I've always wondered why people have a problem with that. It doesn't seem like you are a good person if the only reason you don't sin is because it is illegal. Shouldn't all of the people who believe that something is a sin want it to be legal? After all, the people who would commit sin would then be known. If the only reason you don't sin is because of legal penalty, then you are not very religious. I quite sure the point of several religions is free will. You must be able to sin and get away with it to truly measure the character of someone.

A myth is a story concerning early history that explains a natural or social phenomenon. A mythology is a collection of those myths. Since the bible contains several stories consisting of how the world came to be, reasons why people consider things right and wrong, and similar situations, it is by definition a central text of the Christian mythology. There is no real debate possible here. This is simply a definition.

Or worse. Suppose you believe in any god, but god hates people who believe that a god exists.

No, I just misread the jargon you were talking about in your first comment, but now I'm not confused this time; get it, however, now I realize that I don't care. Energy has nothing to do with the deaths of animals.

Alright, considering you don't think this relates to your argument is proof of your misunderstanding. The amount of energy (i.e. food) needed depends on the level of a particular food chain. If I eat 1000 calories of plants, I require the equivalent of (obviously) 1000 calories of plants. If I eat 1000 calories of meat, I require the equivalent of 10,000 calories of plants. If we assume that more plant production leads to more animal deaths (which is what you assume), then we must assume that a vegetarian diet will lead to less animal deaths by harvesting machinery.

I'll break it down for you one last time using deductive logic:

1. If you have more crop production, you have more animal deaths as a result of crop harvesting. This is the premise that I believe we both agree on. I also assume that the inverse is true: less crops leads to less animal deaths as a result of crop harvesting.

2. Vegetarian diets require less crops than omnivorous diets. This is true as long as the second law of thermodynamics holds true.

_______________________________________

3. Vegetarian diets cause less deaths as a result of crop harvesting.

Vegetarian diets decrease the amount of crop production, decreasing the amount of small animal deaths that you mention in your previous posts, and decrease the amount of those purposeless deaths that you mention you hate so much in your final paragraphs.

An omnivorous diet causes the death of small animals due to agricultural machinery.

A vegetarian diet causes less death of small animals due to agricultural machinery.

Sure, a vegetarian diet will kill some animals as well, but as no individual aspect of animal killing increases and all associated killing decreases, it would be considered a positive aspect of vegetarianism, not hypocrisy.

I fail to see how that is more humane. If we don't eat them, they will die. I'm quite sure if we eat them they die.

How about we just slaughter all of the animals that we have bred for meat as we would normally do, and eat that meat until it runs out? No more animal suffering for new animals that we would otherwise eat, and we switch to a more animal friendly diet.

My point is that it's still hypocritical to be a vegetarian only for the purpose of saving animals.

And I believe that the evidence I've provided counters that point.

Just because a few people have made mere estimates of the numbers of dead animals doesn't mean that there still haven't been around that many animals that died. Saying that is like saying that the 6 million Jews that died in the Holocaust was just an estimate. That doesn't make it any less true that it happened.

I'll concede the majority of this point. I wasn't saying that small animals do not die in large numbers, I'm just saying that the one number offered by one man, Steven Davis, may not be entirely accurate. There is little supporting evidence on this matter, which is not analogous to the Holocaust, which had numerous accounts from numerous people with numerous records taken into account. Just saying that the number you provided is not entirely reliable as it has only been offered as a possible estimate with little backing.

Your second point doesn't matter. The acquisition of land still goes towards the agriculture of plants that vegetarians eat. Therefore, the deaths of the animals during acquisition of land are still on the hands of plant eaters.

I believe you misunderstand. The acquisition of land is a one time event and will not compound into multiple years. If the amount of land used remains stagnant (demand does not increase) so the amount of deaths will decrease. If the demand for meat does not increase, the amount of animal deaths will still stay the same. More animals will die while eating animals.

