How did Con lay into the credibility of Jesus? Did he lay into the credibility of the disciples/apostles? Not really. He used innuendo to suggest that they made this person - Jesus - into a legend. But what actual historic evidence does he have to back the claim? He presented none, just asserted 'legend.' What we have available to us he never touched. Con never presented any early evidence that refutes the biblical accounts and he never shows how they were turned into legend? Lewis bases his trilemma on the Jesus of Scripture. Pro also based his argument on Scripture. These disciples claimed they were eyewitnesses to His three and a half years of ministry, His death, and His resurrection. Pro laid out a number of Scriptures that identified Jesus as Lord. They did not think He was a liar or lunatic. In fact, early church history records many of them dying for what - a lie? A lunatic? No, they spread the news of the Lord at the risk of excruciating deaths, in some cases. We have no evidence at all that they recanted Him as Lord.
Furthermore, Con agreed to debate the Trilemma,
"This debate asks us to look at the Lewis' Trilemma argument as defined in the description of this debate."
"Any other outside arguments for Jesus' divinity will be ignored. For pro to win this debate he must prove that this argument is sound."
Con then brings a fourth element into the discussion based on the soundness and validity of the trilemma premises:
"There is, however, a fourth choice: Jesus was a legend. The argument centers around the assumption that the Gospel's accurately record Jesus' teachings and that the miracles he allegedly performed are historical facts. Unless pro proves those things, pro cannot win this debate."
Regarding spelling and grammar, I used Grammarly to judge between the two debaters on the merits of spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Pro had the better, but he also wrote far less than Pro. Pro also used a lot of KJV archaic language. I still give the edge to Con.
Pro used a reliable source when he quoted from early church fathers. Con used more sources (two) and one was reliable and one was biased, IMO. Therefore, I give them a tie.
I found their conduct equally cordial.
Now to the arguments themselves. I found that Pro provided more of an argument. Con just repeated his legend argument over and over again as if it was the knockout punch, but Con did not give any credible argument that this was the case, that these eyewitnesses embellished the character of Christ into legend. I don't know of any such argument from early history. Lewis based his argument on the historic manuscripts.
What Pro said in his third round still stands, IMO:
"What is really the issue here? Is whether or not you believe Jesus is who he says he is. If you do not believe Jesus is who he says he is, you are calling him a liar or a lunatic."
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>Reported Vote: PGA2.0 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Pro for arguments, 1 point to Con for S/G
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: The justification for argument points was borderline, but we will default to considering it sufficient. S&G is insufficiently explained. There are two reasons why it's not enough to say Grammarly suggested that Con had better S&G. First, Grammarly looks at every single grammatical mistake, but S&G points should only be awarded when grammatical errors reach the point where the readability of debaters is severely impaired. Second, the voter is required to specifically reference text from the debate from both sides proving grammatical errors, and explain why one side's readability was worse than the other. The voter may properly revote by sufficiently justifying the S/G points they awarded or by choosing not to award those points.
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“…as Scripture states: God is not a man that He should lie, nor a mortal that He should change His mind.”
But the same scripture he uses here for validation, says that Jesus was not merely/only a man. This objection fails because he is contradicted by the scripture he uses for validation, and his unwarranted assumption that Jesus is only a man.
The charge that Jesus lied is obviously not supported. In his first quoted scripture in supported of his claim that Jesus lied, Con himself records Jesus as saying, ” “I have spoken openly to the world; I always taught in a synagogue and in the Temple, where all the Jews come together; and I spoke nothing in secret. Why do you Question me?”
Con said Jesus purposefully veiled his teachings, but that is not equal to lying, even if it were true. And he gives no reason for us to believe Jesus was in any way dishonest in his speech. Someone not understanding Jesus is not the same as Jesus being deliberately mysterious. Con gives us no
On Arguments:
Con’s point that Jesus being legend was a fourth choice was not logical. Even if Jesus was legend, that would not disturb the logic of Him being either Lord, Liar, or Lunatic within the legend. Pro’s definition of legend was helpful, we saw that legend can be “regarded as historical although not verifiable".
Con even said, “It's important to note that this (Lord, Lair, Lunatic) is the only argument this debate is centered around. Any other outside arguments for Jesus' divinity will be ignored.” I would then expect that any other outside arguments AGAINST Jesus' divinity should likewise be ignored.” Otherwise the criteria become unfair to Pro.
Pro satisfied me that Jesus must logically be one of the 3 options regardless of whether the story is considered legend or not.
Con states, “Any man who claims to be God can be dismissed as a liar without any further examinations of his claims or miracles that he does or does not perform….”
But then bases his dismissal on scripture;
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>Reported Vote: Ethang5 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Pro for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: The arguments points were sufficiently justified. To award conduct points, the misconduct must be "excessively rude" or profane. It is not clear from the RFD how or why the voter regards the misconduct as excessive, though he notes that it occurred. To be excessive is to be either very frequent or extremely severe. The vote may properly revote either by not awarding conduct or by addressing the insufficiency in the justification of the awarded conduct points.
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>Reported Vote: TheGreatSeal // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Neither pro or con went beyond the book much to find sources, but since this is a literary debate on Harry Potter, its perfectly understandable. Since Pro had one other source, Pro can make a really good argument for winning siurces, but its also the case that "most reliable sources" doesn't translate to the same quantity. Using New Criticism itself doesn't make a source unreliable, so I'll tie this one.
The forfeits really cursed Con to lose arguments. There is too much unrefuted by Pro, which really swings my vote here. Pro was also able to refute con unopposed. By volume, and frankly a lack of effort by Con, Pro wins arguments. The full forfeit also costs Con conduct.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: TheGreatSeal // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Con for arguments, sources, and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Full Forfeit.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: SupaDudz // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: full forfeit reee
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Virtuoso // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: Pro forfeited a round and loses conduct. Not only that but he doesn’t really even try to make an argument.
Pro’s entire argument was how he’s some mason and totally failed to actually provide evidence for his claim. Ultimately the BOP is entirely on him which he fails to uphold.
>Reason for Mod Action: The conduct point is sufficiently explained, but the argument point suffers. To award argument points, the voter must: "survey specific arguments and counterarguments from both sides which impacted their voting decision." The voter fails to survey any counterarguments or any arguments from Con; should the voter update their RFD with these arguments surveyed and weighed, the vote would be sufficient.
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Not much of a debate, so not much to say. Con's argument basically functions as a statement that we have a system in place that would function as a minimum wage through labor for the government. Pro's response comes too late (final round responses are generally bad form), but the argument just doesn't do much for me. Basically, he's just stating that this would provide a form of the minimum wage, though it's unclear how it actually benefits beyond providing more people for construction work to rebuild hurricane-damaged areas. Setting aside the fact that not everyone can work in construction, that all such disasters would only need short-term work (and therefore result in short-term employment), that they would require people to move far away from homes and families, and that the government cannot endlessly employ such a large population at such wages (all of which were points Con could have made, but likely didn't have the space to provide), Con's just getting no offense on this point - he's just reproducing status quo through a different means, perhaps slightly improving on minimum wage for an uncertain length of time.
