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Physics professor Richard Muller, chair of the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project.
When it comes to the politics of climate change, it's hard not to enjoy the story of Richard Muller, a Berkeley physics professor.
Not long after the so-called "Climategate" story, Muller, a self-proclaimed skeptic of global warming, created the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project to examine all of the available data, and resolve any lingering doubts. Conservatives were thrilled and quickly proclaimed they would accept whatever results Muller came up with. The Koch Foundation even gave Muller's project $150,000.
To put it mildly, the right was crushed last fall when Muller published the results of his research: the climate scientists have been right all along. "Global warming," Muller concluded, "is real."
That was in October. Over the weekend, Muller went even further in the New York Times, calling himself "a converted skeptic," and highlighting some additional findings of his research.
Last year, following an intensive research effort involving a dozen scientists, I concluded that global warming was real and that the prior estimates of the rate of warming were correct. I'm now going a step further: Humans are almost entirely the cause.
My total turnaround, in such a short time, is the result of careful and objective analysis by the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project, which I founded with my daughter Elizabeth. Our results show that the average temperature of the earth's land has risen by two and a half degrees Fahrenheit over the past 250 years, including an increase of one and a half degrees over the most recent 50 years. Moreover, it appears likely that essentially all of this increase results from the human emission of greenhouse gases.
These findings are stronger than those of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the United Nations group that defines the scientific and diplomatic consensus on global warming.
Remember, Muller's research was intended to prove the opposite. The physicist and his team even took the most common arguments raised by climate deniers, putting them to the test to see if skeptics' claims had merit. It's why the Kochs got out their checkbook in the first place.
But Muller is now telling his benefactors what they don't want to hear (a.k.a., the truth): the climate crisis is real and it's caused by human activity. Whether humanity chooses to deal with the reality of the crisis remains to be seen, but we can't say we weren't warned.
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He's obviously been swayed by extreme liberal theorists!!! LOL
Fun article :)
Seems the real deniers have had enough time to create a better spin. I wonder why they are so quiet for now?
No, no. He has not been "swayed" by liberals or by the evidence. He was an Obama plant all along; a dedicated 5th columnist communist who we should have seen coming. Look where he teaches: Berkeley.
There you go. That was a very good imitation.
I'm sure Pooper242 and his team of trolls will be here soon to chant the wingnut response to all real evidence: "Glo-bal warm-ing is a lib-er-al myth! Glo-bal warm-ing is a lib-er-al myth!"
Yep. They're just waiting for the talking points to be faxed in from Republican Noise Machine Meme Central. They got their unfettered market absolutists working feverishly on a confuse-the-issue response as we speak. It won't be long now till we find out what it is. I imagine the poor old folks over at MediaMatters.org will be the first to know because, unfortunately, they have to watch Fox (so that we don't have to).
Gee, Senator Inhofe must be fuming cause he said "G-d promised no more destruction after the flood". Can't wait to see what he's got to say now, what's that chirping I hear?
The climate is changing people, now how are we going to deal with it, and what are we willing to do to not make it worse for our children?
Where's shooter?
Berkeley, Flower Children, dope smoking hippies! Obviously the man caught him a case of the Liberals.
Trying to figure out how he can somehow write a comment about this that somehow simultaneously blames Obama for climate change, says there's no such thing and demands that Obama produce his actual original raised seal
birth certificatecollege transcripts.Our little Walter Mitty is an ignoramus about his chosen field -- economics -- and a gargantuan black hole of ignorance about science, and so even more when it comes to climate science and climate change. He's here to disrupt, and take the FoxTalkingPoints and FoxScienceFacts he gets from the good-hairs at Fox, the right-wing Noise Machine, and top climate researchers like Rush Limbaugh.
Everything the Useful Mitt-iot says about economics is complete bunk but when he starts spewing on science, it turns to true farce.
Well, Muller's "conversion" is gratifying, but there's still the matter of his silly arrogance in thinking that tens of thousands of careful (and equally honest) climate scientists previously had things all wrong, and it would be up to his personal brilliance to set the world straight.
(Next, I hear he's working on proving the atomic theory; he'll use a special whiz-bang algorithm to see whether electrons really are circling the nucleus made of protons and neutrons.)
Indeed. He still comes off as an arrogant a$$ that assumed the world couldn't consider the 150 years of climate science solid and reputable until an unsurpassed brilliant physicist like himself gave the final passing grade. The guy's an a$$, but at least he's provided some usefulness in this: a Koch-funded study showing the climate scientists got it right, and have even been conservative in its predictions.
The good ol' deniers hanging on over at Anthony Watt's site just had their testosterone levels drop.
I'm just relieved that he was honest about his results. That must have been difficult for him to do. If nothing else, arrogant as he is, he is at least honest.
I'd go one step further. Tell me again why is Muller relevant? Why do I care that a guy who was decades off the pace of climate science has caught up?
http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2012/07/28/muller-is-still-rubbish/
Muller may well be everything everyone says, but take our victories where we can get them.
Yes, good point. Always wise to accentuate the positive, and this story definitely has quite a few positive features.
Hey, if only we had a functioning press corps, we might be able to ask, say, the current GOP candidate for president what he thinks of Muller's analysis. Or, you know, maybe any of the 450 or so Republicans running for Congress. Can't wait to read what they say.
Oh, right.
Everybody should e-mail the NYT and tell them to start treating climage change as a science issue and not the idiotic manufactured political issue the noise-making anti-science unfettered market capitalist warriors still fighting Communism are trying to make it out to be.
- Executive Editor: executive-editor@nytimes.com
- Managing Editor: nytnews@nytimes.com
Let 'em have it.
Just why should I help the times to get real? If they want to pander to crazies why should I care? I have the option to ignore them and not buy their rag. Money talks in this new era.
Because you are not helping them. Money is talking now - but not in a way that helps the Earth and science. The NYT won't change unless they know they are going to be ridiculed. They are no better than the wingnuts on this. You are helping society by having a major news source get real on science, and when the media and press get real that sifts down in the zeitgeist whether people are conscious of it or not.
You make a strong case. Thanks.
I've noticed that Muller's made the rounds with his "conversion" - MSNBC, NPR, etc etc. After listening to several interviews, it's clear to me that the Brothers Koch and their buddies have now found it convenient to allow Muller to go public with this inevitable conclusion IN ORDER TO PROMOTE FRACKING!!! Admitting a "conversion" is small potatoes in the larger scheme of things, and has the priceless benefit of lulling the liberal media to sleep on this issue. Amazing how quickly he pivots from admitting "climate change is caused by humans" to "coal is bad and natural gas is good" to " we need to move forward with fracking so that we can use natural gas". You need to dig a little deeper when someone does such a spectacular 180.
BTW - did you know we can use bacteria to make natural gas from wastewater "biosolids"? Pity this is not more fully pursued. Seems like energy from s#*t would be a terrific idea.