BeIR/webis-touche2020 huggingface dataset:
Absolute Truth

My opponent’s only evidence for why he thinks that morality is relative is that different cultures hold different views of morality. Let me try to show the illogic in my opponent’s argument with this analogy: Americans believe that the world is spherical, but in Australia it is believe it is flat, and the Eastern Europeans believe that the world is shaped like a square. Therefore, the truth of the world’s shape is relative to one’s country. This analogy uses a different example, and obviously is false in its empirical claims, but the logic of this absurd argument is the same logic used by my opponent in his defense of moral relativism. We should be able to see more clearly now why my opponent’s argument is fallacious. He argues from the fact that people hold different moral views to the conclusion that all these moral truths are true and so morality is relative. Just because somebody believes something does not make it so. Truth and belief are not the same thing. Are we so politically correct that we cannot admit when someone is just plain wrong and illogical? I would also question the claim that moral beliefs are necessarily based on one’s own culture too. Maybe Canada as a country holds that gay marriage ought to be legal, but that does not mean that every individual Canadian believes that gay marriage ought to be legal. This is another fallacy, called the “fallacy of division”, which argues that what is true of the whole must be true of the parts. That does not follow. Relativism is also incoherent since it holds that conflicting views can all be true. To say that is to commit oneself to irrationality. How can it be true that “Murder is wrong” and “Murder is not wrong.”? CONCLUSION All that my opponent has proven is that different cultures believe in different views of morality. He has made an epistemological point. This is not controversial and I do not know anyone who does not accept this point. What my opponent has failed to do is to show that morality’s existence is relative. He has made no ontological point. Hence, he has not shown that absolute truth is false and that morality is relative.
Absolute Truth

Morality is relative to the observer. There is no fixed morality, it is only in the context of the culture. For a primal tribe of savages, it is moral and correct for 30+ men to murder and pillage neighboring tribes. Under American Law, it is illegal for 30+ men to travel to Vegas to murder and pillage. The question is, what defines morality? If you talk about homosexual behavior in the context of the Middle East, the death penalty is in effect. If you talk about homosexual behavior in the context of the Canada, gay marriage is allowed. Suppose a culture thought yeast was evil. Not just person X and person Y, but the entire culture. True story.
Sex should be considered an exercise or even a sport.

'EXERCISE NOUN 1.activity requiring physical effort,' Sex requires physical effort, since the man must move his pelvis back and forth so his penis can rub against the vagina and cause ejaculation. This takes effort. Also if the women is giving oral sex she must move her head back and forth to properly suck the penis and it takes muscle power. Also, in many studies, it shows that sex improves health.
Sex should be considered an exercise or even a sport.

EXERCISE NOUN 1.activity requiring physical effort, carried out especially to sustain or improve health and fitness: "exercise improves your heart and lung power" synonyms: physical activity " a workout " working out " gymnastics " sports According to the definition of exercise: Exercise is carried out especially to sustain or improve health and fitness Sex is Not carried out to sustain or improve health and fitness so, sex can not be considered exercise. Sport NOUN 1.an activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others for entertainment: "team sports such as baseball and soccer" synonyms: (competitive) game(s) " physical recreation " physical activity Sex is also not a competition for entertainment either. Sex should not be categorized as a sport/exercise just because you can burn calories. Normal breathing requires the diaphragm to move and you burn calories. However, that does not make it a sport or an exercise.
Sex should be considered an exercise or even a sport.

I am not saying people have sex to lose weight, I am saying, just like jogging, running, push-ups, jumping jacks, Sex is also another exercise. Sometimes it can take over 45 minutes of penetration to ejaculate and the man can be tired of going back and forth over and over. Just like masturbation, the arm can get tired after moving for a long while, since it requires speed and force to have a good grip on the penis. The arm can later develop muscle if you want an argument that fits the definition. I know the purpose is not what you said. But sex should be considered an exercise just like push-ups.
Parents should not be allowed to circumcise their male infants

Well Mirza you asked for it. I will be arguing that the circumcision of infants is equivalent to child abuse and should be abolished. To be clear: "Male circumcision is the removal of some or all of the foreskin (prepuce) from the penis." http://en.wikipedia.org... "Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of children.I n the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or other caregiver that results in harm, potential for harm, or threat of harm to a child." http://en.wikipedia.org... I ask that the first round be used only for acceptance/clarification. Please do not submit any arguments in this round.
Faith Can Help To Heal Sickness

