BeIR/webis-touche2020 huggingface dataset:
Atheism is better than Agnosticism

Pro challenged me to this debate, so I accepted. I'd like to thank him and wish him the best of luck in this discussion. Since he hasn't provided any definitions to start, I'll post them here and he can feel free to challenge them if he deems necessary or would like to add on. Atheism: the position that affirms the non-existence of a deity [1] Agnosticism: the view that the truth value of certain claims - especially claims about the existence or non-existence of any deity, as well as other religious and metaphysical claims - are unknown and (so far as can be judged) unknowable [2] My burden in this debate is to prove that agnosticism is of better or equal value to atheism, while Pro must prove that atheism is superior. Thus far, his sole contention in favor of the resolution is that atheism is based on scientific and logical reasoning, while agnosticism is based solely on feelings. To begin, I'd like to ask Pro to provide evidence that both of these claims are true. Indeed, I will be arguing that they are false; that agnosticism is not based solely on feelings, but a legitimate and perhaps preferable logical deduction. First, I'd like to point out that there are for all intents and purposes logical and historical arguments in favor of theism. For example, apologetics like William Craig [3] and Alvin Plantinga [4] are some of the most well respected religious philosophers, both capable of making coherent arguments in favor of the existence of God that do not necessarily succumb to invalid reasoning. In fact, there are many well known and renound religious philosophers: Descartes, Anselm, Kierkegaard, and Rousseau to name a few. It's arrogant to assert (without explanation) that all religious arguments are illogical. If you acknowledge that there are logical (or sensible) arguments in favor of theism in general - including some famous arguments, such as the Ontological Argument, Cosmological Argument, etc. - then agnosticism makes sense. While I'm sure most would agree that religions of all kinds have been convoluted and manipulated throughout the ages, there are still certain reasons to believe that a deity of some kind is possible and perhaps even logical. Agonostism posits the notion that you don't know rather than you don't believe. There is nothing inherently inferior or superior about either of these positions. However, if I had to pick a superior stance, I would argue that a knowledge claim is more important. After all, of what use are beliefs if knowledge isn't used to help draw certain conclusions? Agnosticism doesn't assert theism. Rather, agnosticism acknowledges that there are too many unknowns to be certain, but that might not require an automatic dismissal of the idea of a deity, despite the way religion and religious ideals have been manipulated through the ages to describe or define what such a deity entails.Back to Pro. [1] Rowe, William L. (1998). "Atheism." [2] Hepburn, Ronald W. (2005) [1967]. "Agnosticism."[3] Craig, William Lane. Assessing the New Testament: Evidence for the Historicity of the Resurrection of Jesus. Lewiston, NY. Edwin Mellen Press, 1989. [4] http://www.amazon.com...
Abortion goes against all moral beliefs and is all over a bad idea.

My opponent has brought up a point in his previous argument stating that if raped a woman should be able to get rid of a child. This is because she does not want a child that another man gave her unwillingly. This is the dividing line that most people walk upon when it comes to the case of abortion. It is upon this line that I myself tread. I will not focus on this point and just restate. I have already disproved most of his points and extend my argument. Lets go down his argumetn and make sure I hit them all. 1. As everyone in the world knows abortion is frowned upon in many cultures and religions. Response: Accpetable on all points. 2. I think that it is a new helpful feature for the modern world. Response: If you mean helpful at ruining the chances at life for a unborn and inocent child. .. yes. 3. They can solve the problem from the start. Response: No, it creates more problems than it solves. I personally would not like to live the rest of my life knowing that I killed someone. 4. So it is from all the information that I have showed you that I believe abortion is morally right and should be accepted in modern day life not as a sin but as an act of mercy. Response: I feel he gave little evidence and did not prove that it was mercy. If the baby will be born without a leg, than et it a prostetic, if it is born with autism than there could be a cure right around the corner. Theres always a chance and never a reason to have an abortion.
Abortion goes against all moral beliefs and is all over a bad idea.

