Tinker, RIP
My beloved cat Tinker died today. I found him in his garden patch when I got home from work. He lived a long and happy life, his last years where a prayer answered as the peace and beauty of my home fit him to a tee.
He loved to sit in my lap when I put my legs up and nestle in the crook of my legs.
We were friends for well over a decade. He was born in my old house and was with me through too many moves. He had his songs and his sayings. He was a very happy cat.
I love you, my beloved friend.
I will see you in Heaven.
Touch and goes at the airport today
I had not landed an airplane in over 3 1/2 years, and today I did. Its a great feeling being about an airport. Its a great feeling being a pilot again. I have decided to get back into flight instruction and will hopefully be able to get that done this month or next. I have some serious studying and work to do to be able to ethically offer my services, but after today, I am confident I will have my chops back.
argumentum ad populum and argumentum ad verecundiam
Daily Pundit has the story about Lord Monckton’s lecture in Schenectady to a bunch of enviromental activists, professors and students.
Lord Monckton puts the correct words to the techniques the agitators have been using: argumentum ad populum and argumentum ad verecundiam.
“That, Madame, is intellectual baby-talk,” replied Lord Monckton. Had she not heard of Aristotle’s codification of the commonest logical fallacies in human discourse, including that which the medieval schoolmen would later describe as the argumentum ad populum, the headcount fallacy? From her reddening face and baffled expression, it was possible to deduce that she had not. Nor had she heard of the argumentum ad verecundiam, the fallacy of appealing to the reputation of those in authority.
Although I had sensed the wrongness of their arguments, I had not known the names of what they where doing.
Now I do.
Argumentum ad populum and argumentum ad verecundiam.
