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Richard Siegmund Lindzen (born February 8, 1940) is an American atmospheric physicist known for his work in the dynamics of the middle atmosphere, atmospheric tides, and ozone photochemistry. He is the author of more than 200 scientific papers. From 1972 to 1982, he served as the Gordon McKay Professor of Dynamic Meteorology at Harvard University. In 1983, he was appointed as the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology at the MIT, where he would remain until his retirement in 2013. Lindzen has disputed the scientific consensus on climate change and criticizes what he has called "climate alarmism".
Lindzen attended the Bronx High School of Science, where he won Regents' and National Merit Scholarships, then Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute before matriculating at Harvard University. In 1960, he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in physics, magna cum laude, followed by a Master of Science degree in applied mathematics in 1961 and a Ph.D. in applied mathematics in 1964. His doctoral thesis, Radiative and photochemical processes in strato- and mesospheric dynamics, was about the interactions of ozone photochemistry, radiative transfer, and dynamics in the middle atmosphere.
Lindzen is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the Science, Health, and Economic Advisory Council at the Annapolis Center for Science-Based Public Policy. He joined MIT in 1983, prior to which he held positions at the University of Washington (1964–65), the Institute for Theoretical Meteorology at the University of Copenhagen, the University of Oslo (1965–67), the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) (1966–67), and the University of Chicago (1968–72). From 1972 to 1982, he served as the Gordon McKay Professor of Dynamic Meteorology at Harvard University. Lindzen also briefly held a position of visiting lecturer at UCLA in 1967.
As of January 2010, his publications list included 230 papers and articles published between 1965 and 2008, with five in process for 2009. He is the author of a standard textbook on atmospheric dynamics, and co-authored the monograph Atmospheric Tides with Sydney Chapman.
He was Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology at MIT from 1983, until his retirement which was reported in the Spring 2013 newsletter of MIT's Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences (EAPS). On December 27, 2013, the Cato Institute announced his appointment as a Distinguished Senior Fellow in its Center for the Study of Science.
Lindzen's work on ozone photochemistry has been important in studies that look at the effects that anthropogenic ozone depletion will have on climate.See for instance the widely cited study The Lindzen and Blake formalism is used in the parameterization of radiative-photochemical damping (see Appendix A).
Nevertheless, the predictions of classical tidal theory still did not agree with observations. It was Lindzen, in his 1966 paper, On the theory of the diurnal tide, who showed that the solution set of Hough functions given by Bernhard Haurwitz to Laplace's tidal equation was incomplete: modes with negative equivalent depths had been omitted. Lindzen went on to calculate the thermal response of the diurnal tide to ozone and water vapor absorption in detail and showed that when his theoretical developments were included, the surface pressure oscillation was predicted with approximately the magnitude and phase observed, as were most of the features of the diurnal wind oscillations in the mesosphere. In 1967, along with his NCAR colleague, Douglas D. McKenzie, Lindzen extended the theory to include a term for Newtonian cooling due to emission of infrared radiation by carbon dioxide in the stratosphere along with ozone photochemical processes, and then in 1968 he showed that the theory also predicted that the semi-diurnal oscillation would be insensitive to variations in the temperature profile, which is why it is observed so much more strongly and regularly at the surface.
While holding the position of research scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in Boulder, Colorado Lindzen was noticed and befriended by Professor Sydney Chapman, who had contributed to the theory of atmospheric tides in a number of papers from the 1920s through to the 1940s. This led to their joint publication in 1969 of a 186-page monograph (republished in 1970 as a book) Atmospheric Tides. 200 pp.
Lindzen recalls his discovery of the mechanism underlying the QBO in the semi-autobiographical review article, On the development of the theory of the QBO. His interest in the phenomenon began in 1961 when his PhD advisor, Richard M. Goody, speculated that the 26-month relaxation time for stratospheric ozone at in the tropics might somehow be related to the 26-month period of the QBO, and suggested investigation of this idea as a thesis topic. In fact, Lindzen's, Radiative and photochemical processes in mesospheric dynamics, Part II: Vertical propagation of long period disturbances at the equator, documented the failure of this attempt to explain the QBO.
Lindzen's work on atmospheric tides led him to the study of planetary waves and the general circulation of atmospheres. By 1967, he had contributed a number of papers on the theory of waves in the middle atmosphere. In Planetary waves on beta planes, he developed a beta plane for simplifying the equations of classical tidal theory, whilst at the same time developing planetary wave relations. He noticed from his equations that eastward-traveling waves (known as Rossby waves since their discovery in 1939 by Carl-Gustav Rossby) and westward-traveling waves (which Lindzen himself helped in establishing as "kelvin waves") with periods less than five days were "vertically trapped." At the same time, an important paper by Booker and Bretherton appeared, which Lindzen read with great interest. Booker and Bretherton showed that vertically propagating gravity waves were completely absorbed at a critical level.
