Events to host real-life moderated TT debates

Religious debate seems recently to be popular on this site. Debate in general is, but recently its highly religious. I see it at times getting a little more personal than it should be, but this is what the internet can allow people to do. I wonder if it might be a good idea to combine this fact with one of the other loves of people on this site... beer... and come up with a more peaceful format.

If we can come up with a nice venue, most likely in Munich, and maybe even an unbiased moderator or panel of moderators, might it be a fun idea to have one, or a series of debates? I would happily travel to munich and crash over on a friday or saturday night to be in the audience, or even the debating team, for such an event.

We could agree a format, heavy on beer, where each team of 1-3 people makes an opening statment, a rebutal of the other teams statement, cross examination and then questions from the audience. Religion might also be a good place to start given its current popularity and the sites religious brains like BB and Dino could go up in a more fun environment against whatever champions the atheist side puts forward.

Anyway just putting it out there to see if people generally think its a good or bad idea. I specifically like the beer part

Can we bring a few lions?

In Munich, beer IS religion. So do you want to have a debate about it, or just practice it?

It's not out of the question that at least one of the major religious contributors is just a well educated wind up merchant and might not want to.

Surely you'd want people from all religions though and a pub and beer might not be the best place for some...

How about BB and Dino rocking up for the Karaoke on Tuesday and bealting out a few religious classics?

Accompanied by beer or not, I'd like to see a ban on all contemporary Christian music.

So a beer fueled night in a christan contemporary music themed karaoke bar then?

Interestingly enough, I recently realized just how stupid it is to debate with religious people. I read up a bunch on Mormonism…. The founding of the religion goes something like this:

Guy 1: God gave me a secret tablet which I will translate to you
Guy 2: Ok, go!
Guy 1: “blah blah blah�
Guy 2: Wow, that’s the word of god!
Wife of Guy 2: Ok, if you are really translating and not making it up, please re-translate the last several pages
Guy 1: You have angered God! He won’t allow me to do that anymore, but I can do a nice summary.

Honestly, if people still buy that story, then there’s really no hope for logic and reason winning over.

How about doing it charivari style. I would make the trip to munich just to see a few tt'ers ride a donkey backwards through a drunken gauntlet.

Or we could commit suicide.

I would have some actual interest in such an event providing it was run with some semblance of professionalism.

funny how this topic has been up for nearly a month and the normally outspoken religious folks are nowhere to be found.

Yes, I kind of expected that. Most of them will be lost without their google to lookup bible quotes or Hitler and Einstein quotes that have been artfully taken out of context.

I didnt think theyd be brave enough to go into a public computerless atmosphere and try and make points of their own.

Why don't you just set up a virtual formal debate right here on TT? Then everyone can watch.
Just a restricted thread where a moderator will only allow the people in the teams to debate (in turn, of course). Have a link for a commentary thread off to the side so the pheasants can chatter/scorn/throw food.
And stick to the wet debate rule. Participants must be consuming beer at the time of writing.

This place needs some good, decent debates - without the name calling and panty twisting.

id be up for that too if there is any interest. Either would be fine.

This place needs some good, decent Christians with whom to debate!!

I think you miss the whole point about debating. It's not about presenting your own mind, it's about taking a position by flip of coin, presenting and defending it. No need for decent Christians at all.

I think you're missing the point of excessive beer.

Oh yeah, debating for the sake of debating. ugh.
That's shit.

But if anyone would formally debate real positions they actually believe in, I'd definitely watch. Otherwise, booooring. Learning how to argue something you totally disagree with is for liars, trolls, high school kids and attention seekers.

Bring on the decent Christians. Or at least people who would genuinely argue the case.

That's true. Takes me back to the days when I'd be given the task of winning the argument from a stance I detested. It's hard bloody work.

It's not all bad, debating that way forces you to look at things from a variety of different positions which in the end should work to solidify your stance on the topic.

How can you really form an (educated) opinion if you haven't considered every aspect of the issue. I do it a lot on TT and I generally come out with a greater understanding and a stronger conviction of my original position. Although on a few occasions I have changed my opinion because of what I've learned from examinig the issue from another perspective. Either way I think it's a good thing.

Debating is a bit like proctology. Armed with the bare minimum of tools you have to address a hell of a lot of arseholes.

Seems its just the atheists interested in watching or taking part. Oh well.

