BeIR/webis-touche2020 huggingface dataset:
Failed Nations are a greater threat to the US than stable nations

My opponent claims that "impovershed nations such as Afghanistan dont have a central government therefore they can attack us at anytime they'd like". I would like to point out the many holes in this statement. One of the keys to organization and effectiveness in an attack lies in the central government. The United States' central government is in charge of all military affairs and without it our defense and military capabilities would be greatly diminished. This is true for other countries as well. A failing state that has no power to make "collective decisions" (according to definition) poses a very small threat compared to an organized country such as Russia with terrifying military capabilities. Also, my opponent claims that the 9/11 attacks by a terrorist group located in Afghanistan made the United States' government weaker. I would refute this with the fact that after this surprising attacking the government became alert, heightened security, and bolstered their military making them more powerful than they had been in recent years. My opponent still claims that North Korea is a failing nation even though it does not fit her own definition and therefore anything she says on the matter cannot be considered. I still hold to my statement that Somalian pirates are small threat to the United States and though they may seize ships and hurt the economy in a very small way, they are no where close to the extent of other threats that I have outlined in my debate. Lastly, I referred to Sweden and Norway as peaceful stable nations whose ABILITY to inflict damage to the US is greater than any Somalian pirates. Which directly supports the resolution. I agree they are peaceful nations and it is highly unlikely they would ever attack the US. But it is their ABILITY which is what I was making a point on. Next, I would like to return to the definition of threat for this debate. My opponent did not offer a definition, so I defined it as "the ability to inflict damage". Thus my contentions are Russia has the ABILITY TO INFLICT MORE DAMAGE to the US with their military than any failing nation and also China has the ABILITY TO INFLICT MORE DAMAGE to the US economically than any failing nation. Russia is the greatest threat to the United States. If they decided to attack, the severity of the results could never be matched by any failing nation. Russia is considered a stable nation. Therefore, a stable nation poses a greater threat to the United States than a failing nation. Thank you. Vote neg.
If of childbearing age, women should be sterilized before assuming the office of POTUS

A pledge not to have children is not sterilization. It is not "de facto sterilization", because the woman is not sterile."It is also inconceivable that a man murder his brother, or that someone would go into a crowded theater and indiscriminately kill moviegoers after turning his own room into a gigantic IED. We have laws that seek to prevent this kind of behavior from occurring."There are no laws that require a medical procedure to prevent the remote possibility a sane man may murder his brother or shoot up a cinema in the future."The opponent continually attempts to frame the discussion in a civil rights point of view, when I have already refuted his arguments to this point, to which he or she offers no counterargument." My opponent has plainly not refuted my contention that carrying out the resolution would constitute a civil rights issue. The assertion that it is a "readiness" issue does not stop it also being a civil rights issue."My point about readiness issues stemming from a prolonged VOLUNTARY INCAPACITATION stemming from "short term disabilities resulting from pregnancy" stands as it is until my opponent attempts an earnest rebuttal."Already rebutted the relevance of "voluntary incapacitation". Short term disabilities resulting from pregnancy amount to no more than a few days to give birth and recover. The length of a minor illness."That CON agrees that a proper course of action for a pregnant woman in the White House is to offer her resignation..."No.CON agrees that a possible course of action for a woman who wishes to raise children is to offer her resignation.If my opponent does not understand that he cannot change the terms of the resolution to fit a wonky new conception of a pledge as "de facto sterilization", I'm sure the voters will. The resolution is negated.
If of childbearing age, women should be sterilized before assuming the office of POTUS

