oh good grief .. "What concerns me is the style and tone of many of these bloggers", there's someone who want to be Sherriff, hey, why don't you release an acceptable standard's style guide to blogging according to je.. oh, it's not your site, as you were everyone ..

No, the attacks, and intimidation and snide remarks and insults are all to try to deflect any skepticism, as much as some people insist they are are "the only real skeptics", they are in fact, just pretenders trying to recast and redefine "skepticism" .. I have seen them now recast as cynics and as "faux skeptics", keep trying, it just draws yet more attention to the desperation of the warmists.

Skepticism can take many forms, they do not all have to comply with the deputy sherriff's standards.

Loxton .. skeptics don't have to prove anything, they can be skeptical just as they are OK, your insistence that anyone with a differing view must prove why they have such a differing view is nonsensical.

JM - I have been calling for a more respectful approach in another blog on this site and have been overwhelmed by the self-righteousness of people who seem to regard personal insults as fair comment. I share your views that the red cross is not enough. There needs to be a more active editorial policy on this site to lower the abuse and condescension. Yes, I admit I have been robust in my language at times, but I do give in to frustration.

RPG - "your insistence that anyone with a differing view must prove why they have such a differing view is nonsensical" yet it is exactly what you demand of people ("warmists") who disagree with you. If you libel someone, they must prove that they were libelled and you must prove that you didn't libel them - the onus of proof is on both sides. To make an accusation against someone and not back it up with evidence is not a debate, it is simply conjecture.

So which is the other thread Loxton? I'm not quite sure how you can justify complaining in public like this about moderation of the site when you're not prepared to use the tools which you are given to help yourself. Even if you don't think the tool is as good for your purposes as is, it still works. The perfect is the enemy of the good as they say, and it might not be perfect but it is good. So to prevent your martyrdom on the other thread, please respond as soon as possible.

It's not possible to moderate every comment on this thread, unless someone is prepared to pay for that to happen. It would be very resource intensive. And every time we have a conversation about paying for access on the site the response is, "No thanks", a sentiment with which I agree because it is meant as an open site for discussion by all, no matter what their means.

In which case people have to take responsibility for picking-up after themselves, and occasionally after others.

Graham - moderator

Loxton

I am in full agreement with you. This is not "Red Faces"- it's potentially one of the best, democratic current affairs blogsites to be found anywhere. I say "potentially", because I am sure- I know- that many people are deterred from contributing because of the tone set by these serial abusers. And serial abusers they are, as the same people consistently use the elements of abuse in their blogs- personal insult, invective, slurs, innuendo, blame, unjustified attribution, and so on.

I appreciate that OLO is a commercial enterprise that relies on advertising. As Graham Y says, readers are averse to payment. I fear that the coming wave of subscription-based viewing that is coupled to the iPad is going to wreak havoc on the Web. As Chris Anderson points out in his book "Free", there is a world of difference between free and even a small amount.

What to do? I'll certainly bear the "red cross" in mind. However, I worry that it could become a "red cross war" of tit-for-tat, with Graham being run ragged in the middle.

I feel a bit like the coalition soldiers in Afghanistan- we feel that we have a right to be here, but the opposition is entrenched and is prepared to sacrifice reason in the name of freedom of speech.

I guess that's "reason's dilemma"- should we be so reasonable as to allow the enemies of reason to prevail?

In the face of this same dilemma, Galileo said "eppur si muove"- "and yet it turns". My Latin isn't up to it, but I'm sure there's an OLO-er who can inform us of the Latin equivalent of "and yet it gets warmer".

Excuse me?

What has happened here is that I have refuted your false assumption that "science" justifies policy action, proved that government policies will be more wasteful of natural resources than the status quo, and you have been completely unable to maintain the argument in support of policy action on global warming, except by circular reasoning.

And do you do the reasonable thing and admit that you can't answer the questions requred to establish the logical minimum necessary to justify the policies you advocate, and the false claim that the science justifies the policies is false?

No: you act as if the requirements of reason don't apply to you, and then have the gall to talk of 'reason's enemies'.

You can see, can't you, that it is intellectually incoherent to argue that policy action must be justified, because we can't know whether it is justified or not? Or that policy action must be justified in this area, because government is acting in other areas where they are similarly unable to establish any net benefits for their actions? Read what you've written!

You can see, can't you, that it is ethically incoherent to advocate policies which it is reasonable to believe will or may cause people's deaths, without being able to satisfy the minimum of knowledge logically necessary to establish that such policies will produce net benefits?

You can see, can't you, that if such policy action were to cause large numbers of deaths, your assumptions would not enable you to see that it was caused by you?

The warmists are morally and intellectually on a par with the people who used to drown witches. If it turns out that she dies, not to worry, we can save her soul with a Christian burial. And if the government direction of production just happens to result (*again*) in enormous deaths, not to worry, it was all for the morally superior cause nominated by you based on circular reasoning impervious to rational disproof.

Two articles from the paper today are relevant:
1.(NSW Government) Sydney Buses in the last year drove 19.4 million kilometres *empty*. That's the equivalent of 50 trips to the moon.
2. Government is going to supply 50,000 gas heaters to schools for a total cost of $400,000,000. Someone wrote in and said what kind of gas heater costs $7483 to buy and instal. The market rate is closdr to $2000.

But you guys still don't get it, do you? You're still just blithely assuming that government *must* be able to allocate resources to their most productive uses less wastefully than otherwise.

If something is not to be done for a profit, it must be done for a loss, and doing things for a loss is *not* more sustainable, is *not* better for the environment, and uses *more* natural resources not less!

What would it take to make you change your mind?