Abstract
There exist a variety of different understandings, definitions, and classifications of risk, which can make the resulting landscape of academic literature on the topic seem somewhat disjointed and often confusing. In this chapter, I will introduce a map on how to think about risks, and in particular uncertainty, which is arranged along the different questions of what the different academic disciplines find interesting about risk. This aims to give a more integrated idea of where the different literatures intersect and thus provide some order in our understanding of what risk is and what is interesting about it. One particular dimension will be presented in more detail, answering the question of what exactly we are uncertain about and distinguishing between five different levels of uncertainty. I will argue, through some concrete examples, that concentrating on the objects of uncertainty can give us an appreciation on how different perspectives on a given risk scenario are formed and will use the more general map to show how this perspective intersects with other classifications and analyses of risk.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Aven T, Renn O (2009) On risk defined as an event where the outcome is uncertain. J Risk Res 12(11):1–11
Bailer-Jones DM (2003) Scientists’ thoughts on scientific models. Perspect Sci 10:275–301
Beck U (1992) Risk society: towards a new modernity. Sage, London
Campbell S, Currie G (2006) Against beck: in defence of risk analysis. Philos Soc Sci 36(2):149–172
Carlyle T (1871) Oliver cromwell’s letters and speeches: with elucidations. Scribner, Welford, New York. http://www.gasl.org/refbib/Carlyle__Cromwell.pdf. Accessed 1 Sep 2010
Douglas M (1992) Risk and blame. Routledge, London
Edwards A, Elwy G, Covey J, Matthews E, Pill R (2001) Presenting risk information – a review of the effects of “framing” and other manipulations on patient outcomes. J Health Commun 6:61–82
European Union (2010) Implementation of directive 2009/31/EC on the geological storage of carbon dioxide. http://ec.europa.eu/clima/policies/lowcarbon/docs/GD1-CO2%20storage%20life%20cycle%20risk%20management-consultation.pdf. Accessed 31 Dec 2010
Funtowicz SO, Ravetz JR (1990) Uncertainty and quality in science for public policy. Kluwer, Dordrecht
Funtowicz SO, Ravetz JR (1993) Science for the post-normal age. Futures 25:739–755
Giddens A (1999) Risk and responsibility. Mod Law Rev 62:1–10
Gigerenzer G (2002) Reckoning with risk. Penguin, London
Gillies D (2000) Philosophical theories of probability. Routledge, London
Greenpeace (2008) False hope: why carbon capture and storage won’t save the climate. Greenpeace International, Amsterdam
Hacking I (1975) The emergence of probability. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Hillerbrand R (2009) Epistemic uncertainties in climate predictions. A challenge for practical decision making. Intergenerational Just Rev 9(3):94–99
Hoeting J, Madigan D, Raftery A, Volinsky CT (1999) Bayesian model averaging: a tutorial. Stat Sci 14:382–417
Hogg MA (2007) Social identity and the group context of trust: managing risk and building trust through belonging. In: Gutscher H, Siegrist M, Earle TC (eds) Trust in cooperative risk management. Earthscan, London, pp 51–72
Itaoka K, Saito A, Akai M (2004) Public acceptance of CO2 capture and storage technology: a survey of public opinion to explore influential factors. In: Rubin ES, Keith DW, Gilboy CF (eds) Proceedings of 7th international conference on greenhouse gas control technologies, 31 volume 1: Peer-reviewed papers and plenary presentations, IEA Greenhouse Gas Program, Cheltenham
Jasanoff S (2003) Technologies of humility: citizen participation in governing science. Minerva 41:223–244
Jaspers A (2009) Slapen met de ramen dicht. Natuur-Wetenschap & Techniek (NWT) 77(4):24–33
Jaspers A (2010) The view from technological journalism. FENCO workshop “CCS and public engagement”, Amsterdam
Joffe H (1999) Risk and “the other”. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Keynes JM (1937) The general theory. Q J Econ 51:209–233
Knight FH (1971) Risk, uncertainty and profit (reprint of the 1921 edn). University of Chicago Press, Chicago
Lahsen M (2005) Seductive simulations? Uncertainty distribution around climate models. Soc Stud Sci 35(6):895–922
Mander S, Polson D, Roberts T, Curtis A (2010) Risk from CO2 storage in saline aquifers: a comparison of lay and expert perceptions of risk. GHGT10, Amsterdam
Moscovici S (2000) Social representations. Polity Press, Cambridge
