BeIR/webis-touche2020 huggingface dataset:
It is reasonable to believe that Alien life exists

FINAL REBUTTALS I just say or planet is unique, both in that life happened, and that life evolved on it to what it’s like today. This is why I find the idea that aliens exist not only reasonable, but almost certain. You see, I cannot possibly fathom something only happening once in all the billions of years that all the billions of galaxies have existed. ------------------------------------------ According to the logic that it is reasonable to believe alien life happened, we should have found it by now, because it would have been abundant. And yet we did not find any traces whatsoever! Something in the proponents argument is already off. No. No, no, no. Consider this analogy: You’ve lost your keys. When can you conclude they aren’t in the house? Do you stand in one place, turn around in a circle and conclude that because you can’t see them, they are lost. No. If you truly wanted to be sure that your keys aren’t in your house, you must search your house. Failing that, you must search harder. If you still can’t find your keys and you’re certain you’ve searched to the best of your abilities, then you can conclude they aren’t in the house. And they still might be in the house! Ok, it’s a poor analogy, but my point is obvious. No right-minded astronomer on Earth would conclude that we have searched to the best of our abilities. We haven’t even searched very well. We’re standing in the middle of an oval, turning in circles trying to find what could be a microscopic insect. We’re not even sure what we’re looking for. Aliens might be completely outside our understanding. ------------------------------------------ The fact that he himself has stated: "My WHOLE point from the beginning has been that the Universe is a BIG place. ". .. .. . "Life exists here, therefore it is reasonable to assume it exists elsewhere in some way, shape or form. ", means that he only believes there is a REMOTE chance of alien life, not that there is REASONABLE chance. I would argue there is a remote chance of life existing in our solar system. If you imagine an orb starting out at the centre of Earth and expanding out; the larger the orb is, the more reasonable it is to believe that Aliens exist in that area. If the orb stretched out to be the size of the Universe, I would be certain you would find life in that enormous area. ------------------------------------------ CONCLUSION I admit. I don’t know. Nobody on Earth was proven aliens exist, despite thousands of eyewitness accounts. But you know they’re there. Out there, in the endless Universe, something ELSE has happened. Something happened here (and yes, we don’t know what) and it’s bound to have happened elsewhere. There are too many galaxies and stars and planets. So, remember. When the scientists prove that aliens exist, I’ll be the guy saying “I told you so! ” …right before we’re destroyed by their death-rays. Seriously though, I think I have provided enough evidences to show that it is reasonable to believe aliens exist, even if you don’t believe it yourself.
It is reasonable to believe that Alien life exists

About life on our planet, I just say or planet is unique, both in that life happened, and that life evolved on it to what its like today. According to the logic that it is reasonable to believe alien life happened, we should have found it by now, because it would have been abundant. And yet we did not find any traces whatsoever! Something in the proponents argument is already off. I am sorry this turned into a definition debate, though the fact that it did supports my argument. The debate turned into a debate over the burden of proof on the opponent - does the opponent have to prove that there is no chance at all for life, or that there is a minuscule chance of alien life. Remember - virtually zero chance of alien life means that it would be unreasonable to believe in it. According to the definition "It is reasonable to believe alien life exists" the burden of prof on the opponent would be to prove that it isn't REASONABLE, not that it isn't POSSIBLE. consequentially, the fact that the debate is whether or not I did that, means that I DID prove that the chance is minuscule, and therefor i proved my case. The proponent has repeatedly said that his argument is that the universe is big, and that therefor there is a chance of alien life. I don't disagree that it COULD have happened - I believe that it is unreasonable to believe that it ACTUALLY happened. The proponent doesn't need to prove the possibility, he needs to prove the reasonableness of that belief. The fact that he himself has stated: "My WHOLE point from the beginning has been that the Universe is a BIG place."......"Life exists here, therefore it is reasonable to assume it exists elsewhere in some way, shape or form.", means that he only believes there is a REMOTE chance of alien life, not that there is REASONABLE chance. Considering the above, I must oppose.
It is reasonable to believe that Alien life exists

Let's assume for a moment that abiogenesis didn't happen. That leaves biogenesis, right? The theory that life can only come from other life... Where did our life come from? Since I expressly asked that theological arguments weren't to be included, this argument seems to support my resolution more than negate it; life came from elsewhere in the Universe. Moving on... First of all, I completely AGREE with the source you cited. "How my proponent takes virtually zero and turns it into almost definitely I have no idea." Let's next assume that the numbers behind your source are ridiculously underestimated and the chance of getting one DNA monocle right through abiogenesis is 1 to the power of a googol... I've shown that two hundred billion galaxies in our Universe is a conservative estimate. I've shown evidence that the Universe is at least fourteen billion years old. Let's say that one relevant chemical reaction has happened in each galaxy, every year for fourteen billion years. That's 2.8 to the power of 21. That's less than 1/5. However, like any number put into the Drake Equation, these are simply estimates. However, I obviously grossly underestimated all of the numbers I used as well as multiplied the numbers my opponent cited. My WHOLE point from the beginning has been that the Universe is a BIG place. We really have no idea how big, since we are severely limited by our relatively primitive technology. Remember, my opponent has not shown any evidence to show that there is no chance (zero) that life could exist outside of Earth and I have shown lots of evidence to show that there is a chance (no matter how insignificant) life exists out there in the Universe. Life exists here, therefore it is reasonable to assume it exists elsewhere in some way, shape or form.
It is reasonable to believe that Alien life exists

