Will humans adapt to climate change? Will our genetics alter?

Thank you for this excellent question. I am not an expert in genetics and don’t believe that there is currently any evidence of true genetic adaptation to climate change. Authors such as Donna Harraway have speculated about this in works that use writing styles similar to science fiction (e.g her book “Staying with the Trouble”). However at the moment works like this are “thought experiments” which imagine what genetic adaptation might be like, rather than science based on genetic evidence. 

There are many other ways that human societies are starting to adapt to our changing climates. Some of this change involves large-scale changes to the way societies live every day, e.g changing our power and transport systems to renewable energy rather than systems reliant on fossil fuels. For example, it’s no mean feat to change our current transport systems from petrol cars to predominantly electric vehicles.  However, countries like Aotearoa New Zealand are currently preparing their infrastructure to do just that. This is an example of large-scale adaptation.  

In terms of our bodies dealing with extremes in temperature (e.g hotter summers), there are limits to how our bodies can deal with this and still maintain a healthy core temperature. For example if we live in hotter, more humid conditions (e.g higher than 33 degrees Celsius), we would need to be careful to avoid heat exhaustion by drinking more fluids and being careful what time of the day we exert ourselves. Many people in the world already live in very hot places, and generally their housing and lifestyles reflect sensible ways to live in these conditions. It’s possible that some of these ways of life will become more common in other parts of the world if the weather is consistently warmer.