The negotiator in me can see so many places where this conversation could be brought back to ground level and both sides could easily find middle ground on the facts presented and finally pass the rest off as inevitable differences of personal opinion. However, the Internet Guy in me tells me that facilitation in a web board forum is almost always doomed to failure.

The best that one can hope for is that you can drop a polite hint that perhaps the thread has reached it's saturation level and is no longer productive for either side to participate in.

Actually that never works either. It often just becomes a challenge for a few folks to prove that they can rise above having to end the conversation and can return to logic. While that would be a good thing, this is again almost always doomed to failure as well, due to the inevitable misinterpretations and the simple fact that there are soooo many participants that it is impossible to come to a consensus or avoid a spark from someone who gets frustrated.

In short and without taking sides, this thread has reached it's saturation point and is likely no longer capable of producing a useful outcome for anyone. I also applaud Axiom for not locking or censoring threads but perhaps it is time this thread had a voluntary retirement from it's participants.



With great power comes Awesome irresponsibility.