POST GAME SHOW - Battle Royale II

POST GAME SHOW - Battle Royale II

  • Knight

    Votes: 24 63.2%
  • Zakath

    Votes: 14 36.8%

  • Total voters
    38
Status
Not open for further replies.

Goose

New member
LOL I like your comment V J.

Not only did Knight hit with emotion and common sense, but logic as well. Made me all misty eyed. :thumb:
 

Freak

New member
Knight!

Knight!

Knight came out in full intensity and that never ceased being the case. The truth prevailed, once again leaving Zakath as the loser!
 

novice

Who is the stooge now?
Good Knight!!!

Zakath's last post was in line with his rounds 2 and 8. In a word... "bad". In two words.... "bad", "bad". :D
 

admiral_d

New member
So, the answer to the question -

Does absolute morality exist?

is Yes.....?

And Knight answered what that morality is because he could point to it and say that ->that is absolute morality....right?

So, what is absolute morality?

I seemed to have failed to see the answer.....
 

Flipper

New member
Apparently, something is constitutes an absolute because we all (as a group and as a nation) agree on it. Apparently, if it achieves success as an emotive appeal, it must be an absolute.

Apparently.

Once again, the looseness of the fundamentalist's definition of an absolute is laid plain through a general lack of any substance other than assertion and emotive appeals to the majority. Somewhere, someone neglected to actually prove the existance of their moral absolutes.
 

Eireann

New member
Knight provided a definition of absolute morality. That definition provided that there must be a standard of absolute right and wrong that supercedes human standards.

What Knight showed: humans almost universally believe that murder and rape are wrong (although Zak provided some clear biblical evidence of "justified" murder and rape, which Knight and his supporters have curiously avoided addressing). Note the key words herein -- humans believe. Knight appealed to human standards only throughout his entire side of the debate, yet his entire argument hinges on there being a standard that supercedes the human. When asked to demonstrate it, he responded that he didn't have to show it because the point of the debate wasn't to show the source of the standard. Well, the problem is, he wasn't asked to show the source of the standard, he was asked to show the standard itself and to demonstrate its existence. What was the point of the debate? I thought it was to demonstrate absolute morals, but Knight succeeded only in showing morals that he has only measured by human standards.

Could someone please show me where Knight demonstrated moral absolutes? Can someone please show me where he demonstrated that the standard that is required by his definition exists? Can someone please show me where Knight did anything but tuck his tail between his legs and run in terror from that question?

As the "affirmative" combatant, Knight was required to do the following things:

1) Provide a definition of absolute morality, as he understands it. He did this.

2) Provide (not merely assert, or measure only by appealing to human standards) that the supercedent standard that he provided in his definition exists. In other words, he needed to be able to go beyond human experience, beyond human emotion, and beyond human belief to demonstrate this point that is so integral to his argument. He did not do this.

By default, Knight loses the debate. There are no two ways about it. I don't give a red darn how much you all agree with his position, he simply did not support the case he was trying to make. He simply did not provide for the existence of the standard he alleged exists. He appealed to human emotion and human logic. Never once did he appeal to the one thing that he was required by his definition to appeal to -- anything superceding humanity. If the only way you can measure the thing is by appealing to factors within the realm of human experience, then "the thing" is by nature relative to the human experience.

You see, a relativist does not need to demonstrate that morals or ethics are not absolute (they may or may not be, but the point is, it's impossible to prove). He only needs to demonstrate that they are relative. They can be relative and absolute at the same time, because the two terms are not automatically exclusive. An absolute merely provides that they are relative in the same way to everyone. So, a relativist can easily prove that morals and ethics are relative, without having to debunk absolutism. But, the same cannot be said of absolutism, which is impossible to prove, as Knight has so clumsily demonstrated.
 

Eireann

New member
By the same token, Zakath also loses the debate. He did not manage to demonstrate that absolute morals don't exist, which was the position he opted for in the debate. Zakath loses by default merely because of the wording. Had Zakath been debating that "relative morals do exist" he would have won easily and without contest, since all morals are relative, whether they are absolute or not.

However, neither side should feel bad about losing the debate on this topic, because this topic is a Catch-22. It is impossible to prove either the existence or non-existence of absolute morality. The best either side can accomplish is, "I believe in them," or "I don't believe in them." Proof pro or con is beyond the ken of any human being.

That said, both combatants argued well within the form they chose -- Zakath with hypothetical scenarios and biblical references, and Knight with ad hominem emotional appeals. From a debatory stance, though, Knight certainly wins the popular vote, due to this being a Christian forum. But I think we all know that had this been a real debate, properly controlled and maintained, in a real debate atmosphere (the kind where they are officially judged and appointed, like in academia), Knight would not have passed muster, for the simple fact that he never built or established the case that was required of his position.
 