Pro's case allows for the same kinds of wage increases through the minimum wage. He also makes a convincing case for both boosting the economy (locally and nationally) as well as the increasing number of jobs. Both probably could have been challenged in a more meaningful way if space and more rounds had allowed, but Con's response doesn't challenge Pro's reasoning, and Pro's final round reasoning was a solid rebuttal to that argument that provided more detail on how the minimum wage functions as Pro claims. Even if I am affording Con some offense through his argument, it comes almost entirely as assertion, whereas Pro's comes with clear warrants and evidence. That gives me enough reason to side with Pro.
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>Reported Vote: Whiteflame // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Pro for arguments
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments and counterarguments of the debate, and then weighed those arguments to produce a verdict. The vote is clearly sufficient.
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>Reported Vote: YeshuaBought // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 7 points to Con
>Reason for Decision: RationalMadman has a brilliant mind.
>Reason for Mod Action: Troll debates are not moderated. So, no moderation action is appropriate for votes on this debate.
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>Reported Vote: Castin // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 1 point to Con for conduct
>Reason for Decision: This was the hardest decision I've ever made in my life.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable. (Also, lol...)
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>Reported Vote: TheGreatSeal // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 1 point to Con for conduct
>Reason for Decision: Full forfeit.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Castin // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: After some thought, I decided to judge this by how much you guys could alliterate while still delivering a coherent message of some creative skill. I figure it's pretty easy to just machine-gun a bunch of alliterated words out from the dictionary and throw them together. The challenge as I see it is balancing alliteration with meaning.
So I give this to Con even though Pro adhered more strictly to constant alliteration. Meaning and theme seemed less clear with Pro, with less continuity of message from one line to the next. He hops from the Illuminati to bouncing boobs to Jacque Fresco. Like "wet willy wank whacking wenus washing weak wimps" just looks like a bunch of random words thrown together to me. In contrast I thought Con did have nice continuity of message, putting descriptive insults and personal history to poetry. His R2 was pretty amusing.
I considered this a contest of creativity rather than an argument from facts or data, so I found sources N/A. Conduct point goes to Con because Pro forfeited a round. Grammar tied.
>Reason for Mod Action: Troll debates are not moderated. So, no moderation action is appropriate for votes on this debate.
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I was asked by Pro (Mopac) to vote on this debate. In doing so, it can be assumed that he asked me to take a look at the debate and exercise my judgment in deciding who I think made better arguments. It would be unethical to simply vote for the person who asked me to vote, unless I should decide that his arguments were better. It is possible that in casting my vote I will not have satisfactorily interpreted the arguments made by one or both parties, as I've only read through them once. That's a risk I'm willing to take.
So that being said...
We must look at Lewis's intended meaning behind "Liar, Lunatic, or Lord". This could be reworded as "Either Jesus was a man who lied about his claims of divinity, or Jesus was a man who was insane, or Jesus really was God in human flesh and therefore you ought to acknowledge Him as your Lord". All of these are exclusive to Jesus being a "legend", which as interpreted by Con meant "something that is a fable but which did not exist in fact". To Pro's credit, I will discount Con's side arguments as to why Jesus was not Lord, on the grounds that He was either a liar or a lunatic; I do not feel that Con has satisfactorily proved either of these things. But in any case, were Jesus to be a liar or a lunatic that would not be a repudiation of Lewis's trilemma. However, since the reasonable possibility of Jesus being a non-existent person would negate Lewis's Trilemma, Pro's job was to show that this was not the case. In my opinion, he has failed on this account. Therefore, this nullifying objection to Lewis's Trilemma stands. Therefore, I must give the win to Con.
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>Reported Vote: Swagnarok // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: I thought this vote was sufficient up until the voter failed to explain why "he has failed on this account." This is a weighing issue and a surveying issue. It is never made clear why Pro failed in this respect, and were the voter's reasoning in this regard made clear, a revote would likely be accepted as sufficient.
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>Reported Vote: Alec // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments, 2 points to Pro for sources
>Reason for Decision: Pro looked to be giving up near the end of the debate. His arguments were shorter and he did not cite at the end. He failed to counter most of the votes made by Con. Pro used a .edu source whereas Con did not. I hope this vote does not get deleted by bsh1 or anyone else because I'm trying not to make it a troll vote.
>Reason for Mod Action: I feel for the voter, because I understand how frustrating it is to have one's votes removed, and I don't feel that they are not trying to troll. That said, the vote remains insufficient. The voter fails to "survey specific arguments and counterarguments from both sides which impacted their voting decision" and fails to weigh the arguments in the debate. To awards sources points, the voter must "explain how the sources impacted the debate, directly assessing the strength of at least one source." The voter fails to do this.
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Pro raised several reasons why the minimum wage is beneficial: economic benefits and the protection of workers. Con failed to respond directly to Pro's economic arguments and instead cited a study that indicates that raising the minimum wage from the status quo would harm the economy. This did not help Con's case very much because Con did not provide a specific reason why Con's source should be preferred to Pro's reasoning and Pro's source, and did not directly clash with Pro'
Owing to the short rounds, neither side developed points very thoroughly. Overall, Pro did a better job of pushing forward their own side than Con did.
Con did not spend enough time proving the crux of their case: that the minimum wage should be abolished, and spent too many characters discussing less important issues. Con began the debate by presenting an alternative to the minimum wage: the government simply hiring anyone dissatisfied with their job. While discussing alternatives is certainly important, Con's first constructive argument failed to contribute to Con's burden of proof, making for a fairly weak start to the debate. This is because proving that an alternative exists without proving that we should pick the alternative over the minimum wage does not fulfill Con's burden. Con's only direct objection to the minimum wage was that the minimum wage contributes to unemployment, which was in round 3 but should really have been in round 2. This argument was severely weakened by Pro's counterargument, which cited a source stating that the minimum wage does not create unemployment. Both sides cited sources with opposite points of view on whether the minimum wage leads to unemployment, but only Pro provided additional reasoning ("Raising the minimum wage enables the lower-class to spend more money and increase jobs. "), which Con failed to counter. Thus, on balance, Pro had a stronger case because they provided at least some logical reason to prefer their conclusion over Con's.
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>Reported Vote: Sylweb // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Pro for arguments, 1 point to Con for conduct
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments and counterarguments of the debate, and then weighed those arguments to produce a verdict. Regarding conduct, the voter provides a specific reference to a conduct violation and explains how this made the debate less fair. The vote is sufficient.
