Total votes: 53
Plagiarism and FF
Pro's case:
Unborn children are humans, humans have objective value, hence abortions should be made illegal.
Con successfully refutes Pro’s first argument by pointing out that if abortions were murder, they would already be illegal, making it futile for “abortion[s] to be made illegal” as the debate resolution states. Furthermore, with his $13k example, Con shows that the value of life is currently treated as subjective, Pro merely asserted that “human life has objective value…” which he however supports with neither argument nor sources, giving me no reason to accept his assertion. In R2 pro attempts to defend his argument by restating “we think the child has the right to live” “the human embryo… deserves a chance outside the womb alive”, these are again mere assertions not backed up by any evidence or argument. Pro merely asserts that human life has objective intrinsic value and that hence abortions should be illegal, the problem however is that Con disagrees that human life has objective value. Merely restating that the conclusion follows from the premises is futile when the premise is rejected by the opponent, Pro did nothing to support his premise (that human life has objective value), and hence he did not defend his conclusion successfully (that abortions should be made illegal). In R3 Pro makes no further attempt to show that human life has objective value other than to moralistically assert "I feel we can all agree those women [referring to those willing to have abortions] have had a severe moral breakdown.". ---> Dismantled by Con, not supported by any argument from Pro, merely asserted.
Con's case:
Con outlines that pregnancy causes lasting harm to the mother, which he supports with several examples and a source. Con furthermore outlines that the mother is not responsible to care for the ‘stranger’ (unborn child), as this would be alike to slavery as the woman would be forced to care for another being against her will.
Pro concedes that abortions are permissible in cases where the mother is “at risk of death” (presumably meaning at a considerable risk of death). Pro then goes on to claim that the mother should be aware of the health risks before becoming pregnant, which however seems irrelevant to the debate, since there are women who are not aware of this in which case abortion would be their best option. Pro has not outlined why the fact that they should’ve known beforehand means that they should be denied their preference after their mistake. Con rebuts this through pointing out that "The vast majority of abortions are for unplanned pregnancies [6], thus future knowledge is not a a point of significance.", and flips Con's own words to show that the “You cannot make the decisions for the majority based on the exceptions of the minority." Furthermore, Pro outlines that abortions also carry health risks, does however not state whether these are comparable to those of carrying out pregnancies, which hence only provides limited support for his POV. Con refutes this point by firstly arguing that there is a significant difference between the two as women are aware of the risks of abortions before undergoing them, whereas they are not considering the risks before an unplanned pregnancy, additionally, Con flips Pro's sources to show that “These problems are really rare, and they’re usually easy to treat” suggesting that the harm of pregnancy is more significant than that of abortions. In his final round Pro again merely asserts "the mother should have known" without stating why this would justify prohibiting abortions for those women who have not known. Again Pro merely makes assertions which are not supported by argument. --> Con's argument stands strong as Pro's counter-arguments suffer from lack of detail (e.g. weighing harm of pregnancy vs abortions) and lack of elaboration (why it matters that the women should've known), Con pointed both of these issues out (and refuted them by citing sources), which were not addressed by Pro who merely restated his prior assertions.
Con’s slavery argument is addressed by Pro, who argues that it uses the same logic as his abortion argument which Con accused of being a non-sequitur. Pro does not outline how they resemble each other, hence his assertion has little value. To defend his case, Pro defines the womb as real-estate to be excluded from the definition of chattel, Con rebuts this through citing a longer definition showing that the woman is, in fact, not real-estate, basically ending the argument as Pro takes a different approach suggesting that the woman "chose to create this life" and is hence responsible for her own servitude. How the choice (which Con pointed out is not a real choice as abortions tend to be for unwanted pregnancies) suggests that abortions should be illegal is again not explained, merely asserted. --> Con's case once more stands strong, well-rebutted against mere assertions by Pro.
I'll copy Franklin's rating system out of convenience, just wanna listen to some good music while revising.
