climate research.
Matt Palmer:So that's the part of the Met office that I work in and I guess for
Matt Palmer:about the last 10 years or so, I've specialized in sea level research.
Matt Palmer:So that's both understanding, , contemporary sea level rise, but
Matt Palmer:also making future projections that's really been the focus of my work.
Matt Palmer:, and then I guess about four years ago, I was lucky enough to be
Matt Palmer:selected as a lead author on the I P C C sixth assessment report.
Matt Palmer:So that's the sixth time that that body has produced a big collective
Matt Palmer:scientific assessment of the state of knowledge of climate change.
Matt Palmer:I'm sure many of your listeners will have heard some of your other people have been
Matt Palmer:on your podcasts, such as Nathan Bindoff
Matt Palmer:who've been deeply connected to, to these IPCC assessment reports there.
Matt Palmer:So they're important because they form the basis of the political, negotiations
Matt Palmer:around, , greenhouse gas, , emissions, and to trying to reduce those over
Matt Palmer:time, such as the Cop26 meeting.
Matt Palmer:, so the conference of parties, these cop meetings are quite important
Matt Palmer:because they're the place that the, the, the international governments get
Matt Palmer:together and try to agree how they're gonna reduce greenhouse gas emissions
Matt Palmer:and , curb the worst effects of climate.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:So, my involvement in the, in, in the report itself, , I did quite a
Matt Palmer:lot of bits and pieces, but, I was really a big part of it was the, in the
Matt Palmer:assessment of observed sea level rise.
Matt Palmer:And also a thing called the global energy budget, which is essentially, , it
Matt Palmer:quantifies the effect of greenhouse gases, trapping, , solar energy within
Matt Palmer:the system so that system starts to warm up and that's really what manifesses
Matt Palmer:surface, temperature rises, melting glaciers, these various other effects.
Matt Palmer:And then there's a neat connection to the sea- level rise that we see.
Matt Palmer:The warming of the oceans, , means that the seawater kind of expands and that's
Matt Palmer:one big component of sea- level rise.
Matt Palmer:And the other big component of sea level rise is the melting of land
Matt Palmer:based ice from glaciers and ice caps and, and the two ice sheets.
Matt Palmer:, so yeah, it was a very, uh, very kind of energetic and exciting, two
Matt Palmer:year period with a lot of hard work.
Matt Palmer:There were some real highlight moments.
Matt Palmer:I was lucky enough to get selected, to be part of the, author
Matt Palmer:team that had to defend these, the summary for policy makers.
Matt Palmer:So that's the final document that, that, that we end up with, which is, basically
Matt Palmer:a condensation of all of the 15 big kind of chapters of scientific assessment.
Matt Palmer:It ultimately gets channeled into this thing called the summary of policy makers.
Matt Palmer:And , it's that document that, , really goes forward and helps
Matt Palmer:inform the political negotiations.
Matt Palmer:So we had to defend the text that we'd written to, to
Matt Palmer:country delegations, over Zoom.
Matt Palmer:, it was just an amazing thing to be
Matt Palmer:Virtually, kind of stood up in front of all these different, people who,
Matt Palmer:represent these different countries around the world and having to defend
Matt Palmer:the, the text you'd written and try and agree, uh, you know, final text for that
Matt Palmer:document, was an amazing experience.
Matt Palmer:I'd not done anything like that previously.
Matt Palmer:So that was really interesting, exciting.
Matt Palmer:And a li you know, a little bit tense
Catherine:I would guess, I would
Matt Palmer:guess.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:So yeah, it was great.
Matt Palmer:It was great.
Matt Palmer:Uh, yeah, it's a great experience.
Matt Palmer:this last assessment report was very difficult in the presence of COVID
Matt Palmer:and a lot of people are exhausted.
Matt Palmer:Mm-hmm um, but then again, there probably won't be another major
Matt Palmer:report for another six or seven years.
Matt Palmer:But yeah, I think the demands on the scientists who participate
Matt Palmer:are getting bigger over time.
