Changing minds on climate change

New data out Monday shows 2017 was the third warmest year ever recorded in the lower 48 states. Every time there's a severe cold snap like we just had, and every time there's a January thaw, like we're having right now in Minnesota, people talk about whether there is or isn't global warming.

In the audio attached above, you'll hear first from John Holdren, a leading scientist from the Obama administration who has long believed in climate change, and then Jerry Taylor, a longtime conservative who used to be a climate change denier, but has recently changed his mind and joined the other side.

Former Obama administration science advisor John Holdren talks about the Trump administration's change in policy on climate change. Taylor talks about what prompts someone to change their mind about climate change.

Holdren was the senior advisor to President Barack Obama on science and technology issues through his roles as Assistant to the President for Science and Technology and Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. He is now professor of Environmental Policy at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

Taylor spent 20 years with conservative think tanks like the CATO Institute and the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), and is the president and founder of the Niskanen Center, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank that advocates for environmentalism, immigration reform, civil liberties, and a national defense policy based on libertarian principles.

Greg Dalton is host of the Commonwealth Club of California's "Climate One" series.

To listen to the program, click the audio player above.