Instigator / Pro
21
1576
rating
12
debates
75.0%
won
Topic
#274

On Earth The Sun Actually Rises In The West And Sets In The East

Status
Finished

The debate is finished. The distribution of the voting points and the winner are presented below.

Winner & statistics
Better arguments
12
3
Better sources
4
8
Better legibility
4
4
Better conduct
1
4

After 4 votes and with 2 points ahead, the winner is...

MagicAintReal
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
3
Time for argument
Three days
Max argument characters
10,000
Voting period
Two weeks
Point system
Multiple criterions
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
19
1697
rating
556
debates
68.17%
won
Description

*Rules*

1. The definitions below are agreed to by accepting the debate.

2. All votes *must* have thorough reasons for voting.

3. Moderators *must* remove inadequate votes that a) fail to address the majority of resolution-impacting points made by both debaters, b) are lies about debater performance, or c) are vendetta votes/overtly biased.

4. Death23 and his related accounts may not vote on or participate in this debate.
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*Full Resolution*
On earth, the sun actually rises in the west and sets in the east.

Pro
Has 3 rounds each with a 10,000 character limit + 3 days to post.
Pro also has the BoP to show that on earth, the sun actually rises in the west and sets in the east.

Con
Has 3 rounds each with a 10,000 character limit + 3 days to post.
Con also has to negate Pro's claims in order to cast enough doubt on the resolution.
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*Definitions*

on - physically in contact with and supported by.
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/on

earth - the third planet from the sun in the solar system, orbiting between Venus and Mars at an average distance of 149.6 million km from the sun, on which we live.
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/earth

sun - the star around which the earth orbits.
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/sun

actually - as the truth or facts of a situation; really.
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/actually

rises - appears above the horizon (to an observer).
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/rise

west - denoting the western part of a specified area.
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/west

sets - appears to move toward and below the horizon (to an observer).
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/set

east - denoting the eastern part of a specified area.
https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/east

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@Raltar

Dude I am not an idiot, I thought it through before accepting. You all can run around calling me a suicidal hero if you want. I genuinely won this if you understand how I shifted all the semantics back onto Pro and force his BoP to remain unmet.

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@RationalMadman

Yes. A tequila sunrise is actually yellow and is actually red.

To win arguments you had to exclude pros position, none of your arguments excluded anything he said: in the same way arguing a tequila sunrise is yellow does not necessarily preclude it from also being red.

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@RationalMadman
@Ramshutu

Perhaps I missed that part.

Anyway, based on the way you guys are discussing this, I'm actually starting to think I gave Pro TOO MUCH credit, if anything. I tried to interpret his argument from a common sense standpoint and attempted to find some way, no matter how remote, that his argument could make sense. I reasoned that if I were standing on the beach in Los Angles and looking at the sunset, I would be physically facing the direction west, but would also be looking across the sea to where the Eastern hemisphere is located, thus causing the sun to be "setting" in the "East" in this unique scenario. I assumed that was why he used coastal cities along the Pacific Ocean as his examples, as opposed to giving places like Denver or Moscow that are inland.

But if what you guys are saying is true, and his whole scheme revolved around the context of the word "in" is used, then that is even more of a play on words than I was interpreting. In that case, I can definitely see where he was "trolling" with this debate, by giving it a seemingly impossible title which seemed easy to beat, even though he planned to steamroll his opponent with a goofy argument based on nothing but wordplay. That would be a trap at best or trolling at worst.

If that is the case, then I guess RM did everyone a favor by throwing himself on this grenade for the rest of us. Pro was probably hoping some poor noob would accept this debate and have no idea what to do.

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@Ramshutu

Do you know what the word 'actually' means?

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@RationalMadman

You didn’t prove anything to the exclusion of pros contention

Your whole argument is like tying to say a Tequila sunrise isn’t red because it’s yellow.

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@Ramshutu

And I proved that 'actually' the Sun sets in the 'west' due to the absolutely identically valid timezone construct based precisely on that.

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@RationalMadman

You didn’t prove east and west don’t exist.

You proved they were social constructs: That at best they were not objective definitions. Because of that, pros argument that LA is in the west is still true - LA is in the west where west is a social constuct.

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@Raltar

I did that in R2.

