a bit of help
Posted on: September 25, 2008 - 7:57pm
Offline
a bit of help
i need a small bit of help. i am a high school student, and in my gr. 11 ancient history class there are 7 creationists, including the teacher, who even told us she was creationist. a girl (who is actually quite good looking, but i digress) who sits in front of me is a GREAT debater for creationism, not even kidding, she seems like the next kent hovind. i am a mediocre debater, having only been in 2 formal ones, so i keep losing whenever i try to go up against her. does anyone have any debate advice, along with good info?
all hail the great and powerful sluffywinks.
- Login to post comments
Welcome to the forums.
I'd recommend starting here:
http://www.rationalresponders.com/argument_and_debate_forms_and_techniques_part_1
This is an 8 part series of essays written by one of the mods here, Hambydammit. It isn't written specifically about creationism, but is pretty fantastic for argument and debate in general. It will help you recognise and show people where her arguments are logically failing, and help you with your own arguments a lot as well.
y thnk u. i might as well add that i sort of find it ironic that its my ancient history class where i know the most creationists.
all hail the great and powerful sluffywinks.
Kent Hovind isn't that bright by the way:
There's also lots of real help on Youtube etc, debunking Creationism and Intelligent Design. It's simply idol worship baloney. Also check out the Evolution videos. Thanks for caring. Fuck them religious loon hocus pocus separatists .... All is one all, which is also a definition of god, as says the science physics of thermodymamics. Lucky you , finding RRS .... LOL
Atheism Books.
I am assuming these creationists believe a god created the universe..wouldn't one have to prove god first?
Slowly building a blog at ~
http://obsidianwords.wordpress.com/
Tickles on you pretty Renee. Me God is pleased ....
There has never been a good or honest creationist debater. Never has one actually produced evidence for their claims. Their entire argument is that evolution is wrong therefore creationism is right by default. The best way to counter creationists is to point that out to them and demand the scientific evidence for creationism and provide references. Since there has been absolutely no scientific evidence for creationism (they only respond by asking questions, keep them on the defensive), they can't win in a debate.
Every day www.sciencedaily.com has updates on new discoveries relating to the field of evolution. Not that pointing out the science to a creationist will sway his/her mind, but it dismisses their notion there is no scientific evidence for evolution.
What I like to point out is the genetic similarities humans have to our fellow apes. We all share the broken gene that codes for vitamin C. We all have the same number of chromosomal base pairs (humans have a fused pair, which, if unfused would be the same number as the other apes. Of course all of this will go above a creationist's head because the fact of evolution is proven beyond a reasonable doubt and creationists just aren't reasonable.
Check out the links below, there's a lot of good stuff there you can use.
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html
http://www.creationism.org/genesis.htm
http://www.talkreason.org/
And I'd recommend picking up a copy of the "Counter-Creastionism Handbook", it gives hundreds of creationist arguments followed by scientific and rational rebuttals. Never avoid visiting a creastionist web-site simply because you don't believe in it. Knowing your "enemy" is the key to defeating him/her/it in battle. Good luck.
"Erecting the 'wall of separation between church and state,' therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society." Thomas Jefferson
www.myspace.com/kenhill5150
Have you discussed this with your parents? You might consider this (unless they themselves are creationists), so they can inform the school board and the school administration.
Even in America, creationism hasn't been given the traditional free pass when it comes the classroom (yet).
- Leon Trotsky, Last Will & Testament
February 27, 1940
im in a catholic school. im taught both evolution and creationism, along with interpretationism (evolution for catholic pussies). alot of teachers are openly creationist. only reason i havent left is because most of my friends go to the catholic school. that and the fact that the school libraries in the local public schools (according to my teacher) ban books including the merchant of venice, and tom sawyer for racism.
all hail the great and powerful sluffywinks.
...Even if that were true (and I'm fairly dubious): welcome to the age of information, where 'banning', 'burning', etc simply no longer has any meaningful impact (thank goodness). Head to Amazon.com and pick them up, or go to a public library or college / university library and see about getting them on inter-library loan (If ever I were to implicate anyone on suspicions of attempting to create a NWO and take-over the world, it'd be the librarians. Those crafty mofos are connected).
As for your predicament... I'm not sure what to say. Likely, you'll just have smile, wave and deal with it for now. Prompting your indoctrinated lecturers for evidence is only likely to get you into trouble (especially if your teacher has already demonstrated their dishonesty about the library), and ridicule is only an appropriate weapon to use when you aren't in a subordinate position.