I will now begin my rebuttals "In 2006, there was a study conducted to answer the question of whether or not prayer helped. He looked at over 1800 coronary bypass surgeries. This was a controlled experiment. Groups 1 and 2 was told they may or may not be receiving prayers, but only groups 1 was really receiving them. Group 3 was told they were receiving prayers, and were receiving prayers. Groups 1 and groups 2 died at 51% and 52% respectively. This is not significant enough to draw conclusions in either direction, as the groups is not large enough to escape such a minor margin of error. 59% of those in group 3, who knew they were being prayed for, died. " If you look at this argument you see that it does not specify what this man's beliefs are. What if he just prayed without having the needed faith? The thing is, the person praying also needs to trust that the person he or she is praying for would be healed. It does not specify if they even believed that they were being prayed for. Neither does it specify the ones prayed for's beliefs.(1) "It is quite possible that Dawkins and the other researcher are correct, and the nocebo effect was in play. The nocebo effect refers to a harmless, or not beneficial treatment, wherein the patients suffers negative effects due to the belief that it is harmful. It is quite plausable that the nocebo effect played some role in the varied effects of the study." My opponent makes a mistake because he shows faith does work even when they believe something hurts them. "There is a reason why people use placebos in expirements. Often times, as I shall demonstrate below, people get significant health benefits, simply because they believe they are getting health benefits. To test the effectiveness of a new treatment, doctors test the treatment against the belief that you were given a real treatment." Wow, that was not a good thing done on the doctors' behalf. It was not right of them to take away an effect that worked. Basically, they took away the faith of the patients. This goes to show, faith works.(2) The Bible demonstrates faith healing. That is your ultimate proof. (1) http://www.bible.ca... (2)http://www.magicalmiracles.com...
Faith Can Help To Heal Sickness

LordGrae r1 :"I would like to state that he must show that faith cures better then the placebo affect." TheUser r2 : " If I must show that faith cures better than placebos, then I'd be happy to." It was agreed upon that he must show that faith is not just a placebo, but works better, and I must show that it is merely a placebo, or perhaps a negative. I showed a fairly reputable study that shows how faith shows little correlation, and the little correlation it does show can be considered part of the nocebo effect, and not affirming that faith can truly cure. My opponent has given the example of the bible. We never agreed to accept the bible as truth, and it is an unreliable source for this topic. If he had looked at my profile, he would have known that it would be foolish to even attempt to use it as a source. Regardless of your beliefs, dear potential voter, you must admit that since we never agreed on accepting it as truth, he cannot do so. He mentions Orthodox Jews, which cannot be compared to the general population because they have very different practices that can have a physical, and not faith related effect on their health. (Rules about eating, smoking, drinking etc.) It also does not specify the percentage difference between these groups. Another study mentioned was only of 250 people, a poor sample size. Since depression is not really a normal 'disease' we cannot treat it as such. And any significant difference can be seen by the community aid and family support that people of faith tend to have more of, because they are less likely to be ostracized from the community and their family. In short, all the studies were either unreliable, discussed diseases that can be attributed to physical, and not spiritual causes, and missed providing percentages, which are the only things that really matter when looking at data. In conclusion, he failed to successfully refute my studies, and made this sentence, which seems to make absolutely no sense in the context of the situation. TheUser r3 " that was not a good thing done on the doctors' behalf. It was not right of them to take away an effect that worked. Basically, they took away the faith of the patients. " Please vote for me. Thank you.
Faith Can Help To Heal Sickness

First of all, you're dosseydossey link seems to be somewhat disreputable, and unreliable for unbiased medical information. "If you look at this argument you see that it does not specify what this man's beliefs are. What if he just prayed without having the needed faith? The thing is, the person praying also needs to trust that the person he or she is praying for would be healed. It does not specify if they even believed that they were being prayed for. Neither does it specify the ones prayed for's beliefs." They asked local churches to pray for them. Based on the location (US) it seems likely that the vast majority were Christian, as this makes up 78% of the population [1] plus the many who are spiritual, but not part of any religion. "My opponent makes a mistake because he shows faith does work even when they believe something hurts them." The topic is that faith can help to cure sickness, not whether it can kill a person. "Wow, that was not a good thing done on the doctors' behalf. It was not right of them to take away an effect that worked. Basically, they took away the faith of the patients. This goes to show, faith works.(2)" It is not faith in the divine sense. We are debating that faith in a higher power can help to heal, not that faith in medicine heals. And they were not 'taking away' anything. I do not understand what you mean. "The Bible demonstrates faith healing. That is your ultimate proof." The bible is untestable, and unproven. This is a terrible source and heavily biased. In short, you have failed to prove that faith is better then placebos, and I have shown a reliable study where faith was detrimental to the patients recovery, and no other correlations were shown. We cannot draw conclusions on anything, and to all accounts by reliable doctors, and neuroscientists who did the experiment I talked about and several others, the brain controls a lot of symptoms and can fight the illness. This is not faith that kills the illness, it is the brain. The brain is a powerful thing, and giving someone a sugar pill is just as useful as telling someone to pray about it, and sometimes praying on it causes a negative reaction to the stimulant, causing more complications and death. [1] Gallup polls, CIA religious statistics and Pew Review all agree to this number, or one or two points off.
Lets Make Healthcare Reform a referendum

