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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 16/09/2026

Pleased to have contributed an article giving a primer on climate tipping points to this issue of environmental SCIENTIST from @the-ies.bsky.social, alongside lots of other interesting pieces too, which is now open access: www.the-ies.org/resources/en... #Climate #ClimateChange #TippingPoints

the-ies.org

Degrees of Disorder: Climate Tipping Points

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

1.5 degrees is coming – does that mean we’ll soon cross a *physical* limit? New post from me, on a perspective piece @smconstantino.bsky.social & I had out recently in Environmental Research Letters, arguing what it says on the tin: that 'Tipping points do not make 1.5 °C a physical climate limit'

gaiaexmachina.wordpress.com

Welcome to the limit

1.5 degrees is coming – does that mean we’ll soon cross a physical climate limit?

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

gaiaexmachina.wordpress.com

Welcome to the limit

1.5 degrees is coming – does that mean we’ll soon cross a physical climate limit?

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Claims have circulated that UK actuaries have predicted that billions will die beyond 2C of warming, forming the basis for a new campaign. But did they really say that? New post by me at climatetippingpoints.info checking it out (tl;dr: no): climatetippingpoints.info/2026/08/11/f... #ClimateChange

climatetippingpoints.info

Fact-check: have actuaries predicted that billions will die beyond 2 degrees?

Some campaigners are claiming that UK actuaries (who measure risk for insurers) have predicted billions of deaths due to climate change beyond 2C of warming, partly due to tipping points & feed…

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

climatetippingpoints.info

Fact-check: have actuaries predicted that billions will die beyond 2 degrees?

Some campaigners are claiming that UK actuaries (who measure risk for insurers) have predicted billions of deaths due to climate change beyond 2C of warming, partly due to tipping points & feed…

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

I reviewed 'Tipping Out of Trouble' (for @nature.com), a new book by Marten Scheffer on what we can learn from past societal transformations to ensure a good rather than dystopian Anthropocene. Free sharing link: rdcu.be/fnmEA #ClimateChange #NatureLoss #Sustainability #TippingPoints #BookReview

rdcu.be

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

rdcu.be

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

New at climatetippingpoints.info: 'News Explainer: Is the AMOC closer to collapse than thought?' There was lots of coverage a few weeks ago of a new study constraining AMOC decline, but some confusion too - here's what the study said, & how it was covered: climatetippingpoints.info/2026/05/06/n...

climatetippingpoints.info

News Explainer: Is the AMOC closer to collapse than thought?

The first of a new occassional ‘News Explainer’ series, briefly summarising recent news on climate tipping points (and checking how well the media reported it). First up, a paper by Por…

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

climatetippingpoints.info

News Explainer: Is the AMOC closer to collapse than thought?

The first of a new occassional ‘News Explainer’ series, briefly summarising recent news on climate tipping points (and checking how well the media reported it). First up, a paper by Por…

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 18/11/2025

Considering a Masters? To celebrate the new Sussex School for Progressive Futures, Sussex Uni. has announced 10 £10k scholarships for selected courses, including our Climate Change, Development & Policy MSc! Details here 👇 + a Virtual Masters Open Day on 29/11/25: www.sussex.ac.uk/study/fees-f...

sussex.ac.uk

Sussex School for Progressive Futures Scholarships : University of Sussex

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 03/11/2025

I had a great chat with @smartcookies.bsky.social podcast a little while back, covering climate change, denialism, doomism, tipping points, and geoengineering. Watch here www.youtube.com/watch?v=OoxH... or listen via wherever you get your podcasts! www.patreon.com/the_smart_co... #ClimateChange

youtube.com

Joe Rogan claims the EARTH is cooling down. I talk to an actual CLIMATE scientist to dispel the BS

YouTube video by The Smart Cookies Podcast

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 03/11/2025

youtube.com

Joe Rogan claims the EARTH is cooling down. I talk to an actual CLIMATE scientist to dispel the BS

YouTube video by The Smart Cookies Podcast

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 29/08/2025

Apropos of recent AMOC news, I've finally gotten round to updating this AMOC tipping explainer from a couple years back with some of the flurry of papers published since then - check it out if you'd like some more background: climatetippingpoints.info/2023/08/15/a... #AMOC #TippingPoints #Climate

climatetippingpoints.info

Shutdown: can climate change make ocean currents collapse?