As everyone in the world knows abortion is frowned upon in many cultures and religions. I think that it is a new helpful feature for the modern world. women that were raped can have the choice of not having to have a child and losing twenty years of their life. They an solve the problem from the start. So it is from all the information that I have showed you that I believe abortion is morally right and should be accepted in modern day life not as a sin but as an act of mercy.
Abortion goes against all moral beliefs and is all over a bad idea.

For a brief road map I would like to go down my opponents case and tell you how his points are invalid. At the end of this I think you will see that abortion is not the right decision. For my opponents first "point" (not to much structure) he has many flaws. He says that killing a child who has a birth defect is considered a mercy killing. I can automatically say this is false. My first problem with this statement is solely the words "birth defect". A birth defect, as defined by the Merriam Webster Dictionary, is a physical or biochemical defect that is present at birth and may be inherited or environmentally induced. My obvious problem is that you need to be born to have birth defect. Here by rendering his point Invalid. My second and last problem with his statement is I, TDK, have a birth defect. I was born with KTW Syndrome in my right leg. I have lived a happy life so far and I am completely fine. My mother gave me the right to live even though I had a birth defect I would not be here debating him if my mother wanted to do a "mercy killing". Look into the defect better and see the different people who have succeeded. My idol, Casey Martin, has the same problem as me. He was born with KTW in his right leg and went on to be a successful golfer. I one day want to become just as successful as him. As this shows, birth defects don"t ruin your life only make them stronger. My opponent later points out that I am, by his standards being sexist by saying that abortion is wrong. As I showed in my earlier argument, I am not in fact trying to be sexist. I just believe that the unborn child has just as much the right to live as the mother. He later say, Quote: I support equality and if you don"t then I have already won. As you can see I do support equality in all living beings. Hence my definition of life, which must be used in today"s debate, which says life, starts at conception. Now when I looked into the amount of "work" my opponent did. At the time I was impressed then I saw almost textbook wording in his debate. After he has called me sexist, my opponent then goes into a long "question answer part of his debate" followed by, Quote: I can thank the website below for some of my information www.aclufl.org When searching up one of his question"s word for word I found that not only is some of his info from this site, ALL of it is. Here is the site where he copied and pasted into his argument: http://www.aclufl.org... His words are not his own and therefore should not be considered in this debate. It is for these reasons and many more that I respectfully urge a pro ballot in this debate. http://www.merriam-webster.com... www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casey_Martin http://www.medicinenet.com...
Final Fantasy X vs (insert Final Fantasy game)

Unfortunately Pro had to forfeit due to the lack of time to reply. Nevertheless, I would like to present the reason why I like FF8 more than FF10.Final Fantasy, after all, is a game so the gameplay must be the main factor deciding how good the game is. Of course, FF10's gameplay is no way bad, but it lacks innovative, while FF8 has a lot of groundbreaking revolutionary elements.* The magic systemFF10 has a traditional magic system (using MP to cast spell, when your MP pool is depleted you can' cast anymore and need to use MP Potion to restore it). While there is nothing wrong with that, there are thousands of RPGs before and after FF10 having a system similar to that. But FF8 is different. In FF8, You "stock" magic. If you have 7 Fire, you can cast Fire seven times. You can get more by drawing magic from Draw Points (scattering all over the world so you need to explore to find them), drawing from enemies or refining from items. You can stock up to 100 per spell.* Junction systemThe magic you stock are not only used to cast spell. In addition, you can junction them with your stats to improve them. How much stats are boosted depends on the types. For example, Life will boost your HP better than Fire, and Haste will boost your Spd better than Holy. You can also junction your Element and Status Effect to your attack/defence. For example, junctioning Fire to your attack will make you deal more damage to the enemies weak to Fire (but less damage to the ones having fire resistance) while junctioning Thunder to your defence will make you resistant to Thunder. Similarly, you can add Sleep to your attacks, making the enemies sleep after you strike them or you can make youself resistant to their status attacks.* Summoned monstersSummoned monsters in FF8 are called Guardian Forces (GF). You can, well, summon them to battle the enemies. But unlike other FF games, here they have another use. You can junction a GF to your characters (and you have to if you want to summon it). Over time the GF will learn more abilities (active and passive skills) and you can choose junction those skills to the characters as well. In this way you can customize your characters.* Card gameTriple Triad is a minigame of FF8. It's a card game which you can play with various NPCs and if you win you will be awarded with new cards. Common cards can also be gained by battling monsters while rare cards can only be obtained from certain NPCs. Therefore, it takes a lot of time for you to explore and collect every cards. Cards can also be refined to get items and many rare items are easier to get through cards.ConclusionFinal Fantasy VIII has an innovative and complex gameplay. It allows you to greatly customize your characters and try different strategies. It also has a lot of things to explore, which is good for any RPG. As a result, FF8 has great replay value (arguably more than FF10).
Final Fantasy X vs (insert Final Fantasy game)