"First of all, my opponent claims that the particular bill I defined is "one of six." That is simply untrue. The source I provided is the bill in its entirety." It would appear that my opponent has misread what I have said I was not saying that the link he sent me was one sixth of the bill i was saying its one of the six proposed bills 3 of them in the house and 3 in the senate. "Next, my opponent attempts to connect the reading and page length of 'Harry Potter and the Death Hallows' with the Healthcare Reform Bill." Actually i was nearly pointing out how are person could go about figuring out what happened in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows without reading it by going to book rags, I was saying that voters would be able to find out the details of the bill without reading the entire 1000 pages see as it would probably be broken down and analyzed just as Harry Potter was by Bookrags.com. Secondly the fact that you try to diminish my first argument as being incoherent is deplorable and insulting, perhaps my opponent just doesn't understand the argument or feels he can simply dismiss it because he has no counter argument for it; just in case he didn't understand the argument allow me to reiterate the people are not represented properly because pharmaceutical and health insurance companies pay our elected officials to the way THEY want them to. What my statement went on to say was with these congressmen and senators being "bought off" the average American isn't represented properly. In fact the Senator i mentioned earlier takes $66,100 from the health insurance companies as well as senators from Georgia, Montana, Arizona etc. It's all available here: http://www.fivethirtyeight.com... I would now like to make mention of a point that my opponent brought up that actually re-enforces the validity of my argument. This was what my opponent sighted as a tediousness of a referendum "he referendum took place in Quebec on October 30, 1995, and the motion to decide whether Quebec should secede from Canada was defeated by a very narrow margin of: 50.58% "No" to 49.42% "Yes"." this is the point of a referendum its designed to make take action on an issue even if it is an issue where people are very divided. And as for the lost votes this happens in pretty much every election whether its for the Senate, The House or the Presidency, and rarely are the overall results contested (see 2008 Minnesota Senate Election, 2000 Presidential Election).
Lets Make Healthcare Reform a referendum

I would first like to make note on my opponent's mention that the particular bill (one of six) and the fact that the length of the bill is over 1000 pages, but I would like to point out that the comparison of the size of between Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and the Health care reform bill is minuscule and as many people are aware you can go to a variety of links to find out what happened in it, lets use this link as an example: http://www.bookrags.com... . Now this may seem irrelevant but it highlights the fact that it would easy for voters to have understanding of the contents of a health care reform bill without reading the full 1000 pages. Now, the reason why it should be made a referendum is because of the polarizing nature of the subject, an example of this would be the conflicts in town hall meetings all over the United States. In the past referendums have been successfully used to help extinguish the partisanship and the division. I use for example the Quebec Independence referendum of 1995, http://en.wikipedia.org..., the people of Quebec where so divided over whether they should separate a referendum was the only thing that would lead to calm waters after the consequences of it had occurred. Many people also feel as if they are being misrepresented by the members of both the House of Representatives and the Senate because of the massive influence that the bug Pharmaceutical and Health Insurance companies have over them, for example how can we trust Senator Evan Bayh when we know he gets paid large sums of money from the health insurance companies to help them. A referendum would be the best way for the American people to be represented, and is the only thing that will cause the cease of partisan bickering over this particular subject.
Lets Make Healthcare Reform a referendum

