A Philosophical Analysis of the Inferential and Predictive Accuracy of the Green Paradox

Abstract

This thesis investigates Sinn’s Green Paradox, a theory that asserts that well-intentioned climate mitigation designs aimed at reducing carbon emissions can, paradoxically, accelerate a climate risk. By reducing the intricate web of climate realities to the rational, atomistic actions of resource owners, the Paradox potentially oversimplifies the multifaceted dynamics of climate change. In so doing, it neglects the unpredictable interplay among human, technological, and nonhuman agents, each shaping outcomes in ways that defy linear causality. Accordingly, I contend that this reduction of agency to a mere linear sequence impoverishes both the inferential depth of the Paradox and the predictive reliability of designs derived therefrom. Reflecting upon inferential logic, I critically analyse how rationality, behavioural patterns, and technological determinism intertwine to influence the causal trajectories of climate risk. Thus, this philosophical lens illuminates the limitations inherent in the Paradox, compelling an advocacy for more nuanced, context-sensitive analyses. Consequently, I argue that mitigation designs must transcend narrow data-driven designs by incorporating an ethical responsiveness to the lived realities of risk. To advance this argument, I employ agent-based modelling, enriched by philosophical insights from Reader’s notion of the ‘other side of agency,’ Dempsey’s articulation of nonagential agency, and Okeja’s idea of deliberative agency. These theoretical perspectives collectively inform my advocacy for adaptive, participatory designs attuned to both local specificities and global exigencies. Finally, while the Paradox foregrounds the unintended effects of designs, it does not adequately engage with the philosophical reflections necessitated by the agential complexity and radical uncertainty within the climate change spaces. My thesis, thus, situates the Paradox within an expansive existential and ethical context, urging that climate mitigation designs transcend economic reductionism to more fully account for the moral and epistemic challenges inherent in our distributed agency and entangled lifeforms, life-worlds, and physical realities.