Talk:List of climate scientists

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Copyright[edit]

As per the previous deletion, you must add a notice that you obtained permission to reproduce this copyrighted material. (The copyright notice is prominently displayed on the source page.--RandomHumanoid(⇒) 17:51, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This should be resolved now. -Atmoz (talk) 02:48, 5 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Scope[edit]

Is this list going to include only recent scientists holding a post in a recognized discipline of climate science, or would those with early theoretical contributions like Svante Arrhenius (1859-1927) and Joseph Fourier (1768-1830) be appropriate? N p holmes (talk) 11:33, 8 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see why the list wouldn't include Arrhenius and Fourier. -Atmoz (talk) 17:08, 8 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]
| I'm concerned that this list is impossible to maintain/build. Even if you keep it to "active" climate scientists and try to exclude cranks and non-climate scientists (e.g. Freeman Dyson), the list would be very long if you really want to recognize notable scientists. There would need to be some additional criteria to decide what distinguishes a notable climate scientist from a run-of-the-mill climate scientist. .Skymath (talk) 21:06, 3 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Which is why the list originally had cite counts. Tough to implement & maintain, though, and open to criticism on validity. The rule now seems to have become "only include climate scientists with individual WP pages". An odd basis indeed!--Gergyl (talk) 13:19, 6 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I am bit stunned by the audacity of this article. I had been wondering if there might be any justification for a list of relevant scientific articles, but was rather put off by the volume involved. (Probably some thousands of articles, and difficult to characterize which articles should be counted.) So to list the "scientists" – which presumably could be the authors of all these articles, although many are just bit players – is daunting, supporting the comment above that "this list is impossible to maintain/build".
As currently constituted the list seems to have taken a pragmatic approach (e.g., listing only "notable" scientists with Wiki pages). Which reminds me of the complaint in Talk:List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming#This page is dominated by Anthropogenic Global Warming activists that anti-GW scientists are included only if (amongst other criteria) they have Wiki pages. Which might seem fair enough if both lists are constrained to just those scientists who have Wiki pages. But this unstated constraint misleads the public who may reasonably expect an indication of what proportion the skeptics are to the entire global warming / climate change community of scientists. On this ground I see the very concept of this article as effectively impossible. A list of articles would be better, and even an article on key players in the development of the understanding of global warming (even if they don't have Wiki pages.) I think this article needs major reconsideration. - 00:02, 7 January 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by J. Johnson (talk • contribs)

Check the article "Expert credibility in climate change" just published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (available on-line) that analyzed the prominence of climate scientists. (See commentary at Science Daily and Science magazine.) In particular: after assembling a list of 1372 climate scientists, they eliminated everyone with fewer than twenty climate publications. And still had over 900 scientists. I suggest that 1) an actual "list of climate scientists" is way beyond the scope of an article, and 2) any sublist needs stringent (even drastic) and documented selection criteria. - J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:52, 3 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

People I've bioged[edit]

I used to do a few biogs of climate people, especially geoengineers and scientific leaders like Katherine Richardson. You mihgt wanna add my biogs to this list. I don't know how to find the articles I've created. Andrewjlockley (talk) 03:02, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]


A few potential additions[edit]

Don't have the time to do the legwork on this at the moment, but a few folks to consider adding:

Malte Meinshausen

Ben Santer

Judith Lean

Jeff Severinghaus

Gerald A. Meehl

Reto Knutti

Steve Sherwood

And hundreds of others whose name I don't have at the top of my head... This [1] might be a useful resource if you haven't seen it already.Zeke Hausfather (talk) 22:13, 4 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Why "List of climate scientists" is only from seniors :-) Let's add more young peoples (like Svensmark) !!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.228.230.250 (talk) 13:06, 17 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Henrik Svensmark[edit]

Heh Atmoz back OFF on reverting the Henrik Svensmark climate scientist addition. Cosmoclimatology theory is as relavant as AGW hypothosis —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.35.137.68 (talk) 16:57, 18 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]

TOC and the letter V[edit]