Maybe if i called it a "confession" or stood outside and rang some bells theyd come filing in

Exactly.
Perspective/multiple angles/educated opinion/every aspect/consider the other side = good. And you can do all this stuff without taking a false position.
Lying, on the flip of a coin, for the sake of winning a debate? = Meh, no thanks.

Iif that's whats popular, go for it, but personally it seems a bit high school. I'd rather see a debate where people are coming with experience, knowledge or at least some sort of interest in their viewpoint. Something to offer, at least.

For example, if you were doing a christian/atheist debate of some sort, I'd like the team or person for christianity to at least know something about christianity or be/have been a christian, and for the atheist team not to be christians arguing what they think atheists would say. Otherwise what's the point of reading all their blabber? Just start a thread and troll instead.
I'm sure it's good for their arguing skills personally, but you know, would that really be of any interest to other people? I'd hope debate topics would be good in themselves, the debaters would be keen and at least slightly knowledgable.. and we'd learn stuff.

But anyway, I just made all that up to see if I could convince you or not.

I'd be interested but can we bring weapons?

When you debate, do you take into consideration who the person you're debating with is and what their past positions have been? Or do you judge the argument at face value regardless of who posted it?

I would have thought the argument should be judged at face value.

But you can judge how bad the debate is going to be, spectator wise, by the persons and their past positions. And whether the effort of setting such a thing up would be worth it.
Anyone could debate what they like, I'm just saying flipping the coin idea sounds shit to me. More for people who just want to show off their debating/wikipedia skills, than actually learn us something.
In which case, count me as another uninterested party. There would too high of a chance I'm just watching someone with good debate skills talk shit, which I can do any old place.

Definitely, from a spectator information gathering point of view you're best to have experts arguing both sides.

Personally, my motives are a bit more selfish than that. For my own amusement and growth, taking a contrary position to what I believe in can be an interesting, intellectually stimulating excercise which forces me to confront and ignore my own personal bias. Some people are able to do that automatically but I'm not one of them, I have to actively ask myself if I'm evaluating an argument rationally or if I'm letting my own personal bias get in the way.

That said, I'm crap at structured debates whether one on one or on here and I don't see the value of debating to win, only to learn or to share.

I think you secretly completely agree with me. You are just being contrary to edumicate yourself.

It doesn't look like there's going to be any debates anyway. I suppose you could set up a second user id and argue with yourself? I would be happy to judge that debate.

Wish I read this thread back when you started it. I would debate from the religious side. Just for the challenge. I'd be up for it. Especially since a scientific debate about religion will always end in a tie.

You forgot lawyers.

I could argue the Christian point myself more successfully than I've seen it done here, I think, without insulting people or making my position look vacuous in the process.

The place where debate ends for the Christian is that in order to be a Christian, one must have faith. Faith, according to Xianity (or at least, according to the ones who are typically preaching it) goes beyond logic and understanding, and cannot be contested with traditionally accepted methods of debate. Otherwise it would not be faith in the Xian sense of the word. One must suspend reason and simply believe. (kirkegaard) Some would go so far as to claim that the faith itself is a miracle, that without the hand of God, one cannot believe, because one has not been chosen to. (the poor, unlucky bastard)

Fine. Even though doubt got the best of me in the end (my disbelief is greatly enhanced by having once believed), I can still respect someone else's walk with the Lard. What chaps my ass - the reason I'd like to see them ride a donkey backwards through a drunken gauntlet in Bavaria - is the people who make claims about ultimate truth without articulating their own understanding (even to themselves!) in their own words, so it's obvious they are believing the Bible at face value to such an extent that they disregard common sense in order that they can fit with such a paradigm. And by rules of Xian faith, these are the true Christians! And even worse, they think others will eventually "see the light" if and when god wills it, and until that miracle happens, they can just go on being nauseating circus freaks. For a grown person to stop at "Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so" is ignoble. Am I right or am I just making this up?

And what is the point of such a debate anyway? One can't expect change another's view when the other is clinging to it with the white-knuckled tenacity of a delusional tweeker. I'd like to see one Christian express his or her views in such a way that any somewhat intelligent being can respect. I'm actually rather astonished that with all the people on TT, and with all the talk on the subject, nobody is doing it.

Heathen! All of you!

All this arguing.. it's getting annoying. Rather than discuss this stuff here, a good idea might be to setup a real-life moderated TT debate where you can do your arguing.

Damn you, why didnt I think of that?

Fancy a beer, Marty?