Norton J, Brown J, Mysiak J (2006) To what extent, and how, might uncertainty be defined? Comments engendered by “Defining uncertainty: a conceptual basis for uncertainty management in model-based decision support”: Walker et al., Integrated Assessment 4: 1, 2003. Integrated Ass J 6(1):83–88
Ravetz JR (2006) Post-normal science and the complexity of transitions towards sustainability. Ecol Complex 3:275–284
Raza Y (2009) Uncertainty analysis of capacity estimates and leakage potential for geologic storage of carbon dioxide in saline aquifers. Masters Thesis, MIT, Cambridge
Renn O, Klinke A (2004) Systemic risks: a new challenge for risk management. EMBO Rep 5(S1):S41–S46
Riesch H, Reiner D (submitted) Different levels of uncertainty in carbon capture and storage
Riesch H, Spiegelhalter DJ (2011) “Careless pork costs lives”: risk stories from science to press release to media“. Health Risk Soc 13(1):47–64
Roeser S (2009) The relation between cognition and affect in moral judgments about risk. In: Asveld L, Roeser S (eds) The ethics of technological risk. Earthscan, London, pp 182–201
Roeser S (2010) Intuitions, emotions an gut reactions in decisions about risks: towards a different interpretation of “neuroethics”. J Risk Res 13(2):175–190
Rumsfeld D (2002) Defense.gov News Transcript. http://www.defense.gov/transcripts/transcript.aspx?transc riptid=2636. Accessed 3 Dec 2010
Schneider SH, Turner BL, Garriga HM (1998) Imaginable surprise in global change science. J Risk Res 1(2):165–185
Shackley S, Wynne B (1996) Representing uncertainty in global climate change science and policy: boundary-ordering devices and authority. Sci Technol Hum Val 21(3):275–302
Slovic P (2000) The perception of risk. Earthscan, London
Slovic P, Finucane M, Peters E, MacGregor D (2004) Risk as analysis and risk as feelings: some thoughts about affect, reason, risk and rationality. Risk Anal 24(2):311–322
Sorensen R (2009) Epistemic paradoxes. In: Zalta E (ed) The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy. http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2009/entries/epistemic-paradoxes/. Accessed 31 Dec 2010
Spiegelhalter DJ (2010) Quantifying uncertainty. In: Paper presented at “Handling uncertainty in science”, Royal Society, London, 22–23 Mar 2010
Spiegelhalter DJ, Pearson M (2008) 2845 ways to spin the risk. http://understandinguncertainty.org/node/233. Accessed 31 Dec 2010
Spiegelhalter DJ, Riesch H (in press) Don’t know, can’t know: embracing scientific uncertainty when analysing risks. Philos T Roy Soc A
Stern N (2007) The economics of climate change. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Stirling A (2007) Risk, precaution and science: towards a more constructive policy debate. EMBO Rep 8(4):309–315
Sunstein CR (2005) Laws of fear. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Tajfel H (1981) Human groups and social categories: studies in social psychology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Taleb N (2007) The black swan: the impact of the highly improbable. Penguin, London
Upham P, Riesch H, Tomei, J Thornley P (2011) The sustainability of woody biomass supply for UK bioenergy: a post-normal approach to environmental risk and uncertainty. Environ Sci Policy 14(5):510–518
van Asselt MBA, Rotmans J (2002) Uncertainty in integrated assessment modelling: from positivism to pluralism. Clim Change 54:75–105
Walker WE, Harremoes P, Rotmans J, van der Sluijs JP, van Asselt MBA, Janssen P, Krayer von Krauss MP (2003) Defining uncertainty: a conceptual basis for uncertainty management in model-based decision support. Integrat Ass 4(1):5–17
Washer P (2004) Representations of SARS in the British newspapers. Soc Sci Med 59:2561–2571
WCRF (2007a) Food, nutrition, physical activity, and the prevention of cancer: a global perspective. WCRF, Washington DC
WCRF (2007b) Landmark report: Excess body fat causes cancer. http://www.wcrf-uk.org/press_media/releases/31102007.lasso. Accessed 13 Aug 2008
WCRF (2007c) Media quotes. http://www.wcrf-uk.org/press_media/quotes.lasso. Accessed 13 Aug 2008
Wynne B (1992) Uncertainty and environmental learning: reconceiving science and policy in the preventive paradigm. Global Environ Chang 2(2):111–127
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2012 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.
About this entry
Cite this entry
Riesch, H. (2012). Levels of Uncertainty. In: Roeser, S., Hillerbrand, R., Sandin, P., Peterson, M. (eds) Handbook of Risk Theory. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1433-5_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1433-5_4
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-007-1432-8
Online ISBN: 978-94-007-1433-5
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and Law