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@RationalMadman

I really liked your argument about the Hemispheres being social constructs, because I probably would not have thought of that myself and it was a clever way to throw a monkey wrench into Pro's argument.

I do wish that you had also taken the more "brute force" approach of simply finding a scientific source that says "the sun always rises in the East and sets in the West" and made that the centerpiece. If combined with the clever response about the Hemispheres, I honestly would have voted for that argument as unbearably correct.

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@Ramshutu

I proved there was no east or west on Earth and defeated him via that.

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@Raltar

his case was actually stronger than what you're making out, but you are right he worded it so terribly that his trap backfired and on top of that I liquidated what east and west on earth even mean defeating his trap altogether.

His argument was that the sun, literally sets on the west horizon while you're on the east of the earth every day while you're there. It also rises everyday on the east horizon of the west of the Earth if you're situated there.

Do not feel bad about your vote, I still won by defeating his very basis of there being an East or West of Earth at all as well as pointing out that if we take that into account the sun ACTUALLY rises on Earth on the socially constructed east of it and vice versa for setting and this is the reason the equally socially constructed timezones are what they are.

I'm waiting on one final point of clarification from a moderator before I vote on this, but I suspect that this fiasco isn't going to end well for anyone.

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@RationalMadman

ok, ok, ok...geez

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@MagicAintReal

You are not allowed to alter people's votes like this. This is violating my rights as a debater.

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@Raltar

Imagine you're Pro in a debate about whether or not humans can fly.
If you define flying as moving long distances in the air and we end up having a debate about whether or not humans can do this, it would be irrelevant for Con to point out that humans don't fly in the scientific sense, i.e. they don't manipulate air resistance with an appendage to travel distance through the air. Flying in an airplane, though satisfies the definition of flying and humans do that all of the time.
Now imagine that Con, in the humans flying debate, said that "Humans can fly in the conceptual sense, not the objective, scientific sense."

If you don't see this as a concession, you don't understand how to apply definitions to a debate.
By Con OVERTLY affirming the resolution, you must vote Pro here.
It's the same thing.

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@Raltar

Stop.
I already addressed that social constructs or conceptual hemispheres are still DENOTED TO BE EASTERN AND WESTERN, scientific or not.
Raltar, please look at the AGREED TO DEFINITIONS of east and west.
As long as they are DENOTED to be eastern and western, conceptually or not, they satisfy east and west.
Con also conceded that people denote these areas to be eastern and western.
Raltar, DO ANY OF THE DEFINITIONS MENTION ANYTHING ABOUT SCIENTIFIC OR OBJECTIVE EAST AND WEST?
If not, you're being a dishonest voter by allowing him that point.
Please read the definitions if you want to be an effective voter.

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@MagicAintReal

I'm not saying hes right, or that I agree with him. And the debate isn't over yet anyway, so anyone could still win at this point. I just don't think being contradictory and confusing is the same thing as conceding. And stooping to his level and counter attacking him with insults isn't going to make the situation better.

But let me put it to you this way;

You think the voters are dishonest and will vote for whomever they like, rather than who was actually the better debater.

You think the mods are dishonest and they won't remove dishonest votes.

So you plan to fix the problem by reminding everyone how dishonest they are and threatening to have the (supposedly dishonest) mods act on your behalf.

That just doesn't make sense to me, and I don't think it is a very good debate strategy.

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@MagicAintReal

The statement is contradictory. It does one thing as much as it does the other thing, but the two things can't both be true at the same. That makes no sense, if taken only on the context you provide.

However, if taken in the larger context of the debate as a whole, we know he also pointed out that Eastern and Western hemispheres are social constructs based on the way humans have chosen to draw maps. Meaning that they don't really exist from a scientific standpoint. But from a scientific standpoint the Earth does have two magnetic poles (North and South) and the earth rotates on it's axis along these poles. And since the Earth always rotates the same direction, the sun will always appear to "rise" from the same direction regardless of which socially constructed hemisphere an observer happens to be physically located in. This was his rebuttal of your arguments made in round one, where you attempted to draw a distinction between how the sun "rises" in the Eastern versus Western hemispheres.

In other words, what he is trying to say in a very confusing and round about way, is that this whole argument is a bunch of irrelevant word-play which cannot change how the universe actually functions. I don't accept that as a concession, just a complex way of saying this entire discussion never made any sense to begin with, and still doesn't.

