The one case of a former railway converted to a guided busway in Cambridgeshire is widely considered to be a costly failure, providing none of the benefits of light or heavy rail while sharing all the drawbacks.

Crackpot ideas for converting perfecly good existing railways into private roads have been swilling around in right-libertarian circles and their tobacco industry funded “think tamks” for many years. Back in the 1980s British Rail spent a lot of time and effort refuting their technologically-illiterate nonsense, when there a serious worry these moonbats had the ear of a notoriously rail-hating Prime Minister.

Yet despite being throroughly debunked at the time, much like young-earth creationism, the bad idea stubbornly refuses to die.

Can they seriously never have noticed the public’s reactions whenever the words “Rail replacement bus” are heard?

What is it about these cranks? It makes you wonder if these people have never quite got over not getting a train set for Christmas when they eight years old. Or perhaps they used to get beaten up by train-spotters at school?

SF author Charlie Stross blogged about Roko’s Basilisk last year, and correctly identified is an a nasty mashup of the bleakest elements of Calvinist theology with H.P.Lovecraft’s “Things Man Was Not Meant To Know”.

Leaving aside the essentially Calvinist nature of Extropian techno-theology exposed herein (thou canst be punished in the afterlife for not devoting thine every waking moment to fighting for God, thou miserable slacking sinner), it amuses me that these folks actually presume that we’d cop the blame for it—much less that they seem to be in a tizzy over the mere idea that spreading this meme could be tantamount to a crime against humanity (because it DOOMS EVERYONE who is aware of it).

And now I discover I’m followed by Roko’s Basilisk on Twitter. Should I be worried?