The Creation of Global Imaginaries: The Antarctic Ozone Hole and the Isoline Tradition in the Atmospheric Sciences

Abstract

This historical essay retraces from the perspective of visual and material culture how ways of analyzing and visualizing atmospheric data dramatically affect how scientific phenomena are perceived. The chapter explains in detail how NASA scientists reframed the local phenomenon of ozone depletion as a global environmental risk through their use of contour maps, displaying large quantities of global satellite data in synoptic form, coupled with the introduction of a new powerful metaphor: the "ozone hole.

Visualising Climate and Climate Change: A Longue Durée Perspective

“…Here, the power of images becomes clearer than ever: the figure reveals a spatial phenomenon that if not mapped would not have any existence at all. Indeed, it is the masterful introduction of what I have called elsewhere a 'global imaginary' (Grevsmühl 2014), the visual creation of a geophysical phenomenon at a very important scale that nobody could or would ever see.…”

“…Although field observations are crucial to the map, isolines create the illusion of continuous measurement, effectively hiding the number of actual measurements used in the construction of the map (seeGrevsmühl 2014). For instance, despite its global appearance, Humboldt retained only fifty-eight places to construct his isothermal map (see Schneider 2016).…”

Revisiting the “Ozone Hole” Metaphor: From Observational Window to Global Environmental Threat

“…2 & 3). It is therefore fair to say that only the synoptic view on the Antarctic continent, combined with a powerful visual tool -the contour line -, helped introduce this highly influential global environmental metaphor (see Grevsmühl, 2014 for more detail on the visual strategies employed). Indeed, mobilizing the contour line allowed for both, creating an "inside" and an "outside" of the "hole" in the ozone layer, as well as effectively homogenizing a substantial number of satellite measurements by correlating a certain data interval with a specific color.…”

“…Indeed, the powerful metaphor and the associated imagery gave support to those groups who believed that the consequences of taking no actions would be far worse than the consequences of over-restrictive regulations. Considered in retrospect, the "ozone hole" also made the case for the necessity and usefulness of fundamental science and its long-term environmental monitoring programs (a program that would hardly find any funding today) as well as big science and global Earth observation programs (Grevsmühl, 2014). Together, these environmental observation programs were able to demonstrate the unforeseen, yet disastrous long-lasting environmental effects of CFCs on a truly global scale.…”

Visualising the global environmental: new research directions

“…Both papers also show that the emergence of holistic conceptions of the environment reveal complex and diverse temporalities, depending on which environmental objects and geographies are taken into consideration. For instance, Regnauld and Limido trace firm links between the ocean and climate science back to the early nineteenth century, showing that Humboldt popularised the idea of a ‘global ocean’ with the help of innovative visual tools, an idea also picked up by Grevsmühl (, see also Grevsmühl ). Coastlines, however, were incorporated into global views only relatively late, as the rise of tourism called for promoting and managing site‐specific, local features of the coast.…”