Excursion to the Museum of Natural History
October 20th, 2024
Below each title is an explanation of each exhibit that I visited while on my trip to the Musem of Natural History in Washington D.C. I had an amazing time learning new things about climate change through these exhibits, and I hope by reading my report, you do too!
Cellphones: Unseen Connections This exhibit used many presentation techniques to explain their information, and to make it more digestible for their possible audiences. One technique that I thought was particularly effective was appealing to the audience, and talking about the different ways we rely on and use technology in our daily lives. The touch screen also made the information presentation interesting. The interactive nature makes the exhibit more appealing. The way in which the information is displayed is also effective because it uses many graphics and pictures that make it easily understandable. The comics and artistic icons make the information more interesting to look at. The exhibit showed the array materials of a phone: plastic, palladium, glass, and cobalt. It also showed the elements necessary to create one. These materials are not easily recycled, and cannot be reused as quickly as they can be discarded. The process of manufacturing and distributing phones already creates a substantial carbon footprint, not to mention the use of the materials needed to make phones not being easily repurposed. They explained how even though e-waste can make many harmful changes to the environment, 80% of the carbon footprint created by smartphones is made up of manufacturing, factory, and transportation emissions. One impact that cellphones have had on technology is the introduction of 5G, which creates fast connection with a wider range, so connectivity continues to grow. This information was displayed on a wall where all of the eras of “G” were explained, and the differences between each. One impact that cellphones have had on society is how easily a lot of media can be seen at once. They talked about our exposure to violence around the world and other types of media that we can see so much of easily, which can cause a lot of stress and even desensitization of violent depictions. I believe that this information was shared in impactful ways because these two pieces came through to me and got me thinking the most. Climate Change in David H. Koch Hall of Human Origins The Anthropocene Event is described in this exhibit by the era of humans where we have impacted the environment in many negative ways. One topic included the growing population and food availability, and how human’s involvement with agriculture impacts that as well. Soil degradation is a large part of how humans change the environment, but we need to keep creating food for the ever-growing population. They also talked about the movement of humans around the earth, where humans have originated from, and how we ended up where we are today. The wall of this evolution was displayed next to the walkway ramp, and it showed screens and graphics that had information about what they were showing. It also included the years and when each place had a significant time of evolution. The graphs showed the changes in CO2 levels throughout history, and how that influences the temperature and sea levels. It can be seen how historically, even with humans still living on earth, levels have drastically grown as time passes and population grows. It shows how the industrialization of cities around the world caused much of this atmospheric pollution. I do not agree with critics in this case, because there is a part of the exhibit says specifically that humans are the cause of climate change. The little corner has a lot of infographics that display information about humans’ involvement in the extremely fast pace of climate change. One of the boards said: “now that warming is getting faster because of us”. I think this is very powerful because it spreads awareness where it is needed. Climate Change and Human Impact in the Sant Ocean Hall The hurricane storm surge video talked about natural disasters like hurricanes and how they form. It talked about how dangerous and destructive storm surge can be. With our recent technological advancements, forecasters can monitor their paths and predict where the most damage is going to end up. As climate changes, it gets exceedingly harder to track natural disasters. The “Our Blue Planet” video explained how the ocean has absorbed 25% of co2 emissions since 1800. This means that since then, the ocean has become one of the world’s largest carbon sinks. One interesting statistic that was mentioned to me was that less than 5% of the ocean is protected. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is working to protect marine life and explore the ocean. They left me with the question: “How can we live sustainably?” This was powerful to me because it showed all of the effects that CO2 has had on the world, and got me thinking about ways I can mitigate my role in that pollution. The Global Ocean video goes through all of the different stages that earth has been in throughout time, and shows how the ocean came to be. 4.6 billion years ago, there were volcanoes that released water and then icy comets came to earth and released water. The oceans were created from precipitation due to the evaporation of the melted icy comets, and there was so much rain that it had nowhere to go except into what formed the oceans. The video also explained how phytoplankton provide half the oxygen we breathe. They were a very early organism in the history of the world, and they originated in the ocean. The video also explained plate tectonics: ridges, trenches, and their movement. It showed the “ducks theory” which explains the movement of surface currents and gyres in the ocean. This led into how currents create climates! I thought that the spherical screen was an interesting way to display the information, because it gave it a more hands-on method of learning the information. I thought it was useful to see the distribution of water throughout each time period that was mentioned. Climate Change in David H. Koch Hall of Fossils - Deep Time The climate change exhibit also had little pylons which contained what a place looked like millions of years ago. One that stood out to me was Wyoming 56-53 million years ago. It was titled “Lush rainforests”, and looked like a representation of modern-day Brazil or the Congo, with little animals and plants that looked unfamiliar to me. The CO2 level was 5 times higher than it is today, the temperature was 14-25 degrees higher than today, and the sea level 200-330 meters higher than today. This was weird to me because you would never think that a rainforest would be in Wyoming, let alone those crazy levels of carbon, temperature, and sea. The world was so different back then that a place like Wyoming could have that type of climate. I thought this was effective because you can see how much has changed and how much effect we as humans have on that change. The second pylon I saw was the Hell Creek Formation in Montana about 67-66 million years ago. The CO2 level was 4 times higher than today, temperature was 16-17 degrees hotter than today, and the sea level was 200-225 meters higher than today. Again, the climate here was wildly different than it is today. The climate was hot and humid where floodplains supported a lot of life. This surprised me again because I don’t usually think of a place like Montana having floodplains like that instead of the colder, northern, and coniferous forests that we know today. Each little touchscreen area in the climate change exhibit had an opportunity to see the levels of CO2, sea, and temperature. In the triassic era, the levels of sea, temperature, and co2 were exponentially higher than today’s levels. The continents were also conjoined in Pangaea, meaning the wind patterns and surface currents in the oceans were different. I could use the sliders to look through time and see how the levels and continents change throughout the eras. This can show me and other audiences how fossils and past information can inform us about our world, and climate change. The changes that have happened in the past have happened over long periods of time, whereas our era of climate change is happening too fast for populations to be able to catch up to it. The gauges move in sync because CO2 traps heat in the atmosphere, so the more CO2, the warmer the planet. The warmer planet increases sea level because it melts glaciers and water expands as it warms. I think that these exhibits effectively show how fossil and geological information can inform us about current or future climate change because they show what the earth has tolerated in the past, and what it may be able to tolerate in the future. The reason we are so concerned about the rate at which the climate is changing is because of the historically slow rate of change from the past.
Here is me at the museum excited to start my excursion!