A proper beer-fueled argument, err, debate, requires OPPOSING sides. Without the brethren Dino and Bob, we're just preaching to the choir.

How about Vic? You're a man of the cloth, no? We could all meet in Halle

Like I said, this would be fun. With a moderated debate. I'd take the religious side. As an opposing belief system, atheism can't actually win. Neither can Religion. Debate is also called forensic science and there is no way to scientifically decide the outcome. In the end it comes down to what one believes and not what one knows. The two are different and too often confused. Atheism, just like any other belief system, has no background in scientifically provable facts, only opinions and guesswork. In the end I think it's unfortunate that science, a method of inquiry and the results of that method, and atheism, a belief system, are often conflated. A true scientist's only scientific answer would be agnosticism, which is to say that we don't know, because knowing and believing are two very different things.

Cracking idea. I'll quite happily take God's side and kick some arse in his name.

Thats good enough for me. In science if someone comes up with a theory and has zero evidence for it then the theory is rejected and ignored until such time as it does.

So any religion, just like astrology, fairies and ghosts, should really just be rejected and ignored in modern society until such time as the evidence is in.

Alas this doesnt happen and its used instead to make political decisions, scientific decisions, educational decisions, financial decisions and moral decisions.

My position is, beleive all you like especially if it brings good into your life, but stay out of the lives of others until such time as your claims have evidence.

I have to disagree. My point here is that science cannot at this point be used to prove/disprove the existence of the Divine. Rejected is far too strong a word. I think shelved until further notice without adjudication might be more accurate. It's less about evidence in this case and more about proof and disproof. With the methods and evidence available, Science can't rule out the existence of God. With the methods and evidence available, it can't prove it either. So we should withhold judgment until we can. Statements concerning the almighty, positive or negative, that veer towards "know" are unsound. My meaning concerning science is that a scientist should stay out of the debate as a scientist because science can't yet answer the question.

When we can't find proof, it doesn't mean we have proof of the negative. So if people choose to believe, in a particular set of phenomena, then that's that. The world of science can't disprove that in which they believe. Using science to debunk religion leaves us with an uncomfortable tie. Some people decide to believe at this point that there is nothing, and some believe in some form of divinity. Both are believing and neither is more sound scientifically.

But, and this is pretty important, Religion and belief in the supernatural are not always conflatable. One can believe in all sorts of scientifically unprovable phenomena and not belong to an organized religion. The two are not necessarily intertwined. Religion is an organizational framework for ordering and making decisions involving a particular set of people who usually profess belief in a particular supernatural power or process. It is often based on what Kohlberg called level 1 and level 2 thinking, respectively fear of punishment and hope of reward. Like any method of organizing and directing behavior in people (especially people whose thinking is at those levels of ethical development) it can be good or bad. Any organizational method has pretty much the same value.

At the end of the day ordering a society or bits of a society based on one moral framework, is the same as another. There is no perfect moral framework, nor is there a universal moral framework. Combining the ordering principle of a society with a belief in the supernatural is no more damaging or beneficial, than an ordering principle with a specified pseudo scientific denial of the divine. The Soviet Union as an (officially) Godless society was no better or worse than Catholic Europe in the Middle Ages or the Organized Dar al Islam of the middle ages. Enough harm has been done in the name of "scientific" modernism in the 20th century to tie the Godly with the Godless for the amount of harm done.

The problem is not the belief of people in question. It's how those beliefs are used, and organized and used to move masses of people to accomplish things that bring us closer to the divine like Cathedrals; which can be indescribably beautiful, or things which bring us closer to the the infernal, like war, which is as close to hell as we can come in this life.

So belief in a divinity (which is a personal decision) doesn't always equate with religion which can be personal or involve submitting to the will of a group (which will be directed at some point by individuals). And religion isn't always good or bad, it's a tool, and like any tool, it can be used for good or ill. With what we now know, science can not settle the argument and should stay out of the argument except where it can actually answer a question definitively.

Oh the joys of trying to prove something that doesn't exist.

I can't prove fairys don't exist. I can't prove that unicorns doen't exist. I can't prove anything doesn't exist because of the basic logic false and false = true.

I can prove that there is no logical end to the argument as long as somebody holds on to a false position.

I'd be up for being the voice of religion on the debate. As ER said it's interesting to take the others position and try and defend it. I feel the religion one is pretty easy.

We could make it even more fun. Dino has to defend science.