Matt Palmer:So that's something they need to think about with the process, uh, cuz they need,
Matt Palmer:it needs to be sustainable as much as everything else needs to be sustainable.
Catherine:Well, I certainly thank you for doing that for bringing the research
Catherine:into text so that it can be discussed at a table, so to speak, for policy
Catherine:change, as our world , moves forward with climate change observations that have
Catherine:been taking place some for long periods of time and some for not as long, but
Catherine:there's still hard evidence as to, you know, things that that need to be done.
Catherine:And, and so your responsibility, I appreciate it.
Niall:I can vouch for just the sheer amount of hard graft and hard work,
Niall:you know, that people like Matt have to put in, he mentioned it in passing,
Niall:but, uh, it's been a real marathon.
Niall:So, you know, good on you, Matt.
Niall:it's not, you know, I don't know if people appreciate sometimes just how
Niall:much effort goes into doing these things.
Niall:It's not something you do kind of in your spare time.
Niall:It's a really big deal.
Niall:Um, a lot of effort goes into it..
Catherine:Definitely , but also the intimidation that scientists
Catherine:must feel when they're receiving some of the questions, you
Catherine:know, you're defending science.
Catherine:Niall, thank you for saying that.
Catherine:That was really.
Catherine:Awesome,
Matt Palmer:thank you.
Niall:Uh, sorry.
Niall:Somebody's got to toot your horn.
Niall:We don't do that in the UK, Catherine.
Niall:You know, we need other people's to do it for us.
Catherine:well, I do it on this podcast.
Catherine:It's your positive imprint, so, yes.
Catherine:Yay, yay for the positive imprints.
Catherine:So anyway, so Matt, anything else that you wanted to share before we go into Niall?
Matt Palmer:Um, I guess I was just kind of thinking that, , the translation
Matt Palmer:of science in, into text in that final stage, it, it is probably the most
Matt Palmer:difficult part, but I think it's pretty illuminating actually to be part of that.
Matt Palmer:You realize how much scientists talk in in jargon so getting
Matt Palmer:that communication, right.
Matt Palmer:It kind of goes back to something that Niall was saying that, you know, I
Matt Palmer:think, and then again, I guess, links back to the music we were talking about.
Matt Palmer:There are different ways to communicate with people.
Matt Palmer:I think to get to understand the way that the country delegations, here and
Matt Palmer:understand the science, it's actually really illuminating as a scientist.,
Matt Palmer:I'm at one end of the problem, really focusing on, on the detail and , I
Matt Palmer:have the luxury of getting to spend most of my job thinking about the
Matt Palmer:science, but actually that's not the same thing as when, , trying to
Matt Palmer:summarize the salient points of that
Matt Palmer:and what's , the understanding and trying to get that across in a
Matt Palmer:way that people can understand is actually a, a skill in itself.
Matt Palmer:And, and, and, and you can learn a lot from just hearing, , how
Matt Palmer:the different country delegations also seek to find ways.
Matt Palmer:To make the text understandable and , acceptable to all, all parties there.
Catherine:That's that's the English phone.
Catherine:the butlers
Niall:just handed him the phone
Matt Palmer:yeah.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:Cause it's all old school.
Matt Palmer:It should be one of those old ones you lift up them.
Catherine:You mentioned Nathan Bindoff and his work on the IPCC.
Catherine:I His work helped Al Gore put together 'The Inconvenient Truth' and everything
Catherine:that came about during that era.
Catherine:And I, I use that word era because I feel, and this is just how I feel.
Catherine:And maybe Niall can, can address this.
Catherine:But the way I feel about it is it seems like we fall into eras.
Niall:Well, well, I was just thinking about, um, about, you know, a part
Niall:of history of, of me and it, it took me back actually, I can tie
Niall:this into my music career as well.
Niall:It took me back to clarinet lesson when I was like 13, where I'd been
Niall:playing clarinet for a few years.
Niall:And I told my clarinet teacher that I decided I was gonna
Niall:start learning drums as well.