Perhaps not all animals are pampered for slaughter. Most, on the other hand, are not abused. The fact that some are has nothing to do with meat eaters, it has to do with the idiot employees and companies that harm the animals. Plant eaters, on the other hand, are responsible for the deaths of little animals due to the fact that farmers and their giant machinery cannot prevent themselves from the killing the animals. The meat companies can prevent animal suffering in their industry, which makes it their fault. The farmers can't, meaning the demand for the crops is responsible.

Now you are talking more about what should be as oppose to what actually is. Farmers could be more careful about causing animal deaths and meat employees could be more humane. The point is moot. If we talk about what could be in terms of food production, it doesn't matter, as both issues could be solved for either way.

Your last point is irrelevant as well. Animals eat crops that we grow with our energy, yes, but if the whole country was vegetarian, then we would be using as much energy feeding people crops as we are using it now to feed animals. Duh.

Apparently you do not understand the basics of energy transfer, even though I clearly pointed them out for you in my argument above. The amount of crops needed to support a vegetarian lifestyle is about ten times less than a fully carnivorous lifestyle. Obviously an omnivorous lifestyle would fall in between, but a omnivorous lifestyle requires more death of animals due to normal crop farming than a vegetarian lifestyle would.

Stop drinking the red Coo-laid of PETA and eat some animals you hypocrite. Unless you're only doing it for your own health. In which case, good for you, it's a great choice for your health. But if you're trying to 'save the animals', well, stop. You're not helping anything except your ego.

I feel as if you are simply name-calling now and have no real substantive arguments. All you really wish to do is deflect my points and link me to an organization whose affiliation I have not expressed. I am simply reading into this under the principle of least harm: less harm comes to animals overall from a vegetarian diet. If you like animals of any kind, the vegetarian diet is for you.

I believe that the points you make are slightly misguided.

First, your idea that millions of little animals die every year during crop harvests is slightly skewed. First, it is not a definite number and is simply some guy's estimate:

"Davis admits he doesn't really know how many animals are lost each year to agriculture, but he suspects it runs in the millions. Not many farmers do a before-and-after survey, so the best data are really just estimates."

Second, that number, as mentioned in the above quote refers to agriculture as a whole, not simply harvesting. This includes the one time acquisition of land for farming purposes. Further, since most kills are a result of land acquisition for farming (few animals would be around after their habitat has been shifted), it is only a one time deal instead of a continuous slaughtering of animals for human consumption.

Third, your idea that animals are pampered for meat harvesting is clearly missing some inside looks into the meat farms across many industrialized nations.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FBKeYXgm_w

The above link shows an example of a pig farm in the United States. I would hardly call something like that pampering animals. The killing portion is often considered painless, but the possess prior to is hardly to be considered a good life.

Other point to look at

Guess what! Animals that humans harvest for food need to eat crops as well. Further, due to the loss of energy of trophic levels, animals will need ten times more farmed crops than a human will need to produce the same amount of energy (I'm not sure about exact numbers, but the amount of crops consumed will definately be larger if we eat meat instead of not).

I really enjoyed reading your argument and found that it was rather well informed. However, I feel as if you are making a rather faulty assumption that is only a possibility when it comes to giving children allowances.

Introduction

You appear to link allowance and "non-essentials." This link is not necessary. It appears that if parents provide allowance as compensation for chores (i.e. the child's "job") and this allowance covers "essentials" (bus money, lunch money, etc.) then it bypasses the major force of your argument. Further, it teaches children valuable lessens in finance management. Sure, the child can use the money to purchase some non-essential thing, but then he or she would need to walk 3-miles to school instead of taking the bus.

Children tend to learn best by simply messing up, feeling the consequences, and eventually learning the proper decision. Obviously, it is good to discus the proper decisions with children, but if they choose to disobey that guidance, they will understand the consequences. If children never see or feel the real consequences of mismanagement of money, they will never grow to fully understand it. If they are the rare breed that is good with money from the start, then good for them. If not, then they will learn through their consequences, good and bad.

Just to clarify and add to that point, I'll respond based on the above idea:

It'll give kids the idea that they don't normally have to help out around the house

In the above provided scenario, children do need to help around the house. Sure, they don't need to help, but the alternative is not exactly positive for them.

