The original version of this blog – written by Giacomo Grassi, with contributions from Stefano Caserini, Giorgio Vacchiano, Gianni Comoretto, Claudio della Volpe, and Mario Grosso - appeared in the Italian climate website Climalteranti. The version here has been checked and further enriched by Pierre Friedlingstein (Global Carbon Project).
“Everything is determined, the beginning as well as the end, by forces over which we have no control. It is determined for the insect, as well as for the star. Human beings, vegetables, or cosmic dust, we all dance to a mysterious tune, intoned in the distance by an invisible piper.” ― Albert Einstein