Debate

Debate is an important tool of persuasion and truth-finding. We often look at it as a contest but its main purpose is to clarify thinking. Most debates are informal and unscored. It isn’t really clear who “won” and often both parties come away believing themselves to be the winner. But regardless, the parties also tend to come away with an appreciation for what the other side has to say and why they believe as they do. Debate is an efficient information exchange mechanism.

But while it may enlighten its participants, debate often fails to persuade them or even to establish the truth. Verbal debates, given their informal nature, are generally inconclusive affairs. It would seem we need to rethink debate design and find a mechanism that works better.

The main problem with debate is that it is usually short, verbal, and comes to an end. The quest for truth does not confine itself this way. Just look at the scientific process. In many ways it can be seen as a debate since there are usually promoters and detractors for any new theory. Establishing the truth and persuading the detractors takes years. It is done through academic publications and real experimentation. And it is open-ended. There is no point at which a theory cannot evolve further or be dismantled altogether. Even when we settle on certain “laws” (eg classical mechanics) we leave open the possibility that new experiments might call it into question (eg relativity).

With this in mind, debates should be written and not have short-term time limits imposed on them. Verbal debates are fun to watch but introduce too many confounding factors, such as personality of the debater, speaking style, wit, etc. These may be important characteristics of people, but they don’t really pertain to informed debate. Verbal debate, furthermore, is prone to devolving into tit-for-tat arguments that get lost in the weeds. Writing certainly does not preclude low quality debate but it works against it. Writing also provides the ability to judge the debate in a more dispassionate way.

Written debate formats should allow people to evolve their arguments over time, as their thinking changes and is sharpened by the opponent. This is the purpose of debate and we should enable it through appropriate design. An effective format might be to hold the debate over several levels. The first level would be more of a brainstorming session where arguments are made and responded to. A few exchanges of statement and rebuttal could follow. This level could be unrated, existing as a type of sandbox where debaters can try out ideas without really committing to them. This allows arguments that have no merit to be recognized early and properly discarded. At some point, if the sandbox is successful, the debaters enter a second level where the debate is held again, but this time with the benefit of practice at the first level. A debater who had an effectively rebutted point in the first level can either avoid the point or modify it to meet the objections of his opponent. This second level debate would also go on for a number of exchanges and be rated by the community. More levels of debate could follow where debaters revise their arguments in light of their opponents’ arguments and the ratings they receive from others.

Community involvement in the debate is crucial. It is, after all, the community that will be settling the results of a debate through public policy. It is also the community that can decide whether a debate continues to advance through more levels or has been exhausted and needs to end. For tough issues, the community may decide to leave the debate in an open-ended state or extract certain points from it to act on but otherwise leave the debate to continue.

Debates should be encouraged to get to the essence of their case rather than waste time pursuing tangential points (as so often happens). This is another reason why rating the debates is important. The raters can keep debaters on track or suggest that they take up another topic to debate. The role of raters is flexible. Some raters may want to participate in the debate and form a team with the lead debater. Some may only want to provide advice. Community involvement in debate is generally a good thing and should lead to more democratic decision making.

The multi-level debate format proposed here is only a basic structure. Further rules can be imposed such as the number of exchanges permitted within each level or the type of argument expected (eg opening statement, rebuttal, close). A maximum length might be imposed on each argument although we generally want to allow a great deal of flexibility here, generally in proportion to the complexity of the subject. A fact-checking session might be imposed on all arguments, one in which research is conducted and reported on before debate resumes. This would be another way of allowing debaters to revise their arguments if they prove to be shaky on factual grounds.