Options to reduce the consequences of climate change generally fall into four broad categories: 1) mitigation-efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 2) adaptation-increasing society’s capacity to cope with changes in climate 3) geoengineering or Earth manipulation-additional, deliberate intervention in the Earth system that tries to counteract some of the impacts of greenhouse gas emissions and 4) pursuit of additional knowledge-efforts to understand more about the climate system, our impact on it, the consequences, or the response options themselves. Options to Reduce the Consequences of Climate Change These four overarching characteristics of the consequences to people from climate change are well-established, unlikely to change with any additional information, and could inform decision-making on the issue. The consequences to people from climate change have four overarching characteristics: 1) the consequences are already occurring and will almost certainly get worse 2) larger and faster climate changes have greater consequences 3) very serious and catastrophic consequences are more likely than most realize and 4) we could respond in ways that lessen the consequences and broadly benefit people by reducing the amount and speed of climate change, and/or by improving people's ability to deal with unavoidable impacts. The Dangers and Consequences of Climate Change