The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet

“You sweat. Your heart races. You’re thirsty. Your vision blurs. The sun feels like the barrel of a gun pointed at you.”

Goodell uses a series of short, staccato phrases to create a sense of urgency and discomfort. Each clause is a simple yet intense description of bodily reactions to extreme heat. Goodell’s rapid-fire observations attempt to draw the reader into an immediate, sensory experience, simulating the physical impact of heat on the body.

“The harshest truth about life on a superheated planet is this: as temperatures rise, a lot of living things will die, and that may include people you know and love.”

Goodell seeks to tap into the reader’s fears by personalizing the effects of climate change. Instead of keeping the consequences abstract or distant, he shifts the focus to the second person—to people “you know and love.” This use of pathos brings the issue closer to home, triggering concern not just for the general environment but for loved ones. Goodell makes the potential losses intimate, increasing the emotional stakes.

“At one point, they [Gerrish and Chung] asked a local contractor to make their daughter’s bedroom cooler because it was ‘too stuffy.’”

Irony lies in Gerrish and Chung’s ability to control something as minor as the temperature in a room while being powerless against the larger, more dangerous force of nature. People often focus on the small discomforts of everyday life while overlooking or underestimating much larger risks, like extreme heat. Goodell uses this anecdote to show how easily we can be lulled into a false sense of security by managing small problems—a key idea in his discussion of the