Round 1: First Time - Speedrace
Round 2: Hold Back the River - Virtuoso
Round 3: Landslide - Virtuoso
Round 4: Let it Go - Speedrace
Round 5: Love Someone - Speedrace
Congrats Speedrace (3) and good job to Virtuoso (2) as well, solid song selection.
Forfeit due to deserved ban.
Forfeit due to deserved ban.
full forfeit
CVB.
I prefer Virt's songs but whether the "Total Eclipse" cover is electronic music is questionable. According to Google the sole genre of the cover is "metal". Great song though
The Madman conceded by not presenting any arguments opposing the resolution.
Forfeiture.
No arguments presented on either side
Concession by Ralph in the final round.
Con gracefully conceded in round 4.
Full forfeit by both debaters
Pro conceded in round 5
Concession by Pro, great attitude though.
Con's memes are all blanks, Pro's is an actual meme, therefore Pro wins
Pro argues that 5G internet causes skin diseases, cancers and has “terrible effects” on the eyes. Pro admitted that he has no clue why 5G internet is doing this “5g screws with this in some terribly since way that i don't understand”. So, his argument basically boils down to “I don’t know why or how but 5G will harm you”. Conceding that one does not know what one is talking about severely harms the strength of one’s arguments, although that alone is not sufficient to refute them. Furthermore, he presented a document that was signed by more than 180 scientists and doctors which supports his case well, however he simply stated that it was a paper from “180 scientists” which is slightly deceptive by making the document sound more credible than it actually is.
Con refutes Pro’s case by pointing to NYC where 5G has been partly implemented but no harm has been reported. Pro counters by arguing that he is talking about 5G, rather than 4g,3g,2g,1g, etc. which suggests that he has misunderstood Con’s argument as he implied that 5G has been implemented in parts of NYC which he supported with a source which clearly supports this assertion: “5G Home Internet Is Now Live in New York City”. Due to this misunderstanding and no new arguments by Pro, Con extended his arguments.
Con’s argument is basically: If A then B, not B, thus not A. Which is perfectly valid and convincing. In his final round, Pro argued that the New Yorkers are probably feeling the side-effects of 5G but simply not linking those to 5G and that it may be due to the short time that it has been present in NYC. Con pointed out that we would still expect elevated doctor visists, etc and in the end this was enough for me to believe that Pro has not fulfilled his BoP. I think Con could have done better by providing some sources that found no statistically significant harm due to 5G but since Pro was unable to explain why 5G is harmful and instead relied on assertions backed up by sources without formulating arguments, arguments go to Con.
Con pointed out flaws in Pro’s sources (e.g. that his firefighter argument relied on an article by someone who is well known to make ludicrous claims such as that Nasa conceded that they never went to the moon) which thereby completely obliterated the credibility of the firefighter argument. Furthermore, the document signed by “180 scientists” was actually signed by 180 scientists and doctors (I went through the list of signees and many of them are MDs, retired and some even from completely unrelated fields such as theology). Thus, Pro’s sources are low in credibility, whereas Con’s sources have not been criticised by Pro and seem to support his case well. Additionally, Pro’s misunderstanding of one of the sources led to round 2 being wasted (the title of the source clearly states 5G, Pro’s reference to 4G, 3G, etc. are red-herrings. Thus sources clearly go to Con due to the quality of sources, the honesty in presenting these and as Con seems to have understood them, whereas Pro conceded that he is basically regurgitating his sources due to him not understanding them.
No serious conduct issues as the false presentation of one of Pro’s sources was quite possibly a mistake and thus penalised by awarding sources already, ergo even.
Lots of S&G errors from Pro but they did not seriously impede the legibility of the debate, thus even.
Full forfeit
Double ff from Pro
Full ff by Pro, thus conduct to Con.
Pro provided four reasons why Nadal is better (youth, superior serve, training & ball direction), Con conceded all of these points "Now, what you've said is quite true." but argued that because Federer gets injured less often, he is better. Pro rebutted this by pointing out that this debate is about who has superior skill and is therefore better, and not about who would win in a match. No further arguments followed so Pro's arguments stand unrefuted/conceded while Con's was rebutted. Arguments to Pro
Con ff'd 2/3 rounds, therefore conduct to Pro as well.