Unfortunately I will have to forfeit this debate, I am leaving for a few days and will be unable to reply in time to any arguments. my main arguments would have been the fact that in most game reviewers ratings FFX rated higher than FFVIII and that it was the first to have a direct sequel game (FFX-2) also I felt the plot was a lot deeper than FFVIII and would have used evidence to support this, thanks for accepting! may we debate in the future. PS: I can;t wait for the new FFX game graphics! :D
Final Fantasy X vs (insert Final Fantasy game)

Good Afternoon random people of the DDO website. Today I bring the challenge of proving that your Final Fantasy game is better than Final Fantasy X. The burden of proof lies with both of us as we both have to prove our Final Fantasy is the best Final Fantasy (in comparison to the other). First to accept gets it. But please no trolls. First round is for acceptance and naming your Final Fantasy game. (choose any you like from any console as long as it is part of the main franchise e.g VII, VI, III, IX etc)
Sources have no place in a Philosophical Debate other than to define terms and give counterexamples.

I'm going to try and make this short, as I don't see much reason to drag this out any longer. Pro and Con clearly have a different view of what philosophy is/means. Absent of a definition provided by Pro in the opening round and the fact that Con's definition is probably closer to what most would assume the definition to be, Pro has to accept Con's definition and, as such, has to even concede that empirical evidence can play a role in philosophical debate. Having said that, Pro believes there should be a separation between science and philosophy. While not unimportant, Pro believes philosophy is better geared to theoretical debate and development of new ideas and critical thinking skills. Pro has no doubt that philosophy has shaped the advancement of science. For one, early psychology (and even some areas of modern psychology), in Pro's opinion, was nothing more than philosophy. Even physics is influenced by philosophical ideas. For instance, the Greeks had a notion of how things ought to be and this helped frame how they approached science (i. e. epicycles were created because they assumed it was obvious the Earth was the center of the universe). However, once you start using results driven analysis, Pro believes this is no longer appropriately called philosophy and now becomes science (obviously Con will disagree that there is such a distinction). I do not think philosophy can answer the question why does science do such a good job at predicting nature. I think philosophy can answer the question, why does science sometimes get things wrong (specifically philosophy can question the scientific method). So Pro's position, is that empirical evidence cannot be used to prove something is correct (i. e. empirical evidence cannot be used to prove Newton's Theory of gravity is correct). The use of empirical evidence to prove a claim is more appropriate for a science debate.
I know everything