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>Reported Vote: Kommandant_Nomad // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 6 points to Con for arguments, sources, and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Pretty straightfoward, Argument's to CON because PRO did not make any. Sources to CON as PRO did not list any. Grammar is tied as pro FF'ed everything. Conduct to CON for PRO's FF.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Armoredcat // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Con forfeits almost every round in the debate, conceding his case.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Earth // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 7 points to Con
>Reason for Decision: Forfeit nac
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Con for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: What Earth said.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Alec // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments; 1 point to Pro for conduct
>Reason for Decision: I hope this vote does not get deleted. Con had more concise arguments that were easier to understand. However, Con forfeit a round without apologizing. This is poor conduct.
>Reason for Mod Action: Unfortunately, the voter fails to "survey specific arguments and counterarguments from both sides which impacted their voting decision," and fails to engage in any explicit analysis of these arguments. This renders the awarding of argument points insufficient.
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>Reported Vote: Armoredcat // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Pro for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Con conceded the debate, FF´ed all the rounds, and he did not present an argument, so arguments and conduct to Pro.
>Reason for Mod Action: Concessions are not moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side, which he did not do.
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>Reported Vote: Alex // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Pro for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: Pro had an argument and used sources.
>Reason for Mod Action: Concessions are not moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side, which he did not do.
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>Reported Vote: Alec // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 2 points to Con for sources
>Reason for Decision: Con cited significantly more then Pro.
>Reason for Mod Action: Per the site voting policy: "The key to sufficiently ground awarding sources points is an emphasis on quality, not quantity...This requires that the voter explain how the sources impacted the debate, directly assessing the strength of at least one source, and explaining how it either strengthened or weakened the argument it was utilized for." By failing to assess the relevance and strength of the sources in the debate, and by failing to examine any specific sources, the voter fails to adequately justify awarding sources points.
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Semi full-forfeit. I also liked the sylweb adheres (perhaps got inspired by me and is a secret admirer) of the prop vs opp dynamic and ignore the 'pro vs con' because being the instigator or contender is not actually indicative of the dynamics in a resolution like this (where side 'con' isn't representing a positive, but a negative whereby Prop has full BoP).
Pro got disputed by Con who explained that what Pro is saying is that morality is an irrational belief at worst and incomplete theory at best, neither of which are inherently 'superstition',
Con adds types of morality and elements to it (realism, absolutism) and explains how not one of them is actually superstition but rather than superstition may come in regarding how the morality is punished or whatever but not directly into the moral code.
Pro never once explains (AND FORFEITS SO HE COULDN'T REPLY) how a superstition is inherently what an irrational belief is.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate meets the definition of a full forfeit debate. It is therefore not moderatable so long as the voter does not vote for the forfeiting side. Insofar as the voter does not vote for the forfeiting side, no moderator action is appropriate.
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Full Forfeit
>Reason for Mod Action: Full forfeit debates, of which this is clearly an example, are not moderated for voting unless a voter voted for the forfeiting side. The voter did not vote for the forfeiting side, so no moderator action is appropriate.
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>Reported Vote: AndrejG // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Con for Arguments and Sources
>Reason for Decision: The contender made more convincing arguments in contrary with the instigator, who failed to find the time to back up much of her side to this debate, causing it to resemble Swiss cheese in many areas unlike to arguments the contender made. As such, without any backed up refute by the instigator for a good portion of her argument, I find that the contender's sources for his arguments held much better, and as such found them to be more reliable and credible than the instigator's numerous potentially biased and inaccurate sourcing.
Spelling and grammar seems fine for both sides. Organization was superb for both.
I had originally put the contender for better conduct, but I'm really not a fan of pushing for us voters to vote for the side their supporter thinks is best. Let us be the judge of that.
>Reason for Mod Action: To award argument points, the voter must identify the main arguments and counterarguments made in the debate and weigh these arguments against each other to arrive at a decision. The voter does not do this. To award sources points, the voter must "explain how the sources impacted the debate, directly assessing the strength of at least one source, and explaining how it either strengthened or weakened the argument it was utilized for." The voter does not do this.
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>Reported Vote: Tejretics // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for Arguments and Conduct
>Reason for Decision: What participant made more convincing arguments? There was no actual argumentation in this debate. However, Pro pointed out that there is a consensus among mathematicians that 0.9r = 1. While Pro doesn't provide actual evidence for this argument, Con drops it and drops Pro's claim that the burden of proof, therefore, lies on Con. Given these drops, "arguments" points go to Pro.
What participant had better conduct? Con forfeited one round and *effectively* forfeited another. Thus, the conduct point goes to Pro.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments, assesses these arguments, and weighs them to produce a verdict. This suffices to award argument points. A forfeit is sufficient grounds to award conduct, so long as arguments are also explained. The voter is therefore permitted to award conduct.
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>Reported Vote: Tejretics // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Counter JCEurovision96's argument point; not bothering to counter conduct and spelling/grammar, since Pro concedes anyway.
>Reason for Mod Action: Counter votebombs are typically not permitted. However, in the case of a conceded debate, per the site voting policy, "conceded debates and are not moderated unless a voter votes for the side that concedes." Therefore, this vote is acceptable, because it does not vote for the conceding side (Pro).
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Pro gives up willingly.
>Reason for Mod Action: Awarding argument points on the basis of a concession is perfectly acceptable.
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>Reported Vote: blamonkey // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Virtuoso conceded the debate
>Reason for Mod Action: Awarding argument points on the basis of a concession is perfectly acceptable.
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Pro for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Both sides had extremely biased and/or unreliable sourcing. Voting tied by both sides being equally poor with Pro having a slight edge but such a small percent of their sources were reliable to deserve the vote.
Con forfeits because Pro brought enough reason to suspect what NASA says and why we should blindly trust what someone says when what we see inside Earth defies what we are told to not dare question because a more qualified bunch of shadowy figures in a government agency says we are wrong about it.
Con keeps trying to make it clear that Pro is a conspiracy theorist who has to prove more but it is actually equal BoP on the round earther as the flat earther and Pro never met his BoP beyond giving an extremely strange vision of a flat earth from a supposed satellite which Pro attacks with grace.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate does not meet the definition of a full-forfeit, and so can be moderated. To award argument points, the voter must survey the main arguments in the debate, assess their relative strength, and explain how that strength imbalance led to a determination to award points. These elements are met for the most part. What is missing however, is necessary detail on how the voter assessed the relative strength of Pro's key argument, namely, "Pro brought enough reason to suspect what NASA says." This is not an analysis of Pro's argument itself. For instance, how do Pro's reasons convince the voter to suspect what NASA says?
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Pro for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: Con never offered an alternative definition for God that could be sourced. The issue with this debate is that Pro defines God as truth itself and Con just says 'no it isn't just the truth because you say it is' but the dictionary that Pro used wasn't his/her own words so... Con loses by default.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter sufficiently explains the argument points by surveying the main arguments and counterarguments in the debate, assessing their strength, and weighing them in order to reach a verdict. To award sources points when one side does not cite sources, the voter must "at least establish the relevance of the other side's sources." The voter does this. Therefore, there is no cause for vote removal.
