I sympathize with PhantomWolf's sentiments as regards critical thinking but I think the decision is correct.

A few things distinguish this forum from all others: the intellectual quality of the participants, the restriction on discussing politics and religion under Rule 12, and the quality of the discussions as a result.

The discussion of 9/11 conspiracies on the science of what happened has been rehashed over and over. Absent new information, we've been there, done that. We await the final NIST report on WTC 7 and we know what we'll get from CTers. New CTer's have come here in recent months not to learn anything but to troll. It has gotten boring. It is boring in every other forum discussing 9/11 conspiracies as well. I think the 9/11 Truth Movement will die a natural death from extreme boredom.

I expressed a desire that we do not lose the threads and am glad that we won't. The quality of material in there is great.

I believe shutting down the 9/11 threads under Rule 13 is a principled one from strength rather than from weakness. Phil and company are stating, "we discussed the science of 9/11 conspiracy theories as an exception to Rule 13, we covered the entire subject, there is nothing new, we are ending the discussion. See the archived threads."