Unexplained Mysteries Debates Board

This is an idea that has been briefly touched upon before, but has never been done on the site in any formal manner. By definition, a 'debate' is a public discussion in which opposing arguements are presented, and that will be the purpose of this forum section.

How it will work
A 'debate organiser' will begin by selecting a topic for debate and selecting two members from a list of willing debate partipants, assigning each of them a side of the arguement that they will need to argue for during the debate. A thread will be started for the debate, and only those involved in that particular debate will be allowed to post there. The participants will be allowed a specified number of posts in that thread in order to put their views forward, take on opposing views from their oponent, and make their own side of the arguement the most persuasive. Once the debate is over, the arguements of both participants will be assessed, and the winner announced.

General Rules
Participants in a debate will need to adhere to the usual forum rules and guidelines. Bad language, personal insults and other such behaviour will not be permitted. Copying material from another site or source is only allowed in moderation; i.e you cannot make up an arguement entirely out of quoted material. Participants will not be allowed to edit their own posts in a debate thread, returning to a previous post and editing something out for example could result in you being disqualified.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. What if i don't share the view i have been asked to argue for ?
A. Whether you personally believe you're own arguement or not is not relevant, your aim will be to try and make everyone else belief that what you are saying is the case. If the debate was to argue for the existance of the Yeti for example, and you were asked to argue for it's existance when you don't believe it does exist, then what better testament to your ability to put forward a logical and persuasive arguement than to manage to persuade everyone else that the creature does indeed exist when you yourself believe the contrary.

Q. Can more than 2 people participate in a debate ?
A. Not at the moment, though this will be supported at a later time.

Q. Can everyone else watch a debate as it happens ?
A. Yes, all debates will be open for public viewing.

Q. What is the time scale for posting to a debate ?
A. It is not necessary for a debate to happen 'live', participants will be allowed to take up to a day to formulate their next response and post it to the debate. If a participant fails to post anything in the debate for an extended period of time however, the debate may be automatically won by the remaining participant.

Q. Can I start a debate thread of my own ?
A. No, only debate organisers are permitted to start debate threads.

Q. How are the debates judged ?
A. A debate will be judged by a panel of members who will assign points depending on how persuasive each side of the arguement is. These points will then be totted up and the participant with the highest score wins the debate. A scoreboard of past debates and results will be made available to show who the top debaters are.

Q. I'd like to take part, where do i register my interest ?
A. Visit This Thread

If anyone has additional questions regarding debates, please feel free to post them in this thread. This post will be updated to include any other commonly asked questions that crop up.

Who you got in mind for the debate organisers, and how'll it work with them and Mods?

*found the proper place to post my interest in participating. Debaters Thread in case anyone decides to post their interest here

Well, I'll certainly do it as my time at work permits.

What if I make a grammatical error? Am I allowed to edit that? Cause I sometimes make spelling and grammar errors and I like to have my posts perfectly written.

The best way around that problem is to write you're debate posts in wordpad or other text editor and then paste it in once it's all written and checked. This might be a good idea in any case, since if you're computer crashes before you've finished writing for example, you won't have to start all over again. If you have a text editor with a spell checker than all the better. On saying that however you will not be penalised for spelling or grammar in any of the debates.

Will there be a specific thread, where members can post suggestions for a debate?

Wonderful Idea Saruman!
I see a Future here for the little anarchist known as S&L..
would it not make a wonderful debate though?

Open Debates

There will now be 'open' debates being posted aswell, which are the same as ordinary debates except that debaters can volunteer to take part in them rather than being chosen by a debate organiser. This should give more people an opportunity to take part, and allow debaters more of a choice in which topics of debate they get to participate in.

this is so kick-ass awesome.......

coooooooooooooool

So unfair though, I'm in a debate about life after death and I have to prove there ISN'T a life after death and I so believe there is one!

Oh well.

Saruman, I noticed the debaters thread is closed. Does this mean that a person who isn't a debater can't become one now?

Also, for the debaters where it says Member, Moderator, Administrator, Debate organiser, etc... , can they have Debater instead of a boring and simple Member tag?

Galor, i'm still waiting for your response bud.
And to your comment that it's unfair that you have to debate that there ISN'T life after death, well, i don't believe there is a life after death, but i have to debate that there IS one! Same with my Loch Ness Monster debate, i don't believe there is one, but i have to debate that there is one hahah.

Saruman, in the future would it be possible to choose what you would like to debate for?

Although in saying that it is actually interesting to debate against what you actually believe, it gives you a nice different viewpoint.

Nevermind Galor, i see you did post.
And another damn good one too. I thought i had you with my first body post there but you blew that out of the water, damnit!

I realize that the 'Debaters List' has been compiled, is there any way to still get involved? if there are any no shows or drop-outs I would like to join in.

well, we have the final list of 20 debaters and once the reg. season is done, we're gonna go into the playoff mode and we'll chose eight winners to go into that. Once the debate champion is crowned, I believe me and Saruman will pick a few who didn't take this board seriously off the list, opening up the door for many new prospects. Since you applied before hand, we'll keep you in mind Chauncy and you'll be the first one added to any new spots. Just gotta wait awhile until the playoffs are over. For right now, we're not accepting any more debaters.

Thats great Saucy thanks Dude!!

well, that's the way I put everything together. I would like to thank my brilliance in putting together debates. I book them better than anyone thus far, but I'm not cocky so i'll stop bragging

I sort of know what everyone has in opinions to certain things and if you're against life after death, you'll probably end up debating for life after death. I'm just that evil. Muhahahahahahahahahahahahahahaahahahahahahahaha (breath) hahahahahahahahahaha!

Saruman - If someone wins a debate, does that make them a Master Debater?

XD sorry couldn't help that one....

I'd Like to Second that

Also your tactfulness in PM's were a bit off

I.e. 1)Rememeber your in a debate, Post Soon
2)Please Post
3)Gonnae post Now
4)Why haven't you posted yet ?

Etc.

If you continue in your role it might be nice to add , "How you doing ?" , "Just a reminder........" "Noticed you hadn't replied in a while" to list a few

its nice to be nice , sometimes

There is actually going to be an overhaul of the way in which the debates are organised and run in the near future, the current system has worked to an extent, but too many debates have remained unfinished, and some even unstarted. All the debates will be moved to an archive subforum soon, and then we'll see about starting over.

Ok sure, thanks, I could certainly use all the help I can get.

might want to set time limits on the debates. That way folks can plan on finishing in a set time frame.

I know all folks don't sit and stare at comp screens all day like me, but if there were a limit it would make for better planning.

If ya need help, I will more than be happy to do whatever I can to assist.

SC

Time limits would be great! I get sick of waiting almost a month between replies, one week should be adequate time to respond..
If there's anything I can do here count me in..

Yes, i'd like a time limit on the debate too.
I'm at fault in this, in my debate 'Life After Death' (which is one post away from completion, shameless plug!) i took over 2 weeks to respond, mainly cause i couldn't get around to it. Even I think that's unacceptable.

oooops i replied to a debate on life after death. My fault for not reading the rules first

I think that on certian topics, only scholastically accepted sources should be used.