Chateando con la Ciencia: Víctor Resco
Day: 27 March 2025
Time: 19:00
To attend the video-conference, request access code to: palacio@unizar.es before 26/03
Víctor Resco de Dios, Professor of Forestry Engineering at the University of Lleida
Talk: ‘Ecomyths: the hoaxes about forests that are harming the sustainability of the planet’
Summary:
It is no secret that we are immersed in a serious global environmental crisis. In an attempt to alleviate its most adverse effects, governments around the world are promoting a Green Pact, a new industrial revolution with the aim of decarbonising the economy, appealing to measures such as taxing emissions, massive tree plantations, installing solar panels on a massive scale and increasing protected areas, among others. But is this really helpful? The environmental crisis has only deepened, which tells us that something is going wrong. In this talk we will try to shed some light on many of the proposals that have been implemented, or are on the table, but which are in fact ecomyths: false beliefs about ecological and environmental issues that have taken hold in the collective imagination, and which do not solve, but rather worsen, the global environmental crisis. We will unravel the knots of this web, created – with more or less intention – by an unexpected coalition of business conglomerates, environmental organisations and governments, which has perverted public opinion to the point of preventing an effective response to this problem. Drawing on the knowledge provided by science, engineering and the humanities, this talk starts from a premise as simple as it is dramatic: ‘We urgently need new knowledge leaders’. This talk aims to be a step in that direction.
Victor Resco de Dios is a scientist working on mitigating some of the major problems that threaten the sustainability of our society, such as climate change, forest fires and pollution.
D. from the University of Wyoming, he is a professor of Forest Engineering at the University of Lleida and writes regular scientific columns that have appeared in media such as BBC Mundo and National Geographic, among others.
In 2024 he published Ecomitos, his first book for the general public, about the ecological hoaxes that aggravate the global environmental crisis.
He has also written a technical book on forest fires, more than 150 articles in scientific journals, and is among the top 1% of the most cited scientists in the world in the fields of biology and environmental sciences.
