ox·y·mo·ron
[ok-si-mawr-on, -mohr-]
Rhetoric
–n. a figure of speech by which a locution produces an incongruous, seemingly self-contradictory effect, as in “cruel kindness” or “to make haste slowly.”It is official. I’m a global warming/climate change skeptic. Something is happening but I’m not convinced that it is our fault, that we can really do anything about it and that anyone really understands it. So when I read this in the NY Times I just kind of rolled my eyes. “The reality is, we’re freezing not in spite of climate change but because of it.” It seems to me that once they (rightly) stopped calling it “global warming” they lost the fight. The earth’s climate has never been stable, it has always changed. Calling it “climate change” is like saying “random chance” or “convicted felon.” It is redundant. Climate changes. When you start saying, with a straight face, “It is getting colder because it is getting warmer” you just punctuate my assertion that you’ve lost.

Ha. Man, how I was that were true. If it were, we might be able to get past the politics, religion and money that drives so much of the climate change (okay, I said it, so what?) debate and get some real answers to what’s happening and why and if we’re in a good place to cope.

Update: Just came across a video of a British meteorologist who predicted the cold winter in Europe. He says that the “warming causes cooling” argument is not based on any kind of science.