Niall:And he sort of sighed and sat there and said, listen, Niall, have you
Niall:ever heard the expression, 'Jack of all trades master of none'?
Niall:And I, and I said to him, something along the lines of, I'm gonna be Jack of
Niall:all trades and master of the universe.
Niall:. And since then, since then I've been a sort of restless, neurotic, you
Niall:know, true to the drummer stereotype.
Niall:Um, so I started off, uh, as a field scientist doing my PhD where I went,
Niall:I was lucky enough to do things like live in the rainforest for four months.
Niall:Um, oh, cool.
Niall:I measuring the gases that the trees produce there because they affect
Niall:the way clouds are, are created.
Niall:And that affects actually the radiation balance, which affects
Niall:the, uh, affects climate change.
Niall:So that's where I started off.
Niall:I, then I did some field work in, uh, in the states, actually in Colorado.
Niall:So in the Rocky mountains for a while, which was great, I went to the Met
Niall:office and I worked in the Hadley center where, where, where I met Matt, doing
Niall:climate modeling for a couple of years.
Niall:But really since then, my, my career's gone more down the path of how can we
Niall:take the outputs of the science and do new things to make them more useful.
Niall:So, you know, you were talking about the different eras and actually I think
Niall:a positive take on this is that we're really at this stage where there's
Niall:lots of people out there in the world who want to change what they're doing?
Niall:And I'm not just talking about individuals anymore.
Niall:Actually, this is no longer about individual action.
Niall:I'm talking about businesses, mm-hmm and you know, really influential
Niall:things like that who are genuinely now saying they want to understand the
Niall:problems much better so they can change their strategy and their policy and
Niall:investors want to invest differently
Niall:I'd really recommend, actually that people are interested there's a, I
Niall:dunno if people in the states know who Mark Carney is, but he was the
Niall:ex-governor of the bank of England.
Niall:He's actually Canadian, but he, he did these lectures on the BBC, the w
Niall:reef lectures a couple of years ago.
Niall:And he was talking about, one of the episodes was about climate
Niall:change and about how, uh, financial sector can deal with climate change.
Niall:And he, he was a real advocate.
Niall:This is a real sober, you know, uh, kind of market banker type guy.
Niall:It was really clear that people should not be investing in stuff , that's
Niall:not gonna thrive under climate change, you know, cuz it's immoral, but also
Niall:because it doesn't make any Prudential, it doesn't make financial sense.
Niall:And so, you know, it is really, uh, I really feel like the conversation
Niall:has moved on to being something much more, much less sort of positional
Niall:and much more kind of like what are we trying to achieve here?
Niall:So anyway, I that's sort of where I am now, the last seven or so years
Niall:I've been, um, I, I I guess sort of arch multi-disciplinarian, so I've
Niall:worked in data science, I've done a lot of research with technology and
Niall:technology companies and flitted between visualization and machine learning.
Niall:And uh, like I say, at the minute, I'm, I'm really trying to work with
Niall:a lot of partners in technology and business so that they can use not
Niall:just the climate change stuff the the Met Office does, but also the weather
Niall:forecasting that we do, which is, inherently part of the same problem.
Niall:How do you respond to the environment around the decisions you want to make?
Catherine:Awesome.
Catherine:I wanna go back to your PhD work over in Borneo.
Catherine:Oh yeah.
Catherine:Can you share a little bit about what it was that you researched?
Catherine:So you were talking about the gases, so, yeah.
Catherine:Yeah.
Niall:So, so, so basically, you know, PhDs is a truism that they always
Niall:seem extremely esoteric, you know, because they are, they're, they're
Niall:very, very deep researched into a very minor part of a bigger picture.
Niall:In fact, actually, I'm gonna call out to another bit of media here.
Niall:. There's actually a Teds talk about, um, the project that I was on in my PhD.
Niall:And it does a really good job of taking a headline from a newspaper and
Niall:saying, what's behind this headline.
Niall:And it looks at all the different research that's gone in to
Niall:build up, including the project
Niall:I was on to make one, you know, five word sentence at the top of a paper article.
Niall:But so yeah, what was I doing?
