The colors God chose to design animals with were made with intelligent choices
The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.
After 4 votes and with 1 point ahead, the winner is...
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- 3
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I'm going to use google docs because pictures are worth 1000 words.
Pros argument boils down to animals having different colours that are suitable for the environment they live in - therefore God.
Con argues that this is due to evolution. In the first round, con points out that if animals fail due their colour - they die. This is a very basic description, and I would have liked to do more.
Con also address, tersely, a key issue with pros argument: that con can point out the painter making the painting, but pro is unable to show God. He points out that pro cannot produce evidence of God actually colouring weasels.
Out of these two, pros argument appears to be unwarranted non-sequitur: pro doesn’t, in my view, provide any reason as to why God is the only explanation - the core of the argument appears mostly asserted.
Pro doesn’t offer any additional arguments - and simply repeats this over and over.
Pro does make an argument relating to evolutionary fraud, con bats this away by explaining that one “fraud” doesn’t necessitate that all of evolution is flawed.
Trimming away all the fat of this debate - it appears that pros argument is mainly asserting that animals are particular colours - then asserting God did it. Cons main argument was to produce a very basic counter explanation which is more causal - and pointing out that pro is mostly asserting his position.
I feel con may have made this easier by hammering home a basic step by step evolutionary explantation the core content of cons rebuttal pointed out the vacuous nature of pros argument and wasn’t significantly harmed by pros only counter. As con offered a necessary explanation whilst pro does not - cons case wins out.
Resolution: BOP on Pro. Con makes no constructive, so Con has to disprove all of Pro's points.
1. Weasels/Natural Camo:
Pro opens up talking about weasels and their natural camouflage, then says that this translates to intelligent design since the colors match their environments (akin to Nintendo designing Pikachu.) I did not find this point convincing as there was no proper evidence given that camouflage could not originate from a source other than intelligent design.
Con responds to Pro's first point through a comparison that fell pretty flat. However, it does an adequate job of demonstrating the lack of logical causation present in Pro's point. Regarding Pro's Pikachu comparison, Con shows that while we know the origin of Pikachu, we can not know the same for animals. Both of these responses are fair points, however regarding Pro's argument as a whole Con would have been much better off simply showing how evolution can produce camouflage through natural selection. Pro's defenses for this point are not convincing and add nothing to the conversation. I must give this point to Con.
2. Servals/Tigers/Proportionate Markings
This point was much closer. Pro's point was that natural selection does not operate based on aesthetics, so the probability of perfectly proportionate animal markings seems low. Yet, I wish Pro had offered more of a reason as to WHY aesthetics is not necessarily evolutionarily beneficial for an animal, and presented this point in a way that it was less confusing for Con. Con's only real response to this point is that since evolution is true, while the probability of proportional animal markings seems low, it must have happened anyways. This would be a sufficient response for me to flip this point in favor of Con, but the problem is that Con really fails to prove the premise that evolution is true. A link to a Wikipedia page on fossils is not an explanation as to why evolution is true, and Pro's original point is already evidence to counter Con on this one. Aside from Pro's original point, however, Pro mishandled the response to Con's fossil argument in my view. Still, even though Con was extremely close to defeating this point, it wasn't quite enough. Pro wins this one.
Conclusion:
This debate boils down to one point in favor of Pro. While Pro's first point was not convincing, Pro's second one was. Con defeated Pro's first point but Con could not sufficiently defeat Pro's second point. Since the burden of proof was on Pro, and Con made no constructive, Con was required to defeat all of Pro's points to win since he had no offense. Since he could not manage to do that, I must give the arguments to Pro but spelling and grammar to Con since Pro's points were fairly confusing to read through. After reading through, I hope both parties can see my reasoning. If not, feel free to message me and I will elaborate more.
Interpreting the resolution:
Two-part resolution; first that God designed animals, second that the coloring was intelligent.
Gist:
Pro makes an argument by assertion, con asks for actual evidence.
Had pro not repeated the same basic things, but instead sought to provide the evidence requested, I would give this debate to him. As is, con wins on grounds of BoP (pro showed that these colors would make sense if intelligently done, but never sought to provide verification of that, or worse verification that God did it as the resolution mandates).
1. Weasels are white
Comparing them to snow was a decent opening
Countered with evidence that this was non-sequitur due to the same logic could equally be used against God (if I understand correct, someone might more easily get away with a crime due to the right hair color?); which admittedly fell flat, but it was against a non-convincing point anyway.
2. Pikachu is yellow
Made that way by artistic choice.
Countered with it being confirmed as an artistic choice, unlike the things God is supposed to have colored.
Back and forth of the same thing.
3. Cat ears and stripes and spots
I think pro was saying Jesus is visible in the ears of cats? He said cat ears somehow prove Jesus, whom had zero to do with this debate.
Con lightly mocked this off topic Jesus talk, then pulled the debate back to the topic by asking for proof it was from God. He then went on to ask for video evidence of God shaping and coloring the ears, as we can do for t-shirts (pro compared glorious cat ears to shirts). Plus a short explanation that these traits are passed down genetically, thus unlikely to be painted on by God each time.
