Christoph Rosol

Predoctoral Research Fellow

Bauhaus University Weimar

Residence: January 1, 2012–June 30, 2013

Profile

I studied history of science and cultural studies in Berlin and Toronto. Previously, I have been stipendiary of the German Historical Institute in Washington, D.C. in 2008 and the graduate program Media of History - History of Media (Erfurt, Weimar, Jena) from 2008 to 2011.

My research deals with the (pre)history and epistemic foundations of General Circulation Models (GCMs) which are derived from numerical weather prediction techniques but have now evolved into a core component of so called Earth System Models. Based on a historiographic reframing of the objects, techniques and longue-durée ideals of rationally modeling atmospheric motion – i.e. the excessively hybrid configuration of empirical, theoretical and technological practices that stabilized an epistemic manifestation of the unrepresentable – I argue for a reconceptualization of the notions of "uncertainty" and "scientific revolution" that are common terms in the literature on this subject.

During my stay at the MPIWG I work on a chapter that focuses on the analysis of climate records (specifically deep-sea sediment cores) and their operative role as data repository in constraining numerical experiments of paleoclimate reconstructions. By discussing an exemplary simulation of a possible pre-Quaternary analogue to current climatic change (the PETM) I am investigating the modes of representation, time evolution and non-linearity in modeling a climate history of the Earth.