In his 1968 paper with James R. Holton, A theory of the quasi-biennial oscillation, Lindzen presented his theory of the QBO after testing it in a two-dimensional (2-D) numerical model that had been developed by Holton and John M. Wallace. They showed that the QBO could be driven by vertically propagating gravity waves with phase speeds in both westward and eastward directions and that the oscillation arose through a mechanism involving a two-way feedback between the waves and the mean flow. It was a bold conjecture, given that there was very little observational evidence available to either confirm or confute the hypothesis. In particular, there was still no observational evidence of the westward-traveling "Kelvin" waves; Lindzen postulated their existence theoretically.
In the years following the publication of Lindzen and Holton (1968), more observational evidence became available, and Lindzen's fundamental insight into the mechanism driving the QBO was confirmed. However, the theory of interaction via critical level absorption was found to be incomplete and was modified to include the importance of attenuation due to radiative cooling. The revised theory was published in the Holton and Lindzen (1972) paper, An updated theory for the quasibiennial cycle of the tropical stratosphere.
During this time, Lindzen published some research on gravity waves, as well as Hadley circulations. He is named as one of 16 Scientific Members of the team authoring the National Academy of Sciences 1975 publication Understanding Climatic Change: A Program for Action. Understanding Climate Change , National Academy of Sciences 1975, full text and pdf scan available at the Internet Archive
Lindzen has expressed his concern over the validity of climate model used to predict future climate change. Lindzen said that predicted warming may be overestimated because of their handling of the climate system's water vapor feedback. The feedback due to water vapor is a major factor in determining how much warming would be expected to occur with increased atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, and all existing computer models assume positive feedback — that is, that as the climate warms, the amount of water vapour held in the atmosphere will increase, leading to further warming. By contrast, Lindzen believes that temperature increases will actually cause more extensive drying due to increased areas of atmospheric subsidence as a result of the Iris effect, nullifying future warming. This claim was criticized by climatologist Gavin Schmidt, Director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, who notes the more generally-accepted understanding of the effects of the Iris effect and cites empirical cases where large and relatively rapid changes in the climate such as El Niño events, the Ultra-Plinian eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991, and recent trends in global temperature and water vapor levels show that, as predicted in the generally-accepted view, water vapor increases as the temperature increases, and decreases as temperatures decrease.
Contrary to the IPCC's assessment in 2001, Lindzen said that climate models are inadequate. Despite accepted errors in their models, e.g., treatment of clouds, modelers still thought their climate predictions were valid. Lindzen has stated that due to the non-linear effects of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, CO2 levels are now around 30% higher than pre-industrial levels but temperatures have responded by about 75% of the expected value for a doubling of CO2. The IPCC (2007) estimates that the expected rise in temperature due to a doubling of CO2 to be about , ± 1.5°. Lindzen has given estimates of the Earth's climate sensitivity to be 0.5 °C based on ERBE data. These estimates were criticized by Kevin E. Trenberth and others, and Lindzen accepted that his paper included "some stupid mistakes". When interviewed, he said "It was just embarrassing", and added that "The technical details of satellite measurements are really sort of grotesque." Lindzen and Choi revised their paper and submitted it to PNAS. The four reviewers of the paper, two of whom had been selected by Lindzen, strongly criticized the paper and PNAS rejected it for publication. Lindzen and Choi then succeeded in getting a little known Korean journal to publish it as a 2011 paper. Andrew Dessler published a paper which found errors in Lindzen and Choi 2011, and concluded that the observations it had presented "are not in fundamental disagreement with mainstream climate models, nor do they provide evidence that clouds are causing climate change. Suggestions that significant revisions to mainstream climate science are required are therefore not supported."
The notion that global warming is a fact and will be catastrophic is drilled into people to the point where it seems surprising that anyone would question it, and yet, underlying it is very little evidence at all. Nonetheless, there are statements made of such overt unrealism that I feel embarrassed. I feel it discredits science. I think problems will arise when one will need to depend on scientific judgment, and by ruining our credibility now you leave society with a resource of some importance diminished.The title of the presentation Lindzen made at the conference was "Critical Issues in Climate Forecasting".
In an announcement on December 27, 2013, the Institute said that in a new position at Cato, Lindzen's focus would be on "the interaction between science and policymakers" and that he would study "whether the move from largely private funding to public support has introduced biases into science and the public policies informed by science."
By mid-2019, Lindzen was no longer affiliated with the Cato institute.
