Atmosphere

Jim Fleming

STS Program, Colby College

http://themaintainers.org/

There has never been a history of atmospheric maintenance, but there could be. “Atmosphere” is a shape-shifting noun whose meaning has changed dramatically, over time from the surface weather of 1900, to the upper atmospheric planetary waves of the 1930s, to the near-space environment of sounding rockets and meteorological satellites. Currently, Earth’s magnetosphere and solar flares define the “space weather” environment.

“Atmosphere” is also spatially contingent, meaning different things in different spaces and places. On a “clear” day in Beijing the air may brown, use of artillery in the service of weather control is considered mainstream, and portent astrology takes its cues from t’ienwen (literally, the manifestation of the heavens). In many African societies, rain is regarded as a sacred phenomenon. In some tribal languages the same word refers to both god and rain, and some say, “god is falling” when it rains. Rain connects time and eternity, survival in the here and now, and blessings for the next generation. African rainmaking practices invoke rites of fertility and are full of fertility symbolism.

Having recently completed histories of atmospheric intervention, invention, and innovation, I turn now to a history of atmospheric maintenance, or the maintenance of something that is not a thing. The atmosphere is certainly not maintenance-free. But if not, how, where, and by whom has it been maintained? And with what implications for gender, race, class? History meets with historical geography and mixes with epistemological musings in this romp through popular culture.

Maintenance

The visual imagery of innovation is dominated by old Edison-era lightbulbs:

Or a disembodied, a-historical globalism:

Maintenance, however, is tool based,

heavily gendered, and not always flattering, as in this image search for Maintenance Men:

Which you can compare with an image search for Maintenance Women (as in high maintenance):

The cartoon archives of maintenance date at least to 1951 as in this issue of PS, The Preventive Maintenance Monthly, which was the successor to Army Motors:

        

Atmospheric maintenance is an ancient practice.

Priests, diviners, and astrologers monitored natural phenomena, including the weather, comets, meteors, and earthquakes (all aspects of ancient “meteorology”). They interpreted how these phenomena determined the present welfare and future destinies of both individuals and the social order. Health and sickness, feast and famine were apportioned to mortals in part by the vagaries of the weather and in part by the pleasures of the gods. Some of the earliest climatic records were compiled by temple scribes. Changes in the seasons and in the configuration of the heavens necessitated annual rituals to appease the gods of rain and harvest.

Atmospheric maintenance is a gendered practice.

In many African societies, rain is regarded as a sacred phenomenon and rain queens are the primary agents of change. In some tribal languages the same word refers to both god and rain, and some say “god is falling” when it rains. Rain connects time and eternity, survival in the here and now and blessings for the next generation. Those that study the rhythms of the seasons, the nuances of the clouds, and the natural phenomena attending the onset of rainy and dry seasons are held in high esteem; those who can bring rain or stop the rain are divinized. Sometimes month-long rituals take place during drought emergencies that involve the rain queen, royal leaders, tribal members, descendants, and ancestors—that is, the rituals are fully intergenerational and communal, emphasizing the centrality of tribal continuity and solidarity.

Western practitioners, almost exclusively male, first demonized the storms then accused women of witchcraft. St. Thomas Aquinas called it a “dogma of faith” that the demons produce wind, storms, and rain of fire from heaven.  The Papal Bull Summis Desiderantes, issued by Pope Innocent VIII in 1484, exhorted the clergy to “not suffer a witch to live” and to uncover those, who, by evil weather destroy vineyards, gardens, meadows, and growing crops.  Since the seventeenth century, the Baconian expectation that increasing knowledge would lead to new technologies “for the common good” has been widely applied to all scientific fields, including, notably, meteorology and climatology. His goal was to replace Aristotelian natural philosophy and eventual gain control of nature. Recently, advocates of climate engineering, with vanishingly few exceptions, are Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich and Democratic (WEIRD) males with superman complexes. Their views are short-sighted, dangerous, and “barking mad.”

Atmospheric maintenance is both an economic and a military practice.

In the 1870s in the U.S., telegraphic reports “for the benefit of commerce and agriculture” formed the primary rationale for the weather service, the enlisted men in thee U.S. Army Signal Corps served as both meteorological observers and at times as secret service agents reporting to him on domestic threats such as striking workers, Indian uprisings, and natural hazards to commerce and agriculture. Signal service observers reported on the hatching and migration of locust swarms, on frost and drought in the cotton, corn and tobacco-growing regions, on hazards to shipping along the coast. Mercantile interests were advised of weather conditions affecting the packing and shipment of perishable goods such as oysters, pork, and ice. Sailors received notice of fogs, storms, and fair winds. Insurance companies received data useful to them for setting rates for shipping. River reports warned of floods and low water conditions; railway reports announced heavy snows and track conditions; sanitary reports tracked the course of cholera and yellow fever epidemics in the interest of public health.. All of these missions, including daily weather reports, involved potential threats to commerce, agriculture, and the domestic order.

Atmospheric maintenance is an ideological practice.

In the post-Paris COP-21 world, in most Integrated Assessment Models, the mythical target of 2 °C, or even 1.5 °C is held sacrosanct, In order to reach this target, modelers adjust carbon budgets artificially by adopting “negative-emission technologies.” This a euphemism for carbon dioxide capture and reliable storage on a planetary level – a suite of geo-engineering technologies that are currently at little more than a conceptual stage of development. Nowhere is this more evident than in the IPCC’s scenario database. Of the 400 scenarios that have a 50% or better chance of resulting in no more than 2 °C warming, 344 assume the successful and large-scale deployment of negative-emission technologies. Even more worryingly, in all 56 scenarios without negative emissions, global emissions peak around 2010, which is contrary to available emissions data. In such cases, scientists must make their assumptions transparent and defensible, however politically uncomfortable the conclusions.

Atmospheric maintenance is a mediated practice.

Atmospheric maintenance is huge!

May a thousand more brainstorms form in Hoboken.