If they didn't have to work for the money, they wouldn't understand its true value.

Not much to say, considering they do work for the money in their own way through chores.

Kids have no financial responsibilities, so every penny they get is money that they can spend on whatever they like

I'd disagree with the no portion of that statement. Properly delegated like the example above, children can be given financial responsibilities (such as dealing with transportation to and from school, lunch at school, etc.). They are not big, but they can be given some financial responsibilities that will teach them the value of money. Since they have financial responsibilities, they need to spend it on necessary things.

Conclusion

While your joint decision making idea does hold some ground, it does not provide a child with even simulated responsibility. While speaking with children about the importance of financial responsibility is a good thing, providing them with experiences is also relevant.

Meh, I'll be a pedant, but it is really important to me!

Marriage is a religious institution (or social if that works for you)

Alright, I've been criticized much for caring a great deal about language, but this is a big one that slightly annoys me. Religious have often claimed ownership over religion, and even if this is incorrect, the government is needlessly entangled itself with this either religious or societal institution. This creates an annoying and hotly debated issue. If this can be avoided, it should be.

Alternative: Broad title of "civil unions" for all legal partnerships

I never understood the coveted nature of marriage, but many people feel that it is necessary to protect it as a government practice. I disagree. It should be destroyed and dismantled in place of domestic partnerships (or whatever you wish to call them). Marriage has too much baggage associated with it, and should be dismantled as a government institution. Having both a societal and governmental institution by the same name (e.g.marriage) creates too many annoyances and should be rejected in terms of "civil unions" or whatever term is deemed appropriate.

You sort of brought up a couple of important points:

First: Should Obama’s Nobel Prize be taken away?

Absolutely not. I doubt anyone has ever had their Nobel Prize taken away. This is not because the committee is so great at delegating awards, it is simply because there is most likely no process for retracting awards. Obama is not the first undeserving person to receive (or be nominated for) a Nobel Peace Prize. Generally, I do not think someone should be awarded while being involved in two wars, but to retract a Nobel Prize is a bit off. Granted, he should never have gotten it in the first place.

Second: Obama is bombing the hell out of bombing the hell out of innocent civilians in Libya.

Erm, where did you here that? First of all, this is not just Obama involved in this air campaign: it is much of the international community. Second, civilian casualties are unfortunately part of the principle of double-effect. Many people believe that Libya massacring their own people should be stopped, and unfortunately, it will involve some civilian casualties, but no one is currently bombing the hell out of anyone, especially civilians.

Erm, no? What type of uninformed individual would believe such a thing. I am also skeptical that anyone believes that in any capacity. Where did you hear such a foolish statement?

There is a reason why there are two ways of debate in createdebate.com the for/against debate can be used in some circumstances while a perspective debate allows multiple sides. Some real-life debates can only be two-sided. At the end of the day in the United States Congress, congresspersons must vote on a certain bill for or against a certain topic. Sometimes perspective debates are rather unnecessary, so a for/against debate is more than adequate.

I do not exactly know what absolute libertarianism is, so I cannot comment, but I will simplify my previous post.

First, government is composed (simply) of two parts, economics and politics. Nearly any economic formula (capitalism, socialism, a mix, etc.) can be paired with a political one (libertarian, totalitarian, a mix, etc.). Therefore, a quick assumption about socialism, capitalism, totalitarianism, and libertarianism would neglect a possible pairing.

Second, socialism as an economic theory advocates for the communal ownership of capital. Who owns this capital depends on the type of political system used. When paired with totalitarianism, you get Stalin's Russia, where the government owns all of the capital. However, when paired with libertarianism (or more simply every individual as the political leader) you get social libertarianism, where every individual owns the capital.

I am sorry that I cannot simplify this issue any further. In one line, I would say that Socialism is not a singular philosophy and stretches far beyond what the average individual believes.