Eireann

New member
Originally posted by Flipper
Apparently, something is constitutes an absolute because we all (as a group and as a nation) agree on it. Apparently, if it achieves success as an emotive appeal, it must be an absolute.
Yep. In other words, he has taken the relativist's stance on morality and is merely changing the terminology. The tack he took for proving morality, though, only served to show the existence of relative morals. "I believe, you believe, he/she believes, we believe, everyone believes ..." (which was Knight's main approach to establishing the absolute) simply means the moral is relative to "I, you, he/she, we, everyone ..."
 

Gal3_28

New member
Zakath

Zakath

Knight accepted the burden of proof and he failed to produce it. He did not show how morals transcend our own human standards, period. Given a specific action, some will agree that it is wrong. If I agree that a specific instance of rape is wrong, well I would never say it is right. Just because I cannot find any justification for such an event and can say that it is always wrong *in my mind*, does not make it absolute, at least not according to the definition provided. Zakath wins by default.
 

admiral_d

New member
Being a lover of good stories, and a director of a drama group, I would add that Knight's appeal to the emotional by contrasting absolute depravity vs absolute morality is a shallow emotional appeal.

One could argue that the 10 Commandments are an absolute morality, but with the Saturday Sabbath being changed from Jesus' time til now, that absolute appears null......

To argue that absolute morality exists, one would have to show where a person lived by absolute morality...by a set of known standards ...Unfortunately, they are not universal, for as what one sees as required law to live by, another may see as foolishness.
 
C

cirisme

Guest
I would have said Zakath, but very early on Zakath pretty much shifted burden of proof onto himself and Knight nailed him on it. Because of it Knight wins, hands down.
 

Eireann

New member
Originally posted by cirisme
I would have said Zakath, but very early on Zakath pretty much shifted burden of proof onto himself and Knight nailed him on it. Because of it Knight wins, hands down.
I would say that neither side wins. In a debate on a topic such as this one, one can't say that failure to prove one side proves the other. The burden of proof was on both participants, and both failed to prove their accepted positions, but Zakath only because of the wording, as I mentioned before. Knight failed to prove that absolutes exist, and Zakath failed to prove that they don't. All in all, Zakath provided a more sound argument, and Knight provided a more emotional argument. One cannot "shift the burden of proof" onto the other, because the burden of proof lay on both from the very start. As I said, it's a catch-22 topic, because it is impossible to prove either way the existence of absolutes. Now, there could have been a winner had the debate been formatted like this:

Knight: I will prove the existence of absolute morals.
Zakath: I will prove the existence of relative morals.

Unfortunately, they're not mutually exclusive, so it isn't sufficient to prove one by disproving the other or failing to prove the other. Bottom line -- this was a winnerless debate. A fun debate, but no winner can possibly be declared.
 

Hank

New member
Although I believe in absolute morality, I don’t think it is possible to prove. However I thought the debate was interesting and thought provoking in some ways. I agree with Eireann for the most part. I do find it interesting that Knight seems unable to have a discussion without resorting to name calling if the discussion gets a little intense.

From what I have read here, it appears that both Eireann and Becky may have some debate training. I would like to see the two of them debate this same topic.
 
P

Pilgrimagain

Guest
I agree with Eireann. While I agree with Knights position I can't say that the argument he presented was totally convincing. (Thought in his last post he presented extremely powerful images of events that one would be hard pressed to find any positive reasons for)

By the same token I never felt that Zak made an air tight case. At the most Zakath proved that morals are relative to him, but not universally relative. (Hmmm, now that was an interesting statement wasn't it.)
 

Nathon Detroit

LIFETIME MEMBER
LIFETIME MEMBER
Originally posted by Hank
I do find it interesting that Knight seems unable to have a discussion without resorting to name calling if the discussion gets a little intense.
c.
Hank it's "Battle Royale"!!! Ya know, "Smack Down style", it's suppossed to be a tad provocative! We don't want boring, dry, same ol', same ol' debates.

But thanks for the feedback none the less.
 

Jaltus

New member
I agree with Pa and Eir. It seems as if both accepted, at least at one point in time, the burden of proof. What happened is neither produced. Too bad there is not a "they both lose" part to the voting.

I think Knight's closing was stronger than Zak's, and on that basis (since I had them tied going into the last round) I will vote for Knight.

Good going Knight! I honestly did not think you would be able to "out-debate" Zak. Good for you for proving me wrong!
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top