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>Reported Vote: Logical-Master // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points for argument
>Reason for Decision: RFD: https://shrib.com/#Q3RpDXG4Hd7hs0ZfZDQU
Good job to both debaters!
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments and counterarguments, assess the strength of these arguments, and weighs them to produce a result. This meets the basic standard of sufficiency for argument points.
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>Reported Vote: Whiteflame // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points for argument
>Reason for Decision: Pro sets up a rather clear equation on which to base his comparison, explaining that by turning each of the fractions he's presented into a decimal, you can find that adding them together leads to a number that is not 1, in spite of the fact that adding those two fractions together does result in 1. The difference is infinitesimally small, but it does exist. He's essentially stating that the number 0.000r is equivalent to 0 for the same reason. While I understand Con's responses regarding the need to round in order to get a real number, I don't think that's necessary when you're comparing what is, effectively, an unmeasurable quantity. That's what Pro is doing with his argument, and while I think he could have defended it better, I don't think just railing against the lack of rounding suffices as a reason for me to vote Con. I do think there are ways to challenge this that involve more complex math, but those aren't presented, leaving me with little choice but to vote Pro.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments and counterarguments, assess the strength of these arguments, and weighs them to produce a result. This meets the basic standard of sufficiency for argument points.
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>Reported Vote: Type1 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 7 points to Con for all categories
>Reason for Decision: 2-DDO is a f**king f***ot bitch p**sy c**t d**k hole f**k nugget ass titty bastard [asterisks are my own, not the voters]
>Reason for Mod Action: While votes on FF debates are not typically moderated, personal attacks are never permissible for any reason on this site. This vote, as a violation of the conduct policy, is therefore going to be removed.
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>Reported Vote: 3RU7AL // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 1 point to Pro for Conduct
>Reason for Decision: I would call this a tie on arguments, because CON fails to make a clear case, but I'd like to make a case to award points to PRO for conduct.
Round one PRO - "Hello, I appreciate my challenger taking me up this debate. Good luck to you Sir/Ma'am" which is polite.
Round one CON - "...Pro is tricking you..." which is a negative characterization ad hominem strongly suggesting that PRO is intentionally deceptive.
Round one CON - "'I am smart and good at math'" which is not only a bald assertion but also an indirect ad hominem directed at PRO.
Round two PRO - "Thank you Mad for the quick reply." which is polite.
Round two CON - "You're completely deceiving the reader..." which is a negative characterization ad hominem strongly suggesting that PRO is intentionally deceptive.
Round two CON - "Checkmate." which is a rush-to-declare-victory fallacy.
Round three PRO - No positive or negative comments, just arguments.
Round three CON - "Pro concedes..." and "Pro further concedes..." which is another rush-to-declare-victory and by using the term "concedes" falsely suggests that PRO actually conceded the debate.
>Reason for Mod Action: In order to award conduct points, the voter must show that one debater was "excessively rude, profane, or unfair, or broke the debate rules, or forfeited one or more rounds in the debate without reasonable and given cause." The voter listed as evidence of misconduct statements which are not conduct violations. Rush-to-judgement fallacies are faults of logic, not of conduct. Similarly, boasting about one's own abilities is not itself misconduct, unless the voter can contextualize it. The remaining two or three acts of misconduct the voter cites do not rise to the level of "excessive."
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>Reported Vote: Ragnar // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 1 point to Con for Conduct
>Reason for Decision: Forfeiture.
>Reason for Mod Action: Full forfeit debates are not moderated unless a voter voted for the forfeiting side. As the voter did not vote for the forfeiting side, no moderation action is appropriate.
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>Reported Vote: Moeology // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Pro's entire arguments presuppose utilitarianism which despite being commonly supported is far from obvious. Perhaps, some of the audience like myself could be proponents of divine command theory under which the whole paradigm of utilitarianism and what produces the most happiness is useless. So some argument for utilitarianism was necessary. I also thought that some use of terms on the part of pro was uncharitable. "Marriage equality" gives off the wrong signal that skeptics of gay marriage are somehow antithetical to equality which is not true since if their case succeeds and gay marriage should not be legalized, then homosexuals would not deserve the same rights in which case, it would not be unequal.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter fails to sufficiently explain why they awarded argument points. The voter must examine specific arguments and counterarguments, must weigh those arguments, and must not factor in reasoning external to the debate itself. The voter insufficiently explained conduct points by failing to justify those points at all.
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>Reported Vote: Ethang5 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Con for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: Though pro asserted that his was not a literacy test, for all purposes it was. Pro wanted to exclude citizens based on intelligence/knowledge rather than citizenship. This is not only unfair, it is unconstitutional. Intelligence can never be used as a valid standard for eligibility to vote. Con showed, using various quotes from the constitution, how such a law would violate provisions set there-in. His was the better argument.
>Reason for Mod Action: (1) Arguments are insufficiently explained. (a) The voter directly intervenes regarding the issue of a literacy test and uses their own personal opinion to sway their vote (e.g. "this is . . . unfair," "it is unconstitutional," "intelligence can never be used as a valid standard for eligibility to vote"). (b) The voter tries to explain why they're voting for Con without explaining why they're not voting for Pro. That requires examining Pro's arguments or examining the burden of proof in this debate, which the voter has not done. (c) The voter fails to analyze any counterarguments in the debate or do any weighing analysis. (2) The voter fails to explain why they awarded sources points at all, awarding the points without any reference to them in their RFD.
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>Reported Vote: Ethang5 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points for arguments, S/G, and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Pro used precise mathematical terms for his position. That precision was important to his conclusion. Con decided to round, but that wes not what pro was asserting, and he showed why that was incorrect by using other math properties. I think also con rushed to state that pro had conceded.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter failed to sufficiently explain S/G points. The voter must make it "clear from the vote why a given argument is difficult to read" in order to award these points. The voter failed to sufficiently explain conduct points. In order to award these points, the voter must reference specific instances of poor conduct, explain how these conduct violations were excessive or severe, and compare the two debaters' conduct. Finally, the voter failed to sufficiently explain argument points. The voter must references specific arguments and must weigh those arguments in order to award argument points; neither of these things was done.
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PGA's RFD, Part 2:
How did Con lay into the credibility of Jesus? Did he lay into the credibility of the disciples/apostles? Not really. He used innuendo to suggest that they made this person - Jesus - into a legend. But what actual historic evidence does he have to back the claim? He presented none, just asserted 'legend.' What we have available to us he never touched. Con never presented any early evidence that refutes the biblical accounts and he never shows how they were turned into legend? Lewis bases his trilemma on the Jesus of Scripture. Pro also based his argument on Scripture. These disciples claimed they were eyewitnesses to His three and a half years of ministry, His death, and His resurrection. Pro laid out a number of Scriptures that identified Jesus as Lord. They did not think He was a liar or lunatic. In fact, early church history records many of them dying for what - a lie? A lunatic? No, they spread the news of the Lord at the risk of excruciating deaths, in some cases. We have no evidence at all that they recanted Him as Lord.
