RE: Agriculture was mankind's biggest mistake.

Thank you for a timely response and thank you for the opportunity to debate with you. =====DEFINITIONS===== agï¿½riï¿½culï¿½ture/ˈagriˌkəlCHər/ Noun: The science or practice of farming, including cultivation of the soil for the growing of crops and the rearing of animals to provide food, wool, and other products. gathï¿½erVerb/ˈgaT͟Hər/ 1. Come together; assemble or accumulate: "a crowd gathered". 2. Bring together and take in from scattered places or sources: "gather information" hunt/hənt/ Noun: An act of hunting wild animals or game. Verb: Pursue and kill (a wild animal) for sport or food: "in the autumn they hunted deer"; "they hunted and fished" biggest superlative of big (Adjective) 1. Of considerable or relatively great size, extent, or capacity. 2. Of greater size than the ordinary, esp. with reference to a size of clothing or to the size of a packaged commodity. =====MY CASE===== What we must all realize is that war and all of these problems are inevitable. My opponent himself even stated that the gatherers and hunters could still make inventions in their free time. Well, who is to say that war won't start over these technologies or land that the tribes own? There are also many inevitable problems with people who only hunt or gather such as simple disasters (See OVERVIEW OF OPPONENTS CASE). We all must realize that agriculture only improved our society over the years and it only protected us from potential disasters that we could face any day of our lives. Now I suspect my opponent will bring up the topic of overpopulation so I will refute that right now. Even though overpopulation is a problem in our modern society, how many of you viewers would like to die right now for the greater benefit of the world for a problem that will eventually reoccur later, only to ask for more sacrifices of death? If my opponent believes this, than that only shows how immoral he is. So, if the majority of the worlds population today pays for insurance every month to protect themselves against disaster, why would the past generation not use the intelligent method of agriculture to better their society and protect their lives? =====OVERVIEW OF OPPONENTS CASE===== My opponent spends the first 3/4 of his case evaluating the pros of gatherers and hunters and explaining exactly what is so great about them but he does not at all reveal to you the cons of them. For example, he himself stated, "they got what they needed day to day," and this shows a major flaw. What happens if disaster strikes? If their food source is killed of in the area or it runs away, the hunters starve. If there is a drought and the fruits and vegetables they gather stop growing, the gatherers starve. So what I want to know is, what was better about life back then? When a simple problem can turn into a life or death situation, I don't believe that is the kind of world I would like to live in. =====ATTACKS===== My opponent overlooks the obvious and states first of all that no agriculture equals no war. Now think about this logically. Sorry mikeee but that does not make any sense whatsoever. I believe that the people of the world should have the right to choose between fishing, agriculture, gathering, hunting, or anything else they want. Agriculture was a major advance in today's society and it has benefited society in ways that you obviously don't understand. I'm positive you have eaten a fruit or vegetable at one time or another in your life and it came from agriculture. You will probably respond to this by saying that you can also gather fruits and vegetables but there are no gatherers in today's society and if there is, they don't sell their food as you said yourself. You stated that they gather everyday at their need for that particular day. Also, possibly the BIGGEST flaw of all was the wording of the resolution. Does my opponent really believe that agriculture is the BIGGEST mistake mankind has ever made? Certainly there are more serious mistakes that we have made in the past such as war, genocide, murder, and many other terrible mistakes. =====REFUTATIONS===== My opponent didn't attack my case properly so this section shouldn't be as large as the others. My opponent stated that agriculture caused "ownership of possessions , which lead to conflicts and wars, inequality between genders, races, and cultures, health related issues such as diseases, and dramatic impact on the world." Well as I have stated before, wars are inevitable and people will own things one way or another. Killing a wild animal has a greater risk of spreading disease than agriculture does by far. I honestly don't understand the " inequality between genders, races, and cultures," part and if you could expand on "dramatic impact on the world," that would be great. =====OVERVIEW===== I have refuted my opponents feeble attacks and I have created strong attacks of my own on my opponents case and logic. I have presented my case and I have provided definitions to clarify the debate. =====CONCLUSION===== I am sorry if my words have offended you in any way and I look forward to reading your response. For all the reasons I have stated, I strongly urge a CON vote, Thank you again, S98SAMMAN