''The Cold and the Dark: The World after Nuclear War'' is a 1984 book by

Paul R. Ehrlich Paul Ralph Ehrlich (born May 29, 1932) is an American biologist known for his warnings about the consequences of population growth and limited resources. He is the Bing Professor Emeritus of Population Studies of the Department of Biology of St ...

, Carl Sagan,

Donald Kennedy Donald Kennedy (August 18, 1931 – April 21, 2020) was an American scientist, public administrator, and academic. He served as Commissioner of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (1977–1979), President of Stanford University (1980– ...

, and

Walter Orr Roberts Walter Orr Roberts (August 20, 1915 – March 12, 1990) was an American astronomer and atmospheric physicist, as well as an educator, philanthropist, and builder. He founded the National Center for Atmospheric Research and took a personal research ...

Background

It makes dramatic long-lasting climate predictions of the effect a

nuclear winter Nuclear winter is a severe and prolonged global climatic cooling effect that is hypothesized to occur after widespread firestorms following a large-scale nuclear war. The hypothesis is based on the fact that such fires can inject soot into t ...

would have on the Earth, an event that is suggested by the authors to follow both a city countervalue strike during a nuclear war, and especially following strikes on oil refineries and fuel depots. The book was released following a highly publicised 1983 study co-authored by Sagan published in the journal ''Science''."Nuclear Winter: Global Consequences of Multiple Nuclear Explosions"
R. P. Turco, O. B. Toon, T. P. Ackerman, J. B. Pollack 2, and Carl Sagan, ''Science'', vol. 23, December 1983, Vol. 222. no. 4630, pp. 1283 - 1292

References

1984 non-fiction books American non-fiction books Books about nuclear issues Books by Paul R. Ehrlich English-language books Works about the theory of history Works by Carl Sagan Collaborative non-fiction books {{Nuclear-issue-book-stub