How to improve your debate skills

http://coolhaus.de/art-of-controversy/

 

Being right about the issue is a good way to start.


What kind of debate are we talking about? It can be for different purposes, including proselytization, personal education, status (ego masturbation), and even pure entertainment.

 

Not being a dumbass helps too.
Most people can't help that, though...
Genetics.

 

Critical thinking is indeed a good skill to have. Or if you aren't surrounded by critical thinkers then I suppose fallacy can become an art. Crow was certainly good at that.

 

First, one should understand the concept of fallacy and why it has no place in debate.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy

In logic and rhetoric, a fallacy is a misconception resulting from incorrect reasoning in argumentation. By accident or design, fallacies may exploit emotional triggers in the listener or interlocutor (e.g. appeal to emotion), or take advantage of social relationships between people (e.g. argument from authority).

Definitely worth looking into each fallacy type. Once you study them you would be amazed how often you spot them.

 

He gives us a bad name.

 

"Winning" a debate and being right are roughly overlapping occurrences.

Slant asked how to get better at debating.

 

What I dislike about many of those tactics is that they allow a person with a weaker position to appear to win from the audience's perspective. There is a difference between defeating an opponent and making the audience think he is being defeated, and it appears that that fellow geared most of his tactics towards swaying the audience.

That she did. But since she asked about debate tactics that we "personally use," I think it's relevant to express opposition to certain tactics of which I disapprove.

 

I personally think George Carlin is one of the best critical thinkers we had.

http://www.livevideo.com/video/935CAACB935A44E3B733D303BF536CC4/george-carlin-critical-think.aspx

 

Well, apparently in America you win a debate through fallacy, because people don't care about the facts. We aren't passionate enough to demand facts.

 

Debate is the modern form of monkeys beating each other, when there's a problem to be solved like, say, a fallen tree.

Present case: monkeys have defecated all over each other for decades, then some of them finally got consensus that it SMELLS, damnit, and, guess what, the monkeys didn't wash, but started fighting again over who smells worse.
*feels stuck with the wrong life form*
Oh. And critical thinkers are just addicted to criticizing and judging others, so critical thought, and its preaching, are commercial myths. People don't think, they react, the way our brains get used to react. Critique, and debate, are turning into some mystical almost religious concepts of supposed highest value, when in practice, they are just one of the possible human biases.

 

Very relevent to an online forum, though. XD

Fair enough, I wasn't trying to chastise you for your input.

 

False, humans are a different species from monkeys. This is fallacy.

Where is your proof?

 

Yea, that is a good point.

 

Could you explain why you think this?

I actually think that better debates can be found on the internet than in most other venues, with the exception of professional debate circuits. The worst kind of "debating" occurs on television, where pundits (or politicians) get less than a minute or two apiece (if they're lucky), which they pack with fallacies, false claims and red herrings. It's more about filling the time before the other guy gets to respond than it is about making good points.

On the internet, by contrast, people have time to pick apart the text, link to sources, and point out flaws in logic. That more than makes up for the relative lack of expertise.

 

Well said!