This is the difference between individual freedom and governmental. The Constitutions first amendment is meant to protect the people from governmental attacks on religion, speech, and press. The actions of individuals on other individuals is not outlined by the through religious law. Your ideology about an Islamic individual with a hijab can be equated to a Christian with a cross. Now, the Capital building in Texas should not be affiliated with any religion. It would be equally horrid to have it supported by the five pillars of Islam in comparison to the 10 Commandments.

I shall personally help you with tracking down and torturing the next person who starts a debate of a religious nature after you have been tracked down and tortured for creating this debate, which is of a religious nature.

In other words if you're engineering a virus, you make sure that at least 50% of the population cannot be affected, and you do this by selecting for an allele that only occurs in 50% of the population.

First, would this facet destroy the randomness contention that you suggested in your initial argument about the randomness of a bio-weapon on the species. Isn't the ability to select these 50% of the population deny the ideology of randomness?

Second, though I do not advocate for it, I do not understand what is the issue with human extinction. Are humans not create an adverse affect on the biosphere and the species sheltered within? Would it not be beneficial if the plague you suggested sterilized the entire human population and left humanity to die out?

Socialism is an economic philosophy, and they need not even have a ruler. In the base form, socialism is defined as collective economic control. This can take place in almost type of government: a monarch, elected officials, or the people can control the wealth. There need not be a state to perform the actions that socialism calls for.

Anarchism is a political philosophy that focuses (quite broadly) on the abolition of the state. Social anarchism, a society with a socialist economic framework and a anarchist political framework, is a legitimate ideology.

Anarchy and socialism are not mutually exclusive. In fact, some instances may have the two working quite successfully to bring about a more united, collectivist society.

Original post: how make hawiies volcanos go rampant by makeing a nuke explode about a mile under them?

Rephrase: Regarding your idea about creating a landmass in the Pacific Ocean, how do you suppose we would do this? Do you mean, for instance, we cause Hawaii's volcanoes to erupt via the detonation of nuclear weapons beneath them?

I have to agree with the base of the statement. If one commits a crime, the person is still a criminal and should be punished as such. I do, however, believe that some instances require convicted individuals be released. If, for instance, it is declared not within the jurisdiction of the government to prosecute these individuals based on a certain law, they should be released as they had no right to be there in the first place.

In the case of this argument, it is clearly within the jurisdiction of the government to regulate certain substances, so the inmates should not be released.

The original framing of the issue presented only freedom as a general thought. It says "live free." Socialism only might hinder economic freedom in some regard. The fact that Socialism does not hinder other freedoms is relevant to this topic. We do not have to choose between living free or socialist.

I will add then:

The Antarctic sponge has been shown to live over 1,550 years

My favorite quote about superiority and evolution has to be this one:

"If you think that a dog is more highly evolved than a Prochlorococcus bacterium, do the experiment. Take them both out and drop them in the middle of the Sargasso Sea and see which one survives."

Superiority is quite difficult to measure, and most organisms have their own advancements. Just because we have ours does not make us "superior."

The debate asks if we should live free or die a socialist. It gives two distinct that have two changes. A non bias topic title would be "Should we be socialist or free." By adding live and die, it slants the debate and prevents objectivity.

Next, the debate never puts emphasis on economic freedom; it only states freedom. As Akulakhan points out, freedom is bifurcated into some parts: mainly social and economic. Economic freedom is always hindered in some way, such as by the government or by institutions. I find that it is nigh impossible to have full economic freedom as someone controls the money in some way. Something I found quite funny is that libertarian socialism does exist. Socialism is not what most people think it is.

See Akulakhan post for a nice response on freedom.

[sarc]It is a good thing this debate is not bias[/sarc]

Who stated that we cannot be free and socialist at the same time? Obviously based on the choices asked in the title, living is generally better than dieing, but I am confused with this idea that we have to choose between socialism and freedom. There is not a single doctrine in pure socialism that dictates people cannot be free.

So do most cells in my body. Each cell in my body has the potential for life. They each have 46 human chromosomes, and with proper culturing can become a full human. However, it is not illegal for me to kill some of my cells. Every day, over a hundred million sperm cells that could become a human die each day, and thank God that is not a issue with the law.

