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(calming music)
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- [Narrator] Okay, let's
talk about how data
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is becoming music in this piece.
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This is an audio waveform.
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It is a graphic representation of audio
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when making a digital recording.
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As changes occur in a piece of music,
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the waveform will become either
more complex or more simple.
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As you can see, the louder the audio,
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the larger the waveform
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and the quieter the audio,
the smaller the waveform.
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Our science advisors, Andy and Bill
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use data sets to create graphs
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from extremely powerful climate models.
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These graphs have incredible
amounts of information
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embedded into their minute curves,
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much like the audio waveforms.
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To the untrained observer,
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it's difficult to understand
how those data curves
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relate to the changing climate
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without someone to translate them.
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It is this collision
of the audio waveforms
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with the climate data
that drives this piece.
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The translation of the climate graphs,
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the will of the music
coming into direct contact
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with the inevitable direction
of the climate data.
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One of the first steps
in creating this score
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was determining what
the most extreme degree
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of musical disfunction would sound like
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at the end of the piece, in the year 2300.
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We then worked backwards
from there as a control point
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to plot the degree and
type of change to the music
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according to the
corresponding climate data.
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According to the scientific model,
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we used climate data
beginning from the year 1800
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up to the current date
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and projected ahead to the year 2300,
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with every 25 years equally one minute.
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We could then set the
climate data to tempo,
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pitch, rhythm, distortion and
modulation, level of chaos
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and the position of a
knob on any music device.
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The four climate variables
used in this piece
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and their music corollary
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are atmospheric CO2, which is tempo,
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near-surface air temperature,
pitch and harmony,
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incoming and outgoing long wave radiation,
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also known as earth's energy balance,
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distortion, modulation, level of chaos,
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and ocean pH,
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which affected by the level
of CO2 in the atmosphere.
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This controls form in the music.
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If all of the variables
are relatively normal,
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the music will sound relatively normal,
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but as the variables change,
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it may sound like the musicians
are playing out of key,
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playing different pieces, speeding up
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or sounding like it is going
through an audio meat grinder.
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(harsh music)
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Also, this is a live
performance by musicians
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who, with each performance,
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make different decisions
about how to play their parts.
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This is analogous to the randomness
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that naturally occurs
in our climate's system
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and was built in to the
execution of the piece.
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So this music is a sonic translation
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of our climate's system.
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Where it was in the past,
what is happening to it now
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and what the future will bring.
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- And so the piece
actually treats the past,
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runs up to the present,
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and then we track two of
these scenarios going forward.
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One of them is business as
usual, it's this red curve,
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and that winds up with temperatures
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in the range of eight
to nine degrees Celsius,
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close to about 15 to 20 degrees fahrenheit
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by the year 2300,
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and then a scenario where we
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really control emissions very dramatically
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and actually bring
carbon dioxide back down
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in the latter part of the 21st century
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and that puts us on a
trajectory where we increase,
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we are close to about two degrees Celsius
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or about three and a
half degrees fahrenheit,
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and then gradually start to cool off.
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(calming music)
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