Quotes About Debate

When 99% of the world's scientists agree that burning fossil fuels is adversely affecting the planet, and 10,883 out of 10,885 peer-reviewed papers confirm it, and yet a United States Senator steps on to the floor and attempts to rebut the facts by holding up a snowball, we have officially entered The Shithead Zone. But

Arguing with a dead man in a lavatory is a claustrophobic experience.

In some respect Journalism is like science, the best ideas were one that survived and strengthened by opposition.

At moments of important decision-making, the mind could be considered as a parliament, a debating chamber. Different factions contended, short- and long-term interests were entrenched in mutual loathing. Not only were motions tabled and opposed, certain proposals were aired in order to mask others. Sessions could be devious as well as stormy.

The reason he wouldn't be drawn into political or even theological debate was that he was indifferent to other people's opinions and felt no urge to engage with or oppose them.

Many young people now end a discussion with the supposedly definitive and unanswerable statement that such is their opinion, and their opinion is just as valid as anyone else's. The fact is that our opinion on an infinitely large number of questions is not worth having, because everyone is infinitely ignorant.

Our young people - and adults - should be aware that considerable dissent exists in the scientific world regarding the validity of molecules-to-man evolution.

I always set out to tell a good story, to create a character that young people can relate to, place them in a situation that will be interesting, intriguing, eventually suspenseful. But what I find is that after I do that, then there are themes that emerge, which teachers can then use to provoke discussion and debate.

Having spent a number of my younger years with trade-union parents attending NUT annual conferences, I feel comfortable with an agenda in my hand and a procedural format for debate.

When you have the facts on your side, argue the facts. When you have the law on your side, argue the law. When you have neither, holler.

If you like to argue just for the sake of being contentious, you shouldn't pick a job based on this unresolved emotional issue of yours, you should get counseling for it.

What can you do against the lunatic who is more intelligent than yourself, who gives your arguments a fair hearing and then simply persists in his lunacy?

I have founded Khudi, in Pakistan, a youth movement which tries to counter extremist ideology through healthy discussion and debate.

One of my favorite things on YouTube is the famous 1965 debate between James Baldwin and William F. Buckley at Cambridge University.

The mark, to me, of a constructive argument is one that looks at a specific problem and says, 'What shall we do about this?' And a nonconstructive one is one that tries to label people.

Frequently the more trifling the subject, the more animated and protracted the discussion.

When we can commit a crime, we can also trigger debate. Cases go to courts. Media start covering the cases. But once you build smart environments where, if you meet a certain probabilistic profile, you won't even be allowed to board a bus, let alone commit a crime, we're perpetuating existing laws so they face no challenges or revision.

Trigger warnings are part of the West's debauchery of self-indulgent victimhood.

I never doubted that our parliamentarians would vote to trigger article 50 but I expected a detailed, pragmatic debate around the options of how to execute Brexit and the processes involved.

If you believe in democracy, you accept, by definition, the existence and triumph of opposing ideas. The people who believe deeply in the Internet's force as a commons operate on that kind of premise.

Preaching to the choir actually arms the choir with arguments and elevates the choir's discourse. There's a reason the right does it and does it well and triumphs.

During a time of war, we ask our troops to give their best even to the point of sacrificing their own lives. When compared against that, how much of a sacrifice is it for a president to engage in a possibly contentious debate with Congress about whether military action is a good idea?

The trouble with our Liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.

But it is no good using the tongs of reason to pull the Fundamentalists' chestnuts out of the fire of contradiction. Their real troubles lie elsewhere.