No S&G issues.
No relevant sources.
Pro argued that Walker is more famous than Guetta because his music is plain and "most people don't like him as much as Alan Walker". The sole source of this information is an appeal to Pro's friends and Pro's confidence that "that is the same with the public". An unconvincing argument that is supported by nothing but a personal anecdote. Con rebuts this by naming some of the diverse and famous artists that Guetta has worked with "Sia, Nicki Minaj, Kid Cudi, Bebe Rexha, Rihanna, Vassy and more" and further points to some of the videos of Guetta with insane view counts and Con's sources actually showed that Guetta has over 11B views on YT, Con could have pointed out at this point that Walker only has around 6B. Con wins nonetheless as his arguments are based on verifiable evidence and objective facts (view counts of videos and diversity of collaborations), whereas Pro's arguments are based on subjective opinions (e.g. "Guetta's music is more plain") and Pro's sole supporting evidence is an unfalsifiable personal anecdote (reference to his friends that prefer Walker/haven't heard of Guetta). Therefore, arguments to the Madman.
Pro ff'd 2 out of 3 rounds, ergo conduct also goes to the Madman.
I would have awarded sources as well due to the sources that Con presented that support his case well (e.g. the view counts) compared to the reference to personal anecdotes of Pro. However, Con made some unsubstantiated claims "Nicki Minaj wouldn't be seen dead collabing with Alan Walker", "Sure, he is capable now of 'fame' in a massive burst thanks to PUBG owning him for a year at least ". Therefore, sources even.
No S&G issues, everything was comprehensible = even.
Michael’s arguments are based on the assumption that if some vigilante heroes were allowed, then all would have to be allowed, which is flawed in my opinion and RM counters by pointing to real-life “vigilante heroes” such as Mandela who are condoned by society. However, RM left many points by Michael unaddressed (i.e. that without a universal code, absolute anarchy will rule) but since Michael merely stated that this would be the case, without actually providing any fleshed-out arguments in favour of these assertions, these points are outweighed by RM pointing to Mandela, to whom these criticisms do not apply. Arguments to RM nonetheless as his Mandela example is a convincing example of a vigilante hero that in the end was supported by society. (more thorough description of arguments award in the comments).
Snarky comments and questions by Michael (e.g. “Are we going to make this a habit?, WOULD YOU LIKE TO TRY AGAIN?” and “ in case you didn't know”) were entirely irrelevant to the debate and could easily have been addressed in the comment section instead. This nonsense made the debate less enjoyable and degraded the quality of Michael’s rounds. However, RM ff’d, thus conduct is even.
RM managed to jumble together an 86-word sentence which is not only a complete pain to read but also doesn’t seem quite coherent (RM starts out explaining that there is something that defeats Con’s entire case, then lists examples from Con’s case but never actually explains what this “fact” that defeats Con’s case is):
“The entire case by Con is defeated by the fact that everything he is saying, from 'we selected' (who is we? Arbitrary) ignoring the minority who lose in every single democratic election or even the greater peace achievable either through tyranny or something superior to peace achievable by fighting those tyrants or, less severe but just as corrupt, oligarchs by being a brutal rebel who takes down the local pedos and leads a sort of 'peacekeeper by violence' which can work as a non-legislated police force.”
S&G to Michael as this is entirely incomprehensible and RM’s style of 50+ word sentences severely reduces the legibility of RM’s arguments (Grammarly marked 5 punctuation errors and 3 style errors in the first three paragraphs of RM’s round 2 alone; that’s more than 1 error that reduces legibility per sentence).
Pro’s sources supported his points and Con’s supported his own; no one repeatedly made outrageous assertions without providing sources and sources were largely irrelevant to the debate outcome. Therefore, sources even.
Con admitted defeat "I surrender, pls ramshutu whip me in the votes, make my ego bleed!!!"
Full forfeit
Con argues that not all children want to learn an instrument and thus should not have to, Pro argues that playing a musical instrument will is beneficial but Con refutes this by arguing that if a child does not have the passion to learn an instrument, he won't experience these benefits anyway (presumably due to lack of motivation). Pro conceded this rebuttal by waiving the last round, therefore arguments to Con
Ralph accepted the full BoP in the description.
