Interfaith Forums is dedicated to giving all its members the opportunity to share their thoughts and experiences, and most importantly to learn. Learning requires that we become acquainted with alternative points of view, and societies have been getting more civilized primarily through debating issues, in newspapers, on television, in schools and boardrooms, in parliaments and congresses, and now online.

Tragically, the art of effective debating is being lost, in part because television sound bites have convinced us all that the issues are brief, the answers not really debatable. The worst problems can be resolved in 30 minutes, less commercial time!

Not true! Everything of importance to humanity is open to debate, and will not suffer because of it.

Constructive debate is not easy, but can be greatly improved with a few rules and guidelines.

The first and foremost of these guidelines is that not everything is always open for debate. Private, faith-based beliefs may be shared but not debated, unless the holder of the belief specifically states that there are reasons for their belief that they would be comfortable debating. Remember, what the writers of the Bible translated as "faith" is most often from the Greek "pistis," which much more closely approximates "trust." Trust is something that one gives of one's own accord, for reasons generally known only to oneself, and therefore should not generally be challenged. These topics are better shared and discussed on the General Discussion Forum "Spirituality."

Other important debating guidelines are:

1. Be clear. Don’t use terms that may be interpreted differently by different people. Words like “conservative” and “liberal,” for example, are really interpreted quite a number of ways.
2. Provide evidence for your points, bearing in mind that quoting somebody else that you assume to be an authority does not constitute evidence.
3. Leave out the emotional words, and ad hominem arguments. No racial, ethnic or religious slurs or hate allowed, or even at groups you think your opponent might belong to.
4. List of common fallacies that should not be used:
   • Ad hominem: an attack on the person. Stick to the argument and leave the person out of it.
   • Post hoc ergo propter hoc: causality, or "B came after A, therefore it was caused by A
   • Strawman: creating an easily refuted position, and then attributing it to your opponent
   • Regression to the mean and other statistical fallacies: in fact, statistics are generally best avoided, because your opponent will always find other ones
   • Excluded middle: the assumption that only one position or the other can be true, and that there is no middle ground
   • Special pleading: applying a principle to all others while excluding oneself or ones argument, without adequate reason
   • Begging the question: somehow including the conclusion one hopes to prove from an argument in one of the premises
   • Non sequitur: it doesn't follow - a comment which has no relation to the comment it follows
   • Etc.
5. Avoid innuendo.
6. Be sure of your facts. You’ll be killed by your opponent if you quote as fact something that can easily be shown to be incorrect. Sources are extremely important.
7. Listen to and respond to your opponent. Don’t go off on a tangent, answer their argument. Otherwise, they will rightly lose interest. If your opponent makes a point that you disagree with, acknowledge the point, then clearly show why you disagree.
8. Organize your response, with a beginning, middle and end.

So come on! Join the debate. Every careful discussion in which people share and learn increases the general world store of knowledge, and that's a good thing!

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evangelicalhumanist: Greek "eu"=good and "angelos"=messenger. Spreading the good news of Humanism.