Furthermore, Con agreed to debate the Trilemma,
"This debate asks us to look at the Lewis' Trilemma argument as defined in the description of this debate."
"Any other outside arguments for Jesus' divinity will be ignored. For pro to win this debate he must prove that this argument is sound."
Con then brings a fourth element into the discussion based on the soundness and validity of the trilemma premises:
"There is, however, a fourth choice: Jesus was a legend. The argument centers around the assumption that the Gospel's accurately record Jesus' teachings and that the miracles he allegedly performed are historical facts. Unless pro proves those things, pro cannot win this debate."
PGA's RFD, Part 1:
Regarding spelling and grammar, I used Grammarly to judge between the two debaters on the merits of spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Pro had the better, but he also wrote far less than Pro. Pro also used a lot of KJV archaic language. I still give the edge to Con.
Pro used a reliable source when he quoted from early church fathers. Con used more sources (two) and one was reliable and one was biased, IMO. Therefore, I give them a tie.
I found their conduct equally cordial.
Now to the arguments themselves. I found that Pro provided more of an argument. Con just repeated his legend argument over and over again as if it was the knockout punch, but Con did not give any credible argument that this was the case, that these eyewitnesses embellished the character of Christ into legend. I don't know of any such argument from early history. Lewis based his argument on the historic manuscripts.
What Pro said in his third round still stands, IMO:
"What is really the issue here? Is whether or not you believe Jesus is who he says he is. If you do not believe Jesus is who he says he is, you are calling him a liar or a lunatic."
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>Reported Vote: PGA2.0 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Pro for arguments, 1 point to Con for S/G
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: The justification for argument points was borderline, but we will default to considering it sufficient. S&G is insufficiently explained. There are two reasons why it's not enough to say Grammarly suggested that Con had better S&G. First, Grammarly looks at every single grammatical mistake, but S&G points should only be awarded when grammatical errors reach the point where the readability of debaters is severely impaired. Second, the voter is required to specifically reference text from the debate from both sides proving grammatical errors, and explain why one side's readability was worse than the other. The voter may properly revote by sufficiently justifying the S/G points they awarded or by choosing not to award those points.
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Ethang's RFD, Part 2:
“…as Scripture states: God is not a man that He should lie, nor a mortal that He should change His mind.”
But the same scripture he uses here for validation, says that Jesus was not merely/only a man. This objection fails because he is contradicted by the scripture he uses for validation, and his unwarranted assumption that Jesus is only a man.
The charge that Jesus lied is obviously not supported. In his first quoted scripture in supported of his claim that Jesus lied, Con himself records Jesus as saying, ” “I have spoken openly to the world; I always taught in a synagogue and in the Temple, where all the Jews come together; and I spoke nothing in secret. Why do you Question me?”
Con said Jesus purposefully veiled his teachings, but that is not equal to lying, even if it were true. And he gives no reason for us to believe Jesus was in any way dishonest in his speech. Someone not understanding Jesus is not the same as Jesus being deliberately mysterious. Con gives us no
Ethang's RFD, Part 1:
On Arguments:
Con’s point that Jesus being legend was a fourth choice was not logical. Even if Jesus was legend, that would not disturb the logic of Him being either Lord, Liar, or Lunatic within the legend. Pro’s definition of legend was helpful, we saw that legend can be “regarded as historical although not verifiable".
Con even said, “It's important to note that this (Lord, Lair, Lunatic) is the only argument this debate is centered around. Any other outside arguments for Jesus' divinity will be ignored.” I would then expect that any other outside arguments AGAINST Jesus' divinity should likewise be ignored.” Otherwise the criteria become unfair to Pro.
Pro satisfied me that Jesus must logically be one of the 3 options regardless of whether the story is considered legend or not.
Con states, “Any man who claims to be God can be dismissed as a liar without any further examinations of his claims or miracles that he does or does not perform….”
But then bases his dismissal on scripture;
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>Reported Vote: Ethang5 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Pro for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: The arguments points were sufficiently justified. To award conduct points, the misconduct must be "excessively rude" or profane. It is not clear from the RFD how or why the voter regards the misconduct as excessive, though he notes that it occurred. To be excessive is to be either very frequent or extremely severe. The vote may properly revote either by not awarding conduct or by addressing the insufficiency in the justification of the awarded conduct points.
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>Reported Vote: TheGreatSeal // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Neither pro or con went beyond the book much to find sources, but since this is a literary debate on Harry Potter, its perfectly understandable. Since Pro had one other source, Pro can make a really good argument for winning siurces, but its also the case that "most reliable sources" doesn't translate to the same quantity. Using New Criticism itself doesn't make a source unreliable, so I'll tie this one.
The forfeits really cursed Con to lose arguments. There is too much unrefuted by Pro, which really swings my vote here. Pro was also able to refute con unopposed. By volume, and frankly a lack of effort by Con, Pro wins arguments. The full forfeit also costs Con conduct.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: TheGreatSeal // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Con for arguments, sources, and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Full Forfeit.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: SupaDudz // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: full forfeit reee
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Virtuoso // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: Pro forfeited a round and loses conduct. Not only that but he doesn’t really even try to make an argument.
Pro’s entire argument was how he’s some mason and totally failed to actually provide evidence for his claim. Ultimately the BOP is entirely on him which he fails to uphold.
>Reason for Mod Action: The conduct point is sufficiently explained, but the argument point suffers. To award argument points, the voter must: "survey specific arguments and counterarguments from both sides which impacted their voting decision." The voter fails to survey any counterarguments or any arguments from Con; should the voter update their RFD with these arguments surveyed and weighed, the vote would be sufficient.
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Whiteflame's RFD:
Not much of a debate, so not much to say. Con's argument basically functions as a statement that we have a system in place that would function as a minimum wage through labor for the government. Pro's response comes too late (final round responses are generally bad form), but the argument just doesn't do much for me. Basically, he's just stating that this would provide a form of the minimum wage, though it's unclear how it actually benefits beyond providing more people for construction work to rebuild hurricane-damaged areas. Setting aside the fact that not everyone can work in construction, that all such disasters would only need short-term work (and therefore result in short-term employment), that they would require people to move far away from homes and families, and that the government cannot endlessly employ such a large population at such wages (all of which were points Con could have made, but likely didn't have the space to provide), Con's just getting no offense on this point - he's just reproducing status quo through a different means, perhaps slightly improving on minimum wage for an uncertain length of time.