Yes, it is. A fetus is, by definition, "an unborn or unhatched vertebrate in the later stages of development" If the fetus has not been born, it is still a fetus. The fetal stage of growth occurs after the embryonic stage and will continue until birth.

Definition is from Word Web

From Word Net - Murder: "unlawful premeditated killing of a human being by a human being "

First, if abortion were legal, it would not be murder because it would not be unlawful.

Second, a fetus is not a human being and cannot be held under the context of murder.

Considering your second premise is incorrect, your logic is not sound.

Human beings are complex evolved creatures

Just for the record, so are almost every living creature in the entire planet. Millions of years of evolution have brought most creatures to a high level of complexity, and every organism is the pinnacle of evolution.

who are accorded rights on the basis that they are able to think and to feel pain.

Please define think. Thinking is a quite complex and covers a wide variety of concepts. Man is the only creature that thinks in some regards, and very few animals have been proven to have conscious

thought. Obviously animals have some realm of thought (an ability to interpret chemical signals), but it is too much of a broad category to award rights without specification.

Therefore non-human animals should also be accorded rights to lead a free healthy life

Due to your reasoning (that rights should be awarded based on pain and thinking), should animals that do not posses these attributes be awarded rights? How about plants? Is there a bright line or threshold to this argument?

From Mayo - "Anorexia nervosa isn't really about food. It's an unhealthy way to try to cope with emotional problems. When you have anorexia nervosa, you often equate thinness with self-worth."

The issue with this plan is that it pretends that anorexia is some sort of issue that involves food. It is not that simple. The fear transcends most simplistic ideas about eating. It is a deeply ingrained psychological concern. Force-feeding does not solve for this deeper problem.

Most issues are beyond the scope of simple food. Many issues involve the individuals idea of self-image, which cannot be changed through force-feeding. The price of ignoring deeper causation is continuance.

I wanted to add that even though he did make the major screw up with slavery and the Dred Scott case which caused him to inadvertently(?) raise slave tensions as well as allow slavery to gain greater control through the admittance of Kansas as a slave state, his mistakes continued far past that.

During the time of secession, Buchanan decided that secession was illegal, but the federal government can do nothing about it. I imagine him as the cowering man in the corner begging the South not to secede.

As gcomeau pointed out, I made a slight mistake with noun-adjective grammar (much to my own embarrassment). A fetus is not a human. A fetus is no more human than one of my skin cells. Each of my skin cells are human, but they are not a human. Same with a fetus. I made a simple terminology mix up.

Sorry about that. I made a little noun-adjective mix up there. My usual response is that a fetus is human, so I accidentally minced my words. You did say what I originally meant, though. Thanks for the correction.

A fetus is a homo sapien sapien, just like the current species of humans are.

1. Show me these documents about this world-wide flood.

2. I am assuming you mean that the flood was some time ago (over 2000 years ago, before the birth of Jesus).

3. How does a man in Saudi Arabia, or South Africa, or China, or wherever the heck they live know that a flood is world-wide without effective ways to image the Earth's surface? When an individual noticed a relatively large flood, could they not have been mistaken and exaggerated the account?

I feel like having some fun, so I disagree with you there. Economic collapse is the only thing that can save us from an eventual disaster and mass death.

In the status quo there exists complex societies (such as the United States) whose sole purpose is to grow and increasingly innovate in fields across the world. The entire purpose is to sustain the complexity and growth of the civilization that we live in. However, nearly every large civilization in history has collapsed for this reason. The civilization became unable to cope with the increased need for innovation and could no longer support itself. As a civilization develops, it becomes increasingly fragile. Our civilization will eventually collapse, so we should take it out now.