- Leon Trotsky, Last Will & Testament
February 27, 1940
Hi ifywar
Welcome to the site.
I speak as someone who's been there and done that regarding formal debates against the religious "viewpoint" and there are some things one can bear in mind heading into a debate against any shade of this delusion, especially creationism, which you should never lose sight of no matter how eloquent the deluded person is against whom you are debating.
1. They cannot substantiate their argument with fact. They think they can. Indeed some of them are so convinced they can that they will call you a liar to your face should you debunk their sources. But debunk them you should. Creationists actually draw their so-called scientific justifications from a very limited set of texts. Familiarise yourself with those texts and the reasons they are fraudulent or inaccurate.
2. The religious mindset, especially when confronted with reasoned and reasonable opposition to its claims to be justifiable, will always always always revert to simple assertion. They will try to do this authoritatively and make it sound like something else, but it is still simply assertion and unfounded. Make it clear from the off that simple assertion is unacceptable as a means of proving anything and don't be afraid to point it out when it occurs, even if it means you begin to sound like a scratched record in doing so (ask your grandparents what the analogy means)
3. Using a debating tactic which incorporates these two principles will invariably then cause your opponent to take refuge in several well-known responses to successful rebuttal:
a) They will try to ridicule you using points completely irrelevant to the subject. This is known as the ad hominem argument and in fact is not an argument at all. It is a cheap ploy to make the message seem wrong by casting aspersions on the messenger. Respond to this how you like, but keep it dignified. The contrast between your impartiality and their subjective attack on your person will be obvious.
b) They will lie. Amazingly quite often, stating that they did not say what they did, or that their source material says something other than it does, or that you yourself said something other than you did. In a debate you don't always have the chance to pounce on them every time they do this but keep notes as they speak. They tell so many fibs sometimes that you might not always remember all of them when you need to prove them false and this leaves the possibility that the unanswered ones will be believed.
c) They will change the topic completely. Or a variation is to simply excise all reference to an important argument of yours which they cannot counter. Take notes - written or mental - regarding which of your strongest arguments they have chosen to ignore and use them as the main thrust of your next opportunity to speak. This is when they also are inclined to use the "straw man" argument in which they paraphrase your own words badly, add in elements completely of their own, attribute the whole thing to you, and then proceed to demolish it. When they do this it is absolutely necessary to point the fact out. One method is to politely remind them that it is you who they are debating against, not their imagination, and replace their "straw man" with the actual argument you posited while everything is fresh n the audience's mind.
d) They will employ a morally superior tone and/or appeal to emotion. This is a ploy particularly used by religious mindsets who perceive themselves under attack (remember, a rebuttal of any one of their fallacies will be taken as a personal attack on themselves - though it will be phrased as an attack on their god). They have an advantage here, and they know it of course. As a reasonable and rational person you will probably have been inclined to speak in a cnsistently reasonable and rational tone and any attempt to emulate their descent into hysteria will simply make you seem petulant. You have two choices here - continue as you started and hope that your audience is intelligent enough to see through the charade and concentrate on the argument itself, or develop justified indignation as a response. The latter is difficult to do, however genuinely felt it is, whil still retaining a calm inner control over your own arguments. So be careful should you employ it.
e) They will attempt to "outreason" your reasonableness and emulate your own tone to make their points seem equally sane. This gives you an advantage since it allows you to politely correct them when they still insist on employing tactics a), b) and c) above. Then, if this galls them, it is they who run the risk of sounding petulant when their frustration displays itself.
As the others said above though, there is no substitute for doing your homework in advance. Creationists don't actually have many arguments at all - simply variations of a theme most of the time. And they have NO good arguments. Know in advance what they are going to say and you can, if you're lucky, debunk them before they've even opened their mouths.
Good luck!
I would rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy
Hello ifywar
I am a biologist. I can help you a lot with this. If you follow the following instructions, there is no reason you should not be fine
1) If your opposition is like most creationists, there is a good chance that they will be unfamiliar with basic evolutionary biology. As a result, they may end up attacking a strawman version of evolution, such as arguing that “no biological structure could come about via random chance”. Do not let them get away with this. Make sure your opponents understand entirely what is being discussed. The first thing you should do is exactly what I do: Ask your opponents directly what they understand by “evolution”. Most people think they know what it means, and most of the time they are wrong. The correct answer is this:
This presents you with an immediate advantage. If your opponent can’t answer this, you’ve already won. You could undermine everything your opponent says since you need only point out that they do not know that which they are supposed to be arguing against.