The Burden of Proof on the Proponent is to prove that it is REASONABLE to believe that there is alien life. So by showing that the chances of that are virtually nonexistent I disprove the proposition. How my proponent takes virtually zero and turns it into almost definitely I have no idea. The proponent in his argument stated that: 1. Many billions of years ago Mars might have had the possibility of HOSTING life. 2. Earth-generated life can SURVIVE in adverse conditions. But the proponent fully ignored the fact that he needs to prove that the probability of abiogenesis is high enough to be reasonable to believe in, Which it ISN'T. http://www.cs.unc.edu... And merely stating that earth-generated life can survive in adverse conditions does not prove that. Neither does the fact that Mars could have hosted life prove that. Another view is that the fact that MANY BILLIONS OF YEAR AGO Mars COULD have hosted life does not make it reasonable to believe that there is NOW life over there. And the fact that it was that long ago that a planet close to the conditions of ours had the remote possibility of hosting life, surly the chance of a planet that is dissimilar to ours has a virtually zero chance of hosting life now! So again, I say that the chances of life on another planet are virtually zero, therefor unreasonable to believe in. For this reason I beg to oppose.
It is reasonable to believe that Alien life exists

This is my first debate on DDO, so please bear with me. To be clear, I am working under the assumption that when the proposition mentions Aliens, he means organisms who meet the same life requirements as we do - which are: 1. Reproduction 2. Response to environment. 3. Metabolism 4. Growth/Aging http://wiki.answers.com... Also, the planet must be able to sustain life, and so it must meet the following requirements: 1. Water 2. Breathable atmosphere 3. Gravity 4. Heat 5. Nourishment f the life form http://wiki.answers.com... http://wiki.answers.com... All the Proposition seems to be saying is that because the universe is so big and there are so many stars, it would be logical to assume that there are other organisms somewhere out there. My argument, which directly refutes the propositions claim, is that the probability of other life is virtually zero. Yes, there are many planets out there. Therefore it would be logical to assume that some of them have some of the aforementioned requirements. But the probability of the planet to fulfill the 5 requirements and of the life form to fulfill the 4 requirements is so low that it is extremely unlikely for there to be Alien life forms, and therefor extremely illogical to assume that there are such beings. And so, because of the extremely low - virtually nonexistent probability that there is a planet which has the 5 requirements, and of that planet to host a life form that has the 4 requirements, I beg to oppose.
It is reasonable to believe that Alien life exists

OPENING Hello! The resolution is obvious: I am of the opinion that it's extremely LIKELY that Aliens exist and believe this is a reasonable position. Here is my reasoning, based on common arguments arguments against Alien life. I am not building a strawman against my opponent, but giving an insight into my position. PLEASE, NO ARGUMENTS BASED ON THEOLOGY. ARGUMENT "Life exists here, therefore it is reasonable to assume it exists elsewhere." To quote Douglas Adams "The Universe is a really BIG place" Well, given that time restricts how far into the Universe we can see and ultimately impossible to know if other Universes exists, it's impossible to say how big. However, here [1] we see evidence of light 14 billion lightyears away. That's pretty damn big. This more than anything proves to me that there MUST be life elsewhere in the Universe. It would be illogical to assume otherwise. Here [2] we see that a German supercomputer simulation put the number of galaxies in the universe at 500,000,000,000, five hundred BILLION. The science behind these estimates is sound and I'll paraphrase source 2; "In order to create these estimates, astronomers use a powerful telescope to deeply study a region of the sky, gathering light for hundreds of hours. Astronomers count up the number of galaxies in the cone of space that makes up the deep image, and then use this as an average for the rest of the sky." With hundreds of billions of galaxies, each with millions of stars, we are talking about trillions or even quadrillions of planets. To assume that no other single celled organism exists on any other planetin the whole universe is, quite frankly, ridiculous. SOURCES [1] http://www.cfa.harvard.edu... [2] http://www.universetoday.com...
You cannot steal virtual goods, and it is not morally wrong to do so.

