British environmentalist James Lovelock, known for early warning of the climate crisis, has died at the age of 103. “James Lovelock died yesterday (Tuesday) at home surrounded by his family on his 103rd birthday”said the scientist’s relatives in a press release, Wednesday, July 27.
Presenting himself throughout his career as a “independent scientist”Lovelock had created controversy with his apocalyptic vision of the climate crisis. “Today is late, much too late to save the planet as we know it”he explained to AFP in 2009, a few months before the Copenhagen climate conference (COP15), which ended in resounding failure. “Be ready for change, adapt to the change to come. And prepare for huge human losses”he said, a minority position in the scientific world at the time.
James Lovelock, born in 1919, invented in the 1950s the device used to detect the hole in the ozone layer. Hired by NASA in the early 1960s, he went to California to work on the possibility of life on Mars. He is known for having formulated the “Gaïa hypothesis” in 1970, presenting the Earth as a living being capable of self-regulation. At the time, his theory was criticized by his peers.
“What a life and what stories! The genius of Jim (his nickname) made him the Forrest Gump of science, shaping the first climate sciences, the search for life on Mars, the discovery of the hole in the layer of ozone, the conception of the world as a self-regulating system”paid tribute in a tweet to his biographer, Guardian journalist Jonathan Watts.
“Working for Shell, NASA, MI6 (British Foreign Intelligence) and Hewlett Packard, he had access and knowledge. When he warned the world about the climate crisis, he spoke with immense authority”, underlined Jonathan Watts, underlining the strained relationship that he maintained with the environmental movements. He “had worked for oil groups, chemical conglomerates and the army. He was passionately pro-nuclear”according to the biographer.