The Truth about Richard Muller

"I was never a skeptic [...] I never felt that pointing out mistakes qualified me to be called a climate skeptic."
- Richard Muller, 2011

Richard Muller has never been a skeptic, at best he had a moment of intellectual honesty towards skeptics when he acknowledged Steve McIntyre's debunking of Mann's Hockey Stick, only to later dismiss this as irrelevant to the global warming debate, "This result should not affect any of our thinking on global warming".

Hardly surprising, as Muller considers the carbon dioxide produced from burning fossil fuels to be, "the greatest pollutant in human history" and likely to have, "severe and detrimental effects on global climate".

The future outlook for global warming according to Muller is that, "it’s going to get much, much worse" and thus advocates that the United States immediately pay China and India hundreds of billions of dollars to cut back their carbon emissions or, "it'll be too late".

No wonder he endorsed "The Earth is the Great Ship Titanic", Steven Chu as "perfect" for U.S. Energy Secretary and Al Gore's hypocritical alarmism.

"If Al Gore reaches more people and convinces the world that global warming is real, even if he does it through exaggeration and distortion - which he does, but he’s very effective at it - then let him fly any plane he wants." - Richard Muller, 2008

"There is a consensus that global warming is real. ...it’s going to get much, much worse." - Richard Muller, 2008

"Let me be clear. My own reading of the literature and study of paleoclimate suggests strongly that carbon dioxide from burning of fossil fuels will prove to be the greatest pollutant of human history. It is likely to have severe and detrimental effects on global climate." - Richard Muller, 2003

References:
Medieval Global Warming (MIT Technology Review, December 17, 2003)
Global Warming Bombshell (MIT Technology Review, October 15, 2004)
Author and physicist Richard A. Muller chats with Grist about getting science back in the White House (Grist, October 7, 2008)
Physics the Next President Needs to Know (Wired, November 2, 2008)
Steven Chu named U.S. Energy Secretary (KGO-TV, December 15, 2008)
Physics for Future Presidents: The Science Behind the Headlines (Richard Muller, 2009)
‘In the Great Ship Titanic’ (The Daily Beast, April 10, 2009)
Richard Muller, Climate Researcher, Navigates The Volatile Line Between Science And Skepticism (The Huffington Post, November 3, 2011)

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Update 1:

Clarification on Koch Funding for Muller's BEST project,

"The Charles Koch Foundation has long supported, and will continue to support, sound, nonpartisan scientific research intended to benefit society by informing public policy and advancing an understanding of the costs and benefits of proposed solutions. Among the research the foundation recently supported is a project by Professor Richard A. Muller in partnership with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and several other foundations. That research is undergoing peer review now but has already received significant media interest. The research examined recent global surface temperature trends. It did not examine ocean temperature data or the cause of warming on our climate, as some have claimed," - Tonya Mullins, Director of Communications, Charles Koch Foundation

Foundation statement on Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Project (Charles Koch Foundation, October 27, 2011) - [Archive]

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Update 2:

The constructive criticisms by Muller's students seem to have a common trend,

"Arrogant, disorganized, and confusing. His lectures turned into tangents," - UC Berkeley student

"Kind of thinks he knows everything..." - UC Berkeley student

"...sort of arrogant and his information isn't always 100% accurate" - UC Berkeley student

"Muller thinks his opinion is always the correct one so be sure to write what he wants to hear. Too self-righteous!" - UC Berkeley student

"Muller was super arrogant." - UC Berkeley student

"Like others have said, he's arrogant." - UC Berkeley student

"He's very arrogant..." - UC Berkeley student

"Richard Muller loves himself. Quote: "I'm going to be on KGO 810 AM radio tonight. Bill Wattenburg and I will be discussing global warming, and then we'll be taking phone calls. No need for you to listen, or to call -- this is broadcast all over the West Coast, and he has over two million listeners. But I thought you might like to know." - UC Berkeley student

"This guy is so full of himself it gets in the way of learning the material. He name-drops, he pontificates, and he always mentions how he knew everything before so-and-so, blah blah." - UC Berkeley student

"I have two words: he's a narcissist." - UC Berkeley student

"His ego is as big as his classes, he said this: "It's possible that I've analyzed more climate data than anybody else in the world! He brings up how wealthy he is." - UC Berkeley student

"My main problem with him is that he's arrogant...makes is sound as if he's going to revolutionize physics....that all your previous physics profs were wrong." - UC Berkeley student

"...he tends to be a bit of a blowhard and drops names likes its his job." - UC Berkeley student