Niall:I, I was responsible for running, , some instruments in particular, mass
Niall:spectrometer, which is an instrument that can blow apart molecules and figure
Niall:out exactly, , what they're made of.
Niall:And so in particular, I was looking at any particles that were in the air.
Niall:And when we talk about particles here, we're talking
Niall:about extremely small things.
Niall:So, you know, less than a micro nanometers across.
Niall:These particles tend to be created from gases that are emitted by
Niall:the rain forest in that instance.
Niall:And then they get chemically sort of baked by the sunlight and they
Niall:start to condense and form these little sort of mists, I guess.
Niall:So these mists, uh, the question is, are they good at
Niall:being seeds for clouds or not?
Niall:So some people might know that cloud droplets tend to form around,
Niall:nuclei, condensation, nuclei.
Niall:And so what I was doing was I was going and measuring all these little, potential
Niall:cloud seeds that we could find and seeing what chemicals they were made of.
Niall:And then that was my niche.
Niall:You know, somebody else was then taking that information about the chemistry and
Niall:saying, well, how does that affect whether they're good at making clouds or not?
Niall:And then somebody else was taking that research and saying, well,
Niall:we know how good the chemicals are making clouds or not.
Niall:How does that affect the radiation balance and the, and the climate models?
Niall:You know, so it's really a huge team effort in that field project there was
Niall:maybe, I don't know, from memory 60 people camped out in the rainforest.
Niall:And to be honest, a lot of the challenge with work like that is
Niall:fixing the generator and the rats eat through the power cables or,
Niall:um, or, or, I mean, literally setting up electric fences to scare off
Niall:elephants and that sort of thing.
Niall:so yeah, there's, I, I guess , I'm gonna draw parallel, although there's less
Niall:sort of a prestigious draw, parallel to Matt's, I PCC work with science,
Niall:a lot of it's really about the kind of messy, hard graph that you need to
Niall:do to get to the kind of good stuff.
Niall:Mm-hmm uh, so yeah, a lot of it's about keeping your chin up and, um,
Niall:you know, keep going forwards and that
Matt Palmer:yeah.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:I mean, so the work that you're describing then Niall was, was super,
Matt Palmer:super relevant to the chapter that I was on, for, IPCC which was all
Matt Palmer:about the radiation balance basically.
Matt Palmer:And clouds are the big are still the biggest kind, kind of uncertainty in our
Matt Palmer:understanding of future climate change.
Matt Palmer:And the interaction of scales.
Matt Palmer:So the interaction of these very tiny particles that we can, we, you know,
Matt Palmer:we can't even see really, and how they affect clouds and how that might change
Matt Palmer:in future and how that's shaped the climate of the past as well, which is
Matt Palmer:a big part of the problem is trying to understand what's happened to the past.
Matt Palmer:It's all.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:So it's all super important stuff.
Matt Palmer:So, um, yeah, it's in fact, it's great to hear these stories, Niall,
Matt Palmer:I haven't, I haven't heard these stories before, so, uh, we'll probably
Matt Palmer:have to go to the pub at some point.
Matt Palmer:And, um,
Catherine:I wanna go with you, so yeah, well, the, the science
Catherine:is, tremendously important,
Niall:I really think this is one of the things that people sometimes don't
Niall:appreciate about science as a profession versus most people's experience
Niall:of science, which is in education.
Niall:And really until you get to at least postgrad, arguably later, a
Niall:lot of people's experience about science is being sort of force fed
Niall:information, which they have to understand and regurgitate on command.
Niall:And actually, as soon as you finish your undergraduate degree, the
Niall:whole thing gets inverted, which is by definition, everything you're
Niall:doing is stuff you don't understand.
Niall:And I, I actually know, I can think of a few people that I've known in my life
Niall:who've struggled with that transition.
Niall:Sometimes the people who are best at undergraduate and school science
Niall:actually make really horrible scientists because they, they're not
Niall:comfortable with not knowing stuff.
Niall:you know, , and it's the people that actually maybe feel their way through.