(a picture of a tortoiseshell cat would have won this... actually it would have won the whole debate... even pointing out that the pictures of cats had asymmetrical patterns could have done that)
4. Lack of argument
Con counters that an argument for creation has not been established to then weight if the choices were truly intelligent or not, when compared against the competing theory that they developed such variety by chance and natural selection (which tends to be very intelligent, but this did not come up).
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Arguments:
See above review of key points. No argument in favor of God being the one to do the coloring was offered, thus even if we buy that the colors were painted on, we have nothing to suggest that God did it. Pro is making the affirmative claim, and a huge one at that, to which he needs to offer evidence to raise above the null hypothesis.
Conduct:
I was never distracted from the debate by violations, so this is firmly within the tied range.
Which participant provided the most reliable sources?
-Both provided sources during their arguments.
-Tie.
Which participant had better spelling and grammar?
-I saw no egregious violation of spelling or grammar.
-Tie.
Which participant had better conduct?
-Both sides conducted the debate with good conduct.
Tie.
Which participant provided more convincing arguments?
- There were no term definitions or debate framework provided by either side. For example terms like God, Intelligence, design, animals, etc.
- Since the resolution is "The colors God chose to design animals with were made with intelligent choices" and no defined terms or framework were introduced I was making the assumption that both sides believed in God and therefore the argument for proving God exists is not pertinent to the burden of proof.
- The burden of proof is on Pro. So what is the burden of proof? To show that God made intelligent choices in designing animals, specifically their color.
- Since both sides assume the existence of God and God by definition is intelligent, then all Pro has to do is show convincing examples that prove the resolution.
-Con's burden would be to provide a counter example to disprove Pro's examples. If Con would have shown, for example, an Arctic animal that was not White that may have been enough for me to change my vote but Con did not provide these counter-examples.
-Therefore my vote is for Pro.
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>Reported Vote: sigmaphil // Mod action: Not Removed
>Reason for Mod Action: The vote was found to be sufficient per the site voting policy standards.
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>Reported Vote: OoDart // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to pro for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: See beliow
Reason for Mod Action: The argument point is borderline and thus will be deemd sufficient; however, the conduct point is not. According to the COC:
In order to award conduct points, a voter must explicitly, and in the text of their RFD, perform the following tasks:
Provide specific references to instances of poor conduct which occurred in the debate
Demonstrate how this poor conduct was either excessive, unfair, or in violation of mutually agreed upon rules of conduct pertaining to the text of the debate
Compare each debater's conduct from the debate
Misconduct is excessive when it is extremely frequent and/or when it causes the debate to become incoherent or extremely toxic. In the case of awarding conduct points solely on the basis of forfeits, there is an exception to these steps: a debater may award conduct points solely for forfeited rounds, but only if one debater forfeited half or more of their rounds or if the voter also awards argument points (or explains their decision not to award argument points in a manner which meets the argument points voting standards).
The voter fails to show how this is 'excessive, frequent, and/or cause the debate to be incoherent or extremely toxic.'
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Pro provided explanations as to why God created beings with certain colors. Con never proved them wrong, but simply said "You cannot prove God did this." Without proving God could not have done this, I must follow the most logical conclusion. Pro claimed, for example, "God chose their colors not the weasel." He gave support to the fact that weasels do not get to choose their color. He also explained how if they came through random evolution, they should have random colors. Pro gave support for intelligent design. Con went on to compare intelligent design to rape, which frankly seems like a catch-all argument in the event that you do not have any actual arguments.
Neither participant had sources.
Con had slightly better S&G but pro's mistakes were minor and did not affect the debate.
Con said "The second sentence made me laugh." in regards to a sentence said by pro. This sentence was a statement of pro's beliefs. Either con laughed at the minor grammatical error or laughed at pro's beliefs. Both of these are poor conduct.
In philosophy, a formal fallacy, deductive fallacy, logical fallacy or non sequitur (Latin for "it does not follow") is a pattern of reasoning rendered invalid by a flaw in its logical structure that can neatly be expressed in a standard logic system, for example propositional logic.
Formal fallacy - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Formal_fallacy
micro evolution is junk science its silly stuff bible thumpers say, and it makes them look retarded
One could argue it's micro-evolution, which is an accepted point in Creationism.
You know we have no documentation of any of those drawing being made. I just pulled them the picture off the internet once i concluded that they made an intelligent choice by observing them.
thats evolution at work you dolt
Ignore
"I await a rebuttal to the problem. "
Didn't realize it was the last round.
werd
That was the point and it was detailed. You didn't say it was good or not.
How about now?
If you mean't about the current picture. Umm she a little beaten up
ok i hate 1940 imagery that is black and white. I hate 1980s hairstyle. i dislike cars.
Its awsome
I mean what don't you like?
Not you said you don't like something as in name me something you don't like.
I did not say i did not like it ????
What don't you like?
it's cool
I am going to change it. Tell me if you like it.
That one
Which profile I keep changing it?