I always thought it was fair for Cure Zone not to take sides in debates. Has that changed now too?

It hasn't been changed.

Cure Zone is not taking sides in debates.
Cure Zone moderators (and curezone readers through voting system) will be evaluating your messages.

There are two major ways to evaluate debate presentation ( forum messages in this case).
- One is to evaluate it in light of the strength of the arguments.
- The other is to evaluate essential skills in debating.


CureZone moderators will be evaluating debates, and suggesting what messages to be marked with R.
I will review messages, and some of them will then get an R.


It is important to understand that in most debates there is no winner. Nobody is 100% right all time. Some people are 100% right some time. Some people are 100% right most of the times. In similar debates, your skills and your ability to present your case are evaluated.


Evaluating Skills

Your skills are evaluated on several analytical categories such as: analysis, evidence, reasoning, organization, and delivery.


Analysis
"Analysis" is concerned with the analysis of the proposition. The judge must ask: Did the person present important issues relevant to the subject? Did he find strong arguments to support his position and to refute the opponent's position?
How well prepared did the debater seem to be?


Evidence:
"Evidence" is rated high if the person presented strong evidence in abundance. It is also rated high if the person effectively attacked the opponent's evidence or defended his own evidence. Evidence includes experts' opinion, examples (facts), and statistics, usually quoted from books and articles. Evidence can also be a claim established in a debate or a claim made by the opponent's.
The judge must ask: How successful was the debater at presenting supporting evidence? How successful was the debater at refuting the opponent's evidence?


Reasoning:
"Reasoning" is concerned with the ability to connect evidence and claim. The judge must ask: Did the person give a logical explanation about how the conclusion is drawn from the evidence? "Reasoning" is rated low if the speaker committed logical fallacies such as hasty generalization, appeal to emotion, appeal to ridicule, bandwagon, confusing cause and effect, red herring, straw man ...

Organization:
"Organization" is good if you can easily follow the flow of arguments in the presentation. It is also good if the presentation has effectively labeled arguments (distinctive arguments). It is also concerned with the allocation of space within the presentation.
How articulate was the debater?

Delivery
"Delivery" looks at the quality of overall presentation skills, vitality/energy of presentation, refraining from personal attacks, ignoring personal attacks, persuasiveness


Ethical Consideration

Common unethical practices such as personal attacks, name calling, fabricating and distorting evidence .... will get you quickly closed out from a debate forum.



A person taking a part in debate, will get positive points based on her/his ability to debate.
Positive points are gained on:

Organization of Initial Case
- Structure of the message?
- Introduction (importance of topic [rhetorical situation], logical flow, statement of prop., preview of claims) ?
- Body (identify main points, follow an intelligible pattern,)?
- Transitions (follow logically, contain internal summaries) ?
- Conclusion (closure, ties everything together, ends with a punch!) ?




Content of Initial Case
- Position has been thoroughly researched, professionalism?
- Relevance of the contents?
- Clarity of the contents (Presentation of logically structured argument, Logical, Rational Position & Conclusions?
- Use of evidence (relevant, amount, quality, cited, strategically deployed, explained when necessary) ?
- Powerful reasoning overall? Effective Reasoning in Position?
- Absence of mere opinion (e.g., no unsupported claims or conjecture) ?
- Anticipated counter-arguments?
- Demonstrated solid knowledge of other side?


Refutation / Rebuttal
- Quality of the rebuttal?
- Identified appropriate arguments/claims to refute (did not respond to insignificant claims/points, made strategic decisions and identified points of clash)?
- Ability to Successfully Refute Other Team’s Position / Arguments?
- Responsiveness to questions/openness ( Directly and skillfully refuted or responded to major counter-arguments/claims )?
- Used space wisely: immediate and direct response with no filler information?


Delivery Overall
- Quality of overall presentation skills?
- Vitality/Energy of Presentation?
- Refrained from personal attack?
- Ignored those who directed personal attacks?
- Persuasiveness?



Negative points are gained on:

- personal attacks
- poor reasoning, poor logic, logical fallacies
- unresponsiveness to questions
- lack of basic knowledge on the subject of debate
- attempts to turn one subject debate into a totally different subject (pushing and twisting Abortion Debate into Iraq war debate)


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