Climate crisis erodes meaning of 'unprecedented' as extreme weather becomes routine
As record-breaking weather events accelerate, society's psychological adaptation to extremes risks normalizing a climate emergency.
What to know
- Language fatigue: Repeated use of 'unprecedented' to describe climate records is causing semantic bleaching, making genuine extremes sound routine.
- Psychological adaptation: UC Davis research shows people experience extreme temperatures as less remarkable with repeated exposure, a phenomenon called 'shifting baseline syndrome.'
- Unfinished question: While remarkability fades, the study finds negative emotions about extreme weather persist—suggesting people aren't becoming complacent despite linguistic normalization.
“The complacency is staggering: just another hot summer, a flooded street, a crop failure. We are accepting this extraordinary deterioration as normal”
Helen Pilcher, Guardian columnist · The Guardian ↗
Helen Pilcher Guardian columnistFrances Moore UC Davis researcherDaniel Pauly Ecologist
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Study finds negative emotions about extreme weather persist despite reduced remarkability
Moore's research contains a counterintuitive finding: while extreme temperatures become psychologically less remarkable with repeated exposure, the negative feelings they provoke do not fade. This suggests people are not becoming genuinely blase about the climate crisis despite linguistic and psychological adaptation to extremes.
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first by Mastodon, 11d ago · also Guardian Environment
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Our yardstick for what counts as normal or remarkable is constantly changing. Ecologists call this “shifting baseline syndrome”. This was originally described in the context of fisheries by Daniel Pauly (via @theguardian.com ).
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# News # Opinion # ClimateCrisis https://www. theguardian.com/commentisfree/ 2026/sep/13/extreme-weather-unprecedented-feel-normal
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UC Davis study reveals 'shifting baseline syndrome' in climate perception — Research by Frances Moore from UC Davis analyzing over 2 billion weather-related social media posts shows that repeated exposure to extreme temperatures makes them feel less remarkable psychologically, even when they are historically unprecedented. The phenomenon, called "shifting baseline syndrome," means society's yardstick for what counts as normal continuously shifts downward.
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Helen Pilcher argues overuse of 'unprecedented' is dulling climate crisis language — Guardian columnist Helen Pilcher contends that the word "unprecedented" is losing its force through semantic bleaching—the gradual erosion of meaning through overuse—as climate reporting repeatedly describes record-breaking heat, rain, drought, and wildfires with the same adjective. She frames this alongside Britain's hottest summer on record, beaten only last year by the previous record.