We should abandon the practice of printing books and resort to using E-books

*I would like to tell Con that his personal business is very much my business if it affects the debate, as he has had an obligation to this debate since the moment he told me he wanted to debate over this subject on the phone. Also, it is very much an excuse, especially since he lied about having real life obligations preventing him from posting when it actually was a computer game. And now he's saying that he didn't have time to research for the debate, which he could've done if he had not played League of Legends. http://www.thefreedictionary.com...*I don't believe you know what Pathos and Ethos are. If you wish to learn more about them I suggest you join my AP English Language and Composition class in school.http://courses.durhamtech.edu...Now, proceeding to the debate.______________________________________________________Counter-Rebuttals"New Printed Paperback books are slightly more if not equal to the price of a Kindle E-book. When you argue that we should abolish printing books because of the $2 difference, People will just go ahead an buy paperbacks over an electronic format which you cant really own."-Con has conceded that e-books are cheaper than books. Obviously, there are books that are cheaper than E-books, but almost EVERY E-BOOK IS CHEAPER TO THEIR RESPECTIVE PHYSICAL BOOK. Therefore, I stand corrected by saying that E-books are cheaper, and Con has proven nothing. Furthermore, Con has forgotten that I've made a point concerning their prices, stating that if a policy that abolishes printing books is enforced, the price of E-readers will decrease radically. Therefore, from this, it is plausible to say that THE PRICE OF E-BOOKS WILL DECREASE RADICALLY also.-Therefore, in the long run, you save much more money by using E-books instead of printed books.-What do you mean by "you can't really own?" Please elaborate.-"Own" means to have control over something in your possession. If you have an E-book, you own it. You can open it up or exit out of it. You can show it to your friends and if asked they will aggree that you own it. It is physically encoded into your E-reader, like a book is physically placed in a bag, that is with you and not with anyone else the most. If bought online with a credit card, there will be a record saying you bought it and own it. http://www.thefreedictionary.com..."To say that buying used books is not irrelevant at all"-The subject of used books most certainly is irrelevant to the subject at hand. If you will notice at the title, it says "printing books", not "printed books". My suggested policy of E-reading will not abolish all books that have already been printed. If my suggested policy were to be enforced, nothing would happen/change for printed books. -Therefore it is not fair to mention used books to support your argument, especially since used books are not a part of this argument.-I don't understand why you quoted the sales of used books, as they are irrelevant to the printing of books."conclude that 7% of deforestation contributes to paper production."-That is still A LOT OF TREES saved. According to the site below. In 2008, there were 6,456,789,877 trees in the world, roughly. 7% of that is roughly 451,975,291 trees. According to the second site below, the oxygen a normal human being breathes is supported by roughly 6 or 7 trees. The "7%" that Con mentioned potentially could've supported 75,329,215 people!http://www.npr.org...http://sciencefocus.com..."paper can be recycled"-Yes, paper CAN be recycled. But are you suggesting we should make up for the resources used to make books for printing BY RECYCLING BOOKS??? If so, then what's the point of having books when you are going to recycle them, permanently abolishing the text in the book? -Recycling paper uses money, time, effort, and other materials. According to the site I mention below. Soap and Water is used to wash the ink from the paper in the recycling process. Water is wasted in recycling! Water is another important resource that we humans and other animals in the environment need! -Know that the government spends money on recycling. If we don't need to recycle paper as much because of E-books, the governent spends less money on recycling and can spend more money on other aspects, or even REDUCE TAX. -Recycling paper does not change them back into trees.-If everyone used E-books, WE WOULDN'T EVEN NEED TO RECYCLE BOOKS. This would save the money, time, and effort mentioned earlier, and even reduce tax.http://www.recycling-guide.org.uk...;"subsistence farming accounts for 46 percent of the total deforestation in the world, commercial agriculture is responsible for 32 percent."