I just added a section for surnames starting with V to include David Vaughan. However, "V" does not show up in the TOC. Does anyone know why? Can anyone please fix that? Because I sure don't know how. Thanks.--CurtisSwain (talk) 20:14, 16 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Fixed. Not sure we need to only have the letters with scientists on them. I originally did it for aesthetic reasons. -Atmoz (talk) 23:46, 16 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, Atmoz the Wise One- Your commitment to aesthetics 'tis a worthy and noble goal to which all citizens must aspire. Keep it always thus. Now, let us share your alchemy with the masses: click on "edit this page" and you'll see {{AlphanumericTOC then a long vertical line with letters running down the left side. Those letters are the ones NOT included in the TOC. Then, you REMOVE the letter you wish to ADD to the TOC. Click "save page" ...and all shall be right in The Kingdom.--CurtisSwain (talk) 01:24, 17 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

list format[edit]

I find the commas on both sides of the parentheses in the current format (copied from some similar list, I think) odd. Anyone mind if I go through and change "Richard Alley, (1957- ), American" to "Richard Alley (1957- ), American" and so on? N p holmes (talk) 06:59, 18 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Go for it!--CurtisSwain (talk) 08:52, 18 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Blurbs[edit]

Upon reading a few blurbs, they seem to show only what these people have done as relates to modern climate, and do not summarize their notability in general. Is this good? I find it misleading/uninformative as to their scientific careers, or else I wouldn't be bringing it up, Awickert (talk) 07:50, 19 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure what you mean. The blurb should be about their major work as climate scientists, which is why they are notable. -Atmoz (talk) 01:24, 7 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Why is there blurb at all? William M. Connolley (talk) 08:49, 7 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]
To establish what makes them worth mentioning (because otherwise the list is just a duplicate of the category system)? N p holmes (talk) 09:22, 16 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Cruft[edit]

I toook out a whole pile of cruft Cla added. These people have wiki links; we don't need refs here William M. Connolley (talk) 09:04, 10 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If we would ever like to nominate this list for Featured List consideration, it will need at least one ref for each name. Would you be able to help me out with doing that, as well as adding more names? Cla68 (talk) 23:30, 10 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Actually I was thinking about nominating this list for deletion. Among many other problems, its purpose for existence is unclear and the criteria for inclusion are extraordinarily vague. (And really, Tim Ball does "weather research"??? He's done even less research on "weather" than he has on climate.) Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:30, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I was thinking that if this list was completed, then the List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming could be proposed again for deletion. Like I said on that page, there is such a wide variety of opinion on the cause, severity, and impact of climate change and the numerous components that make up climate science that trying to label scientists as "for" or "against" seems to be to be highly problemmatic. I think a generic list of all scientists with Wikipedia BLPs that have made any significant contribution to climate science without any commentary on their stance on global warming is much simpler and easier to keep NPOV. Cla68 (talk) 01:37, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Again, the criteria are too vague. For example, what does "any significant contribution to climate science" mean? What's a "scientist"? Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 01:55, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
You're probably right that the criteria is too vague. I never would have thought that a statistician could be included on this list before I read about the Hockey stick controversy. So, where is the line drawn between what is and isn't a significant contribution to climate science? Cla68 (talk) 04:11, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I have my ideas on where the line should be drawn (e.g., well north of Tim Ball, who has a lower h-index than many of our grad students), and you likely have yours. But there needs to be a line. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 14:34, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
A little late to the party, but I was busy this last week. After it was decided at AfD to keep and cleanup this list, However, the criteria I used to determine if someone was notable enough to be included was that a secondary source had to say why they were notable. Hence the cruft at the bottom of the list. -Atmoz (talk) 22:57, 14 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I'm no expert, but journalist Peter Hadfield's Youtube Videos and accompanying citations certainly make me skeptical of Timothy Ball's credentials to be listed as a Climate Scientist.--Lilliputian's Coo (talk) 15:12, 23 September 2010 (UTC)[reply]

