On another thread (here), cholland brought up the need to consilidate some threads since threads are created with the same topic that has already been debated time and time again. My only problem along these lines has been that there's a lack in seeing who wins these debates so that may be one reason why they keep going and going on and on just to be recreated in a new thread a week or so later.
Being able to measure who wins debates in the regular threads may be difficult since you have many different people debating but this should be fairly easy to do in the head-to-head debate section esp. when the number of posts in the debate is restricted to a specified number agreed upon by the two debaters beforehand. If debating is like a sport or even like chess, then what's the point in debating when there's never going to be a winner? I certainly don't have a perfect way to measure but we can at least do a poll on public opinion which would show who people think won the debate or if it was more like a tie, etc.
That's my suggestion. Perhaps after each debate is done, put up a poll where all can vote on who won, loss, or if it was a tie. We can even mention some guidelines to what would constitute winning a debate so that way people can consider that and understand better what to look for.
How do you know who WON a debate?
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cnorman18
Post #11
From what I've seen here, most of those who claim to have "won" debates -- haven't.
I think a bigger problem is those who argue dishonestly and in a hypocritical and underhanded manner, ignoring others' points and/or deliberately distorting and misstating them for sport, in order to inflate their own egos and to amuse themselves. This is no more than pretending to debate, with no interest whatever in the actual views of others, but only in deliberately distorting and lampooning those views with nothing in mind but baiting, mocking, goading and playing games. When the object has finally had enough and ends the "debate," the instigator declares victory and pretends that his disingenuous arguments and distortions have "won" the debate.
That sort of gratuitous nastiness doesn't seem to be against the rules, and it's pretty much left up to their objects of ridicule and goading to defend themselves -- without support or intervention from the moderators or anyone else, if they're smart enough not to actually post straight-up blunt personal attacks, but only run up to the edge. Even blatant innuendo and obvious distortion and smear don't seem to count, and seem to be tolerated without comment.
If left unchecked, this kind of trolling disguised as phony debate will be the end of this forum.
From [url=http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=trolling]The Urban Dictionary:
I think a bigger problem is those who argue dishonestly and in a hypocritical and underhanded manner, ignoring others' points and/or deliberately distorting and misstating them for sport, in order to inflate their own egos and to amuse themselves. This is no more than pretending to debate, with no interest whatever in the actual views of others, but only in deliberately distorting and lampooning those views with nothing in mind but baiting, mocking, goading and playing games. When the object has finally had enough and ends the "debate," the instigator declares victory and pretends that his disingenuous arguments and distortions have "won" the debate.
That sort of gratuitous nastiness doesn't seem to be against the rules, and it's pretty much left up to their objects of ridicule and goading to defend themselves -- without support or intervention from the moderators or anyone else, if they're smart enough not to actually post straight-up blunt personal attacks, but only run up to the edge. Even blatant innuendo and obvious distortion and smear don't seem to count, and seem to be tolerated without comment.
If left unchecked, this kind of trolling disguised as phony debate will be the end of this forum.
From [url=http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=trolling]The Urban Dictionary:
I have no idea how to prevent or stop this sort of thing. But if it isn't stopped, there'll be little else going on here but "lulz" for the smug little trolls who do it.
1. Trolling
The art of deliberately, cleverly, and secretly pi**ing people off, usually via the internet, using dialogue. Trolling does not mean just making rude remarks: Shouting swear words at someone doesn't count as trolling; it's just flaming, and isn't funny. Spam isn't trolling either; it pi**es people off, but it's lame.
The most essential part of trolling is convincing your victim that either a) truly believe in what you are saying, no matter how outrageous, or b) give your victim malicious instructions, under the guise of help.
Trolling requires decieving; any trolling that doesn't involve decieving someone isn't trolling at all; it's just stupid. As such, your victim must not know that you are trolling; if he does, you are an unsuccesful troll....
There is only one legitimate reason to be trolling: For the lulz.
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JoeyKnothead
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ThatGirlAgain
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Post #14
Congratulations! You win...um, wait... no, you don't.Nickman wrote: I win!!! What do I get?
Dogmatism and skepticism are both, in a sense, absolute philosophies; one is certain of knowing, the other of not knowing. What philosophy should dissipate is certainty, whether of knowledge or ignorance.
- Bertrand Russell
- Bertrand Russell
Post #17
I am not sure if you can trade it in for money, but I am rather sure the amount wouldn't make you very rich...