Pro's case allows for the same kinds of wage increases through the minimum wage. He also makes a convincing case for both boosting the economy (locally and nationally) as well as the increasing number of jobs. Both probably could have been challenged in a more meaningful way if space and more rounds had allowed, but Con's response doesn't challenge Pro's reasoning, and Pro's final round reasoning was a solid rebuttal to that argument that provided more detail on how the minimum wage functions as Pro claims. Even if I am affording Con some offense through his argument, it comes almost entirely as assertion, whereas Pro's comes with clear warrants and evidence. That gives me enough reason to side with Pro.
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>Reported Vote: Whiteflame // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Pro for arguments
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments and counterarguments of the debate, and then weighed those arguments to produce a verdict. The vote is clearly sufficient.
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>Reported Vote: YeshuaBought // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 7 points to Con
>Reason for Decision: RationalMadman has a brilliant mind.
>Reason for Mod Action: Troll debates are not moderated. So, no moderation action is appropriate for votes on this debate.
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>Reported Vote: Castin // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 1 point to Con for conduct
>Reason for Decision: This was the hardest decision I've ever made in my life.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable. (Also, lol...)
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>Reported Vote: TheGreatSeal // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 1 point to Con for conduct
>Reason for Decision: Full forfeit.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Castin // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: After some thought, I decided to judge this by how much you guys could alliterate while still delivering a coherent message of some creative skill. I figure it's pretty easy to just machine-gun a bunch of alliterated words out from the dictionary and throw them together. The challenge as I see it is balancing alliteration with meaning.
So I give this to Con even though Pro adhered more strictly to constant alliteration. Meaning and theme seemed less clear with Pro, with less continuity of message from one line to the next. He hops from the Illuminati to bouncing boobs to Jacque Fresco. Like "wet willy wank whacking wenus washing weak wimps" just looks like a bunch of random words thrown together to me. In contrast I thought Con did have nice continuity of message, putting descriptive insults and personal history to poetry. His R2 was pretty amusing.
I considered this a contest of creativity rather than an argument from facts or data, so I found sources N/A. Conduct point goes to Con because Pro forfeited a round. Grammar tied.
>Reason for Mod Action: Troll debates are not moderated. So, no moderation action is appropriate for votes on this debate.
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Swag's RFD:
I was asked by Pro (Mopac) to vote on this debate. In doing so, it can be assumed that he asked me to take a look at the debate and exercise my judgment in deciding who I think made better arguments. It would be unethical to simply vote for the person who asked me to vote, unless I should decide that his arguments were better. It is possible that in casting my vote I will not have satisfactorily interpreted the arguments made by one or both parties, as I've only read through them once. That's a risk I'm willing to take.
So that being said...
We must look at Lewis's intended meaning behind "Liar, Lunatic, or Lord". This could be reworded as "Either Jesus was a man who lied about his claims of divinity, or Jesus was a man who was insane, or Jesus really was God in human flesh and therefore you ought to acknowledge Him as your Lord". All of these are exclusive to Jesus being a "legend", which as interpreted by Con meant "something that is a fable but which did not exist in fact". To Pro's credit, I will discount Con's side arguments as to why Jesus was not Lord, on the grounds that He was either a liar or a lunatic; I do not feel that Con has satisfactorily proved either of these things. But in any case, were Jesus to be a liar or a lunatic that would not be a repudiation of Lewis's trilemma. However, since the reasonable possibility of Jesus being a non-existent person would negate Lewis's Trilemma, Pro's job was to show that this was not the case. In my opinion, he has failed on this account. Therefore, this nullifying objection to Lewis's Trilemma stands. Therefore, I must give the win to Con.
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>Reported Vote: Swagnarok // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: I thought this vote was sufficient up until the voter failed to explain why "he has failed on this account." This is a weighing issue and a surveying issue. It is never made clear why Pro failed in this respect, and were the voter's reasoning in this regard made clear, a revote would likely be accepted as sufficient.
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>Reported Vote: Alec // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments, 2 points to Pro for sources
>Reason for Decision: Pro looked to be giving up near the end of the debate. His arguments were shorter and he did not cite at the end. He failed to counter most of the votes made by Con. Pro used a .edu source whereas Con did not. I hope this vote does not get deleted by bsh1 or anyone else because I'm trying not to make it a troll vote.
>Reason for Mod Action: I feel for the voter, because I understand how frustrating it is to have one's votes removed, and I don't feel that they are not trying to troll. That said, the vote remains insufficient. The voter fails to "survey specific arguments and counterarguments from both sides which impacted their voting decision" and fails to weigh the arguments in the debate. To awards sources points, the voter must "explain how the sources impacted the debate, directly assessing the strength of at least one source." The voter fails to do this.
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Sylweb's RFD (cont'd):
Pro raised several reasons why the minimum wage is beneficial: economic benefits and the protection of workers. Con failed to respond directly to Pro's economic arguments and instead cited a study that indicates that raising the minimum wage from the status quo would harm the economy. This did not help Con's case very much because Con did not provide a specific reason why Con's source should be preferred to Pro's reasoning and Pro's source, and did not directly clash with Pro'
Sylweb's RFD:
Owing to the short rounds, neither side developed points very thoroughly. Overall, Pro did a better job of pushing forward their own side than Con did.
Con did not spend enough time proving the crux of their case: that the minimum wage should be abolished, and spent too many characters discussing less important issues. Con began the debate by presenting an alternative to the minimum wage: the government simply hiring anyone dissatisfied with their job. While discussing alternatives is certainly important, Con's first constructive argument failed to contribute to Con's burden of proof, making for a fairly weak start to the debate. This is because proving that an alternative exists without proving that we should pick the alternative over the minimum wage does not fulfill Con's burden. Con's only direct objection to the minimum wage was that the minimum wage contributes to unemployment, which was in round 3 but should really have been in round 2. This argument was severely weakened by Pro's counterargument, which cited a source stating that the minimum wage does not create unemployment. Both sides cited sources with opposite points of view on whether the minimum wage leads to unemployment, but only Pro provided additional reasoning ("Raising the minimum wage enables the lower-class to spend more money and increase jobs. "), which Con failed to counter. Thus, on balance, Pro had a stronger case because they provided at least some logical reason to prefer their conclusion over Con's.
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>Reported Vote: Sylweb // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Pro for arguments, 1 point to Con for conduct
>Reason for Decision: [posted above]
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments and counterarguments of the debate, and then weighed those arguments to produce a verdict. Regarding conduct, the voter provides a specific reference to a conduct violation and explains how this made the debate less fair. The vote is sufficient.