Next, with a collapse of the economy, individuals will shift their ideologies to a more conservationist mindset. This will force individuals into smaller, less complex settlements. People will not have the capital they once had and will be forced to rely on their environment. This will cause massive environmental restorations

Further, continued growth inevitably leads to increased warming. Economic growth in intrinsically linked to the greenhouse gas emission problem, and it is one that threatens the existence of the biosphere. Further growth along this trend will inevitably lead to critical levels of greenhouse gas emissions and eventually become a tipping point in food supply and biodiversity. The shift to self-sustaining civilizations that will result from economic collapse will prevent the issue of global warming and environmental deconstruction.

Finally, economic growth is the root cause of poverty and exploitation of lesser developed countries. This is what always happens in the world: the richer countries exploit the poor countries. The wonders of the world economy perpetuated by United States supremacy has led to undoubted exploitation of countries within the periphery. This results in the enormous amounts of resource disparities that exist within the world's countries.

So, what has this entire health-care plan brought us? It has led to the prevention of economic collapse. Obama's change is not one to be hoped for as he is going to be doing much to good of a job. We need someone, such as Sarah Palin, as President in order to quickly collapse the economy and lead to an overall better world.

((Looks up Man, was I feeling nihilistic or what?))

I do recognize that I tend to take an incredibly focused approach to many topics (occasionally a single word in a serious topic causes me to switch sides), but I find that proper wording is incredibly essential to a coherent debate and argument. I find that deconstruction on any ground has its uses. For instance, this debate has a rather trivial basis: is there really any importance in these down-votes? The differentiation between dislike and hate, however, was brought into light. Maybe next time someone constructs a topic, the individual puts some more thought into word choice.

If I can make an individual think about an issue more closely, which results in a more well constructed debate, a purpose has been served, and I believe, regardless of the topic, I have been successful.

I dislike it, but I would not say I hate it. For me to hate something, it needs to actually have a degree of importance. The down-vote has no real negative effect on me. I do not hate it when people do that; I simply disagree with it.

Exactly, these words (mutations, adaptions, evolution) are so used interchangeably that they confuse the lay person.

Just for everyone's sake, I will put these in the proper hierarchy based on current science's understanding of evolution: Evolution is the change of inheritable traits through successive generations. The change in inheritable traits is usually the result of mutations. These mutations can both help and hinder a population's ability to survive and reproduce. The ones that help in certain ways are referred to as adaptations. These adaptations do not result to help a population, but help purely from coincidence. Populations that lack enough adaptations most likely die it. This process is referred to as natural selection.

Mutations always result in a loss of genetic information, or are neutral.

I hate to break it to you, but this statement is incorrect. Mutations result in a gain, loss, or no-net of genetic information. Huntington's disease and Myotonic dystrophy are both illnesses that result from a tri-nucleotide repeat, which is a mutation. Too many codons are added in a certain area resulting in a dangerous increase in genetic information.

I agree with that statement. I was disputing that the person above stated that because nothing cannot turn into something, there must have been a creator. However, this neglects two concepts: one is that matter always existed, and the other is that its creation is beyond our understanding.

The individual above my disputed post stated an absolutism statement. Just because a creator is a viable alternative does not mean it is the only alternative.

The universe is so vast and there is so much out there that we still don't know that I am always amazed at how arrogant some people are in claiming they know the origins of man.

I love this statement. It reminds me how arrogant many people are and how numerous individuals misunderstand the scientific credo. The beauty of science is that proof does not exist. Science merely attempts to develop possible explanation, and it never takes things as true. I flashback to fifth-grade science fair when we had to develop a report for our experiments. At the end, we had to state whether our experiment supported our hypothesis, not if the experiment confirmed it.

Though I trust gravity with my life, I also recognize that human perceptions of it may be off. That evolution that I observed the other day in E.coli is not proof, but only one possibility. Anyone who follows an absolutism framework towards science is not a scientist in my eyes.

As for the major "What if..." question that this debate centers around, there is no concrete way to support a hypothesis that states, "God did [insert thing here]." However, a scientist should state that he or she has nothing against that statement. It should hold possibility like any other statement. Lack of evidence to support a hypothesis is not evidence against it.