He has criticized the scientific consensus on global climate change, claiming that scientists are just as liable to err when the science appears to point in just one direction. He drew an analogy in 1996 between the consensus in the early and mid-twentieth century on eugenics and the current consensus about global warming., 267 pp. In a 2007 interview on The Larry King Show, Lindzen said:
In a 2009 editorial in The Wall Street Journal, Lindzen said that the earth was just emerging from the Little Ice Age in the 19th century and that it was "not surprising" to see warming after that. Lindzen stated that the IPCC's 2001 findings were
According to an April 30, 2012 New York Times article, "Dr. Lindzen accepts the elementary tenets of climate science. He agrees that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, calling people who dispute that point 'nutty.' He agrees that the level of it is rising because of human activity and that this should warm the climate." He also believes that decreasing tropical cirrus clouds in a warmer world will allow more longwave radiation to escape the atmosphere, counteracting the warming. Lindzen first published this "iris" theory in 2001, and offered more support in a 2009 paper.
In 2001, Lindzen urged the Bush administration not to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. "Reflections on Kyoto" , Los Angeles Times, 12/12/97. In a letter to Mayor David B. Cohen of Newton, Massachusetts, Lindzen wrote that he believed the Kyoto Protocol would increase the cost of electricity for no gain, putting signatory states at a competitive disadvantage.
In 2017, Lindzen sent a petition to President Trump, asking the President to withdraw the United States from the United Nations Convention on Climate Change. The petition contained the names of "around 300 eminent scientists and other qualified individuals", and called on the United States and other nations to "change course on an outdated international agreement that targets minor greenhouse gases", starting with carbon dioxide. It received considerable media coverage; 22 then- current or retired MIT professors promptly issued an open letter addressed to Trump saying that Lindzen's petition does not represent their views or those of the vast majority of other climate scientists.
A 1996 article in The New York Times included the comments of several other experts. Jerry D. Mahlman, director of the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, did not accept Lindzen's assessment of the science, and said that Lindzen had "sacrificed his luminosity by taking a stand that most of us feel is scientifically unsound." Mahlman did, however, admit that Lindzen was a "formidable opponent". William Gray of Colorado State University basically agreed with Lindzen, describing him as "courageous". He said, "A lot of my older colleagues are very skeptical on the global warming thing". He added that while he regarded some of Lindzen's views as flawed, he said that, "across the board he's generally very good". John Wallace of the University of Washington agreed with Lindzen that progress in climate change science had been exaggerated, but said there are "relatively few scientists who are as skeptical of the whole thing as Dick Lindzen is".
The November 10, 2004, online version of Reason magazine reported that Lindzen is "willing to take bets that global average temperatures in 20 years will in fact be lower than they are now". However, on June 8, 2005, they reported that Lindzen insisted that he had been misquoted, after James Annan contacted Lindzen to make the bet but claimed that "Lindzen would take only 50 to 1 odds".
The Guardian claimed in June 2016 that Lindzen had been a beneficiary of Peabody Energy, a coal company that has funded multiple groups contesting the climate consensus, but it said it had not seen "amounts or dates".
Lindzen has been called a contrarian, in relation to climate change and other issues. Lindzen's graduate students describe him as "fiercely intelligent, with a deep contrarian streak."
The characterization of Lindzen as a contrarian has been reinforced by reports that he claims that lung cancer has only been weakly linked to smoking. When asked about this during an interview as part of an Australian Broadcasting Corporation documentary, Lindzen said that while "the case for Passive smoking is not very good ... the World Health Organization also said that" (referencing a 1998 study by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) on environmental tobacco smoke (ETS)), on the other hand "With first-hand smoke it's a more interesting issue ... The case for lung cancer is very good but it also ignores the fact that there are differences in people's susceptibilities which the Japanese studies have pointed to."Archived at Ghostarchive and the
target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> Wayback Machine: – Transcript; Episode page Again, when asked to clarify his position Lindzen wrote "there was a reasonable case for the role of cigarette smoking in lung cancer, but that the case was not so strong that one should rule that any questions were out of order ... the much, much weaker case against second hand smoke is also being treated as dogma."
Lindzen lives in Newton, Massachusetts.
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Categories: 1940 Births, American Atmospheric Scientists, American Climatologists, American Meteorologists, Atmospheric Physicists, Amateur Radio People, Harvard University Alumni, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Alumni, The Bronx High School Of Science Alumni, Massachusetts Institute Of Technology School Of Science Faculty, Fellows Of The American Geophysical Union, Members Of The United States National Academy Of Sciences, Members Of The Norwegian Academy Of Science And Letters, People From Webster, Massachusetts, Scientists From Massachusetts, 21st-century American Physicists, Living People
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