Last night in the SOTU address, Obama made this pronouncement about climate change:
But the debate is settled. Climate change is a fact.
To that, I say this:
There’s never been any assertion that climate didn’t change, the idea that somehow this is something new to the 21st century is absurd. For example, this graph illustrates just that fact:
Click image for a full sized print (3000 pixels wide, suitable for printing) or choose the PDF below. Note the blip in the top line at the far right, that’s our climate change today. Source: Andy May
Younger_Dryas_to_Present_Time_Line (PDF)
And, as science itself has demonstrated through history, it is never settled, it is always searching for new information, retesting, and sometimes discarding old ideas based on new knowledge.
Saying “the science is settled” is as ridiculous as this famous quote attributed to Lord Kelvin who reportedly said in 1900*
“There is nothing new to be discovered in physics now. All that remains is more and more precise measurement”.
* This quote is reputed to be Kelvin’s remark made in an address to the British Association for the Advancement of Science (1900). Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Thomson,_1st_Baron_Kelvin#Pronouncements_later_proven_to_be_false
Equally preposterous (now) is this statement from Kelvin:
In 1898, Kelvin predicted that only 400 years of oxygen supply remained on the planet, due to the rate of burning combustibles.[62][63] In his calculation, Kelvin assumed that photosynthesis was the only source of free oxygen; he did not know all of the components of the oxygen cycle. He could not even have known all of the sources of photosynthesis: for example the cyanobacterium Prochlorococcus—which accounts for more than half of marine photosynthesis—was not discovered until 1986.
Kelvin’s pronouncement, which he believed to be true at the time based on the facts he had at hand, were later disproved by new science and obviously discarded. But, imagine if there were a panic movement then to conserve oxygen, with “oxygen taxes” applied, massive government funded research implemented, and reams of NGO’s feeding on the frenzy demanding a host of new laws and changes in human behavior to avert the crisis.
They’d look pretty stupid to us in the context of science knowledge today, wouldn’t they?
It is very difficult for POTUS right now. He is bright and knows he is right. We are all just dumb unwashed for not getting it and agreeing with him.
We got change no one believes in (if you like your healthcare, you can keep your healthcare—not), implemented by violating his oath to uphold the law (Obamacare implementation, non-recess appointments, exemptions to No Child left behind,…).
It would be so much easier for him not to try to ride so many dead horses (climate change as a code word for CAGW), income inequality (a new code word for the war on poverty that already failed back in LBJ’s day), peace in the Mideast, brotherhood between Shiites and Sunnis, … But he knows he is bright and right, and so rides on into oblivion.
“The president said ‘climate change is a fact’ and vowed action via the Environmental Protection Agency in his State of Union Speech, but he did not ask for any new legislation such as the cap-and-trade bill he touted a year ago. As a scientist who knows without a doubt there is no significant man-made global warming, perhaps I should be pleased the president took a softer stance on the issue, But I am far from happy about the state of affairs on the issue.
“It has become purely a rock-solid, lock-step political position of the Democrat Party to believe in global warming, and of the Republican Party to disbelieve. I see no hint that the leadership in either party is truly interested in opening their minds to a scientific debate — to study the evidence and reach a reasoned non-politically motivated position and take actions accordingly.
“Science and politics do not match well. Science is not settled by a vote, and slogans and platform planks are not scientifically significant. It is my deepest regret this has become a political issue. I think we will make little progress in obtaining an open hearing from the public as long as the political leaders line up their followers on one side or the other.”
Dear President Obama,
Drought in California is Normal; the last 100 years have been the wettest in the last 7,000 years. The last 100 years being wet is the “abnormal’. So if man changed California’s climate, man made California Wetter!
http://www.mercurynews.com/science/ci_24993601/california-drought-past-dry-periods-have-lasted-more
My reply to anything this guy says now is:
“If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan. Period”
(I would love to be in a debate with this guy, I would start every one of my turns by quoting that.)
I also hear he is decalring a “year of action”, where he bypasses congress and just does it himself. Not suprising that he also lied when he took that oath of office “to support and defend the constitution”.
When he rams through “action” to protect us from Warming (and everything else), realise that the actions are really to increase his personal power and prestige and to increase the unilateral power of his friends, specifically the Democrats (or those who support him anyway, specifically the large government worker unions). If, like the above health care plans, he has to hurt you to increase his own power, he will do so (again).
People get the kind of government they deserve.
Science is never settled; only dogma is settled. Reference the consensus of scholars in 1902 who insisted Man would never fly or the academics in 1491 who maintained the world was flat…
Please, please don’t say “oxygen tax” too loudly, lest someone gets an idea.
Doug Huffman says – January 29, 2014 at 9:39 am
“… Have we learned the lesson of progressivism the make-things-better movement – FORWARD willy-nilly – damn the unintended consequences.”
What reason could one possibly have to believe any of the consequences are unintended? If your goal was to destroy America as we know it, what would you do differently? Just a thought.
An excellent graphic presentation.
One suggestion: The Vostok chart insert, which was published originally with a reversed “years ago” time axis, should be flipped to match the rest of the graphics.
Allow me to put this in religious context, since that is the most logical description of the warmist brethren, “Anyone, or any organisation that prophesies with faith and certainty, is by their very nature – FRAUDULENT”.
herkimer says:
January 29, 2014 at 9:40 am
” but the debate is settled. Climate change is a fact”
Now we all know that when the alarmist Democrats refer to climate change it is not “natural” climate change that they refer to which is happening all the time . They use climate change to mean global warming caused primarily by man generated greenhouse gases.
