Greyparrot

Forfeits and manipulation are bad because it's mean. And because I said so.

Anyway, vote con. I did.

Mhar wins round 2 and 4
RM wins 1, 3, and 5

While I liked pro's research on his arguments, I feel like con barely won the debate by presenting the fact that societal agreement is forced in North Korea, so it is impossible to ascertain if the societal agreefulness and homogeneity is genuine. Other points seemed to be barely tipping the scale in either direction for me.

Pro is convincing, but used fewer sources. Pro was very legible, but con offered nudes. Conduct point to con for pics.

Con gets a conduct point because Pro dropped 2 rounds.
Con gets source point as Pro used no sources

Pro clearly stated the definition of communism. Pro went on to make some more generalizations of that definition and started talking about property.

Con clearly got distracted and did not address what the debate was about: namely, that the debate was about whether or not society should evolve so that everyone would have a duty to produce property for those who have no property. This was from the definition stated.

Key word here is duty. Con would have easily won the debate by stating simply that "people who choose to work should never have a duty to provide for people who do not choose to work." Instead, con spent too much time attacking communism and the concepts of production instead of directly contesting the stated definition. Sadly, point for Pro on arguments.

Conduct point for forfeit.

I didn't see any real debate resolution here, but Con seemed to make a point about small portions. While Pro certainly had some tasty submissions, Con had a far more diverse diet, so I will have to award Con for arguments.

Pro presents the meat of his argument in round one by saying teaching ABOUT religion is a necessary part of education in the framework of the teaching of liberal arts through understanding culture. Note: Pro makes the distinction between teaching religion and teaching ABOUT religion, as this is how he uses the present guidelines for education in a legal framework. For Con to win, he must prove this is not the case.

Con makes a mistake right away by assuming Pro is arguing for schools to "teach religion" with this:

"First of all unless the school is setup for certain things like an art school, vocational school or theology school, a public school houses the general studies. Anything else, the child learns at home where they're trained up in the way they should go according to the scriptures if it's that kind of a household....I understand many are brought up in a church, learn what they learn in Sunday school, learn what they learn in elementary school."

Con does put the gauntlet down and claims that Pro needs to convince the reader that the instruction is necessary. Does Pro do this? Let us see!

Pro claims that instruction about religion is necessary for a well-rounded education.
Pro lays out the meat of this later on in the debate with this:
"Teaching religious studies provides the benefits of helping students to better understand human behavior, and promoting a more tolerant society. Religious studies can complement other subjects and expand students’ horizons. Finally, the public school curriculum would not be well-balanced without religious studies, since religion plays such an important role in American society, and the curriculum should reflect this."

I think this is sufficient for proving his case, and Con did not do enough to counter this claim. Instead, Con in his final thoughts attacked a strawman argument of Pro, namely: promoting the teaching of religion instead of teaching ABOUT religion in a cultural framework.

Moreover, on a personal level, I can't stress how important Pro's position is for promoting a tolerant and understanding society. We currently live in times where this type of cultural education is sorely lacking, and people on both sides do not understand or tolerate each other because they have never been exposed to the different opposing cultures in America. Learning about different religious cultures can go a long way to help bridge the gap and offer compromise instead of both sides labeling each other as extremist whack jobs. While this is my sentiment, I think Pro did an adequate job outside of my own feelings about this issue; but please let me know if I may have unfairly assessed this debate.

Thank you.

A lot of this debate goes back and forth about Kalam's arguments with little resolution, so I won't use that for my criteria.

What I did find was a large discrepancy in the arguments about the nature of pain and suffering. Con's position was that a benevolent God would not allow pain and suffering.

The response from pro was:

"I agree it is entirely possible that God has good reasons for permitting the suffering we see around us that we have just not thought of yet. My response to that is.. so what?"

Now I was kind of disappointed the debate didn't go deep into the nature of entropy and how life and evolution can't exist without it, namely, that pain and stress are absolutely necessary for growth as a universally observable axiom....but I digress. (in the most base terms, spare the rod and spoil the child)
Using this line of argument, Pro could have successfully made a case that a benevolent god could indeed cause suffering, and in fact, it would be necessary for the growth of life. Instead, Pro just dismisses the argument with hand waving by saying this: "We’re simply not in a position to make the judgement that God doesn’t have reasons for permitting suffering." This isn't proving that god probably exists. It's kicking the can down the road. The philosophical tack of hinting "we just can't know" skews more in favor of non-existence. Disappointing, as I noted that there IS evidence that we DO know about the observable properties of evolution and entropy.