I will leave it to the voters as to whether my opponent is attempting to equivocate on the meaning of "sterilization". I maintain that my opponent has affirmed that sterilization of a female POTUS is unnecessary, as a pledge will achieve the same purpose. For the sake of completeness, I will briefly cover my opponents points in round 2. It is inconceivable that the POTUS would voluntarily become pregnant with the intention of raising children during her term of office. I suggest to voters that any argument based on voluntary incapacitation be discounted on the grounds that it is not a realistic scenario. Besides, my opponent maintains that the issue is "readiness" of the President. So it does not matter whether incapacitation is voluntary or involuntary. A. The argument that discrimination in the workplace is justified by toilet ettiquette is a novel one. I move we close the lid and flush it. I suggest my opponent may be aware that toilet ettiquette is NOT discrimination. That women and men use different toilets does not justify discrimination in the workplace. My opponent suggests that discrimination law should not apply to POTUS. However, discrimination law exists to protect everyone from sexual discrimination. Sterilization is not a reasonable request, for it is a permanent and drastic correction for a problem that does not exist at time of employment. Such a measure would constitute unlawful discrimination against women. The assertion that civil rights should not apply to the President is an interesting one, but fails due to the fact that POTUS is a citizen, not to mention that the office is an example. What a poor example to set if the highest office were to discriminate against women. "the legality of the issue is not relevant to the argument"I agree in as far as my opponent has already conceded the debate. If they had not done so, I submit they would need to find a reason why a civil rights law should be wiped off the books. B. My opponent assumes that POTUS would take six weeks maternity leave. This assumption is unwarranted. E. "What if the electorate saw fit to elect someone under the age of 35 into the White House? This is an impossibility because of laws that prevent such an occurrence. The electorate does NOT have the democratic right to elect such a person to the office of POTUS. "Granted and irrelevant. The electorate might still see fit to elect a pregnant woman to the White House. F. "Again, resignation is a choice, one that the POTUS can easily not make. Could America have survived if Nixon did NOT resign? THAT is the real question. "My opponent wishes to make extreme provisions in case the President acts unrealistically unreasonably.
If of childbearing age, women should be sterilized before assuming the office of POTUS

I disagree. Following my quoted statement, I wrote: "It would be de facto sterilization of a woman capable of childbearing while in office." You have wasted a round and I have negated most, if not all, of your points prior. Also, none of your arguments even begin to cite any differences between outright sterilization and de facto sterilization. Most of your arguments merely dwelt on gender bias, which I have successfully negated as a valid argument. Sterilization has yet to be defined: http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com... 1. the complete elimination or destruction of all living microorganisms. 2. any procedure by which an individual is made incapable of reproduction. A legal procedure forbidding childbearing is indeed a procedure by which an individual is made legally incapably of reproduction. As of this point in the debate you concede to all of my arguments in round #2, unless you decide to offer a rebuttal to them.
If of childbearing age, women should be sterilized before assuming the office of POTUS

A. The law forbids discrimination on basis of sex. A woman would have the same right of any natural born citizen to run for the office of President, without the additional stipulation of an invasive and irreversible medical procedure. It is indefensible under law to deprive women of the opportunity to apply for sensitive state jobs without prejudice. The Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978 makes it illegal to discriminate "on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions. "B. Assumption that woman would be primary carer for the child is not warranted. If she is not primary carer, then a pregnant POTUS need take no more time off work than if any President had a minor medical issue. She could work right up until the last few days of labour. C. The resolution is unworkable: If pregnancy, then other issues that could incapacitate a President. You could just as well argue that a POTUS with a history of heart disease in his family is endangering national security. Or a candidate that is particularly old. The selection of a President could become highly discriminatory. D. You cannot deny an unsterilized woman the office of POTUS on a hypothetical. Hypothetically, a male POTUS may get testicular cancer. Should we then pre-empt the possibility by insisting only on eunuchs in the White House? E. The electorate has a right to choose the candidate they see fit. If in fact the electorate voted a pregnant woman into the White House that would be their democratic right. F. Presidents can resign. This would be a less drastic, more sensible resolution to a POTUS becoming pregnant, if she decided also to be primary carer. America survived the resignation of Nixon. G. Finding the best person for the job. The battle to make employment truly meritocratic, through civil rights, is an ongoing one and has been long and hard fought. To affirm the resolution would be to take a backwards step. The resolution can only be negated. Sources1. . http://www.eeoc.gov...
Free Will Exists