My conclusion will be short as my review of the positions offered by my opponent have been addressed and refuted. I see no way for Pro to uphold the resolution given the contentions I have offered. Yes, Mrstabby is a cool name. WoW is a fantastic game. I play with several lifelong friends now living in various parts of the US. We can get to together, drink some beers, and kill bad guys. It is not poker night, but close. Three of my friends have had accounts compromised and now we require the additional authenticator tool before acceptance into our guild. I don't care for thieves, in game or not, and anyone caught buying/selling anything for real money will be removed from our group. Any violation of the ToS will result in us removing the person. We don't need the GMs to do this for us. My entire position rests on the phrase Pro used concerning stealing "from" other players. I fully stipulated that "ninja looting" via the need/greed system was not in question. Pro and I agreed on that point. I was reasonable in my evaluation as I showed in my third round. My case is bolstered by the fact that Pro did not refute my definitions in the second round. I properly showed the moral agent to be the player, and showed how violating the ToS and the law by the actions of the moral agent were morally wrong using Act Utilitarianism and the Deontology philosophies Pro offered. In addition, I showed that in game items have value outside of the game as they are sold for real money so they meet the MPC definition for property as being "anything of value". Pro offered a rebuttal to the MPC in his final round, but did not leave a source so I cannot comment on it at this point. I have a hard copy of the MPC and I did not see the definition of "intangible" within section 223.0. I have rebutted all points and urge a solid vote for Con. As a side note, I usually attack debates from different angles so definitions are very important. Anytime a definition is offered, I recommend addressing the definition immediately in the next round. I was fully under the impression that the definition was accepted. I thank Pro for a fun debate and look forward to debating again soon. Very Truly Yours, SherlockMethod
You cannot steal virtual goods, and it is not morally wrong to do so.

1.In the first sentence Pro referenced the huge market for selling virtual goods for in-game use. 2.Pro is an experienced Wow player and is familiar with the terminology as evidenced by referencing "ninjas", he was familiar with the name of the land in Wow (Azeroth), and his profile page lists clearly that he does indeed play Wow. 3.Pro specifically said (in reference to ninjas), "Who are people who steal items from others in game." I believe that #3 is where we get the confusion from. By the stealing I meant via the rolling system. When a person rolls on [cloth of wasted Saturdays] and need-rolls for it, then another person who does not need it rolls need it is considered in game to be stealing or ninjaing from the person. I concede I should have made this clearer. I thought it was please forgive there. Now I will refute the argument about selling the "stolen" item. People in game who roll like this and take the item from someone who needed it, will often then go and sell it to people who want it. I still contend that this in no way makes them real or makes them liable for theft. I will address other points that my opponent brought up, in the order he stated. 1. The moral agent: I enumerated on this in my previous argument. (Mrstabby is still a cool name.) What I said was that there is no moral agent. If you intended to use the person for the moral agent then you must also hold them responsible for everything else that happens. Such as the killing of other players I addressed. 2. The means one must use to steal from another player: As I have also addressed. Now my opponent brings up the point of ToS violation. I agree that violating the ToS is wrong. However I say nothing nor do I mean nothing with the ToS on my theft of virtual goods. I have now addressed this as well. 3. The act utilitarianism position: As I have addressed and disproved that they can say anything in the situation given that there is no moral agent. 4. The deontology position: See my 1st argument and 3. 5. The legal definition of property via the Model Penal Code: Definition of intangible, "existing only in connection with something else, as the goodwill of a business."[1] What this means is that the item is only real when in conjunction with something else from its world. Such as a character. However since the character does not exist and can be completely deleted then the item still does not exist. Therefore it cannot be considered for a moral law breaking. 6. Violating the ToS: I agree with my opponent about the ToS. Any violation of this can be held in moral contempt. However since there is nothing about ninjaing in the ToS then it cannot be held in moral contempt. So I have now completely addressed all issues brought up. I have defended the resolution completely. It is not possible to steal virtual items via the ninja definition. It is also not morally wrong since you cannot have a moral agent and it does not violate any laws/rules. Therefore for all the above reasons and the fact that I have defended my entire case. I must urge a Pro ballot. Thank you.
You cannot steal virtual goods, and it is not morally wrong to do so.

