Roger Revelle

Roger Revelle (March 7, 1909 – July 15, 1991) was one of the first scientists to predict and study global warming and the movement of Earth's tectonic plates, and was also instrumental in the formation of the University of California, San Diego. One of the world's most articulate spokesmen for science, he made his first mark in oceanography as a scientist, explorer and an administrator. The son of two schoolteachers in Seattle, he attended Pomona College and under the influence of charismatic professor Alfred Woodward, became interested in geology. In 1936, he earned his doctorate from the University of California at Berkeley, and soon was on a path of leadership in international scientific affairs. One of his first major accomplishments was his proposal that the continuing addition of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere, oceans, and biosphere could lead to global warming. In a seminal paper in 1957, Dr. Revelle argued that the world's citizenry was performing "a great geophysical experiment" and called on the scientific community to monitor changes in the carbon dioxide content of the waters and the air. He later argued that the developing nations of the world were demanding special treatment on the limitations on the combustion of fossil fuels and that the carbon dioxide problem had become a "global economic experiment." In the 1950s, he was the intellectual architect for the creation of a University of California campus at La Jolla which involved the establishment of "a modern-day Athens where scholars would have a golden environment in which to think and create" with a heavy concentration on graduate education. Professor Revelle played a key role in the founding, in 1970, of the Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment of the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU). In 1986, he underscored the committee's initiatives to "understand the interaction of the great global physical, chemical, and biological systems regulating Earth's favorable environment for life, and the influence of human activity on that environment." From 1964 to 1974, Dr. Revelle was the Director of the Center for Population Studies at Harvard University. In 1976, he returned to UC San Diego as a professor of science and public policy. In 1991, Dr. Revelle received the National Medal of Science from President George H.W. Bush as one of the twentieth century's most eminent scientists. Roger Revelle addressed the student delegates at the 1985 Achievement Summit in Denver, Colorado and spoke about his lifetime as a scientist, educator, and environmentalist.