Sorry, I miss-read the structure. Rebuttals *My opponent, Con claims that "Fate is controlling your brain, because you are not acting outside of fate." Fate dose -not- control the brain, you also have no evidence to prove your point. According to the medicaldaily [1] "The bulk of human decision making may occur in one of the smallest parts of the brain, according to a new study. Researchers from the University of British Columbia have discovered that the tiny lateral habenula plays a crucial role in calculated, cost-benefit decisions. The findings, published in Nature Neuroscience, shed additional light on the neurological processes whereby we make up our mind. As you can see, fate is *not apart* of the brain whilst it makes a decision. Fate to some is fake, so there is no way to convince people that Fate makes decision's. *Con then goes on to say that "I feel as though you have ignored that reactions of subatomic particles and calculations are a restraint on choice. Well, I feel as if you just compleatly ignored my point here. You don't rebut this at all, instead you just tell me I'm wrong, but you don't actually yell me why. *Con states "I don't feel as though your source is really one that we should be using in this debate. I used definitions from Google dictionaries, whereas you used a source that provides what free will and fate are through the philosophical aspect, not the objective one." I'm able to use this source because *I* wanted too, and I have free will. You never put limits on the sources just asked for them to be "reliable" I used this sources because it backed up my argument to show that it is correct. You used sources that you thought would benefit your argument, as well as I did. *Con then goes on to claim that "This was the exact wording of point 1 at the end of the article [1]. Not a rebuttal since I have already refuted that source's validity, but directly taking a quote from this source is a bit sketchy." How is this sketchy? Again this is a source I used for my benefit. And you don't approve of my sources. * You then go on to say that "If you don't express what this quote even means, then why are you using it? This is just a general debate thing, not a rebuttal, but you are supposed to use quotes to enhance your points" This is kind of funny you say this because I used it to prove a point, yet you haven't rebutted any of my points what-so-ever. *Con says "As my case proves, the universe was going to have this exact debate 100% since the big bang. The entire thing was calculable and it was sure to happen. No you chose to do so, you chose to be Con on this debate, you chose to have a 72 hour challenge time. *Con states "Well that's not a good argument for those people. I don't believe in this argument and it is effectively unrelated. You are meant to have a constructive case, not one that is rebutalling against points that were made, or even were not made. Again, you don't rebut my points at all. You are just saying how you don' like the way I present my arguments, and how they are incorrect to you. Sources: [1] http://www.medicaldaily.com...
Free Will Exists

Thank you con for your argument.Before I forget.... Cakeday!! Okay...moving along! Theoretically by providing a definition of "Free Will" that I have gave in R1 goes to show that "Free will" dose exist. I will argue my point though. Rebuttal P2/C1 Probability in this case, really has nothing to do with "Free Will". Con states ""the power of acting without the constraint of [...] fate", In order to "act" out something. Your brain must process this through the brain to make a decision. [1] "brain’s functions are very different but they both work together in helping to make decisions" You see in order to act out something you think about it first. Let me use an example, if a mother wont allow her son to drink soda at the age of 10 he wont be able to drink it because his mother tells him not too. By the age of 18, he's able to make his own decision to drink soda, thus that is free will. Making a choice without restraint. If If want to scratch my head, I can, because I want too. Fate and Free will are completely different [2] According to the theory of forms, an individual can exhibit free will during his actions. He has a choice over his fate. Free will dose exist. [3] "There is no need to insist that free will is some kind of magical violation of causality. Free will is just another kind of cause. The causal process by which a person decides whether to marry is simply different from the processes that cause balls to roll downhill, ice to melt in the hot sun, a magnet to attract nails, or a stock price to rise and fall." Another example: You *choose* to instigate this debate because you have free will. Another argument people bring up is the "law". Saying that you can't do certain things, such as driving without a seat belt, or driving while on the phone. Nobody can stop you from doing this. You are your *own* person. The government isn't forcing you to *not* do these things. I bet you, if you are driving down the road, and you get an important phone call, you more then likely will pick-up the phone because you *can* and *want to*. Again, by providing a definition dose show that "free will" exists. Back to Con! Sources: [1] http://www.1stpersonaldevelopment.com...... [2] http://www.differencebetween.net...... [3] http://io9.com......
Free Will Exists