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>Reported Vote: Kommandant_Nomad // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 6 points to Con for arguments, sources, and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Pretty straightfoward, Argument's to CON because PRO did not make any. Sources to CON as PRO did not list any. Grammar is tied as pro FF'ed everything. Conduct to CON for PRO's FF.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Armoredcat // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Con forfeits almost every round in the debate, conceding his case.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Earth // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 7 points to Con
>Reason for Decision: Forfeit nac
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Con for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: What Earth said.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate is a full forfeit. FF debates are no moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side. This did not occur, so this vote is not actionable.
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>Reported Vote: Alec // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments; 1 point to Pro for conduct
>Reason for Decision: I hope this vote does not get deleted. Con had more concise arguments that were easier to understand. However, Con forfeit a round without apologizing. This is poor conduct.
>Reason for Mod Action: Unfortunately, the voter fails to "survey specific arguments and counterarguments from both sides which impacted their voting decision," and fails to engage in any explicit analysis of these arguments. This renders the awarding of argument points insufficient.
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>Reported Vote: Armoredcat // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Pro for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Con conceded the debate, FF´ed all the rounds, and he did not present an argument, so arguments and conduct to Pro.
>Reason for Mod Action: Concessions are not moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side, which he did not do.
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>Reported Vote: Alex // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Pro for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: Pro had an argument and used sources.
>Reason for Mod Action: Concessions are not moderated unless the voter voted for the conceding side, which he did not do.
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>Reported Vote: Alec // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 2 points to Con for sources
>Reason for Decision: Con cited significantly more then Pro.
>Reason for Mod Action: Per the site voting policy: "The key to sufficiently ground awarding sources points is an emphasis on quality, not quantity...This requires that the voter explain how the sources impacted the debate, directly assessing the strength of at least one source, and explaining how it either strengthened or weakened the argument it was utilized for." By failing to assess the relevance and strength of the sources in the debate, and by failing to examine any specific sources, the voter fails to adequately justify awarding sources points.
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Semi full-forfeit. I also liked the sylweb adheres (perhaps got inspired by me and is a secret admirer) of the prop vs opp dynamic and ignore the 'pro vs con' because being the instigator or contender is not actually indicative of the dynamics in a resolution like this (where side 'con' isn't representing a positive, but a negative whereby Prop has full BoP).
Pro got disputed by Con who explained that what Pro is saying is that morality is an irrational belief at worst and incomplete theory at best, neither of which are inherently 'superstition',
Con adds types of morality and elements to it (realism, absolutism) and explains how not one of them is actually superstition but rather than superstition may come in regarding how the morality is punished or whatever but not directly into the moral code.
Pro never once explains (AND FORFEITS SO HE COULDN'T REPLY) how a superstition is inherently what an irrational belief is.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate meets the definition of a full forfeit debate. It is therefore not moderatable so long as the voter does not vote for the forfeiting side. Insofar as the voter does not vote for the forfeiting side, no moderator action is appropriate.
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Full Forfeit
>Reason for Mod Action: Full forfeit debates, of which this is clearly an example, are not moderated for voting unless a voter voted for the forfeiting side. The voter did not vote for the forfeiting side, so no moderator action is appropriate.
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>Reported Vote: AndrejG // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Con for Arguments and Sources
>Reason for Decision: The contender made more convincing arguments in contrary with the instigator, who failed to find the time to back up much of her side to this debate, causing it to resemble Swiss cheese in many areas unlike to arguments the contender made. As such, without any backed up refute by the instigator for a good portion of her argument, I find that the contender's sources for his arguments held much better, and as such found them to be more reliable and credible than the instigator's numerous potentially biased and inaccurate sourcing.
Spelling and grammar seems fine for both sides. Organization was superb for both.
I had originally put the contender for better conduct, but I'm really not a fan of pushing for us voters to vote for the side their supporter thinks is best. Let us be the judge of that.
>Reason for Mod Action: To award argument points, the voter must identify the main arguments and counterarguments made in the debate and weigh these arguments against each other to arrive at a decision. The voter does not do this. To award sources points, the voter must "explain how the sources impacted the debate, directly assessing the strength of at least one source, and explaining how it either strengthened or weakened the argument it was utilized for." The voter does not do this.
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>Reported Vote: Tejretics // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points to Con for Arguments and Conduct
>Reason for Decision: What participant made more convincing arguments? There was no actual argumentation in this debate. However, Pro pointed out that there is a consensus among mathematicians that 0.9r = 1. While Pro doesn't provide actual evidence for this argument, Con drops it and drops Pro's claim that the burden of proof, therefore, lies on Con. Given these drops, "arguments" points go to Pro.
What participant had better conduct? Con forfeited one round and *effectively* forfeited another. Thus, the conduct point goes to Pro.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments, assesses these arguments, and weighs them to produce a verdict. This suffices to award argument points. A forfeit is sufficient grounds to award conduct, so long as arguments are also explained. The voter is therefore permitted to award conduct.
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>Reported Vote: Tejretics // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Counter JCEurovision96's argument point; not bothering to counter conduct and spelling/grammar, since Pro concedes anyway.
>Reason for Mod Action: Counter votebombs are typically not permitted. However, in the case of a conceded debate, per the site voting policy, "conceded debates and are not moderated unless a voter votes for the side that concedes." Therefore, this vote is acceptable, because it does not vote for the conceding side (Pro).
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Pro gives up willingly.
>Reason for Mod Action: Awarding argument points on the basis of a concession is perfectly acceptable.
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>Reported Vote: blamonkey // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Con for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Virtuoso conceded the debate
>Reason for Mod Action: Awarding argument points on the basis of a concession is perfectly acceptable.
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points to Pro for arguments
>Reason for Decision: Both sides had extremely biased and/or unreliable sourcing. Voting tied by both sides being equally poor with Pro having a slight edge but such a small percent of their sources were reliable to deserve the vote.
Con forfeits because Pro brought enough reason to suspect what NASA says and why we should blindly trust what someone says when what we see inside Earth defies what we are told to not dare question because a more qualified bunch of shadowy figures in a government agency says we are wrong about it.
Con keeps trying to make it clear that Pro is a conspiracy theorist who has to prove more but it is actually equal BoP on the round earther as the flat earther and Pro never met his BoP beyond giving an extremely strange vision of a flat earth from a supposed satellite which Pro attacks with grace.
>Reason for Mod Action: This debate does not meet the definition of a full-forfeit, and so can be moderated. To award argument points, the voter must survey the main arguments in the debate, assess their relative strength, and explain how that strength imbalance led to a determination to award points. These elements are met for the most part. What is missing however, is necessary detail on how the voter assessed the relative strength of Pro's key argument, namely, "Pro brought enough reason to suspect what NASA says." This is not an analysis of Pro's argument itself. For instance, how do Pro's reasons convince the voter to suspect what NASA says?
