There’s tautology:
In grammar, the use of redundant words. In logic, a tautology is a formula which is true in every possible interpretation. Philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein first applied the term to redundancies of propositional logic in 1921
and then there is tauntology:
The practice of making remarks in order to anger, wound, or provoke someone.
Which one do you think our ‘commander in chief’ prefers? Obama gave a speech to an audience of college graduates at University of California, Irvine in which he expounded on his advanced views of climate change:
“They say, ‘Hey, look, I’m not a scientist.’ And I’ll translate that for you: what that really means is, ‘I know that manmade climate change really is happening but if I admit it, I’ll be run out of town by a radical fringe that thinks climate science is a liberal plot,'” he said.
“There’s going to be a stubborn status quo and people determined to stymie your efforts to bring about change. There are going to be people who say you can’t do something. There are going to be people who say you shouldn’t bother trying. I’ve got some experience with this myself,” Obama said.
“It’s pretty rare that you’ll encounter somebody who says the problem you’re trying to solve simply doesn’t exist. When President Kennedy set us on a course to the moon, there were a number of people who made a serious case that it wouldn’t be worth it,” he continued.
“But nobody ignored the science. I don’t remember anybody saying the moon wasn’t there or that it was made of cheese,” Obama said.
Wow, grade school level logical fallacy. How…unpresidential.
I’m sure Obama’s mind, the taunting of the significant percentage of people in the United States who don’t think climate change is a significant problem worth doing something about is a winning strategy.
From: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/03/12/new-gallup-poll-shows-climate-change-near-the-bottom-of-things-worth-worrying-about/
From: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/06/11/despite-climate-edicts-from-the-white-house-even-liberals-dont-think-climate-change-is-a-top-priority/
Except in this case, Obama isn’t smart enough to realize that divide and conquer isn’t a winning strategy. Of course when you feel like you can do things without a mandate, and just dictate policy instead of following the path of democracy, I suppose the phrase “what difference does it make?” might apply to unpresidential tauntology.
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RE:Mary Brown at 9:25 am
Obama said snow pack is declining and drought worsening.
On May 29, 2014, I was struck by the low the water level at Dillon Reservoir, Summit County, Colorado. It was lower than I had ever seen it.
But it wasn’t from drought. It was from planning ahead. There was still thick snowpack in the drainage basin that was going to flood the valley if the managers of the reservoir didn’t make room for the water.
Reservoir levels of Denver Water Board. Note how close they are to capacity on June 12.
http://www.denverwater.org/SupplyPlanning/WaterSupply/ReservoirLevels/
Links to Snowpack and precipitation monitoring stations in Colorado:
http://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/snotel/Colorado/colorado.html
Click a Station, Then click “Daily Graph” at “Snow Water Equivalent”, “Current Water Year”
Example: Hoosier Pass (Continental Divide, CO-9)
http://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/nwcc/view?intervalType=+View+Current+&report=WYGRAPH×eries=Daily&format=plot&sitenum=531&interval=WATERYEAR
Simon says:
June 16, 2014 at 3:14 am
“Could be worse. They could have Tony Abbott. The man who already had a book full of laughable quotes.”
How many people has that dreadful Abbott already killed with drone strikes?
Reblogged this on Sierra Foothill Commentary and commented:
Obama makes a grade school level logical fallacy in his presentation on climate change, while employing some signature ‘tauntology’ How…unpresidential.
Photo: snowpack above timberline, Hoosier Pass looking NNE, 9:40 am June 9, 2014
This proves nothing: It snowed the afternoon and evening before. Still, the snowpack was unually thick for early June.
I talk to college kids regularly, as well. I usually point out some anecdote about how the prevailing wisdom has been wrong, and it takes courage to have an open mind and think about things in different ways in order to test whether the status quo is right or wrong.
I encourage the kids to realize they can, and should, question anything they hear, including what I might tell them. This is the hallmark of educated people.
If the prez wanted to address man-made global warming, he could have noted that he has one view, and some in the country have another view, but he is sure that this young.bright graduating class has learned what it means to be educated, and to be critical thinkers, that he is sure the future, including the climate, is in good hands.
Graduates have a limited experience with lying pols. So they didn’t have to develop the normal web of deceit that is required for more experienced voters. They went with the “Oldest Trick in The Book”.
Obamanator: “Lookest thou over there at that fool that believes in a “moon of cheese””!
Students: “Where”?
Obamanator: “Hah!! Madest thou look”.