The two ways a person can steal in game items from another is by accessing the account of the targeted player (which is also a violation of the ToS) or committing an in game scam" I believe you may be misunderstanding me. I do not mean hacking of an account. That is wrong and a violation of the ToS. I agree there. What I am talking about is ninjas. In the game you must roll for items. You can need-roll on the item if you need it or you can greed-roll if you don't. I am saying a ninja is the the guy that needs what he does not need and takes another players item that they may have needed on by rolling need himself. Now onto the selling of game items for real world cash. I state "How can anyone steal a virtual good when said good DOES NOT EVEN EXIST? Clearly you cannot steal something without taking it, and we can no more take said good than we can clone virtual people or shake hands with a virtual person. So how can a ninja steal an item that is non-existent? It's reasonable to assume that thieves are real people who take real items that belong to other real people, and ninjas are virtual characters who virtually steal from other characters" What this means is that since the item is a game item made of numbers and codes that it does not exist in the real world view. While you may be able to sell it that in no way makes it real or gives it real value. If a real person could own the item in the real world then it would have value. However they cannot and so it is not of any true value. Therefore since it does not exist then it cannot be stolen. Now to defend my moral agent idea. My opponent states " The player, on the other hand, is a moral agent. Pro attempts to disengage the player from the avatar by asking rhetorically whether we would hold a player morally responsible for "killing" avatars in the game. This, however, is a false equivocation. I made clear in Rd 1 that allowing players to steal via a special ability like pick pocketing would be fine." I agree if this was a rule that you could ninja then it would be okay. However it is not a rule it is just a personal choice. My "rhetorical" argument about the moral killing aspect should not be taken in this matter. What I mean by it is that if you hold a person in moral contempt by stealing a non real item then you must hold them responsible for killing non real people. Killing people is wrong in the real world, so is stealing, however in the game world it is not wrong and people cannot be held in responsibility for it. Same goes for ninjaing an item. There is no rule in game about it. Therefore it is not against the law or a moral code. It may get you bad rap with the rest of the game world but that matters not in this debate. So to conclude, you still cannot own the ingame item therefore you cannot steal it. You also do not break a rule or law by ninjaing the item. Therefore you cannot be held responsible. Also like killing people in game no one could you morally responsible , nor could they do so for ninjaing.
Minimum Wage

LaissezFaire, In the process of researching for this debate, I have changed my mind on many accounts. My main argument was going to be that because of inflation, we need something to continually keep workers up to date on their wages. Here's the problem with that; increases in minimum wage help increase inflation. The market would also adjust itself to inflation because, as workers became more experienced, businesses would compete for the more skilled workers and in order to draw them in, pay them more. On top of all this, inflation isn't such a big deal to the vast majority of minimum wage employees because they are kids, living with mom and dad just trying to get some work experience. Minimum wage doesn't do much to help against inflation for a family because it's so far below the poverty line. My only concern about not having a minimum wage would be this. Let's use Ben and James as examples. Ben lives in the country 30 mins out of town. James lives in town only minutes away from shopping and restaurants. James and Ben both apply for the same position. They both have no work experience. James however, decides to offer to work for a very low amount to get the job. After all, he can ride his bike or even walk to work. Ben however, must pay for gas in order to get to work. He cannot go any lower on his wages. Ben now cannot find work because everyone who lives in the city is working for lower than he can. If there is no minimum wage, what happens to the Ben's of the world?
Minimum Wage

That particular situation is irrelevant. One, while abolishing the minimum wage may hurt a few people, it would benefit far more. Two, the government has no right to infringe on a worker's right to take an available job. If an employer is willing to offer someone a certain amount of money for their labor, and the worker is willing to offer their labor for that amount of money, what right does anyone have to stop them? The government should never stop peaceful agreements between consenting adults.
Homosexual acts are immoral

My only point is, that with his portrayal of the word immoral, virtually anything may fit into this "immoral" category in one way or another. It is not a "strawman" because I am attacking his number one argument. I am using examples into how virtually everything may fit into his definition of immorality. Because his first argument is obviously flawed, his other two arguments also fail. I did not need to even talk about homosexual acts in the 3rd round because his first argument is merely telling what immorality is. If I destroy his first argument, then his 2nd and 3rd arguments also crumble. Therefore, Pro has not proven that homosexual acts are immoral.
Homosexual acts are immoral

My opponents entire argument, as pointed by contradiction in the comments, is a straw man. [1] First, all of the things he mentioned are not immoral, as the objects he mentioned do fulfill their faculty. Such as the Popsicle, for example, I could to this for any of them, the faculty is pleasure to the taste buds. So my opponents list of things that make things not fulfill their faculty is: "CANDY POPSICLES EXCERCISE BOWTIES TIES GOVERNMENT CAR RACING PILOTSUSING A TAMPON FOR A NOSEBLEED SNOWMEN POTATO GUNS" But this, in itself is a straw man. Now, candy is made for pleasure. Also, may I ask, is this even relevant? My opponents straw man is claiming man made objects refute my premise, which it does not. My argument is not on artificial man-made arguments, rather what the biological proper function of sex is. I am not relating the argument "natural" to man made objects, but rather the proper function. If you look at round 2, I was proving my example through human functions, not artificial ornaments. None of them in your list apply. It is a strawman and a red herring. The argument: 1. It is immoral to actively use a faculty against its proper function. 2. Homosexual acts actively use our sexual faculties against their proper function. 3. Therefore, homosexual acts are immoral. This premise is logically valid and still stands, even through my opponents strawman and red herring. VOTE PRO 1. http://www.fallacyfiles.org...