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>Reported Vote: RationalMadman // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Pro for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: Con never offered an alternative definition for God that could be sourced. The issue with this debate is that Pro defines God as truth itself and Con just says 'no it isn't just the truth because you say it is' but the dictionary that Pro used wasn't his/her own words so... Con loses by default.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter sufficiently explains the argument points by surveying the main arguments and counterarguments in the debate, assessing their strength, and weighing them in order to reach a verdict. To award sources points when one side does not cite sources, the voter must "at least establish the relevance of the other side's sources." The voter does this. Therefore, there is no cause for vote removal.
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>Reported Vote: Logical-Master // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points for argument
>Reason for Decision: RFD: https://shrib.com/#Q3RpDXG4Hd7hs0ZfZDQU
Good job to both debaters!
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments and counterarguments, assess the strength of these arguments, and weighs them to produce a result. This meets the basic standard of sufficiency for argument points.
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>Reported Vote: Whiteflame // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 3 points for argument
>Reason for Decision: Pro sets up a rather clear equation on which to base his comparison, explaining that by turning each of the fractions he's presented into a decimal, you can find that adding them together leads to a number that is not 1, in spite of the fact that adding those two fractions together does result in 1. The difference is infinitesimally small, but it does exist. He's essentially stating that the number 0.000r is equivalent to 0 for the same reason. While I understand Con's responses regarding the need to round in order to get a real number, I don't think that's necessary when you're comparing what is, effectively, an unmeasurable quantity. That's what Pro is doing with his argument, and while I think he could have defended it better, I don't think just railing against the lack of rounding suffices as a reason for me to vote Con. I do think there are ways to challenge this that involve more complex math, but those aren't presented, leaving me with little choice but to vote Pro.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter surveys the main arguments and counterarguments, assess the strength of these arguments, and weighs them to produce a result. This meets the basic standard of sufficiency for argument points.
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>Reported Vote: Type1 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 7 points to Con for all categories
>Reason for Decision: 2-DDO is a f**king f***ot bitch p**sy c**t d**k hole f**k nugget ass titty bastard [asterisks are my own, not the voters]
>Reason for Mod Action: While votes on FF debates are not typically moderated, personal attacks are never permissible for any reason on this site. This vote, as a violation of the conduct policy, is therefore going to be removed.
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>Reported Vote: 3RU7AL // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 1 point to Pro for Conduct
>Reason for Decision: I would call this a tie on arguments, because CON fails to make a clear case, but I'd like to make a case to award points to PRO for conduct.
Round one PRO - "Hello, I appreciate my challenger taking me up this debate. Good luck to you Sir/Ma'am" which is polite.
Round one CON - "...Pro is tricking you..." which is a negative characterization ad hominem strongly suggesting that PRO is intentionally deceptive.
Round one CON - "'I am smart and good at math'" which is not only a bald assertion but also an indirect ad hominem directed at PRO.
Round two PRO - "Thank you Mad for the quick reply." which is polite.
Round two CON - "You're completely deceiving the reader..." which is a negative characterization ad hominem strongly suggesting that PRO is intentionally deceptive.
Round two CON - "Checkmate." which is a rush-to-declare-victory fallacy.
Round three PRO - No positive or negative comments, just arguments.
Round three CON - "Pro concedes..." and "Pro further concedes..." which is another rush-to-declare-victory and by using the term "concedes" falsely suggests that PRO actually conceded the debate.
>Reason for Mod Action: In order to award conduct points, the voter must show that one debater was "excessively rude, profane, or unfair, or broke the debate rules, or forfeited one or more rounds in the debate without reasonable and given cause." The voter listed as evidence of misconduct statements which are not conduct violations. Rush-to-judgement fallacies are faults of logic, not of conduct. Similarly, boasting about one's own abilities is not itself misconduct, unless the voter can contextualize it. The remaining two or three acts of misconduct the voter cites do not rise to the level of "excessive."
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>Reported Vote: Ragnar // Mod action: Not Removed
>Points Awarded: 1 point to Con for Conduct
>Reason for Decision: Forfeiture.
>Reason for Mod Action: Full forfeit debates are not moderated unless a voter voted for the forfeiting side. As the voter did not vote for the forfeiting side, no moderation action is appropriate.
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You've got about a day left to post your final speech, RM.
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>Reported Vote: Moeology // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 4 points for arguments and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Pro's entire arguments presuppose utilitarianism which despite being commonly supported is far from obvious. Perhaps, some of the audience like myself could be proponents of divine command theory under which the whole paradigm of utilitarianism and what produces the most happiness is useless. So some argument for utilitarianism was necessary. I also thought that some use of terms on the part of pro was uncharitable. "Marriage equality" gives off the wrong signal that skeptics of gay marriage are somehow antithetical to equality which is not true since if their case succeeds and gay marriage should not be legalized, then homosexuals would not deserve the same rights in which case, it would not be unequal.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter fails to sufficiently explain why they awarded argument points. The voter must examine specific arguments and counterarguments, must weigh those arguments, and must not factor in reasoning external to the debate itself. The voter insufficiently explained conduct points by failing to justify those points at all.
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>Reported Vote: Ethang5 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points to Con for arguments and sources
>Reason for Decision: Though pro asserted that his was not a literacy test, for all purposes it was. Pro wanted to exclude citizens based on intelligence/knowledge rather than citizenship. This is not only unfair, it is unconstitutional. Intelligence can never be used as a valid standard for eligibility to vote. Con showed, using various quotes from the constitution, how such a law would violate provisions set there-in. His was the better argument.
>Reason for Mod Action: (1) Arguments are insufficiently explained. (a) The voter directly intervenes regarding the issue of a literacy test and uses their own personal opinion to sway their vote (e.g. "this is . . . unfair," "it is unconstitutional," "intelligence can never be used as a valid standard for eligibility to vote"). (b) The voter tries to explain why they're voting for Con without explaining why they're not voting for Pro. That requires examining Pro's arguments or examining the burden of proof in this debate, which the voter has not done. (c) The voter fails to analyze any counterarguments in the debate or do any weighing analysis. (2) The voter fails to explain why they awarded sources points at all, awarding the points without any reference to them in their RFD.
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I posted my argument.
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>Reported Vote: Ethang5 // Mod action: Removed
>Points Awarded: 5 points for arguments, S/G, and conduct
>Reason for Decision: Pro used precise mathematical terms for his position. That precision was important to his conclusion. Con decided to round, but that wes not what pro was asserting, and he showed why that was incorrect by using other math properties. I think also con rushed to state that pro had conceded.
>Reason for Mod Action: The voter failed to sufficiently explain S/G points. The voter must make it "clear from the vote why a given argument is difficult to read" in order to award these points. The voter failed to sufficiently explain conduct points. In order to award these points, the voter must reference specific instances of poor conduct, explain how these conduct violations were excessive or severe, and compare the two debaters' conduct. Finally, the voter failed to sufficiently explain argument points. The voter must references specific arguments and must weigh those arguments in order to award argument points; neither of these things was done.
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Did you mean for your round to be so short?