I only put a specific rule in their so I knew if you read the rules or not, and it seems that you did not. ThanksContention I: Rules of the universe. Everything that does currently exist, did exist, or will exist in the future has to operate under the rules of physics that set up the way that the Universe functions. For example, nothing that has mass may go above/at the speed of light, and this physical law may never change [1]. This is not to say, however, that current ideas are the only rules that govern the universe -- we may be wrong about some of our currently held theories and laws [2], because the things that we know are constantly evolving and will change as we progress through the experience that is mankind. What this thinking does is give us the very first premise of my conclusion: P1: The laws of the universe are constant (though our knowledge of them may change) Next, we must examine the idea of probability. People say that rolling a die will have a 1/6 chance of landing on a specific side, but is this really true? The weight of the die, the air colliding with it and bouncing off, how much force was directly applied to the side of the die, which side of the die, etc. all influence which side of the die will land on the top. A way to see this is with the Janken, made by the University of Tokyo [3] (link to a video). This robot sees what is happening around it and decides which type of hand to play, based on all of the previous actions made by the player. You can compare the player to be an external stimulus and the robot to be an observer (perhaps a human). If you look at the external stimulus, you are able to calculate what it will be within a moments notice, and you are able to calculate what will happen in the future. Because the laws of the universe are never changing, we can use this idea to make my next conclusion. If we had an infinite amount of data to compute and to see the future, then we could do this based on what this robot can do. What this does is lead me to my second premise of my conclusion,: P2/C1: Everything is calculable with enough data within the universe (which means that everything will happen in a particular way) [<-- just rephrasing] Now, the definition of 'free will' is as follows: "the power of acting without the constraint of [. .. ] fate", and 'fate' is defined as "be destined to happen, turn out, or act in a particular way" [google definitions]. This leads me to my next logical conclusion: P3: Free will is the power of acting without the constraint of fate P4: Fate is something that is destined to happen in a particular way P5/C2: The universe (and in turn, all of us) have fate bestowed upon us. P6/C3: Nothing in the universe has free will (because everything is fated) C4: Free will does not exist. [1]. . http://www.phys.vt.edu...[2]. . http://www.bbc.com...[3].
Free Will Exists

I saw this debate and want to argue from the con side, since I have been thinking this over for almost 10 years now.Resolved: Free will exists.I am in the negation (con), and my opponent will stand in the affirmation (pro) of this resolution.I set this debate up for anyone to accept if they are ranked as good or better than me, because I want a meaningful debate. Rules:1. We have 10.000 characters, you shouldn't use url shorteners or anything like that2. Keep all text of debate within the debate.3. Reliable sources are necessary4. Both judges and my opponent should say 'cakeday' in their acceptance round/RFD so I know they read the rules. Judges that don't follow rules will have vote reported.5. Keep good conduct at all times6. Don't forfeit or else you forfeit the entire debate (I usually don't like this rule but this is meant to be a meaningful debate for me, so if you can't allocate the time don't bother accepting) R1: AcceptanceR2: Constructive CaseR3: RebuttalsR4: Defense/crystalizationthanks!
Free Will Exists

*Con states "My evidence would be my logical reasoning in round one, which you have seemed to have dropped." I didn't drop any of her argument's. She simply "dropped" mine. She never rebutted my points. She only judged them based on her opinion. * She then says "That quote did literally nothing to disprove that fate exists within the brain and the universe at large. All that it did was say that a small part of the brain is used to make decisions, which are made under the control of fate." *She tells us that "fate" makes our decisions before we proceed with them. Not it seems as if she has changed her mind. My quote did help, sorry that you didn't approve. My quote simply goes through the process of the brain making a simple decision. *Con says "The Sun is fake to some people, does that mean that it does not exist? Maybe, but probably not. The point of this debate is to convince people that fate makes decisions, not a nondeterministic human being and thought process. People are more likely to believe that there is a sun because it is a object, it is a object, you can see it. Fate, you can't see. *Con then goes on to lecture me on my sources by saying "Because the big bang* forced you to plant that. If we looked at all of the particles that were in formation after the big bang, then we could calculate that you would use that source, regardless of what you thought about free will." The Big Bang didn't do anything. I searched many websites and found two websites that would back up my argument. I made a decision on website I wanted to use. Fate didn't make me choose. *Again she goes onto critique my sources by saying "her sources were more reliable" So were mine. My sources came from Medical articles. Is that no reliable to you? * She then goes onto to say that "Undertones of plagiarism without source attribution." How did I plagiarize? I put all my quotes in quotation marks, meaning they are not my words, I also numbered my sources and copied and pasted the link to show you where they came from. The rest of the stuff that she says in the last round is basically the same stuff I have explained up there^^ I don't feel like repeating myself multiple times. I did prove free-will existed by giving you a quote that shows that the brain makes decisions by it's self. You can't say fate dose this, you can't see fate. Fate is something spiritual in which some people don't believe in. *Note that Con dropped all of my cases. She never rebutted any of them, instead she stuck to saying its all about fate, yet she never proves this. She then tells me that I had plagiarized which I didn't, I used the correct formatting and I numbered my sources. crystallization: *Free will exist *Evidence and Proof of Free will *Why fate can't be true *Due to the evidence of the brain making a decision, Free will exist. Thank you.