In round 1, Ralph argued that the contradictions in the Bible are the quickest way to make a Christian lose his faith. RM argued that not being indoctrinated (i.e. never having read the Bible in the first place) is a faster way to become an atheist and that questioning the faith before reading it “cover to cover”, as the resolution states, is quicker as well. Ralph responded by pointing out that RM is debating in bad faith, which is likely true, but RM’s arguments are convincing and this debate was extremely hard to win for Pro due to the unfortunate formulation of the resolution and the acceptance of the sole BoP. RM restated and supported his opening arguments with further definitions and explanations which were however unnecessary as Ralph did not respond to them again and instead pointed to his own opening arguments. In the end, RM's argument being born to atheistic parents and/or losing faith just before reading the last sentence of the Bible, were not refuted sufficiently and convincing.
Bad faith debating? Probably. Successful bad faith debating? In my opinion, yes.
Conduct even, both debaters behaved reasonably, the bad faith from RM, in this case, does not constitute bad conduct in my opinion as Ralph shot himself in the foot by choosing the debate resolution and accepting the whole BoP. Had RM been the creator of this debate I would have awarded conduct to Ralph.
S&G even, both debater's arguments were comprehensible.
Sources even, RM presented sources that supported his points regarding susceptibility to irrational beliefs in early childhood while Ralph presented none but these sources had no significant impact on the debate outcome
Both conceded, there was no serious disagreement, this topic should probably be debated again with a clearer title such as "Should every college have to offer a law course"
Con rightfully pointed out that Pro's interpretation of his epiphany could well have been influenced by personal biases and that someone who was primarily surrounded by Muslims may have become deeply attracted to Islam because of a similar experience in a mosque. I also liked Con's reference to possible unconscious influences leading to the behaviour in the church which provides a naturalistic explanation contrary to Pro's supernatural interpretation. Pro tries to rebut this by explaining that his environment is not actually all that Christian, although it is evident that it still is primarily Christian as both his father and step mother are Christian. Pro then outlines his conscious expectation of boredom in the church, which does however not address Con's point that unconscious influences could have led to his religious experience. Due to forfeits in subsequent rounds, no further argument points can be awarded as there was no opportunity for Pro to defend his position. Therefore, arguments to Con as Pro's reasons for believing in God were questioned and successfully shown to not be convincing beyond reasonable doubt due to naturalistic explanations (e.g. unconscious influences) having just as much explanatory power and possibly even more as they can also explain the religious experiences of other faiths (e.g. Islam)
While I understand that 12h rounds can easily be missed, conduct goes to Con nonetheless as Pro accepted this debate with the knowledge that the time limit is short
As this debate centred around personal experiences, the only sources that were presented related to Pro's prescription medication use and air pressure having little influence on his religious experience, which while true, did not sufficiently support his position to warrant awarding sources points.
Both debaters had reasonable S&G although a bit more structure would have made the debate more legible.
Full forfeit
Full forfeit
Almost full ff and Pro's argument that airsoft should not be banned just because a small minority might abuse it is convincing (round 1) and not refuted by Con who focuses on the small minority that may or may not abuse it.
Full forfeit
Full forfeit
https://imgflip.com/i/2ykyk9 was my favourite meme
Forfeiture.
Forfeiture.
Forfeiture.
Forfeiture.
Full forfeit
Full forfeit
Full forfeit
Full FF by Pro.
While I agree with RM, it is nonetheless unfortunate that Pro conceded.
Arguments to Con as Pro conceded.