-This is irrelevant to the debate. We are not talking about farming. Nevertheless, I would like to inform Con that unlike subsistence farming, the amount of deforestation would easily decrease if we switched to E-books. Subsistence farming is farming enough feed you and your family. You can't deny them of food, therefore it is difficult to reduce subsistence farming, because it would leave people starving. -However, a great way to reduce deforestation would be to adopt my suggested policy of E-reading. We cannot do much how subsistence farming influences deforestation, BUT WE CAN do much about how printing books influence deforestation. -When there's a problem like deforestation, shouldn't we do something about it by adopting this policy of E-reading, rather than complaining about how other things affect deforestation more and not doing anything, because we cannot do much about those things? http://en.wikipedia.org..._______________________________________________________________________________________Rebuttals"I'd like to illuminate the different uses for paper"-Con has clearly misunderstood the subject at hand. I did not say we should stop producing paper, but stop printing books. In doing so, the production of paper decreases, and not completely eradicated as suggested by Con. The production of notebooks, drawing paper, cardboard, paper calenders, A4 paper, toilet paper, paper bags, etc, will remain the same, because they are not "Printed Books""It becomes clear that Pro is using a huge problem(Deforestation) and pinning it on a small contributing factor(Paper Production)"-This is a huge understatement.-Paper Production is not a small contributing factor. As mentioned by yourself, it's 7%. Percentage-wise, that does not seem like much, mut as established above, that 7% is A LOT of trees (451,975,291). -I am not pinning anything. I am simply saying that if paper production is reduced, so is deforestation. Never in this debate have I said that it is the ONLY contributing factor or even the BIGGEST contributing factor."Stopping the production of woodpulp, would not stop 7% of deforestation, instead it would open up more trees to be cut down for the use of Commercial Agriculture or Subsitent farming."-This is not neccessarily true. Once trees are cut down for their wood, the land left would have been used for agriculture already, therefore the amount of agriculture would not increase.-Agriculture requires soil condition that is suitable for farmland. A lot of times, even if all the trees in an are were to be cut down, it could not be used for agriculture, therefore people use it for wood products such as paper. http://www.ehow.com...-However if it were to happen, it would not as bad as trees being cut down to be made into books. Agriculture means planting different crops and plants. Plants that convert C02 into Oxygen just as effeciently as trees, while books can't. Agriculture can also mean planting trees. If agriculture and farming increases, that just means that there are more bellies in the world that can be filled. -While there are no environmentally beneficial gains from agriculture, there are economic and social gains, whereas printing books have no gains that can't be replaced and/or improved by resorting to E-books. Tell me Con, would you rather more bellies in the world are fed, or have mankind read physical books, that can easily be replaced by E-books without any negative impacts on the world."Stopping book printing you are only cutting a tiny thread in a huge problem"-Again this is an understatement. We've already established that book printing is not a tiny thread. Plus, isn't cutting a thread from a huge problem good?-Furthermore, what about the technological and economical benefits from "cutting this tiny thread?"_______________________________________________________________________________________*Con continuously attacks my statement that not printing books is good for the environment. In fact it really is, and he has conceded to it. ***No printing books = less paper production = less deforestation or more bellies fed. *He deliberately ignores my proposal on how resorting to E-books will bring technological and economic benefits. He also fails to address my proposal of tax reduction. Therefore I will assume that he concedes to all this. *Con endlessly defends my statement about how my suggested policy is good, which I refute, and he ends up conceding my refutation. Yet he doesn't make many valid statements himself about why books are more beneficial than E-books or why my suggested policy is bad. _______________________________________________________________________________________Addendum *I will not add anything new for now. But I will breifly state the points I've made that are still unaddressed. -E-books will bring about economical and technological benefits.-E-books are more convenient. -My suggested policy of E-reading can reduce tax or allow the government to fund something else more effeciently. -Resorting to E-books can increase availability of wood for other products. -It brings more human capital to our economy, which is beneficial.