Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
GuyStewartCallendarwasanoutsidertoclimatescience,buttoscientificresearch
and debate he was an insider. His father was the famous British scientist Hugh
Longbourne Callendar. Guy grew up in his father's scientific world and as an adult
worked closely with him. The son became a leading authority on steam and com-
bustion engineering, writing a standard text on the properties of steam at high tem-
peratures and pressures.
Guy Callendar read his first paper on carbon dioxide before a distinguished
audience at the Royal Meteorological Society on February 16, 1938. The society
published the article in its
Quarterly Journal
, where Ekholm had published in
1901. Callendar began by acknowledging that “few would be prepared to admit
that the activities of man” could have influenced global temperatures. Neverthe-
less, he was ready to “show that such influence is not only possible, but is actually
occurring at the present time.”
23
The idea went back to Arrhenius, Callendar noted, but since then most (includ-
ing most of his audience) had concluded “that the effect of carbon dioxide was
probably negligible.” But, he said, recent research had produced much relevant
new information on such topics as the thermal structure of the atmosphere, the ab-
sorption spectrum of water vapor, the relationship between vapor pressure and at-
mospheric radiation, thedissolution ofCO
2
inseawater,andmore.Itwasnowpos-
sible, Callendar said, to “make a reasonable estimate of the effect of CO
2
on tem-
perature, and also of the rate at which the gas accumulates in the atmosphere.”
24
He did not cite Hulburt.