Niall:I mean, um, some of the undergraduate stuff can make exceptional scientists
Niall:because they really have the pragmatism to, to keep going and to,
Niall:to kind of chip away at stuff until they find out, and the curiosity
Niall:is a totally different skill set.
Niall:I think Uhhuh
Catherine:that's interesting.
Catherine:Well, I, there's still so much in the world from the micro, to the macro
Catherine:that we don't understand and hasn't been studied, there's even animals that we
Catherine:still haven't done enough observations on to learn how climate change is
Catherine:affecting their diets or their habitat.
Catherine:. There's just a lot out there.
Catherine:And we are given these, these God given skills especially you, Matt
Catherine:and Niall, to go out and do this work and learn about this world,
Catherine:this planet and what is in store for the future and what might happen.
Catherine:So when you were talking Niall about your experience, I'm sorry I had, when you
Catherine:talked about, how music sometimes that comes into your head about something,
Catherine:well, a movie popped into my head.
Catherine:You'll laugh.
Catherine:Sorry, everybody.
Catherine:But, uh, mosquito coast popped into my head.
Catherine:I see that.
Catherine:Okay.
Catherine:It's Harrison Ford, but not the, not the raunchy parts when he turns into a weirdo,
Catherine:but the part when he was, scientist and really working with, with the
Catherine:people and, and building his invention.
Catherine:And I was just seeing that.
Catherine:But anyway, moving forward, sorry, moving forward.
Catherine:So, uh, we'll get back on track here, Catherine.
Catherine:Yes, . So is there anything else that, you'd like to share?
Matt Palmer:I guess I was just gonna say that, it goes back to
Matt Palmer:the music a bit, again, and it gets us into the space of communication
Matt Palmer:of of, of science in, general.
Matt Palmer:But, , so there is a song that was on that EP called 'the flood',
Matt Palmer:which is about sea- level rise.
Matt Palmer:I think it's a topic that, in, in some places perhaps is becoming
Matt Palmer:better understood, but sea level rise is really, um,, maybe the creeping
Matt Palmer:challenge of, climate change.
Matt Palmer:We think is gonna keep rising for many centuries to come.
Matt Palmer:And it's a, it's a, a problem that's going to need dealing with.
Matt Palmer:We're gonna have to adapt to this.
Matt Palmer:, and I do tend to subscribe to Niall's view of climate change.
Matt Palmer:The science is really moving now.
Matt Palmer:It's no longer really a conversation about whether this is happening
Matt Palmer:and whether it's human caused.
Matt Palmer:It's human caused.
Matt Palmer:It's happening.
Matt Palmer:So the question now is what are the solutions?
Matt Palmer:How do we minimize our, , exposure to climate risk, which includes by
Matt Palmer:the way, trying to coordinate efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Matt Palmer:I mean, that's the best way to avoid, the future risks, but even, even with
Matt Palmer:those best efforts, such as the Paris agreement to limit surface warming
Matt Palmer:to two degrees and preferably even 1.5 degrees above pre mm-hmm , um,
Matt Palmer:we are still gonna have to deal with substantive sea level rise.
Matt Palmer:So, so the flood was really my attempt to highlight this.
Matt Palmer:I wanted to write a song about a problem that might help people engage with
Matt Palmer:something in a way, as, , as Niall said, I don't think kind of lecturing people
Matt Palmer:on things is actually a very effective way of communicating things in general.
Matt Palmer:I think if you can capture their kind of imagination or, or, or think about
Matt Palmer:ways to tap into them and I think music is one of the things where
Matt Palmer:people can be very passionate about.
Matt Palmer:I mean, obviously I'm massively passionate about music.
Matt Palmer:It's been a huge part of my life and will always be, and with that video in
Matt Palmer:particular, which I suggest, I think it's the one I tell people to go and have a
Matt Palmer:look at what we did, cuz we've really put quite a lot of time and effort into trying
Matt Palmer:to make something visually interesting, so yeah, so I'd go and check out the
Matt Palmer:flood and it's also the reason that, , the EP itself is called a rising tide.