A working definition of the "divine" needs to be made before scientific investigation can take place. It's difficult to imagine religious leaders agreeing on this topic. But that doesn't mean "Science" should be dissed (ie, that the earth is 4000 years old and dinosaurs were the demons cast out of heaven, etc. as many religious people claim to believe)

And if some experimentation actually did take place, and the divine were disproved, there would always be some religious person who says "Ah! Ah! The Lord has chosen to hide himself from your faithless experiments!"


That sounds Catholic to me. Which things are good, and which are bad? Why are cathedrals indescribably beautiful? Doch they are for the most part overrated. For those that I find impressive, I can explain in detail why. Because I DON'T find cathedrals indescribably beautiful does NOT mean that I am incapable of such feelings. And why is war infernal and hell-like? Many find it entertaining and useful, no? Silly questions, perhaps, but it boils down to one person getting the other to agree on a set of definitions.

That set of definitions has nothing to do with the thing itself, but for us, makes knowledge of the existence and discourse of the thing possible.

Yet it is the Christian who insists that he AND the other person see everything according to his own definitions ... which, if you are correct in your definition of religion, are ALWAYS up for grabs because the directors "reinterpret" the definitions.

@Vic: beers in Halle with the sisters, god willing!

Scientific investigation of the world in which we live and where we came from has been going on for centuries. It will continue and someday maybe we get some answers. I'm not dissing science. But science is a method and not an alternative to religion for establishing moral norms. It can only do so much, and it has been used, rather incorrectly as a foil for religion. The two are not opposites. One doesn't cancel out the other.

I can side with Galileo, but that doesn't mean I can't believe in God. And all people who claim some religious affiliation can't just be lumped together.

The point is that the existence of God is beyond the scope of science to prove or disprove. It's not actually possible to prove a negative. What basic observation and the scientific method can do is prove/disprove some of the mythology that is used in formulation of religious history, but that mythology and the actual existence of something greater than ourselves aren't necessarily connected.

All proselytizing belief systems do the same thing that you describe. Progressive Atheists are a perfect example. So are fundamentalist Muslims. I wouldn't just pick on the Christians, they aren't all like that. To say so is ignorant as they are so often charged with being. Two wrongs don't make a right.

But always being wrong does make you right.

Yes indeed.


Leon Lederman

No not all of them, just too many of them. Hey, God! Thanks a lot that I didn't grow up in one of those US states where the high school science courses are required to teach creationism! I got to do more cool stuff like cut up dead frogs!!

And I've never experienced a fundamentalist Muslim knocking on my door at four in the afternoon and wrecking my train of thought so they could try to proselytize. No, it's the Christians. The self-righteous, smug, patronizing Christians who think they have the right to "save" another person's spiritual condition. But then I'm the asshole when I tell them to take a hike, because everyone knows Christians are filled with the perfect love of the holy spirit and just want to spread the love around. Give me a fookin break and save your lousy prayers for someone who needs your intercessory "spiritual warfare."

But whatever. The debate is not about the moral value of religion, because that has nothing whatsoever to do with the validity of Christianity. Either the Bible IS the word of god, or it is NOT.

Wow. That's bitter. I won't touch that part, that's all you and has nothing to do with the deabte. A debate that is in fact at this point about all sorts of things including the moral value of religion. It is not limited to the validity of Christianity. And even so, it in fact has everything to do with the validity of Christianity (or any other belief system) and with the validity of Science as a foil for belief. It's a very broad debate. the tack your are taking is very narrow, just like a Christian fundamentalist or any other fundmentalists. Not all Christians, even some of the leaders of the bigger churches think the bible is the indisputable word of God. Some think it's a metaphor, or a series of metaphors. One doesn't require a bible to believe in God or even in Christ. No symbols or books are required. Only faith. Holding the entire religion hostage to the fundamentalists is just plain ignorance. Either one doesn't knwo or, one ignores the turth that invariably lies somewhere in the middle. I would also encourage a bit of perspective, the Christians in question, probably feel it's their duty rather than their right. Whether you are an ass or not, would depend on how you tell them to take a hike. They aren't my prayers. Im not praying for you. But those Christians are, and it sounds like you need it.

Radical Fundamentalist Islam won't wreck your train of thought. They'll blow it up. Or cut off your head and let the thoughts run out, and from the way you phrased your last post, there would most likely in fact be precious little to clean up.

Your whole reply is precisely what I'm talking about. I couldn't have made it up any better myself.