I shall negate the resolution, "Lets Make Healthcare Reform a referendum. " As The Instigator and Pro, my opponent posseses the Burden of Proof to affirm and uphold the resolution. If I am able to prove otherwise, the resolution shall be negated. I would like to begin with several definitions: Healthcare Reform Bill- . http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov... referendum- the principle or practice of referring measures proposed or passed by a legislative body to the vote of the electorate for approval or rejection. electorate- the body of persons entitled to vote in an election. ============================================= My opponent quoted: "So we have all seen the passion of those protesting at the townhalls of liberal demorats in favor of public option so lets put the public option on a referendum" Protesting is not a valid reason to put the Public Option on a referendum. My opponent has failed to provide a single argument. ============================================= As a Quick Note: This debate will solely be focused on the electorate in America, for the Healthcare Reform Bill would only be voted upon by Americans of voting qualifications if it were to be put on a referendum. ============================================== The Healthcare Reform Bill should not be a referendum. Being that the bill itself is over a thousand pages long, I highly doubt that most of the electorate would read the entire document before voting upon it. Thus, it would lead to an uninformed and ignorant vote, which would cause massive faults in American democracy and future legislation. Conclusively, the Healthcare Reform Bill should not be a referendum. My opponent has failed to provide any argumentation to support his side, so I shall await his response in the following round. Thank you.
Debate.org has an unnecessary verification process.

Rules: 1. There will be no swearing or derogatory terms directed at either individual, however they may be directed at anything or anyone else.2: Have a basic understanding of American English. You don't need to sound like you graduated with a Ph.D in English, just dnt telk lik3 dis k thx3: Sources are completely optional as this is more of an opinionated debate.4: This is a serious debate on a non-serious topic. Don't half @ss it because it's a "dumb" debateFailure to comply with these rules will result in me calling you a fool. That's about it.--------------------------------------------------------------------- Today is the first time I've heard of this website, and after reading a really bad debate by both sides, I went to cast my vote. To my discouragement though, I was prompted with two preventive measures: I must provide my cell phone number, and complete three debates in order to vote (and I also assume comment as well as other functions that I couldn't seem to do). A CellPhone: Not everyone has one nor does everyone want one. "But PRO, there are more cellphones in the world than there are people!" I realize that, however that doesn't mean everyone has one. Plenty of individuals have more than one cellphone, sometimes one is for work and one for leisure. Other times, people just buy a new cellphone that is more up to date, and they'll just leave their old ones in a drawer somewhere. The amount of phones increases but the amount of users stays relatively the same. Debate.org does not take into account the people without cellphones who still want to participate.CellPhone Privacy: Giving all of our numbers to one collector is a serious risk. A skilled hacker can break into the database and collect these private details. Other companies with personal data collections have been compromised before, and I can say with certainty that it will continue to happen to other companies, perhaps even this one. 3 Debates Requirement: I understand where they're coming from with this, they don't want trolls or bots ruining all of the debates so they have this wall here to prevent that. However, seeing as how debates can last anywhere from three days to six freaking months, it becomes highly inconvenient for people that just want to do something as simple as leave a comment.
Gods existence

Re KCA 1. I am not even sure what you mean by its not tangible evidence how does that defeat my argument. 2. Also your argument about quantum fluctuation its not true that it applies to my argument. Because there are certain physical preconditions that must exist for the particles to come in and out of being uncaused as you say. So for now this argument still stands. Re TA first your mixing this argument with the KCA. This argument is not about cause but design the question of cause is irrelevent to this discussion. Also you say there are systems that are ordered simply because it is following natural physical processes this doesn't help you at all. These natural physical processes themselves are example of great design. They were designed to order the universe to work the way it does. Kind of like we create tools and machines using our intelligence to help keep things ordered the way there supposed to be. Re MA Ah yes the 'Euthyphro' dilema is a false dilema. objective moral values are not determined by transcendental facts or by gods whimsical commands. But god gives us these objective moral values based on his nature which is good. And not his his will which can change but his nature which cannot. And the second premise follows because theres no good alternative theory of how they could originate from us. and if they can't they must have come from a law giver Re RNA so you want proof ok my first evidence is that virtually every civilization believes in some sort of spirituality there seeking something
Gods existence

I will be defending the position that god exists i'll wait for my opponents responses his arguments why god doesn't exist my arguments for god's existence are 1. Kalam cosmological argument 1. everything that begins to exist has a cause my support for this premise first is its logical you don't see anywhere else in nature where things just randomly begin to exist without a cause 2. the universe began to exist first evidence for this is philosophical 1. an infinite number of moments cannot be traversed 2. if an infinate number of moments had to elapse before today then today would never have come 3. but today has come 4. therefore an infinite number of moments have not elapsed before today 3. therefore the universe has a cause 2. Teleological argument 1. All designs imply a designer 2. there is great design in the universe 3. therefore there must be a great designer of the universe 3. Moral argument 1. there must be an objective universal moral law 2. this moral law did not originate with us 3. therefore there exists a moral law giver 4. Religious need argument 1. every natural innate need has a real object that can fulfill it 2. human beings have a natural innate need for some kind of spirituality 3. therefore god must exist