I think Pro's response of "so what" was basically a concession on that crucial point, so I will have to award Con a point on arguments. Neutral on all other criteria.

In order for Pro to win, he has to win these 4 arguments...

1..Sexual Sensation: While some individuals claim that circumcision may reduce sexual sensation, studies on this topic are inconclusive and arbitrary.
2..Aesthetics: Same as above.
3..Risk of Complications: While all medical procedures carry some level of risk, the overall risk of complications associated with circumcision is acceptably low when performed by trained healthcare professionals in a sterile environment.
4..Autonomy and Consent: Infants cannot provide informed consent for many routine medical procedures, including vaccinations and other interventions aimed at protecting their health. Parents or legal guardians are entrusted with making decisions in the best interest of the child's well-being. Circumcision, when performed for cultural or religious reasons, is often seen as a reflection of the parent's beliefs and values. Many parents consider circumcision to be a positive choice for their child as a part of overall cultural acceptance.

So...did Slainte convince me? Let us see!

Early on pro makes an argument for point 4 that there may be cultural reasons and also says "Sometimes it IS a good choice because it is medically necessary." but Pro did not state that consent isn't needed if there's little harm traded for the benefit of cultural acceptance...I'll give pro a neutral grade on this... didn't pass or fail on this one. But that means he definitely has to get the others right.

""not feel good" on itself is insufficient reasons to justify an outright cultural ban." This is Pro's main argument for the "not feel good" argument. This is really shaky. No studies cited, just a blanket statement. Pro didn't even bother to say that sensations are personal and not easily measured. At this point, Pro would have lost the debate here and now...but Pro pulled a magic card and somehow managed to say this at the end.

"Con's own comments referencing friends and general statements show that the debate is based on the social interpretation, not the personal."
This is sufficient to win on points 1 and 2. Well done Pro..well done.

Now onto point 3.
This is Pro's argument:
"Yes they do. Cooking food can cause a burn. Do we cancel it? Cars cause deaths. Do we ban cars? Accidents are not independently justified to ban"
An utter flop of an argument. No studies, and not even a hint of a justification of the balance of good over risk regarding cut dick. Pro fails this point entirely. Sad day.

So let's tally up...A draw on one point, failed on one point, passed on 2 points. Somehow, Pro managed to barely squeeze out a win here. I am really ashamed to have to vote and give pro a win for such a poor performance, but the score is what it is.

Pro wins on arguments (barely). Con wins on sources, sadly there is no source point to award.

AHHHHHGHHH! I so wanted to give this debate to con, I was looking and looking for a way to a W and just couldn't connect enough dots to do it.

Here are the issues I had with COn's arguments:
1) Resolution was stated as: "I am arguing for Drug Prohibition and defending that all psychoactive substances should not be legalized."
This a ridiculously constrictive constraint as using the word ALL includes Alcohol, which would mean arguing for the prohibition of Alcohol as well.
Now, I could overlook this because COn made voluminous arguments about addiction and the reason for the prohibition of psychoactive drugs should be based on problems arising from addiction. So okay, I can generally assume con meant to say "all highly addictive psychoactive substances" Con makes some great arguments about addiction and uses great sources. If only this was the only hurdle for Con...

2) Con then states "Psychoactive substances are easier to abuse than any of the previous three and will require more government enforcement & maintenance to reduce danger."
The key word here is "danger." Pro has an incredibly easy time defeating this argument by simply citing statistics of a less addictive drug, Alcohol, as being more deadly and dangerous.
What Con could have argued instead would be that the addiction of a psychoactive drug prevents a person from understanding the risks, and loses the cognitive freedom to choose. Losing mental freedom affects the quality of life, and would not be so easily countered with the death statistics of Alcohol. The "dangers" would then be identified in opportunity costs associated with the loss of freedom. Con never made this connection.