Matt Palmer:So again, , it's not super subtle, but it's, it's just the fact
Matt Palmer:that this situation is happening.
Matt Palmer:And I think people need to be aware of it.
Matt Palmer:In fact, one of the recent, Pearl jam albums released, I think two or
Matt Palmer:three years ago was, called gigaton.
Matt Palmer:And it just has a massive picture of an ice terminating
Matt Palmer:glacier on the front of it.
Matt Palmer:I think there are quite a few musicians now getting on board, I guess, as there's
Matt Palmer:always been, you know, bands with trying to push political agendas, of course, it's
Matt Palmer:like almost the bedrock of folk music.
Matt Palmer:That, that was really, I think what I was hoping to do, do with that song and,
Matt Palmer:um, yeah, it's an interesting space.
Matt Palmer:Uh
Catherine:The communication, just going back to what Niall said , the
Catherine:communication of music, or other ways other means of communicating
Catherine:science to people is important.
Catherine:And I think this is a great way.
Catherine:One of our scientists here in the United States and you know, him,
Catherine:Josh Willis, he is climate Elvis
Catherine:I don't know if you knew that,
Matt Palmer:So I think, I, I think I heard him on your podcast.
Matt Palmer:podcast I got to know Josh quite a long time ago when we were working
Matt Palmer:in similar area and I've kind of lost touch with him a bit, but I went and
Matt Palmer:saw his, YouTube video where they did a gr a great job with this climate song.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:With him performing it as climate Elvis.
Matt Palmer:So it's definitely worth, it's definitely worth looking at it is,
Catherine:it is great.
Catherine:I enjoyed that.
Catherine:And of course COVID hit.
Catherine:So he obviously couldn't do his gigs, but hopefully you guys will be able to go
Catherine:back out there and do your gigs and, and make this ginormous with the message that
Catherine:you are trying to get out with regard to climate change and the rising sea levels.
Matt Palmer:I'm writing music, I'm still involved in collaborations and,
Matt Palmer:we go into the rehearsal studio so yeah, so there's stuff happening.
Matt Palmer:Yeah
Catherine:here's a question from one of my guests who's a Marine biologist.
Catherine:Who is liable for the cleanup caused by climate change?
Catherine:A homeowner lost their home in Hawaii to the sea level rise.
Matt Palmer:Yeah.
Matt Palmer:Um, and I think that actual idea is now kind of starting to
Matt Palmer:appear within the, the political negotiations , at cop 26 and others.
Matt Palmer:There's an idea of kind of loss and damage and fundamentally it's about, ... so
Matt Palmer:different countries have emitted different amounts of greenhouse gases in the past.
Matt Palmer:And so it's about negotiating what the costs of those, which kind of links
Matt Palmer:to what you are saying basically.
Matt Palmer:So there is some discourse around that idea now.
Niall:And also some interesting science, right?
Niall:So I think phrase aloft at the Met Office is just published an
Niall:interesting paper about this.
Niall:Yeah.
Niall:How, what's the kind of, you know, if phrase as a scientist is not his job
Niall:to say what's the right way to do this, but what are the different possible
Niall:ways that we could start to actually calculate these kind of, um, yeah.
Matt Palmer:Contributions.
Catherine:Matt and Niall, you have been so inspiring and so informative,
Catherine:and I so much appreciate the music and your science and that you are combining
Catherine:the two to, spread the message and not just message, but your research.
Catherine:Thank you.
Catherine:So we like to end with last inspiring words.
Catherine:So Niall, I know you have to go, so Niall, why don't you, take off
Catherine:with your last inspiring words?
Niall:I think my inspiring words are try and be interested in stuff, you know,
Niall:and, and don't be sort of pigeonholed into how you think you should do things.
Niall:I think in my experience, There's been so many different facets to tackling climate
Niall:change that I've been involved in and I've loved sort of being part of all of those.
Niall:So yeah, don't be pigeonholed and just go and follow stuff you find interesting.
Catherine:Oh, awesome.