2) Nordmann is right. There is a high probability that your opponents will attempt to make an argument on moral grounds. Do not let them. Do not counter argue against it. Note down (take notes) of every time this occurs. When it is your turn to speak, point out the repeated times your opponent has brought up something which is irrelevant to the debate. Remind them to keep on topic. Point out that in the context of the debate (the truth or lack thereof of evolution) any argument attempting to take moral high ground, or arguing about the amorality or immorality of evolution, is ad consequentiam, a form of red herring fallacy.
3) Familiarize yourself with some statistical notions that will help you articulate how evolutionary processes occur, especially if your opposition attempts to argue that evolution is a wholly random process.
Although it is an oversimplification, it sometimes helps to think of changes in allele frequency as analogous to chemical kinetics (if you do chemistry, this next part will make much more sense). In chemical kinetics we talk about dynamic equilibrium. This is a point in the reaction where the rate of production of the products is equal to the rate of reversion to the reactants. Hence the concentrations do not change. The Kc is called the equilibrium constant. It is a measure of the ratio of products over reactants at equilibrium. A Kc higher then 1 means the reaction tends toward the products, a Kc less than 1 tends toward the reactants. Similarly, in allele frequency distribution, we can refer to the rate of change of proportion of an allele within a population. For an allele which has no selective advantage, the rate of destruction (death of organisms who carry it) versus production (birth of organisms who carry it) is roughly equal. This simple fact is the basis of the tremendously important Hardy-Weinberg principle. For a chemical reaction, it would be analogous to say that for a Kc of 1, the change in free energy is 0. Any shift in this equilibrium will tend toward the production or destruction of the allele. Even if the shift in probability is tiny, the trend is inevitably going to happen. It's just a basic consequence of the law of large numbers. All evolutionary processes responsible for the formation of any biological structures can be described in terms of rates of proliferation and destruction of alleles in closed breeding populations of size N. The comparative advantage of an allele q within the population can be described by the frequency coefficient, such that for generation n after the introduction of the allele, the frequency will be fn-1.The coefficient f can be described in terms of rate of proliferation of an allele versus rate of destruction. If the population remains the same in size (rate of destruction of individuals is in equilibrium with the rate of production), then f is the common ratio in a geometric sequence tending either toward 1 (every entity in the population holds the allele) or 0 (no entity in the population holds the allele). If f<1, then the allele is destroyed over time. If f>1, then the allele frequency increases over time.
4) Your opponent may change topic to the origins of life. Don’t let them. You’d be amazed at how often this occurs. Point out that the debate pertains to biological evolution and if they wish to discuss chemical evolution, they should have set up another debate.
"Physical reality” isn’t some arbitrary demarcation. It is defined in terms of what we can systematically investigate, directly or not, by means of our senses. It is preposterous to assert that the process of systematic scientific reasoning arbitrarily excludes “non-physical explanations” because the very notion of “non-physical explanation” is contradictory.
-Me
Books about atheism
but aside from all of this, i still dont understand one thing that the girl showed us. it was a picture of a fossilized human footprint in the same stoone as a fossilized dinosaur footprint.
all hail the great and powerful sluffywinks.
The answers will better be found in science, not make believe. Science does not yet have all the answers, but does religion even ask the real questions? .... religion just says have faith in god. Umm, but I am god , and I ask seriously what am I , and so is my personal science, as all is one, as is to ask, what are WE?
Atheism Books.
Those are not human footprints. Some are even forgeries. Check out the links below to get a better idea on what is really going on with those pesky footprints.
http://www.religioustolerance.org/ev_noway.htm
http://paleo.cc/paluxy/paluxy.htm
Hi, ifywar. I have two suggestions. First, watch this video by Ken Miller, in which he rips apart Creationism. It is very entertaining, and more importantly, extremely informative.
Second, visit, read, and study the Talks Origins website (http://talkorigins.org/). This is one of the most comprehensive rebuttals to all known creationist arguments. Just do a search for whatever topic has you stumped, and you'll probably find it there. For example, searching for "dinosaur human footprints" finds http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CC/CC101.html, which states:
Browse through the Index of Creationist Claims (http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html), and you will find all the familiar claims and their rebuttals. It is very comprehensive.
Wonderist on Facebook — Support the idea of wonderism by 'liking' the Wonderism page — or join the open Wonderism group to take part in the discussion!
Gnu Atheism Facebook group — All gnu-friendly RRS members welcome (including Luminon!) — Try something gnu!