Post by bookeditor on Aug 22, 2007 13:03:36 GMT 10
Last night I watched the playoff DAV debates at Caulfield Grammar.
As usual I took a notepad and did my own mock adjudication [unseen to anyone else of course]]. This time I erred in both debates by not managing to reach thew same conclusions as the adjudicator. This is unusual for me; so far I have got the right winners.
In the first debate the topic was "That doctors should not be able to refuse treatment that conflicts with their values". It was a secret topic [1 hr prep] and A grade DAV. John Paul College had the affirmative and Carey Baptist Grammar had the negative.
In a debate where both teams struggled to come to grips with the topic it was the negative team [CBaptist] that managed to consider some relavant points such as the doctor knowing better than the patient due to his or her mecial training. In contrast JP College lapsed into tangents about racism and discrimination in their attempts to argue "that doctors should not be able to refuse treatment that conflicts with their values".
Then I watched Camberwell Grammar debate against St Helena in C grade on the topic "That we should have a moratorium on genetically modified food until it has been proven safe".
This was a better debate than the A grade one. There were good arguments from both sides. Camberwell Grammar [aff] managed to win out tactically by agreeing with the negative that there were benefits but they should not be put ahead of the risks or ethics. Again, I got this decision wrong.
I seem to get a lot of the points ahbout manner, method etc but I don't quite put it all together to reach a cogently argued conclusion. Maybe I should take fewer notes and just let myself think about it a bit more so the debate can "sink in".
I think that there is some hope for me to get better! It's not like other things like mathematical problem solving where I never have a clue what to do.
As usual I took a notepad and did my own mock adjudication [unseen to anyone else of course]]. This time I erred in both debates by not managing to reach thew same conclusions as the adjudicator. This is unusual for me; so far I have got the right winners.
In the first debate the topic was "That doctors should not be able to refuse treatment that conflicts with their values". It was a secret topic [1 hr prep] and A grade DAV. John Paul College had the affirmative and Carey Baptist Grammar had the negative.
In a debate where both teams struggled to come to grips with the topic it was the negative team [CBaptist] that managed to consider some relavant points such as the doctor knowing better than the patient due to his or her mecial training. In contrast JP College lapsed into tangents about racism and discrimination in their attempts to argue "that doctors should not be able to refuse treatment that conflicts with their values".
Then I watched Camberwell Grammar debate against St Helena in C grade on the topic "That we should have a moratorium on genetically modified food until it has been proven safe".
This was a better debate than the A grade one. There were good arguments from both sides. Camberwell Grammar [aff] managed to win out tactically by agreeing with the negative that there were benefits but they should not be put ahead of the risks or ethics. Again, I got this decision wrong.
I seem to get a lot of the points ahbout manner, method etc but I don't quite put it all together to reach a cogently argued conclusion. Maybe I should take fewer notes and just let myself think about it a bit more so the debate can "sink in".
I think that there is some hope for me to get better! It's not like other things like mathematical problem solving where I never have a clue what to do.