If we would ever like to nominate this list for Featured List consideration - if FL requires filling the list with cruft, then lets just not bother with FL status. Or if you have a burning desire to take some list to FL, find another one William M. Connolley (talk) 14:52, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I can't see this becoming an FL anyway. To begin with, it would need to be "complete". Which means it would need to include everyone who met some sort of external criterion for inclusion. What would that external criterion be? And then it would need to include everyone who met that criterion who was notable enough for a WP bio. Which, I assume, is everyone who passes that oh so subjective WP:PROF. Finding everyone who met that criterion would be challenging, to say the least. Guettarda (talk) 15:50, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
@Cla, if you want to make a list of climate scientists a featured list - then i suggest that you start with List of authors from Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis - which has A) A chance of being complete B) All names on the list would match WP:PROF, and thus should have an article (sorry Boris) C) Are real climate scientists. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 16:30, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, that's a very good idea. Related lists that have a more limited scope would be better suited for expansion first before this one. Cla68 (talk) 22:47, 11 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]
A list of prominent climate scientists may be available, but shows the basic concept to be impractible. See the comment above. - J. Johnson (JJ) (talk) 20:59, 3 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Removing two names[edit]

Timothy F. Ball and Krishna AchutaRao

I'm considering removing both of these. I decided against being bold, because I came here on it being used as an example in another dispute. However the list says it's for "famous or otherwise notable persons" which makes sense since we can't list every single climate scientist in the world. And it's questionable if this applies to these two people, as shown in the AFDs. There's one more red link I'll leave in as it hasn't been tested yet. BTW, please refrain from referring to these people by name if possible. I purposely formatted this comment to make it easy to blank out the names later which I feel is for the best for BLP reasons. Nil Einne (talk) 01:33, 24 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

WP:LISTPEOPLE may be relevant. -Atmoz (talk) 19:53, 24 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Not sure if I waited long enough but since the primary person who may be interested is I guess aware of this discussion and hasn't raised any objections, removed. Will leave the names for a few days longer (if I forget feel free to remove) Nil Einne (talk) 00:13, 25 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Two names that need to be added. The article has Suyotoro Manabe but his collaborator on their seminal paper in 1967 Roger Wetherald ismissing.

Also Gilbert Plass - arguably the person who set the ball rolling on calculation of the GH effect and AGW is also missing. He has his own Wiki entry, but no entry here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Glenn Tamblyn (talk • contribs) 10:50, 3 December 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Delete the dead guys from the list too. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:569:BE21:100:ADAB:DEF0:9FE3:6BBA (talk) 03:28, 27 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Bias[edit]

The list is presently heavily skewed toward scientists who are politically active contrarians against the mainstream scientific community, rather than scientists who have made significant contributions to climate science. Here, for example, is a list of the 3000+ most-cited climate scientists. --The Cunctator (talk) 19:06, 15 March 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I've just added several dozen links to existing bios of climate scientists, drawing on blue links in List_of_authors_of_Climate_Change_2007:_The_Physical_Science_Basis, etc. This should alleviate some of your legitimate concern about the prior overweighting of contrarian names. Birdbrainscan (talk) 18:27, 18 March 2015 (UTC)birdbrainscan[reply]
It's much better but it still overweights contrarians - I count about 10 out of 200 names when the representative sample is more like 2-3 out of 100. So basically if the list of 10 contrarian/skeptic/deniers remains there should be another 100 prominent climate scientists added to get closer to a proper reflection of the actual field. --The Cunctator (talk) 23:30, 22 March 2015 (UTC)
Are you suggesting eliminating the names of actual climate scientists from the list to demonstrate a particular political point?
I believe that would amount to censorship, and also raise POV issues.

Position on AGW[edit]

How about adding some sort of code (an asterisk, for example) either to all those scientists who do support the alleged consensus on anthropogenic global warming -- or adding the designation to those who don't support that position? This would make the list doubly useful. 74.95.43.249 (talk) 20:53, 16 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

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Missing climatologists/NPOV discussion July 2017[edit]

User:Hob Gadling has done a good job summarizing the re-emergent NPOV problem of overweighting contrarians. See 2015 discussion above. --The Cunctator (talk) 23:31, 6 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

User:Handwerker has added some names to the list today, which, by some weird coincidence, are all on the List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming.