Precisely.
So, the statement “climate change is a fact” is, indeed, a factual statement, but what he means by the statement is, indeed, neither a fact or settled debate.
Would **** *** comment **** **** but ***** ***** can’t ***** ***** breathe !!!!1!1!
Legatus says:
January 29, 2014 at 9:58 am
I also hear he is decalring a “year of action”, …
Well, yeah, and we should give him a break on this.
He is just trying to separate this new “year of action” from the previous years of inaction.
🙂
I think Obama can be forgiven for his position on this. I’ll bet that if you polled the CEO’s of the Fortune 500 the majority would tell you AGW is a fact, and a serious problem that needs to be dealt with. Why do you think we are having a Super Bowl in an outdoor stadium in NJ. It’s because people thought winter was history.
^ this
SOTU was confusing at first.
It began very bipartisan, and red-white-blue. It continued this way.
Then, at the end, it became a statement regarding the imperial presidency.
This morning after, I believe the strategy is to have a show of being bipartisan, and portray any dissenter as an opponent of bipartisanship.
This is all it takes to keep most liberals and the liberal media off the scent.
“Settled” is newspeak for suppressed, squelched, and subverted.
That man and all his cronies are just manuplitive liars; we can expect nothing less and never any good/right from them.
Obama always looks stupid – to those who are not enamored with his new clothes.
But the debate is not settled. It is not a fact that I am Richard Nixon reincarnated.
No, I am not Richard Nixon. I am not the ghost of Richard Nixon. I am not the prodigy of Richard Nixon…
…Ok, I’ll stop before it ceases to be funny. But, then again, maybe it’s not funny. I mean, can one really seriously look at Richard Nixon and assume, in their wildest dreams, that the man provoked humor?
@Tom J – Mr. Tom, I served with Nixon, I knew Nixon, I was a friend of Nixon. Tom, you are no Richard M. Nixon!
Sorry, I could not resist. 😉
Contemporarily, N. N. Taleb, any that prophesy without doxastic commitment are not to be trusted.
Eric Worrall says: “Sure he was the first black president of America,” …He’s not black. His Mom was white. He’s as white as he is black.
The POTUS cares nothing about scientific truth.
That is brilliantly and blindingly clear.
He cares only how he can abuse the name of science in support of his political agenda.
He cares only to exploit science to gain power and control.
Sadly, there are many, many eager academics who will do his bidding for and with your money.
I know a few. They care only to keep the gravy train going, and none at all about the horrid expense, nor the plight of of the poor they will kill with increased energy costs and by diversion of billions of dollars away from more important causes such as clean water, medicine, and cheap energy. So they can sleep well at night these academics arrogantly drive their electric cars (coal-fired) and Prius’s built with batteries who’s very construction is poisoning a nation. They care nothing about suffering of the world’s less fortunate who every day must face the quadruple Hobson’s choice between heat, food, gas or medicine. Instead of really helping the poor and sick we’re spending a billion dollars a day on this scam called ‘climate change.’
The POTUS wants to keep control of his 47% with free bread and circuses paid for by taxing the middle-class and with crony-capitalist deals of necessity. He has to keep the 47% in his debt or the whole thing falls apart. He WANTS the 47% under his thumb and angry at everyone else except him. Free phones and food stamps! Extend those unemployment benefits! Keep them dependent. He has to tell them every single day who to hate and who the savior is. It’s the job of the mainstream media to sell it, and they happily do.
What I write here sounds wrong! How can this be right? All you have to do is ask some leading questions of academics and economists in the pay of our nation, or socialistic multi-national organizations. These folk would double the cost of gasoline through taxes to fund the machine, and give tax credits to the poor so they can buy their gas and to keep them dependent. Same thing with taxes on that ‘pollutant’ CO2 that is necessary for life. Tax the ‘evil CO2’ through taxing energy costs to play the same game with credits to keep the poor dependent and grateful because they don’t know any better.
It’s criminal. This is the only thing that is settled. It’s criminal.
The worldwide distribution of cheap and plentiful energy and the redirection of the billions of dollars spent on this climate change fiasco into clean water, medicine, and jobs are the ONLY things that will improve the plight of emerging nations, and in fact our own nation’s poor.
Instead we get abhorrent taxes on tightly controlled cheap plentiful energy going into the Nations coffers to redistribute crumbs to the useful idiots who keep this treadmill in motion with their votes.
RoyFOMR says:
January 29, 2014 at 9:14 am
RoyFOMR says:
January 29, 2014 at 9:17 am
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[non- (naturally)] falsifiable.
TonG(ologist) says:
January 29, 2014 at 9:21 am
“Personally, I think he was no better in his way and day than our modern climate science elite; i.e., a charlatan who traded on his name.”
That begs the question of how he got “his name”. He earned it.
The takeaway is not that Lord Kelvin was a charlatan, but rather that even the most accomplished figure in a given field can be blinded by personal bias and tunnel vision.
Peter Miller says:
January 29, 2014 at 9:40 am
“…I hope Americans will do everything in their power to introduce the French metrical system.”
We probably would have, if calculators and computers hadn’t come along and made menial arithmetic trivial.
Wasn’t it Bill Gates who said we would never need more than 1 Mbyte of computer memory (when introducing the IBM-AT?).