Bob the Magic Fairy Exists

1. ImpossibilityWhen debate challenges are issued, particularly when in regards to the existence of something, definitions are given in the opening round for a reason. Con seems to have missed that memo.Imagine Con challenges me to debate the existence of God. In round 1 he defines God as “An omniscient and omnipotent intelligent being responsible for the creation of the universe”. I accept the challenge to negate his existence, then proceed by refuting the biblical God of Christianity. If this actually happened then Con, being a Muslim (that’s right Christians), would be the first to see what is wrong with this picture and argue that I am not sticking to the resolution. It doesn’t matter what Con thinks the definition of BTMF is supposed to be, the definition was given as a condition of the debate and despite having every opportunity to decline or postpone his acceptance till the definition could be straightened out, he accepted. Below is a reminder of the definition that was actually given:“A creature who hangs around in peoples closets when they are not home. He likes to trash the place and make a mess, but once he senses that someone is close by he disappears and magically erases all traces of his ever having been there”Cons says I am confusing redefinition with interruption (I believe he meant interpretation). Con can call it whatever he wants, he is not arguing the definition provided.Con claims that I do not have the right to “clarify” what I meant after an argument was made. That's nonsense. I merely responded to Cons unreasonable interpretation. That's called a rebuttal, and yes, it's allowed in a debate.Con asks if he was supposed to read my mind. No, he was supposed to read the definition.Con asks: “who is going to investigate the rhetoric and use of omission when you are talking about a freaking magic fairy”. Actually common sense would dictate that when discussing the existence of such a creature that involves magic and erasing the damage it causes in peoples closets, that the definition needs to be explicitly understood before rational discussion can continue. Con says “Ain't nobody got time for that”. Well I do. If Con didn’t then that is his problem. He shouldn’t have accepted the debate.Con says that all I have provided are tong twisters. It might feel like tong twisters to Con, that’s what happens when your argument is invalid.Con has made no argument refuting anything other than his own definition. We are not debating his definition, we are debating the definition given at the start of the debate. That’s how debate works.2. Fairies do not existMy response to Con was not to characterize his argument as an argument from ignorance. I don’t know where that came from. My response is that Cons argument is wrong. “If A then B, not B, therefore not A” is a valid structure. However, to use this properly: if A [a creature who… disappears and magically erases all traces of his ever having been there] then B [???]. Con needed to come up with a valid B scenario that would have made some detectable impact on us and has failed to do so, which is why he must resort to adding to the definition.Con says that I need to provide a similar image from reality for my counterargument to be of any value. I have no responsibility to counter an argument that fails to address the topic of this debate.Con still argues that if BTMF is real then we should expect to see other fairies, villages, bones, pictures, etc... I remind Con once again that the being in question clearly doesn’t want his existence to be known and has a magical ability to erase all traces of anything we would expect to see, therefore there is nothing we would expect to see. Cons argument is self-refuting.Cons entire point here is based on the idea that since the word “fairy” is used in the resolution this gives him a free pass to use any interpretation of a fairy he wants and apply that interpretation to BTMF. If the term “fairy” has no one specific interpretation that must be stuck with then Con needs to refute every possible interpretation in order to prove his nonexistence, which he clearly hasn’t done. On the other hand, if there is only one interpretation for us to debate then there is only one way to determine what we are debating… read the definition given in round 1.3. FalsifiedCon claims that the term “there” from the description “BTMF's magic erases all traces of his ever having been there” limits his magic to only what is in the closet. That’s not English. The word “there” is used to describe the location which BTFM occupied. What his magic does is erase all traces of his occupying said location. There is nothing about this that limits his magic to the closet, in fact the definition which explicitly states “all traces” actually clarifies that his magic in this regard is unlimited.Con hasn’t falsified anything except his own made up definition.4. Bob & implausibilityMy friend’s name is still Bob. Cons graph does nothing to make my statement any less believable. Most of us can instantly figure out why. This is the classic Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy. He is painting the bulls-eye around the bullet hole after the shot, then claiming it meaningful that the bullet hit the target.Bob is just the name that happened to be selected out of thousands, so no matter what name was picked it would have been an extremely unlikely outcome, making the likelihood of an extremely unlikely outcome to actually be 1 in 1. In other words, Con graph shows us the same unlikelihood we would expect no matter what his name was.5. Appeal to bibleCon ignored every point I made regarding the invalidity of his argument here. His appeals to emotion instead were quite amusing:“Something that spits on our dignity” – Nothing intelligent contained in this phrase“invades everyone's homes” – Gee that sounds scary doesn’t it?“and casts evil magic in our closets…” – Evil? Really?“It is bound that a supposedly mischievous species with so much potential power would be mentioned” – No, it is not for the reason I mentioned that Con never responded to. The creature in question has no impact on our lives, so there is no reason why it must have been mentioned nor has Con demonstrated that it actually wasn’t. His search doesn’t prove anything, most of the passages in the bible that talk about prophecies are indirect.And this is all coming from someone who does not even believe in the bible in the first place as he has openly stated that he is a Muslim (sorry Christians, so much for “wink wink”). Like I said, very amusing. Unfortunately nothing of substance to warrant consideration in this debate.ConclusionIt is quite unfortunate that this debate has pretty much come down to whether it is acceptable to refute the existence of something by attacking made up characteristics not given in the definition of it, but this is what happens when suddenly being tasked with proving the impossible to prove; the nonexistence of an unfalsifiable entity. Clearly that was the point of the debate despite Cons semantics.I remind the readers again that the burden of proof in this debate was shared. I was tasked with proving BTMFs existence, a burden which I conceded and thus failed to uphold. Meanwhile Con failed not only to uphold his burden of proving its non-existence, but failed to engage in a discussion about the actual creature in question. Neither of us upheld our burden, so this debate is clearly unresolved, aka, tied.Thanks for reading.