So I made a list of names which are categorized in Category:Climatologists or its subcategories (except Category:Indian meteorologists, which is the only subcat both of this and of Category:Meteorologists) but are not in this list:


On the other hand, these people are in the list but not in the cat. Some of them do not have an article, and one of them (Bard) has one in the French WP:

Hope this helps. --Hob Gadling (talk) 19:29, 28 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Ethnic bias?[edit]

About half of the authors publishing in the field today have East Asian names. Eg.:

http://journals.ametsoc.org/toc/clim/current
Keith McClary (talk) 21:38, 15 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • I doubt it -- I think the list you see is a product of self-selection, not bias in the choices for the list. Americans learn from their leader. They aspire to go to business school. STEM is for foreigners. (Brutal but true.) Rhadow (talk) 21:45, 15 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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How about converting alphabetical list into a sortable table?[edit]

A list is good, but I am tempted to think that it would be more valuable if it was parsed into a sortable table including columns such as:

  • Name
  • Institution
  • Country
  • Number of climate related papers published
  • Specialty
  • ?

I realize that there are a great many possible variables that could be used for columns, but I perhaps just a few choice columns would already add value. Comments?
Enquire (talk) 05:10, 16 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support. After typing "List of " in the search box, I looked at a half-dozen articles, all of which had one or more tables. I don't envy the poor soul who does the conversion here, but I agree with the concept. Remember (I think) to make it alphabetize by family name. —RCraig09 (talk) 05:42, 16 March 2021 (UTC)[reply]

More entries[edit]

I collected some names that are not in the list, but the descriptions are still missing:

--Hob Gadling (talk) 12:34, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Some of those are already there, I just noticed. James Hansen, for example, is already in the list but as a redirect. The list originates from "What links here" for climate change. I grouped the articles into climatologists, activists, and denialists. I may have put some names in there that do not belong. --Hob Gadling (talk) 12:39, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Singer[edit]

[2] he clearly meets the basic criteria

The criteria are persons who have contributed to the study of climate science. Our article Fred Singer does not mention climate in the "Career" part, except in the context of teaching. It only appeared in the "Public debates" section and in the intro.

So, @Jonathan A Jones:, please explain how Singer has "clearly" contributed to the study of climate science. (Misinformation does not count.) Did he also "contribute to the study of oncology" by lying about the connection between smoking and cancer? --Hob Gadling (talk) 05:52, 15 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

"Fred Singer ... was an Austrian-born American physicist and emeritus professor of environmental science at the University of Virginia, trained as an atmospheric physicist ... He became a leading figure in early space research, was involved in the development of earth observation satellites, and in 1962 established the National Weather Bureau's Satellite Service Center. He was the founding dean of the University of Miami School of Environmental and Planetary Sciences in 1964, and held several government positions, including deputy assistant administrator for the Environmental Protection Agency". I would suggest that atmospheric physics and earth observation are signiifcant aspects of climate science, particularly in the context of environmental science and environmental protection. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 09:28, 15 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
professor of environmental science Not a contribution to climate science.
trained as Not a contribution to climate science.
space research Not a contribution to climate science.
involved in the development of earth observation satellites Not a contribution to climate science.
established the National Weather Bureau's Satellite Service Center Not a contribution to climate science.
founding dean Not a contribution to climate science.
held several government positions Not a contribution to climate science.
So, you have nothing.
And mentioning "environmental protection" in connetion to him is real chuzpe He was an opponent of environmental protection! --Hob Gadling (talk) 07:43, 9 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
That's an idiosyncratic assessment. I get that you didn't like him or agree with him, but inclusion on this list is not about that sort of thing: climate science is a very broad field, particularly so in its early days, and a wide range of people have worked in it. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 20:18, 10 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
"Worked on" does not mean "contribute to". It can also mean "detracted from", as in Singer's case.
You have not made a valid case that Singer has "contributed to the study of climate science". He should be deleted from the list. --Hob Gadling (talk) 06:59, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You have not made a convincing case for deletion, but I suspect we will have to agree to disagree on that. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 10:27, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The onus is on keepers, not on deleters. --Hob Gadling (talk) 12:45, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Hob Gadling. It's a stretch, and arguably an insult to climate scientists, to characterize Singer a climate scientist. —RCraig09 (talk) 14:20, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]
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