The man who might be our next Prime Minister by the end of the year is telling primary school students in my own home city of Adelaide, which somehow makes it worse, that the planet was hotter when Jesus was alive. (NB the begged question in this pronouncement.)
Mr Abbott appears to have provided no evidence to back up his gobsmacking remark. Nor does he say whether he meant it was hotter in the Middle East than it was in Adelaide when Jesus was alive. Nor did he, apparently, point out to the bemused Year Fives and Sixes that there was no Adelaide when Jesus was alive, nor that the Middle East tends to be hotter than Adelaide, hard though it may be to believe that there is anywhere hotter than Adelaide, when Adelaide is hot, whether Jesus is there or not. Then. Or now.
Mr Abbott probably thought it best to dispense with this sort of epistemological complication, as being beyond the minds of the impressionable young. No doubt he likewise thought it unnecessary to distinguish between verifiable facts and Tory-god-botherer thought-bubbles of pure methane, which, as we all know, doesn't hurt the environment whether produced by man or beast.
Because, of course, he understands that distinction.
Doesn't he.
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13 comments:
Clearly he's been drinking too much altar wine.
Capcha: bodifil
Either that or it's some sort of biochemical imbalance brought on by cycling up Willy Hill.
Or, you know, he really believes it. How much do you think he'd pay for that nice bridge over Sydney Harbour?
How much longer can it be before the Liberal party comes out giggling and shouting "Gotcha good didn't we. You really believed TA was leader!" Seriously.
Evidently it comes from Ian Plimer's sceptic book.
He was also asked whether or not he agreed with C Pyne, who wants to ban the burqa.
"I do not absolutely agree with that," he said: a very carefully nuanced fence-sit.
Maybe he took his kids to this scary "education" session about evolution as well?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3bdtlNUlx4&feature=player_embedded#!
He's trying to make me feel less homesick.
Honestly, I am thinking I may as well stay here. (where it really is hot - it's regularly 40 degrees now, and it's not even summer)
Well, he only needs to dig up three days' worth (give or take) of mean global surface temperature negative anomalies to be proven correct or no. There's a pretty good chance he's right.
"Dinsness" - I guess that's characteristic of a thick Kiwi?
While I do not go for Abbott's religious comments, I think it is a mistake for people to focus on these rather than on his other policies on the economy, industrial relations, education and health. And there should be more focus on his over-simplistic comments, such as labelling practically everything 'a great big new tax'. Abbott has a record in government that bears examination. I do not recollect much concern for families, especially mothers, affected by the Liberals' policies on industrial relations and Workchoices (Ha!).
But you are right to draw attention to his off the cuff and generally ill-considered comments.
Well, if the planet was hotter when Jesus was alive I hope that the food handling protocols were as stringent then as they are now.
Fish and loaves out in the midday sun (leaving out mad dogs and Englishmen) being divvied up amongst the multitudes seeking free takeaway would be a salmonella fest.
Ask Abbott (in front of a camera) what the temperature was when humans had sex with Neanderthals--most likely in the Middle East, say the scientists. No miscegenation,'twas same species sex. Personally I feel oddly cheerful to be 4% Neanderthal DNA.
Lucy
Such efficiency. Here's a lesson in how to cover Christianity and climate change in one quick school visit, and make these kids really think.
I wonder if the parents had any prior warning?
It would have taken a high temperature to evaporate the waters of the Red Sea to allow the passage out of Egypt into Israel and the West Bank. So it must have been warmer.
KG, you and your followers are doing a context-fast on this one.
Kids know there was no air-conditioning back then.
Couldn't you find another Opposition Leader to pick on?
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