It would be better if they made it with more rounds than one, but anyways. Since the instigator didn’t define any definition, then I will do instead. DEFINITIONS From the resolution we understand that “know” is a verb. Know: Verb => To perceive or understand as fact or truth; to apprehend clearly and with certainty. [1] OR Be aware of through observation, inquiry, or information. [2] OR Have knowledge or information concerning. [2] Everything:All things. [3] REBUTTAL Pro claims that they know everything. The BOP was fully on Pro to prove their claim. The only argument they presented was that “Know is everything”. First of all, as we see from the definitions I provided, “know” cannot be “everything” , because “everything” is not a verb3 and “know” is a verb. Second, “know is everything” is a bare assertion that needs first to be proved. Third, Pro doesn’t show how “Know is everything” proves that they know everything. Fourth, 95% of the universe is dark (dark matter and dark energy) and we, including Pro, almost know nothing about it. This is true, until Pro proves otherwise. [4] CONCLUSION Pro only provided one irrelevant bare assertion as an argument which didn’t affirm the resolution in any level, as I showed above. I also provided some other arguments that it is impossible for Pro to know everything. Vote Con please! [1] . http://www.dictionary.com... [2] . http://www.oxforddictionaries.com... [3] . http://www.oxforddictionaries.com... [4] . http://science.nasa.gov...
True Altruism Does Not Exist

The selfless concern for the well-being of others has existed since the beginning of mankind and will exist for centuries to come.When the mother sacrifices her beauty for the creation of a child that she could easily have not produced and adopted instead, she is indeed being selfless for the sake of her child's well-being and the emotional well-being of the father who probably wants to see his biological child raised.When a father is directly ordered to not run back into a burning house in order to save his child but does so anyway, he is risking every selfish motive for the concern he has for that individual.When people put their lives on the line to become rebels, such as the Underground Railroad [http://www.pbs.org...], all of whom had already escaped slavery themselves, they risk their entire freedom and legal safety by putting their neck on the line for the sake of freeing more and more slaves via illicit means.There is true altruism all around the world, you just have to open your eyes to see it. The president of DDO and co-president [http://www.debate.org...] do not gain money for what they do.
True Altruism Does Not Exist

Hopefully someone will actually vote on this one. Anyway, I'm taking the position that there is no such thing as true altruism - defined here as "selfless concern for the well-being of others." Con has the burden of proof here. He or she needs to make a convincing case that altruism exists (and to be clear, that doesn't just mean providing a long list of nice things people do for each other; I'd like to get more into the foundation/basis of altruism and take a more theoretical approach). Since con has the burden of proof I don't think we need to waste time with acceptance - if you accept, you can go ahead and make your case. I'd like to keep it concise and fun. Thanks.
NURSES WEARING CAPS VS NURSES NOT WEARING CAPS

"Hospital band nurses from wearing caps, due to them not be able to separate the RN nurses from CNA because everyone had the same look." Well, this does not seem like a real reason to ban wearing caps. Still, you have not cited this information or given any details [ what hospitals, when, where, etc] Therefore, this 'fact' is invalid. "It was also proven that nurses wearing caps was a old traditional look from other countries and was not because of sanitary purposes" It is proven? Who proved it? When? Again, lack of evidence. Today, most nurses do wear hats for sanitary reasons, not because of tradition. Even if this was so, how is this bad? You have yet to prove that. Overall, the caps are good because they much more sanitary that having a nurse's hair hanging down during his/ her practice. I strongly urge voters to vote on who provided the better arguments. I would also like to point out that my opponent never specified what 'caps' we are debating on, and did not rebut most of my points made. Thanks for the debate!
NURSES WEARING CAPS VS NURSES NOT WEARING CAPS

"Con ~ well it is a proven fact that many hospitals band nurses wearing caps similar to some of the same reasons I mentioned" You have mentioned one reason: "I believe that nurses should not wear hats because they are too busy at work to keep a cap on their heads" So I am still guessing that you are talking about the sanitary hats that cover the nurses' hair? You have not made that clear. Anyways, I will continues my debate. It doesn't take much effort at all to put on or keep on a hat. You can barely feel it, and it helps keep others clean and things sanitary. I believe that at hospitals and doctors' offices, their main concern is the health and well being of their patients and then the nurses. I do not see how that is a valid argument. As I said, the cap is not hard to put on or take off or keep on! Also, you mentioned that some hospitals have banned nurses from wearing caps. You provided no source of your information or why they have, so I am still left guessing. Also, just because it was banned doesn't mean it's right. Why was it banned? Thanks and I await your next argument.
NURSES WEARING CAPS VS NURSES NOT WEARING CAPS

