About

Deborah R. Coen is a historian of science whose research focuses on the modern physical and environmental sciences and on central European intellectual and cultural history. She earned an A.B. in Physics from Harvard, an M.Phil. in History and Philosophy of Science from Cambridge, and a Ph.D. in History of Science from Harvard, where she was also a Junior Fellow of the Society of Fellows. Before joining Yale, she taught for ten years in the History Department at Barnard College and served as Director of Research Clusters for the Columbia Center for Science and Society. At Yale, she is a member of the steering committee of the Environmental Humanities Initiative. Her scholarly work includes the book 'Climate in Motion: Science, Empire, and the Problem of Scale,' which received the 2019 Pfizer Award from the History of Science Society, as well as 'The Earthquake Observers: Disaster Science from Lisbon to Richter,' a finalist for the Turku Book Prize, and 'Vienna in the Age of Uncertainty,' which won multiple awards. Her research explores the history of the physical and environmental sciences, climate change, and the cultural history of Central Europe.

Research topics

• Political Science
• Computer Science
• Sociology
• Law
• Environmental ethics
• Epistemology
• Engineering
• Ecology
• Social Science
• Engineering ethics
• Human–computer interaction
• Geology
• Business
• Knowledge management
• Earth science
• Management

Selected publications

• Zgodovina podnebne znanosti

  Filozofski vestnik · 2026-01-07

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Standardne zgodovine podnebne znanosti prikazujejo dolgo in imenitno razvojno pot raziskovanja antropogenega globalnega segrevanja. Tovrstni opisi izpostavljajo posamične fizike iz 19. in 20. stoletja, ki so ugotovili, da lahko kurjenje fosilnih goriv privede do ogrevanja Zemlje, vendar so jih pri tem sodobniki na videz ignorirali. Ta zapis se bo namesto tega osredotočil na prvine, ki v standardni pripovedi umanjkajo. Organiziran je okoli treh zgodovinskih procesov, ki so neizbrisno zaznamovali zgodovino znanosti o podnebju: teoretskih razmišljanj o razlikah med ljudmi, širjenja imperijev in industrializacije. Geografsko se bomo pri tem osredotočili na Evropo in njene kolonije. Zgodovinski opisi podnebne znanosti, ki zanemarjajo njene povezave z evropskim kolonializmom in rasnim kapitalizmom, prinašajo nevarnost zacementiranja znanstvene kulture, ki te oblike zatiranja nadaljuje. Ta zapis se začenja s pregledom, kako se je pomen besede »podnebje« med zgodnjo moderno dobo in 19. stoletjem spreminjal v odgovor na geografska poročila evropskih popotnikov in zdravnikov ter v spregi s preobrazbo atmosfere v predmet laboratorijskega proučevanja. Zadnje poglavje to zgodovino privede do sedanjosti, pri čemer sledi dediščini kolonializma v dobo digitalnih podnebnih modelov.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• The history of climate science

  DiRROS repository (University of Maribor) · 2026-01-07

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Standardne zgodovine podnebne znanosti prikazujejo dolgo in imenitno razvojno pot raziskovanja antropogenega globalnega segrevanja. Tovrstni opisi izpostavljajo posamične fizike iz 19. in 20. stoletja, ki so ugotovili, da lahko kurjenje fosilnih goriv privede do ogrevanja Zemlje, vendar so jih pri tem sodobniki na videz ignorirali. Ta zapis se bo namesto tega osredotočil na prvine, ki v standardni pripovedi umanjkajo. Organiziran je okoli treh zgodovinskih procesov, ki so neizbrisno zaznamovali zgodovino znanosti o podnebju: teoretskih razmišljanj o razlikah med ljudmi, širjenja imperijev in industrializacije. Geografsko se bomo pri tem osredotočili na Evropo in njene kolonije. Zgodovinski opisi podnebne znanosti, ki zanemarjajo njene povezave z evropskim kolonializmom in rasnim kapitalizmom, prinašajo nevarnost zacementiranja znanstvene kulture, ki te oblike zatiranja nadaljuje. Ta zapis se začenja s pregledom, kako se je pomen besede »podnebje« med zgodnjo moderno dobo in 19. stoletjem spreminjal v odgovor na geografska poročila evropskih popotnikov in zdravnikov ter v spregi s preobrazbo atmosfere v predmet laboratorijskega proučevanja. Zadnje poglavje to zgodovino privede do sedanjosti, pri čemer sledi dediščini kolonializma v dobo digitalnih podnebnih modelov.

