Freeman Dyson has followed the same path as myself, going from true believer in 1979 to skeptic in 2015.
In 1953, Freeman Dyson told his graduate students at Cornell that Quantum Mechanics is well understood settled science
In 1979, Freeman Dyson was very worried about CO2
In 1986, speaking at the University of Adelaide, Dyson said
“nobody really understands quantum mechanics.”
And in 2015 Dyson said
“CO2 is so beneficial in other ways, it would be crazy to try to reduce it”
The New York Times says Dyson is “infinitely smart”
There is the suspicion that, at age 85, a great scientist of the 20th century is no longer just far out, he is far gone — out of his beautiful mind. But in the considered opinion of the neurologist Oliver Sacks, Dyson’s friend and fellow English expatriate, this is far from the case. “His mind is still so open and flexible,” Sacks says. Which makes Dyson something far more formidable than just the latest peevish right-wing climate-change denier. Dyson is a scientist whose intelligence is revered by other scientists — William Press, former deputy director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory and now a professor of computer science at the University of Texas, calls him “infinitely smart.”
Dyson has shown the rare ability to learn, and change his views as he gathers more understanding.