Good luck! "I believe that nurses should not wear hats because they are too busy at work to keep a cap on their heads" I would like to begin my argument by stating that your opening argument should include your opinion and then an explanation of the debate and such things. I am guessing that from the information you have given me, you are talking about the caps that nurses wear on their heads during their work? I do not see how your point you made relates to wearing the hats that are meant to be used for sanitary reasons (keeping hair out of your face and off your patients. ) They are barely felt, and very easy to take on and off. I am sorry if there is a misunderstanding, but the opening argument/ title was a bit confusing for me. Thanks so much! I await your response. ~Slammin
Death Penalty

Main rebuttal points: 1. You said: "My point is that the death penalty should not just be about money". In your first argument 'cost' was one of your main points. Point conceded to me. 2. The Time magazine study actually showed that the percentage of those sentenced to Life in Prison Without Parole borders on 24-25%, not 10%. 3. Do you know what the do at mental institutions? They try rehab for about 6 months to a year, then move on to shock therapy, and then ultimately to a lobotomy, which eliminates any and all semblance of a human being. 4. Ernst Van Den Haag, PhD from Fordham University, claims that, "the statistics have reaffirmed my belief that the DP is a crime deterrent. Though modest, the expected drop is about 8% with a + - 1.2% standard deviation". It is indeed a crime deterrent. 5. The right to life is not just arbitrarily stripped, and cannot be taken away on a whim as you seem to think. Nearly all moral philosophers agree, murder and rape forfeit basic human rights.
Death Penalty

My point is that the death penalty should not just be about money. Additionally, the amount of prisoners sentenced to Life Without Parole is not very high. Only one in ten out of the people sentenced to life in prison can not get parole. People on death row also are treated very poorly, some are in their cell for 23 hours of the day, with little interaction with other people. Maybe instead of putting these killers with mental defects, as you put it, on death row, we should send them to a mental institution. The intent of the DP may not be to teach ethics or prove a point, but that is what it is doing, and it is not working. So many people believe the death penalty is a deterrent, but crime rates have not gone down because of it. And if the only reason we are killing these people is because they are beyond rehabilitation, then what is the harm in a Life Sentence Without Parole.
Death Penalty

When comparing the death penalty to the average inmate, yes of course, the costs are much higher. But what you are failing to compare is the costs of those facing a sentence of Life Without Parole (LWOP) for similar crimes. Life without parole prisoners face, on average, 30 or 40 years in prison with an annual cost of incarceration about $34,500 each year (TIME magazine). Couple this staggering amount with a very similar number of appeals hearings and you have a MUCH higher total. Justice for All (JFA) reports that death penalty cases average around $2 million with an average of 6 years in appeals courts, while the LWOP prisoners average around $2-3.6 million with 8-12 years in appeals courts. Short term, more expensive, but long term, considerably less. And in regards to "eye for an eye". The point of the DP is not to teach ethics or prove a point. It is to rid society of criminals who are beyond rehabilitation. Serial killers have permanent mental defects, not character flaws.
Death Penalty

The thing is people on death row stay on death row for years. There have been cases where someone is on death row for so long they whined up dying of old age before there execution. We are still paying to feed and shelter these inmates on death row. Additionally, I would appreciate a source supporting your claim that the death penalty is not as expensive as a life sentence. This is because I have found multiple cites supporting your statement, but also opposing it. I feel that it is something we can never truly know. You bring up a good point when you say we do not live by an "eye for an eye." We don't, yet we do. We kill people to teach them that killing people is wrong. How is this ethical? The death penalty is a violation of our rights. We have a right to life, and that should not be taken from us. Lastly, where have our morals gone. The death penalty is just immoral, a life sentence should be given instead. http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org...