T2B41

I just realized that a debate is essentially a very organized, very structured, very long persuasive essay.

I was trying to tidy up my Reading List yesterday, and I came upon this very interesting article:

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/brainwaves/2013/12/02/why-life-does-not-really-exist/

I read it and I realized that it basically did what debates do: take one side's argument, and tell you why it's wrong. In this case, they're disproving examples, which you're technically not supposed to do in debate, but it all comes down to the same idea that the essential definition is wrong.

I found this article pretty interesting, though. It kind of gives me the same feeling as a debate, if you know what I mean. Usually in tournaments, you argue both sides of the same resolution. You come up with arguments that, to me, make a lot of sense. You debate it, and you can form good arguments. But after a debate, sometimes I'll look at the resolution and say, "Heck, I just agreed with myself throughout the last round and now I totally don't see why I did." The individual arguments contribute to the resolution, but when I look at it from my glasses, from my perspective, with my opinion, I might not actually agree. People say the best debaters can take any side of a resolution and win, despite their personal beliefs. A truly great debate team can debate both sides of the same resolution in a tournament and win both. This article gave me the same feeling as a debate: I look at the individual arguments and I'm nodding all the way, and then I ponder the actual question and I'm like, "Heck no." I think it really just depends. I think I'm getting better at being objective in debates. It used to be harder for me to argue a side of the resolution that I didn't agree with, but I found that with time, the more I practice forming arguments, the more I can convince myself and debate well.