Lloyd Berkner

Detlef Bronck had in March 1953 appointed the US National Committee to the International Geophysical Year.

including Roger Revelle and its initiator Lloyd Berkner.

The International Geophysical Year was a global scientific project aimed at achieving a deeper understanding of the earth system.

It played a pivotal role in establishing global warming as an international scientific issue and initiated a process that extends to the present day.

What's interesting is that these weren't your typical sci-fi geeks.

You had Howard Robertson, a Caltech physicist who'd just finished work on cosmic expansion, Luis Alvarez, the nuclear champion, and people like Lloyd Berkner from the Naval Research Laboratory.

That already tells us they took it seriously.

The panel was convened under the Office of Scientific Intelligence, which in turn sat under CIA.