Arguments: Pro (Pro’s Evolutionary Model and Scientific Data model are both successful [supported by evidence such as citations and studies and provided with sufficient examples such as bad hygiene negatively affecting sexual market value and autistic savants being considered generally unattractive] and logically coherent [The conclusions follow from the premises] while Con’s first and second argument are contradicted by the scientific data cited in Pro’s second argument [i.e. Pro showed that there are methods of reliably determining mate preferences such as using "Vaginal photoplethysmography"] and his third argument is a non-sequitur which is later pointed out by Pro “A man's knowledge and awareness of what strategies he is using to attract a woman is irrelevant to how the women experience them and also irrelevant to the debate, because we are debating what women are attracted to and we are not debating whether or not the men are aware of the concentration of androstenol in their sweat, their social status, or the pitch of their voice.”)
Sources: Pro (Human cited several peer-reviewed studies and academic literature which supported his arguments well [for example Human asserted that “Why women have sex is complex and multifaceted” and then supported this assertion with a study by Meston & Buss that did indeed identify over 200 different sexual motivations.] Ralph, on the other hand, made several assertions that did not seem self-evident to me such as “In fact, many woman simply fall for guys just on looks and then just tolerate their personality” whether there are truly “many women” that do this is questionable in my opinion, especially as Ralph conceded that it would be sufficient for Pro to show that 51% of women prefer a holistic approach, whether anywhere near 50% of women are prepared to “tolerate personality” seems questionable to me, so either Ralph’s argument does not support his position or it evidently requires a source. Even after Human pointed this out in the following round “There is no warrant for this assertion and no source provided.”, Ralph did not provide a citation or even attempt to support it with evidence. Therefore sources go to Pro as he supported all relevant assertions that were not self-evidently true with high quality sources, whereas Con did not support questionable assertions with sufficient evidence even after Pro requested a source for one of Con’s claims.
S&G: Pro (Human structured his text neatly, remained on topic and made no significant S&G errors, Ralph devoted a significant portion of the debate off-topic subjects [such as whether Pro is happily married, his own marriage and at least ten unnecessary rhetorical questions] , his second argument is hard to distinguish from his first [except for the added appeal to a shared BoP] and there were S&G errors that made reading difficult throughout the debate [e.g. “woman” was constantly used instead of “women”, sentence starters are regularly not capitalised which decreases the flow “furthermore”, “whenever”…]
Conduct: Pro (Con goes off-topic by passive-aggressively asking Con whether he is “happily married”, regularly asks rhetorical questions “right?”, “No evidence huh?”, “You mean Pseudoscience “ and is confrontational in general “Oh no. You're not dodging this one.”, “Oh, you're a dating coach. Well I guess you have a bias towards this topic then right?”, “Appealing to the voters. hmmm. Yeah I guess I would do that too if I had weak arguments.”. Finally he acknowledges his “harsh” debating style and Pro’s good conduct: “I know I was harsh, but that's my style. Good debate to my well conducted opponent.”)
<4 = Would skip on Spotify, 4-6 = Wouldn't mind listening to, >6 Would enjoy listening to.
Everytime We Touch - A bit too fast for my taste and the high-pitched voice was annoying at times but I enjoyed the bass boost and liked the song - 6
Black and White - I like the intro but the high-pitched voice from 0:32-0:40 is somewhat annoying - 4
More Than You Know - Decent but not impressive, similar to Black and White but without the high-pitched voice - 5
Let's Go - Too repetetive for my taste, weak drop, not awful though - 4
Jammu - The only song in this debate that I perceived as somewhat unpleasant - 3
Total: 22
I would have preferred songs without high-pitched voices and a bit less repetetive songs, it'd probably have been better to select Dance/Pop/Chill songs to appeal to the widest possible audience.
Superman - Enjoyable song, nice beat, the part from 1:05 till 1:30 is pretty good - solid 7
Red Forest - Pretty chill, the kind of song I might listen to while working on an essay or reading fiction, a bit boring at some points though - 5
No More - A bit repetetive and hardly outstanding in any area, still somewhat pleasant though - 4
Crash - Decent song, doesn't underwhelm in any area, doesn't stand out either though and is less enjoyable than Superman - 6
Blue Light - Pretty chill song, I like the opening and its pretty chill throughout - borderline 7
Total: 29
RM didn't take any serious risks in this debate, solid selection with exclusively dance and chill music, if I had another Electronic Music Battle, I'd probably go for similar genres.