Unintended consequences: Climate-hacking poses big ethical questions

The idea of blotting out the sun, whether floated by Frédéric Bastiat or Montgomery Burns, has long stood as a metaphor for human arrogance.

But today, as the planet approaches critical temperature thresholds, some observers are now saying that reducing the amount of sunlight, and therefore heat, that reaches the Earth’s surface, is not just technologically feasible, but also necessary to avoid catastrophe.

The latest report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, with its warnings of worsening water shortages, heat waves, and rising seas, along with the catastrophic damages from extreme weather events like hurricanes Michael and Florence, have increased some of the buzz around geoengineering: deliberate large-scale technical interference into