A Q&A with Roy Scranton about climate change, Notre Dame’s Environmental Humanities Initiative, and ‘ethical pessimism’
"We think homelessness is bad — but what about homelessness when there’s 5 inches of rain in one day? Or when it’s 108 degrees out? It exacerbates every problem," said Roy Scranton, the associate professor of English, director of the Creative Writing Program, and founding director of the University’s Environmental Humanities Initiative. "And if we don’t start thinking about it now, in forward-looking, adaptive ways, it’s going to be unmanageable. We need to be thinking now about how to live ethically in a world of catastrophe."