A recent study renewed worries that the ‘AMOC’ – a key set of ocean currents – could soon pass a tipping point and shutdown this century, with major ramifications for the cl…

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 20/08/2025

Writing this in 2019, there was a small cottage industry in dodgy Arctic sea ice trend-fitting to claim collapse by 2022. Instead, it's plateaued, in line with projected 1st ice-free summer in 2030s/40s plus natural variability. A case study in power of process understanding vs. naïve trend-fitting!

climatetippingpoints.info

Fact-Check: will an ice-free Arctic trigger a climate catastrophe?

Claim: A summer ice-free Arctic (called by some the “Blue Ocean Event”) will happen within the next few years and will cause an abrupt worsening of climate change and possible runaway f…

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 20/08/2025

Quote from me on this. Obviously not good, but not unexpected - the more warming there is, the harder it gets for natural carbon sinks to keep pace with rising CO2, but in absolute terms we still expect them to keep on taking up carbon in to the future (just not as big a % of emissions as so far).

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Dr Adam Levy @climateadam.bsky.social · 11/08/2025

I've wanted to make this video for literal years, and finally summoned the courage. Is permafrost *really* a climate time bomb? Thank you @davidamckay.bsky.social for the input! youtu.be/97-egzC-xjk

youtu.be

Is Permafrost Really a Climate Time Bomb?

YouTube video by ClimateAdam

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

Seen a #TippingPoints story recently about the SMOC (the AMOC's southern sibling) abruptly reversing? Thankfully, it's not true (seems a press release got overenthusiastic). Want to know what the paper behind it really said? Read this from the lead author instead: theconversation.com/completely-u...

theconversation.com

‘Completely unexpected’: Antarctic sea ice may be in terminal decline due to rising Southern Ocean salinity

Scientists once thought Antarctica might hold onto its sea ice as the world warmed. No longer.

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 09/07/2025

theconversation.com

‘Completely unexpected’: Antarctic sea ice may be in terminal decline due to rising Southern Ocean salinity

Scientists once thought Antarctica might hold onto its sea ice as the world warmed. No longer.

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 02/06/2025

I was on BBC Radio Scotland last week talking about whether the recent very sunny & dry followed by wet weather in Scotland & rUK has been a case of "weather whiplash" - you can listen in here: www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/..., & read my write-up: medium.com/p/82e39321740c #ClimateChange #SciComm

medium.com

Is Britain’s spring suffering from a case of weather whiplash?

This text is based on my comments on a BBC Radio Scotland panel on May 27th 2025, in which we talked about the phenomenon of “weather…

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Rob Bellamy @drrobbellamy.bsky.social · 29/04/2025

Introducing the special inaugural double issue of Dialogues on Climate Change @dialoguescc.bsky.social, with 27 authors addressing the state of research in 20 articles on hotly debated topics! Volume 1 Issue 1: journals.sagepub.com/toc/dcca/1/1 Volume 2 Issue 1: journals.sagepub.com/toc/dcca/2/1

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 28/04/2025

Going to @egu.eu #EGU25 today? I'll be speaking remotely about Holocene climate stability (and whether or not it means we're in a self-stabilising climate attractor, or just got lucky) & the #HothouseEarth hypothesis at 1620 CEST in Room F1 / online: meetingorganizer.copernicus.org/EGU25/EGU25-...

meetingorganizer.copernicus.org

Abstract EGU25-19647

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 03/04/2025

Come work with us at Uni. Sussex Geography! We're looking for a 1yr maternity cover Assist. Prof., teaching on the Earth system, climate change, & biogeography, starting in August. Details here: jobs.sussex.ac.uk/job/003194b4... #AcademicJobs #AcademicSky #Geography #UKHE #ClimateScience

jobs.sussex.ac.uk

Assistant Professor in Physical Geography Ref: 40324 (Fixed Term, Maternity Cover) - Job page - University of Sussex Job Search