Pro easily showed the dangers of the manufacture of toxic unregulated drugs, so he had that as a winning argument. He did make a mistake comparing drug statistics with France and Portugal instead of using a competing study within the USA Studies from other countries frequently fall into the apples-and-oranges trap as there are many other variables at play when it comes to drug use and drug culture. So Pro lost that argument and the source point. Pro ends up winning the whole shebang at the end with the: "alcohol and tobacco kill more people a year than all other drugs combined, and by a huge margin"

Sources to Con, Arguments to Pro.

This debate was heavily skewed in favor of pro, making it practically unwinnable for con due to its lopsided nature. Right at the beginning of the debate framework, con asserted that murder is a term strictly confined within the legal framework. Consequently, pro's sole task to secure victory was to present evidence of legal abortions, a feat that was rather easily and effectively accomplished.

Despite the formidable odds, con displayed commendable effort throughout the debate.

I supposse i will have to vote for pro for a few reasons:

1) Despite pro calling Anakin "privileged" and then stating Anakin was sold off into slavery....Pro still met the criteria for a tragic character when he said Anakin was manipulated. this suggests Anakin did not entirely willingly choose to become evil.

2) Con states Light Yagami would have had a better life if he chose differently, but did not provide sufficient evidence.

This has to be one of the toughest debates I have ever voted on. This debate could have easily been a tie, but I think I will have to favor CON ever so slightly. The reason for this is that in the 1st round, PRO sets up his argumentative framework as America being prosperous and powerful as a result of the insurrection against Britain, and therefore was justified. What I expected to see was many more arguments about the ideas behind the Magna Carta, the efficiency of local representation, and the rule of local oligarchs (rich white farm owners as CON discussed) being more efficient than distant oligarchs. I saw none of that from PRO and instead tried to lay out a moral framework for the revolution completely dropping the utilitarian argument that he started in round one. Then the debate shifted to moral arguments....

Since CON defeated him on the moral grounds (especially on the slavery point) I'll have to award this one to CON.

Ahh the time-honored debate regarding the yin and yang of LA and STEM.

It really is a shame CON fell into the trap of comparing utility and purpose on the same path as STEM. By doing so, it gave Pro an advantage on the utility argument. Namely, the salary and advancements argument.

I looked hard at CON's points hoping to find his salvation, namely, pointing out that LA answers the question of WHY for societal utility rather than the HOW that STEM provides. Had CON pursued this, it would have set up many counterarguments based on the creation of the societal policies by LA that ultimately dictate where STEM is to be focused.

Many counterexamples of STEM driven societies with little LA social policy abound in numerous historical examples of failed great civilizations. Con almost went in this direction by discussing global warming policies dictating the direction of STEM, but should have devoted an entire section to this point, not one line.

CON instead mostly stayed on the Utility track and so lost this debate.

Forfeit with a concession.

Pro was wrong about Taiwan being recognized as a sovereign state as the international consensus is clearly the "One China" policy.

But this debate was practically unwinnable for CON as the PRC wishes for the status quo of One China, and Tawian's recent elections affirm this with the rise of the One China opposition KMT party.

Full forfeit. Best of luck to both debaters in the rest of the tournament, hope Lxam can participate in future rounds.

Basically con wins on arguments solely due to a semantic technicality where the resolution did not state "paid less for the same work"

Conduct is scored based on the forfeiture of the 1st round.

I did not feel pro was able to rebut the Severe Disability/Severe Inheritable Disease adequately enough to warrant a win.

Since pro seemed to stop arguing against that point, it appears he conceded that point. Mind you, the way the debate was set up made it pretty easy for con to find the one exception to the rule as laid out by pro at the start of the debate. I believe Con proved that exception in the case of Severe Disability/Severe Inheritable Disease people, especially in the case of having such a severe disability that it nullifies the natural urge to procreate.

Pro kinda opened up the door to a loss by insisting motion is relative, whereby con immediately conceded that point and then established a relative point of reference as an x,y,z plane.

The rest of the debate was semantics and minor back and forth jabs. No outrageous conduct marks. Maybe Pro could have won if he established the monkey's face as a point of reference to motion, but I didn't see any compelling arguments as to why that would be the only case.

Pro forfeited. Additionally, pro refused to provide any evidence that everyone else in history was less smart than Tesla.