Quotes About Debate

Wilderness areas are first of all a series of sanctuaries for the primitive arts of wilderness travel, especially canoeing and packing. I suppose some will wish to debate whether it is important to keep these primitive arts alive. I shall not debate it. Either you know it in your bones, or you are very, very old.

Sometimes, however, a man can grasp this without being a great metaphysician, when he is still fresh to the problem; and it is only by discussing it, and hearing it discussed, that he becomes incapable of understanding it.

To judge from the conduct of the opposite parties, we shall be led to conclude that they will mutually hope to evince the justness of their opinions, and to increase the number of their converts by the loudness of their declamations and the bitterness of their invectives.

we are not always sure that those who advocate the truth are influenced by purer principles than their antagonists.

Who shall decide when doctors disagree?

An American cannot converse, but he can discuss, and his talk falls into a dissertation. He speaks to you as if he was addressing a meeting; and if he should chance to become warm in the discussion, he will say Gentlemen to the person with whom he is conversing.

Governmental intervention and personal responsibility are not mutually exclusive issues, but they do frame a 'do it ourselves' vs. 'what are you doing for us' debate. For the black community, that's a debate that's been raging at least as far back as the W.E.B. Du Bois, Booker T. Washington philosophical grudge matches.

Health care has become a political football that is being tossed back and forth by both sides in Washington. And it's divided our country.

What passes for real debate in Washington often seems more like an echo chamber, with politicians talking at politicians.

It's a sad indication of where Washington has come, where policy differences almost necessarily become questions of integrity. I came to Washington in the late '70s, and people had the ability in the past to have intense policy differences but didn't feel the need to question the other person's character.

Healthy debate has been replaced by automatic sensors that eliminate the need for actual talking during a filibuster - a la 'Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.' Robust debate is necessary in a democratic society. Instead, our discourse has been relegated to media spin by expert entertainers.

One thing I will commit to the people of Ohio is, when I'm a U.S. senator and there's issues being debated in Washington, when I'm a U.S. senator they'll know exactly what my position is.

It is hard to see taxing plastic bags as one of the great issues of our time that merits the foremost place in our finest statesmen's minds. It is an absurd little issue, a picayune proportion of household waste, and a pointless inconvenience in people's lives.

This country has wasted too many years pretending it had the luxury of debating climate change.

I would be with a bunch of Kennedy fans watching the debate, and their comment would be, 'He's really slaughtering Nixon.' Then we would all go to another apartment, and the Nixon fans would say, 'How do you like the shellacking he gave Kennedy?'

What we owe future generations is the subject of growing debate by economists, philosophers, ethicists, public policymakers, and academics of all stripes. But for me as a mother, the moral implications are very clear. We owe them clean air and fresh water, a healthy planet and a secure future.

Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled.

Deliberation and debate is the way you stir the soul of our democracy.

Be able to defend your arguments in a rational way. Otherwise, all you have is an opinion.

We cannot be so scared that our ideas or opinions will not survive being tested. If you are afraid of being wrong, then you might not have a good argument.

We cannot sway extremists with rational thought or with our ideas of right and wrong.

There is too much disagreement for disagreement's sake. In a time of persistent challenges that still call into question our most sacred aspirations as a country, we cannot afford shallow callous divisiveness in our public debate.

Orators are most vehement when their cause is weak.

Sadly, I have found that even evolution's most staunch believers are afraid to debate, because they know that their case for atheism and evolution is less than extremely weak.