Why should I mince my words. You can direct it to an assessment of my character if you like. I am of the mind that to the degree that Christianity (that is, christians) tries to impose itself upon my life, I am obliged to push it back to the degree that I don't wish to accept it, and I have sufficient style to shut the door peacefully the first few times they come around. I'm too independent and intelligent to make any compromise in this area.

And why am I bitter, then, as you say. Maybe because some of the vilest people I've ever known and have known of happen to call themselves Christian. Millions have been slaughtered under the pretext of Christianity. Christianity (that is, christians) has destroyed whole cultures, have poisoned the lives of many many people. Oh, that's right, you wouldn't touch that. You would rather look at the indescribable beauty of cathedrals.

The debate that I am interested in has nothing whatsoever to do with spirituality or morality or the myriad social structures and pretty buildings that have been erected around the religion. I can name dozens of sources of inspiration that are not religious in the christian sense but, to me, are deeply spiritual or moral. And the good people who are Christian, I believe, are good people because, well, they're good people. They might believe that it's Christianity that makes them good, but I'd wager they would find it within themselves with or without it. but that's beside the point.


No slack for you. Either it is true that the Bible is the word of god, and the Christian god truly exists as depicted in the bible, and "He" is the ONE AND ONLY god, or it is not. There are many shades of gray but this matter should be black and white, because too many christians take their Christianity too seriously. This is evident even on Toytown

That someone might want to practice christianity as a moral/value system is a different matter than the factual matter of what the believer claims to be true based on the contents of the bible. Jesus can be alright with me, but he doesn't have to have had existed, and he doesn't have to have had been the son of god and etc., in fact.

Because if the bible is "Truth", then some of the most amazing people are surely burning in hell right now just because they didn't believe.

There have been vile people who called themselves Christians, Atheists, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Mormons, You name it. It doesn't change anything. All of X aren't bad. Some individual X's are bastards. It's not because they are X. It's because they are pricks. You can fit any group of people into the preceding sentence Any belief system can be perverted beyond its stated goals for motivating large groups of people to do just about anything. The people and the system are two different things. You can't see that, you are too busy nursing your grudge. That's your business, that's what I won't touch. I don't care why you are so screwed up about Christianity. I made my point about science and agnosticism. Your personal issues are of no interest to anyone. The fact that bad people who claimed Christianity as their religion, did bad things and led otherwise good or bad people into doing awful things is neither unique, nor a means of judging the relative usefulness of the system or the existence of God.

As for the debate, when you hold individuals liable for what groups have done and Groups are held accountable for what individuals have done, you are on the road to ruin, just like the above named individuals, who you so vociferously condemn. You rail against the wholesale "Christian" destruction of cultures but then employ the same methods to condemn groups (let's take chrisitians) with whom you disagree. Just lump 'em all in together. It's easier. "God will know his own" right? If the bishop that said that was an ass for saying it, where do you get off doing the same? If it wasn't fair for them to do, why are you the exception? You are not. And when you want to actually get at the truth, you have to specific. In this case you are neither specific or truthful.

People who can't compromise aren't usually what I would label as intelligent. Your view of "either God is God or God isn't God and that's it, that's all" is right up there, with all sorts of other harebrained ideas I've heard from people who read, but don't read enough and feel too much based on what they don't know. Why does Christianity have to be zero sum? Why is it 100 or 0 and not 70/30 or 50/50 or 5/95? How would you or anyone else know? Especially in such an authoritarian manner? Who are you to stomp around like a five year old and say "so oder so?" Is it because a small but vocal minority in the Christian Polity says that the whole book is true? Literally true? Did they offend you? Who cares? Do all the various sects and groupings of Christianity claim that? No they do not. Are you familiar with anything more than sound byte Christianity or what you got from Anne Rice? It doesn't sound like it. You're far too certain to be very educated on the subject at all.

I also think houses and the other works of mankind like skyscrapers and indoor plumbing are pretty amazing. Cathedrals are pretty nifty, because of when they were built, and the sheer chutzpah of people who decided to build them, and the fact that they don't fall down, but a simple house is also a small miracle. I know how they are built and how hard it is to get them right, and just how far we've come as a race to be able to build something as functional and beautiful as a house. It's called perspective. Get some. It will do wonders for that burning unsatisfied feeling you're trying to get rid of.

some pretty massive posts on here. would be nice if some bullet point summations were made.

Aye, it has crossed my mind a few times.
Might be interesting but I'm a bit tied up at the minute.