Instigator / Pro
1
1511
rating
7
debates
42.86%
won
Topic
#3281

Christianity has value, and people should convert to Christianity.

Status
Finished

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

Winner & statistics
Winner
1
3

After 3 votes and with 2 points ahead, the winner is...

Bones
Parameters
Publication date
Last updated date
Type
Standard
Number of rounds
3
Time for argument
One week
Max argument characters
10,000
Voting period
Two weeks
Point system
Winner selection
Voting system
Open
Contender / Con
3
1763
rating
29
debates
98.28%
won
Description

-- INTRO --
In light of recent polling data showing that 3 in 10 adults have no relgious affiliation, it is clear that a debate around the value of Christianity and Christian conviction is relevant and necessary.
https://www.pewforum.org/2021/12/14/about-three-in-ten-u-s-adults-are-now-religiously-unaffiliated/

-- TOPIC --
Resolved: Christianity has value, and people should show conviction towards it.

-- STRUCTURE --
1. Constructives
2. Rebuttals
3. Rebuttals/Close

-- Rules --
1. Forfeit merits a loss
2. Citations must be provided
3. Everything else is fair game and if nescesarry can be debated through theory in round

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@RationalMadman

From the voting policy:
"wholly tied votes are generally considered borderline and not removed, due to their lack of any meaningful impact on the outcome. Still, if they fail to be better than spam, they will be removed."

Granted, had that vote assigned any points, its lack of any analysis would be a huge problem.

Anyone curious about my feedback, can PM lunatic for a copy and past of the PM. I just refrained because I think I was leaning towards awarding a controversial win and my vote wouldn't have altered the result anyway.

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@Barney
@whiteflame

I would like to report Crocodile's vote which I did flag but it was with only 8+ hours left.

Please notice that it's not an acceptable laziness for a tie-vote as this is not a troll debate.

no prob

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@Lunatic
@Ramshutu
@Crocodile

Thanks for voting and the feedback everyone.

No problem. Both of you can message me with any debates you need voting on in the future and I'll do my best to vote before it expires.

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@Lunatic
@Ramshutu
@Crocodile

Thanks for the feedback! The three of you came in clutch.

If morality is incoherent, but what harm does it do. If the morality is coherent, what benefit do these little sins have. This means more strongly towards con given the above - but I would liked to have seen more here.

In terms of the overall conversion; con provides a kritik about people In Syria. I will say that Pro does very well recognizing fiat - that if everyone converted it wouldn’t be an issue. But also points out that just because it’s bad for some, doesn’t mean it’s on balance bad for all.

Saying this; though; on a technical note I’m not sure how well fiat applies here as it’s not “if everyone converted to Christianity then…” but a little bit more ambiguous.

The kritik itself isn’t enough to move the dial for me; I would assume by default more of an “on balance”, which cons argument doesn’t meet - but I would accept that there maybe some harm to certain people if they converted.

Overall weighting.

Weighting everything together with what I’ve established from the overall framing. Is that pro establishes that there is positive mental health benefits, and there maybe better treatment of each other if everyone went to Christianity. Con shows there could be a definitive harm from sins being treated as sins, and to lgbtq; and it may not be beneficial for everyone to convert due to death.

To me the harms are more clear cut for con; and a little bit more generalized and wishy washy for pros main point.

Without giving any clear cut weighting criteria; the lgbtq and possible harm from conversion significantly outweighs the benefits to mental health.

Pros main point about the benefits to society is potentially realizable but seems very wishywashy and Ill defined. If pro gave me a benchmark of how well crime could improve by (ie crime rate from christians to non christians) I could better rate this, but without this it’s more tricky. Worse is that con doesn’t really contest it directly, but sort of by undermining the morality element. Cons rebuttal gives a more concerte harm, which leans me in his direction weighing these two items. The bottom line here is that pros argument for improvements in crime and murder are not concrete and developed enough for me to award the debate on; while I can’t award the debate on the economic harm for the same reason - it at least feels a little more fleshed out. This, together with the lgbtq - which was fleshed out enough to award the debate shifts the needle to con enough for me to be happy awarding points rather than allotting a draw.

As a result: arguments to con.

Con did provide an explanation of why the truth matters in R1, but I didn’t really get the rationale for why Christianity couldn’t provide any benefit if it wasn’t true.

What’s tough here, is that con didn’t provide a clear argument for the harms being false make; but pros response focused more on showing it could be true rather than the negating the potential harm. In these scenarios I tend to err in not awarding the debate on this sort of ambiguity, means I have to side with pro on the element of truth mattering in the absence of a clear rationale for why it’s a negative.

Given this, while I think con makes some great points about the truth of Christianity - the point doesn’t weigh into the resolution. As a result, even if I accept everything con says is true - it wouldn’t necessarily prove the resolution - as such I won’t review the truth of Christianity sections as they aren’t relevant to the burden.

Pro made an almost throwaway comment about the evidence for the resurrection as confirming the truth of Christianity - but this is not fleshed out in any way: so while proof of Christianity would win the debate for pro - he didn’t do nearly enough on this point to accept it on its own merit.