Catherine:Niall Robinson drummer from Matt Palmer band and scientists out in England.
Catherine:Thank you so much for joining your positive imprint.
Catherine:I appreciate you.
Matt Palmer:Thanks guys.
Matt Palmer:Thanks.
Matt Palmer:Nice to meet
Catherine:you, Catherine.
Catherine:Bye.
Catherine:Nice to meet you, Niall.
Catherine:Bye.
Catherine:Okay, Matt, your last inspiring words.
Matt Palmer:As I was saying to friends quite recently, I think many
Matt Palmer:of us do need these creative outlets.
Matt Palmer:I dunno how much for Niall, I should talk to him about this specifically,
Matt Palmer:but for me, I was kind of a crossroads when I was about 18 or 19, and I
Matt Palmer:kind of had to decide whether I was become a scientist or a musician.
Matt Palmer:And, uh, you're both, well, I've tried to do both, but see, yeah.
Matt Palmer:I mean, it's just one of those things.
Matt Palmer:I, I don't think I have a choice with music.
Matt Palmer:I have to do it.
Matt Palmer:basically, I'm just compelled.
Matt Palmer:I can't not do it;
Matt Palmer:Yeah, so I, I think from my point of view, um, It is about focusing on the
Matt Palmer:solution space with climate change.
Matt Palmer:Now that's where my head is at and, the need to work together.
Matt Palmer:I think all of the problems and the decisions, well, it's common problems.
Matt Palmer:Let's say the challenges and there are always, opportunities as well in, in any,
Matt Palmer:in any situation, but the opportunities and challenges, they're all in this
Matt Palmer:multidisciplinary space really; they're at the intersection between science and
Matt Palmer:society and, and the natural environment.
Matt Palmer:I think focusing on solutions and we heard Niall talk about this as well;
Matt Palmer:the buy- in from, from businesses.
Matt Palmer:And, and the way that I think we, we collectively need to think about this.
Matt Palmer:Yes.
Matt Palmer:Just focusing on those solutions and working together and, and the
Matt Palmer:time I'm most inspired and, and feel most energized is in, in my career.
Matt Palmer:It's been all, been all the way through, but particularly in things like I P C C,
Matt Palmer:where you really have the privilege to work with these people from all across the
Matt Palmer:globe, from different cultures and, they will have something to bring to the table.
Matt Palmer:So that collective working, I think, is really the future
Matt Palmer:of everything that we do.
Matt Palmer:So, um, For me, these days, it's all about, being a team player
Matt Palmer:and collectively trying to, address these problems and see what
Matt Palmer:decisions need to be made in future.
Matt Palmer:And, and that's really where my interest is now is moving away from
Matt Palmer:just the pure sea level rise stuff.
Matt Palmer:But working with people who are thinking about the coastal,
Matt Palmer:ecosystems and, , what those changes mean for, , coastal management.
Matt Palmer:So that's where I feel excited to, to be working.
Matt Palmer:And I think it is a, I think it is a great time if you can be working in
Matt Palmer:science to try and sit on the interface between these different disciplines.
Matt Palmer:I think that's where a lot of the exciting opportunities
Matt Palmer:and progress is gonna be made.
Catherine:I agree.
Catherine:I think collective organization is really a means to solutions.
Catherine:We just can't do it individually.
Catherine:Matt Palmer of Matt Palmer band.
Catherine:Thank you so much for sharing your positive imprints here on the show.
Catherine:And to learn more about Matt Palmer and Niall Robinson, go to MattPalmerband.com
Catherine:and listen to their music.
Catherine:They have awesome music with wonderful messages,
Catherine:I appreciate it.
Catherine:And I'm glad I, I found you guys, with your music.
Matt Palmer:Yeah, that's great.
Matt Palmer:I'm glad you found us too.
Matt Palmer:Thanks for doing the, podcast.
Matt Palmer:Thanks for coming up with this whole thing.
Matt Palmer:Thanks a lot for organizing it all and yeah, it's nice to meet you
This was a very informational interview. I also loved the music clips.