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@Raltar

"When I say that if you are on the Western Hemisphere, the sun both rises and sets for you everyday and that if you are on the Eastern Hemisphere, the sun does the same."

I mean COME ON!!!

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@Raltar

Don't start off on a dishonest note.

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@Raltar

Um, he said that the sun rises in the west as much as it sets on it and it sets in the east as much as it rises on it.
This affirms the resolution, nearly word for word.

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@MagicAintReal
@RationalMadman

I have to say that I haven't seen a major problem with the moderation on this site so far. There are a few users who deserve a good smack upside the head, but the mods seem alright.

You can see from some of the comments below that I've had a few of my own votes removed and I didn't object because I actually agreed those votes weren't very good. So I went back and made better ones after they got taken down.

I wasn't ever one of the users of DDO (because when I signed up there, I saw everyone was moving here), so I don't know what drama may have taken place way back when, so I have to give this place a clean slate until I have reason to do otherwise.

And now we are talking about a second concession? I still never saw the first one...

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@MagicAintReal

Mods here are better than mods on DDO by far. Cannot compare this to fucking airmax and whiteflame. I don't even hate whiteflame at all, issue is just a matter of integrity.

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@Raltar

This site is a spillover site from DDO, on which I have the same name and a very extensive record.
Throughout my time on that debate site, which is nearly identical to this platform, I had so many dishonest voters vote me down, that I have to be very particular about everything in my debates. You can't count on mods to actually remove votes that are dishonest, so I put all of that in the rules and re-mentioned it to voters.
I mean, this debate has been conceded twice now by my opponent and I'll still have to battle off some dishonest voter.

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@MagicAintReal

And Magic, now that I think of it, what exactly did you mean when you claimed "that dishonest people try to vote others down" on this site?

From what I can see, you have only participated in one prior debate which ended in a tie because neither you or your opponent provided any arguments. So who has ever voted you down?

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@Raltar

Cool beans :)

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@bsh1

Thanks.

Some of those votes I changed admittedly weren't very good and I actually wanted to redo them anyway after learning more about how the site works. From here on out, my votes are likely to be fairly detailed.

I already have a feeling that this debate will provide me with plenty of material to comment on.

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@Raltar

Also, glad to see you went back and revised some of your other RFDs. Without commenting on their sufficiency per the rules, I can say that they were improved.

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@Raltar

Violating the rules of the debate is typically grounds for conduct points, so if they used the letter "e," maybe it would be acceptable to award conduct in such a situation (so long as the violation was unfair or excessively rude). It might even be grounds for argument points if their opponent made some kind of theory argument on the rules violation, though that would be a stretch. But if the rule was something like "voters may only vote for Pro" it would immediately be disregarded by vote moderation.

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@bsh1

Thanks. Good to know.

I personally understand if one debater politely asks for certain considerations as part of the debate. But the rules some people tack on get pretty outrageous.

I foresee a situation not unlike a certain episode of 'The Simpsons' where a person was challenged to make an argument without using the letter 'e' in the argument.

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@Raltar

Currently, we will take the rules of the debate into consideration, but ultimately, we only enforce the actual rules. This is something that is under review.

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@Raltar

Answer is they genuinely take it into strong consideration. If you say X can't vote that's almost always taken into consideration due to it being what the Contender agrees to when accepting the debate.

I don't mind that Pro's playing dirty, I am a master of balancing dirty play with rule-enforcing goody two-shoes stance. You can't outplay me, ever, you can only hope to get lucky in that enough voters 'feel' I am too wrong.

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@David
@bsh1

Hey mods, this debate actually brings up something I want to know about the rules (and which I can't find in the posted rules).

When someone creates a debate with "special rules" of their own creation, are those rules enforceable?

For example, if someone creates a rule that says "Moderators *must* remove votes that [X]" will a moderator actually remove votes that do whatever the statement says, or will moderators only enforce the *ACTUAL* rules which normally apply on all debates?

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@MagicAintReal

I haven't seen a concession yet, despite your claim.

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@Raltar

No one threatened voters, it's just that dishonest people try to vote others down and they would clearly ignore a concession. So I tend to remind.

Con accuses Pro of trolling. Pro rebuts by threatening voters. "Bold" strategies in play here to say the least. Was this a debate to see who could lose the "conduct" vote?