"I've found that, with the exception of children raised in fundamentalist families (and quite disturbing to the families, I'm sure, only a percentage of them), the scales fall off the eyes of most kids and much of religious mythology goes the way of belief in Santa Claus, and at about the same age."

Yeah, so have I. No kidding.

And???

"By the way, Little Hawk, I'd like to know what's wrong with being emotionally involved in believing in and attempting to convey to others the truth?"

Absolutely nothing at all is wrong with it. It's quite natural for people to do that. (But they do it even when they're completely in error...and therein lies the problem.)

If you would stop trying to make this into another personal fight with me, Don, we could have an altogether more reasonable discussion here, and I would not be obliged to spend part of it defending my own character and proving (to whom?) that I'm not a person who is in favour of all kinds of reprehensible and stupid things you dream up for me to supposedly be in favour of. ;-) Let go of the personal chewbone you have against me, and stick to discussing the general subject itself, not trying to prove that I'm the bad guy you seem to imagine I am.

I have made no personal observations about you here, and I don't wish to, I'm simply asking that you stop making them about me.

I am passionately involved in a great many issues, just as you are. As you say, though, the question is not the degree of emotional involvement, but the validity of the information itself and the ethical nature of the cause.

Agreed again.

You have nothing really to argue with me about here, Don, except one thing: whether human-based CO2 emissions are a major cause of global warming. That's it, period.

We believe in the same ethical and rational approach to dealing with various issues, but you're trying once again to steer the discussion into some kind of personal catfight or battle for dominance between you and me that will prove finally (to someone?) that I'm "dispassionate", "colorless", that I "sit on the fence" or whatever other personally critical assertions like that which you can come up with.

You're wasting your time and mine when you do that. Please stop personally attacking me, Don. Discuss society. Discuss human behaviour and belief systems. Discuss scientific viewpoints. Discuss the nature of the mass media and the government. Don't discuss the picayune character flaws of Little Hawk. If you leave off personally attacking me then I won't have to spend a bunch of my time replying to those attacks, will I?

And we'll have more time then to talk about something which actually matters.