So let’s look at the values.

The values that pro gives - are two fold; that the moral teachings would reduce harm; and that there is a mental health benefit to being religious or christian.

Con didn’t not challenge either of these - which I think he should have, as they are easily challengeable.

The primary harms con raises is treatment and teaching of anti-lgbtq, and the incoherence of moral standards taught. Pro tries to claim this doesn’t matter by citing one form of Christianity where it isn’t an issue - which I am not buying given my thoughts above. Con does very well by citing examples in the Bible that are clearly against lgbtq - this wasn’t really addressed - so I have to accept the harm of lgbtqs as a way in which Christianity produces harms.

The second issue is the incoherent morality - which if followed would cause trillions of dollars of damage (not working on a Sunday was cited here). While both sides argued about whether things are sins or not - in the context of the debate - it’s not about whether something is a sin or not, but whether it does harm. In this case, con points out that some of these are only actually wrong if Christianity is true: but as neither side (other than the financial impact) pointed out either harms or benefits from these incoherent morality, it’s very hard to weight.

Framing.

My Reading of the resolution to me the framing is fairly simple. Pro must show the value of Christianity AND provide justification why, in balance people should convert to it.

Con takes this approach, and my default position is to side with him. Pro offers some caveats to this: while the format does not offer much back and forth; it’s hard to weigh much.

Given how all the points are kinda intermingled and interrelated - I sort of wanted to start off at the beginning.

I think both sides sort of agree that one side has to show Christianity is valuable, and the other that it isn’t. The caveats in the first round by pro seem to try and set up a scenario where negatives can be knocked down on technicalities.

Past actions of Christianity? No specific type of Christianity makes the context of the resolution a bit slippery. I side with con on this side - if Christianity led to harm in the past, this should be used to determine whether there can be harm in the future: that being said, few real examples of past harm were used, making this point a little moot.

The second, about types of Christianity - inside with con too, it seems a little bit of a dodge where con can state things the Bible teaches, and if followed are bad; and pro can say “well not everyone believes that”, unless one can show what is or isn’t Christianity I think con and pro should be working on balance. Con shouldn’t invoke some special sect, as reasons Christianity has little value, pro can’t invoke progressive sects as reasons why issues specific of Christianity aren’t issues. This kind of only relates to one or two points con makes.

The biggest point of contention is that of truth. If Christianity was true - I would suggest that’s an automatic win by pro - so negating arguments for proof are necessary. That being said, if the harm from it being untrue is outweighed by the benefit of it being followed - it doesn’t have to be true to have value. So in this respect I side with pro.

I will say that pro has dedicated a lot of space to talking about whether Christianity is untrue. What I needed him to do was to give me a quantifiable harm from it being untrue that I can weigh against the benefits - but I didn’t get this.

mine too, and I'm not even sure who I am voting for, despite reading the debate 3 times.

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@Lunatic
@Wylted

Thanks for taking the time to vote, and write RFDs.

My vote will be finished on this a bit later but before the deadline.

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@Wylted

Thanks for the help, I appreciate whatever you can do.

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@Wylted

Thanks for the help, I appreciate whatever you can do.

I already spent 2 hours on judging this debate. I'll see what type of progress I can make with my RFD tomorrow

"By our moral standard, there appears to be nothing overtly or inherently immoral about these 5 commandments. However, these commandments are laid out alongside more important commands, such as "thou shall not kill" - yet the bible offers no distinction between the prohibition of murder and working on a saturday, thus from a Christian perspective, they are both equally immoral"

This is true. From God's POV, you are no better than somebody who murders, if you break any of the other commandments as well. This has nothing to do with how the laws should be, enforced because prison is meant to keep society safe as well as punish. However both the blasphemer and the murderer are condemned to hell. That is unless they accept Jesus christ as their lord and savior

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@Bones

I am trying, but this is a tough read. Kinda boring to me. I am the best kind of voter though. Disinterested and unbiased

Final bump

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@whiteflame
@Ramshutu
@Sum1hugme
@Benjamin

Plz vote

One week to go.

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@Lemming

Some axes are better than others

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@Ramshutu
@Benjamin
@949havoc

An athiest, a theist and an agnostic voter. Feel free.

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@DeprecatoryLogistician

You got an argument ready?

@NoOneInParticular
Eh, religions are not a 'single type of mass produced axe.
Some axes are better than others,
Some are better for certain tasks,
Sometimes you pick the same type of axe as those around you, even if it's just the same color.
Some people don't want an axe, but many in the lives they live, find it useful.

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@Bones

I am actually pretty undecided on it still, and I don't really have an opinion on it one way or another.

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@DeprecatoryLogistician

Just wondering - do you believe that homosexuality is immoral? That could be an interesting topic to debate.

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@Bones

Ok, I changed the argument time.

Also, make the time for argument one week - I don't even come on here every day.

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@Bones

Alright I changed it, and that is also definitly a better way of wording it.

Btw it's spelled 'necessary'.

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@DeprecatoryLogistician

Change it to "People should convert to Christianity", and I'll accept.

Everything has value in a certain context.