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Dialogues on Climate Change @dialoguescc.bsky.social · 17/03/2025

Two decades of climate tipping points research: Progress and outlook New article online first in @dialoguescc.bsky.social by @davidamckay.bsky.social journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 12/03/2025

I'm co-convening a research session at this year's Global Tipping Points Conference in Exeter, June 30th-July 3rd - abstracts presenting your latest research on Earth System Tipping Points and Risks welcome by March 19th! #EarthSystemScience #ClimateScience #TippingPoints

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

The abstract submission deadline for #EGU25 is tomorrow 12GMT/13CET - if you're working on nonlinear human-Earth system interactions, then consider submitting your latest research to our session! #EGU #EarthSystemScience #TippingPoints #Anthropocene

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 14/01/2025

Many things familiar to me in this article on the issues stemming from precarious ECR contracts (in some of my first postdoc projects, the zero hours contract I had to be on didn't even allow access to the Uni's *library*, let alone a desk, webprofile, or a long enough contract to write a paper in).

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 13/01/2025

Some top notch viral content at the moment over on linkedin, of some definitely real firefighters in LA rescuing absolutely real animals with very real smoke pouring out of... themselves? #LAWildfires #AI #LinkedIn

Screenshot of an AI-generated video on LinkedIn (liked by 785 people and reposted by 62, and with hashtags of #Biodiversity, #ClimateAction #WildlifeProtection, #Firefighters, and #LAWildfires), showing a still of a firefighter calmly sitting and holding an owl, both of whom are emitting large plumes of smoke

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Dr. Aaron Thierry @thierryaaron.bsky.social · 13/11/2024

Dr. David McKay gave an excellent public lecture on ' #Climate Tipping Points' at Cardiff University's School of Earth & Environmental Sciences. How close are they? & What can we do about them? 🧵 1 / 18

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Rob Bellamy @drrobbellamy.bsky.social · 10/01/2025

Two decades of climate tipping points research: Progress and outlook New article online first in Dialogues on Climate Change by @davidamckay.bsky.social journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 17/12/2024

Thinking of going to @eurogeosciences.bsky.social GA2025? We have a session on 'Earth resilience, tipping points and human-Earth system interactions in the Anthropocene' - abstract deadline is Wednesday 15th Jan. 13:00 CET! meetingorganizer.copernicus.org/EGU25/sessio... #EGU #EarthSystemScience

meetingorganizer.copernicus.org

Session CL3.2.6

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 17/12/2024

meetingorganizer.copernicus.org

Session CL3.2.6

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 04/12/2024

New post from me on recent stories of #CarbonSinks "collapsing" last year & Earth's "buffering capacity" reaching its limits, putting it in context of past trends & future projections. A lukewarm take by now, but hopefully a useful explainer! climatetippingpoints.info/2024/12/03/c... #ClimateChange

climatetippingpoints.info

Are Earth’s natural carbon sinks collapsing?

This autumn, several media articles reported on a study showing the global carbon sink on land – which so far has drawn down around a quarter of human carbon dioxide emissions – took up…

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

I've got a commentary out today in the new Dialogues on Climate Change journal, summarising progress so far in research on climate #TippingPoints, and reflecting on their implications for climate action & the outlook for future research: doi.org/10.1177/2976... #ClimateChange #OpenAccess

doi.org

Two decades of climate tipping points research: Progress and outlook - David I. Armstrong McKay, 2024

The potential for nonlinear ‘surprises’ in the climate system has been recognised since the 1960s. One such nonlinearity is a tipping point: when change in a sy...

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

doi.org

Two decades of climate tipping points research: Progress and outlook - David I. Armstrong McKay, 2024

The potential for nonlinear ‘surprises’ in the climate system has been recognised since the 1960s. One such nonlinearity is a tipping point: when change in a sy...

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David A. McKay @davidamckay.bsky.social · 04/12/2024

climatetippingpoints.info

Are Earth’s natural carbon sinks collapsing?

This autumn, several media articles reported on a study showing the global carbon sink on land – which so far has drawn down around a quarter of human carbon dioxide emissions – took up…

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