The thing is that real debates don't have articles, pictures and whatnot. Even so, on the internet, if you allow this in debates, you aren't actually testing someone's debating skills or rhetoric. You're testing their ability to search google for relevant articles. Plus, as I said, people will wind up arguing over the interpretation of an article, distracting from the actual debate.
It's about rhetoric and skill, not facts.
Let the peanut gallery post articles in their thread that support or refute points. Let them argue about them. And then, at the end of that, they can use what they read from the debaters and the sources/facts/arguments that they talked about in their thread to make a judgement on who was the best debater.
I know this all sounds counterintuitive on an online forum, but real debates don't usually have props and what not. I ran for office and had to debate and they weren't allowed there, nor are they in the ones I've seen on TV.
At the end of the day, we're the guinea pigs, trying to figure out some ground rules. If it works, maybe others will follow. If it doesn't, they won't. But neither of those situations preclude you guys from trying different formats. Hopefully, you all will see the merits of this one when it's been tested.
So, if I understand you guys correctly, the ruleset that Hobbsyoyo posted is intended for thus one specific debate between you and him?
Yes. Hopefully it will stick in some variation.
It seems fine with me, though I'm not sure why you're asking the peanut gallery's opinion.
We aren't. They have a separate thread. They discuss the merits of our points, they post graphs and articles that support or refute us if they want. Ultimately, they will vote on who won after reading us and arguing it over amongst themselves.
I do, however, wonder if the proscription against links, graphs, tables, and such is not a disservice. If a point is raised about budgets and spending and returns on investment I can easily imagine we peanut gallerists having a very hard time verifying claims without anything more to go on than "NASA future spending. .." or "Congress predicts..."
I know, it's weird on a forum. But this is actually how it's done.
But again, I'm not sure why you're even consulting with us - if you two are debating, it seems to me that the ruleset is between you guys and the moderator.
To hopeful catch anything we haven't foreseen, to work out kinks, to get feedback and to explain why it is this way so hopefully people can understand we were deliberate about this and didn't nilly-willy pick some rules.
This is why I would not participate using their rule set as presented. Assuming good faith is a nice idea but there needs to be some kind of check. Maybe a PM to the chair who can then decide whether it should stand.
The checking is done by the peanut gallery. Nothing stops a debater from going 'BS!' except the post count restrictions. However, they shouldn't have to:
Debaters should be serious and not be making stuff up
Dubious claims will be thrashed by the Peanut Gallery
Why should a debater waste a post refuting something that (obviously or otherwise) isn't true when they have their own arguments to make.
Although I don't plan on participating anytime soon, I would just opine that sourcing facts would be different than sourcing arguments, and you guys could agree ahead of time on source material, e.g., only nationally recognized newspapers or peer-reviewed journals or government documents or something. I would not really appreciate arguing against someone who, for instance, makes something up or gets a fact completely wrong for which I would have no way of refuting the argument.
You don't have to argue against that. This is the whole point. The format allows you, forces you really, to move on to the points you want to make instead of simply reacting to every falsehood the opponent spits out. That's how current debates on CFC work, and the quote wars/source/article spam can get tiring and old. This is about rhetoric and skill, not who google's best. Let the Peanut Gallery judge the falsehoods, chew on the relevant articles and pikck a winner. Just because a poster says an obvious falsehood, you don't have to refute them. Let their silliness stand on it's own and make your own brilliant arguments. That's how real debates work.
It's not a 'nuh uh, you're wrong'. 'well your source is dumb', 'but your source actually says this' debate. We have those all over CFC to begin with.