Students: “Hey.”?
Obamantor: “Yes”
============================================================================
😎
One looks at an American president like Reagan, someone I could always understand and trust at a deep level, despite political differences and then at our current president who seems captivated by foreign memes, brain dead celebrities and the sound of his own voice. Him, I could never trust farther than I could throw a safe! He takes positions after taking polls and then changes his mind, Hamlet-like!:)
He wants to be president of the world and create a new secular religion while he’s at it.
People like him, Gore or Kerry, are all faux Americans- sworn to support a new world order. It’s time the rest of us woke up.
RE: Stephen Rasey at 10:59 am
On May 29, 2014, I was struck by the low the water level at Dillon Reservoir, Summit County, Colorado. It was lower than I had ever seen it.
Here is the panorama of Dillon Reservoir from I-70 Scenic Overlook east of Frisco
Odama and the liberal dems are riding a tiger and don’t have a clue. I believe he’s mentally ill and should have immediate intervention. The tiger will bite come November….
It’s more evidence of a string puppet president with vengeful speeches written for him by radical activists.
So President Obama flies to Bismark, North Dakota, and on to Southern California, burning plenty of hydrocarbons on the flight, and preaches against burning hydrocarbons. He’s either an idiot or a hypocrite.
I believe cigarette smoking is harmful. No one in my family smokes, and we don’t permit others to smoke in our household. Contrast that with the behavior of AGW believers
who claim that cutting back a little, not eliminating, is all it takes.
Humans put out a certain fraction of atmospheric CO2, maybe 1%. That 1% extra
per year is supposed to have a catastrophic effect. Proposed
measures resolving to cut this to 60% by say 2040 are supposed to
make a material difference over the next century. How is it that
increasing CO2 by 1% over natural rates over the next century would
have a catastrophic effect and restricting CO2 use to
only 0.6% over naturarl background rates would somehow make a
measurable positive difference?
In actuality, in 1950 the world had half the population it
does now, it was using
1/4 of the energy it does now, and CO2 was increasing at roughly
half
the rate it does now. Assuming that all of the increase is due to
humans, by cutting back on energy use by 7/8 we
wouldn’t be ELIMINATING any human caused CO2 increase, we’d just be
slowing down the increase to 1950 levels. Assuming the AGW arguments were correct, we’d have to cut back CO2 production by 100%.
Instead, the AGWers are proposing pissant efforts to fight global warming, figuring that’s all that’s needed to demonstrate their “concern for the environment” and to prove their faith.
AGWers argue there are positive feedbacks from water vapor.
For a mundane example of feedbacks, I believe that extra calories lead to extra weight, but I don’t believe eating a 150 calorie piece of pie every night for dessert will cause me to
gain 150 calories/day* 365 days/year*20 years * 1 pound/3000 calories= 365 pounds in 20 years. There are plenty of negative feedbacks in metabolic rate, extra calories burned with extra weight, etc., keeping most people who DO eat an extra piece of pie from gaining those unusual amounts. The same applies to CO2. The warming effect of CO2 is small, and ultimately chemical interactions between atmosphere, ocean, plants, etc will bring about a balance between CO2 produced by humans and CO2 removed from atmosphere, and from oceans.
Our current fossil reserves, coal and oil, will last us maybe 500
years at current rates of consumption. After that, we’ll have to
rely entirely on nuclear reactors, etc. A 1% increase in CO2
production over only a few centuries cannot devastate life on earth,
else it would already have happened over geological eras. That CO2
in the atmosphere must have come from volcanoes. The earth must
have been gradually cooling over billions of years as the radioactive
elements in the earth’s core decay. Since volcanic activity is a
result of earth’s interior heat, volcanic activity must ALSO have been
falling off over geological aeons. That gradual reduction in tectonic
activity must result in less CO2 and water vapor being recycled into
the atmosphere.
Longer term geological evidence and the faint sun paradox essentially can rule out high climate sensitivity over the long term. We know that liquid oceans have been present on Earth as early as 4 billion years ago, when the sun was 30% less bright. This means temperatures cannot have been vastly different than today. As the sun strengthened feedbacks as high as 2 watts/m2/degC would have caused run away temperatures, and boiled the oceans. It seems likely that there are stabilizing effects on climate which lead a water covered planet like Earth to self-regulate temperatures
Talking about President Obama former Vice President Dick Cheney said, “Rarely has a US president been so wrong about so much at the expense of so many”. He was referring to Iraq but the same could be said for climate change.