In his speech, Gore credited Roger Revelle and Charles David Keeling for opening his eyes to the realities of climate change, and acknowledged Lynne Talley, Ram Ramanathan, Ralph Keeling and the late Mario Molina for their scientific contributions to understanding and protecting our planet.

I never met Charles, but I had the privilege of visiting Ralph's laboratory a few years ago. A lot of care goes into maintaining the quality of the Mauna Loa CO2 time series.

500 votes in Florida meant we missed the window on addressing climate change by 25 years.