  Publisher

• Earth Virtualization Engines (EVE)

  Earth system science data · 2024-04-30 · 37 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract. To manage Earth in the Anthropocene, new tools, new institutions, and new forms of international cooperation will be required. Earth Virtualization Engines is proposed as an international federation of centers of excellence to empower all people to respond to the immense and urgent challenges posed by climate change.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Reimagining Earth in the Earth System

  Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems · 2024-08-01 · 29 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Terrestrial, aquatic, and marine ecosystems regulate climate at local to global scales through exchanges of energy and matter with the atmosphere and assist with climate change mitigation through nature‐based climate solutions. Climate science is no longer a study of the physics of the atmosphere and oceans, but also the ecology of the biosphere. This is the promise of Earth system science: to transcend academic disciplines to enable study of the interacting physics, chemistry, and biology of the planet. However, long‐standing tension in protecting, restoring, and managing forest ecosystems to purposely improve climate evidences the difficulties of interdisciplinary science. For four centuries, forest management for climate betterment was argued, legislated, and ultimately dismissed, when nineteenth century atmospheric scientists narrowly defined climate science to the exclusion of ecology. Today's Earth system science, with its roots in global models of climate, unfolds in similar ways to the past. With Earth system models, geoscientists are again defining the ecology of the Earth system. Here we reframe Earth system science so that the biosphere and its ecology are equally integrated with the fluid Earth to enable Earth system prediction for planetary stewardship. Central to this is the need to overcome an intellectual heritage to the models that elevates geoscience and marginalizes ecology and local land knowledge. The call for kilometer‐scale atmospheric and ocean models, without concomitant scientific and computational investment in the land and biosphere, perpetuates the geophysical view of Earth and will not fully provide the comprehensive actionable information needed for a changing climate.

  PublisherDOI

• Comment on essd-2023-376

  2023-09-24

  peer-reviewOpen accessCorresponding

  <strong class="journal-contentHeaderColor">Abstract.</strong> To manage Earth in the Anthropocene, new tools, new institutions, and new forms of international cooperation will be required. Earth Virtualization Engines are proposed as international federation of centers of excellence to empower all people to respond to the immense and urgent challenges posed by climate change.

  PublisherDOI

• Placing diverse knowledge systems at the core of transformative climate research

  AMBIO · 2023 · 81 citations

  • Sociology
  • Political Science
  • Social Science

  We argue that solutions-based research must avoid treating climate change as a merely technical problem, recognizing instead that it is symptomatic of the history of European and North American colonialism. It must therefore be addressed by decolonizing the research process and transforming relations between scientific expertise and the knowledge systems of Indigenous Peoples and of local communities. Partnership across diverse knowledge systems can be a path to transformative change only if those systems are respected in their entirety, as indivisible cultural wholes of knowledge, practices, values, and worldviews. This argument grounds our specific recommendations for governance at the local, national, and international scales. As concrete mechanisms to guide collaboration across knowledge systems, we propose a set of instruments based on the principles of consent, intellectual and cultural autonomy, and justice. We recommend these instruments as tools to ensure that collaborations across knowledge systems embody just partnerships in support of a decolonial transformation of relations between human communities and between humanity and the more-than-human world.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Comment on essd-2023-376

  2023-10-29

  peer-reviewOpen accessCorresponding

  <strong class="journal-contentHeaderColor">Abstract.</strong> To manage Earth in the Anthropocene, new tools, new institutions, and new forms of international cooperation will be required. Earth Virtualization Engines are proposed as international federation of centers of excellence to empower all people to respond to the immense and urgent challenges posed by climate change.

  PublisherDOI

• Earth Virtualization Engines (EVE)

  2023 · 9 citations

  • Political Science
  • Political Science
  • Earth science

  Abstract. To manage Earth in the Anthropocene, new tools, new institutions, and new forms of international cooperation will be required. Earth Virtualization Engines are proposed as international federation of centers of excellence to empower all people to respond to the immense and urgent challenges posed by climate change.

  PublisherDOI

• Between History and Earth System Science

  Isis · 2022-05-23 · 10 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  The Anthropocene is the signature concept of the new discipline of Earth System science (ESS). This essay argues that ESS is, first and foremost, a framework for interdisciplinary collaboration, and it considers the advantages and disadvantages to historians of adopting this framework. The authors conclude that the epistemological framework of ESS devalues the role of historical interpretation and evinces a self-defeating tendency toward Holocene nostalgia. A historically informed response to the present environmental crisis needs to attend to historical forces that remain invisible to ESS, such as the technological agency of nondominant actors.

  PublisherDOI

• Introduction: Critical and historical perspectives on usable climate science

  Climatic Change · 2022-05-01 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• When Climate Changed: The Fall of Empires and the Rise of a New Science

  NSF · $127k · 2009–2013

Frequent coauthors

• Daniela Jacob

  Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon

  6 shared

• Hartwig Anzt

  4 shared

• Veronika Eyring

  Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt e. V. (DLR)

  4 shared

• Silvina A. Solman

  Instituto Franco-Argentino sobre Estudios de Clima y sus Impactos

  4 shared

• David N. Bresch

  Zürich Airport (Switzerland)

  4 shared

• William R. Wieder

  Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research

  4 shared

• Sandrine Bony

  Sorbonne Université

  4 shared

• T. C. Schulthess

  4 shared

Awards & honors

• 2019 Pfizer Award from the History of Science Society
• Finalist for the Turku Book Prize from the European Society…
• Susan Abrams Prize from the University of Chicago Press
• Barbara Jelavich Prize from the Association for Slavic, East…
• Austrian Cultural Forum Book Prize