Finally, what many creationists and evolutionist individuals who argue need to remember that interpretation of holy books like the Bible is quite complicated. The book of Genesis clearly states seven days to create the world, but that does not confirm or deny anything. Who are we to determine what a day is to God? If humans believe God to be all-powerful, then he can do what he damn well please (such as substitute day for several billion or million years or create the process of evolution). Since there is no real way to support (or not support) the existence or power of God, then there is no real way to answer such a question about God.

The amazing ability that has been bestowed upon humans is the ability to think. Someone who puts their trust in the bible has the same rights as someone who puts their trust in science: the right to think. Evolution as suggested by modern science neither confirms nor denies the existence of a deity or the concept of creationism.

Loop your own logic: if nothing cannot turn into something, then how did this creator come into existence.

Your answer would need to be "it always existed"

That is the point of matter: it has always existed.

A near miss is when an object misses another, but are relatively close. What type of miss was it? One that was near. It is a near miss. As to say, it is a near miss as oppose to a far miss. I have illustrated my point with the complex diagram in the link.

This is where we agree on some ground. I feel that I have no moral obligation to protect an individual who has committed a crime. The issue is the position of the bright line.

Where is the bright line between suspect and criminal?

Until that question can be answered, issues with torture are much more plentiful. Obviously, the scenario you gave shows an individual as an obvious criminal, but sometimes it is not that simple.

I tend to shy away from the word suspects in this debate. I will put aside the morality argument as it will get nowhere.

No one should torture a suspect for information.

There are two properties to be weighed in performing an action such as torture: definite harm and potential harm. Definite harm is the harm you will directly inflict upon a suspect and will undoubtedly happen. Potential harm is the harm that will result from not retrieving the information. The issue with potential harm is that gaining the tools to prevent that is purely a matter of chance. If you catch a suspect in a murder investigation and torture him for information, the harm you inflicted upon him or her is real and definite, but the suspect may have no useful information, resulting in an irrelevant potential harm.

At the end of the day, the interrogator may go home saying, "Well that was useless, and I just [expletive]ed up someones life."

Let me clarify my position. The law does become incredibly weak during wartime, but it is never silent.

The law is never mute. It is always kicking, screaming, and telling us to stop acting like a bunch of uncivilized idiots. Whenever issues of law breakage during war occur, some important individual or collection of individuals will condemn the breaking: this is the law yelling at us. Even if the condemnation falls on deaf ears, the law was not silent; we were just not listening to it.

I tend to always resent those statements that states that being in the kitchen is not a job. The classic housewife is generally not a lazy and immobile individual. Being "home with the kids" is not an easy task. Further, the quote is not sexist. It simply is creating a division of labor, which is not really sexist. Creating a schism between sexes is not really sexist if the work involved is equal. A housewife is not doing less than a woman in work since the work involved may be great indeed. Stating that one sex is more proficient in a certain activity, as I believe the quote above states, is not sexist.

You failed to answer my contention regarding your importance in the entire debate community, not just this site. Individuals tend to get angry in many debates unrelated to this site. Ergo, you have absolutely no importance to this topic.

Further, I doubt that individuals would be stupid enough to strive for a thing of such quasi-importance as points to such a degree that would generate an angry response.

EDIT: If you were referring to me as being angry, I am not. I rarely become genuinely angry during a debate.

I find that this comment is both irrelevant and incorrect. For one, many debates exist without your presence, so it can be easily inferred that you are not the reason for anger for many people in the world. You are not the center of the debate community and many people could not care less about you, so do not equate yourself to greater causation.

The reason that individuals frequently get angered during debates is for two reasons for two defined instances. One is shown above in superiority, but I would suspect this only occurs for individuals who are alienated from their topic and arguments. I have noticed this, but will not comment on this as it is discussed above. I have observed, and hope that this is the usual case, that much anger results from actual care about an issue.

During a debate on a touchy subject, an individual may feel threatened when an opposing debater makes an argument that they find to ignore key points that were brought up. If, for instance, I am arguing pro-life and an individual makes a comment on how a fetus is not living, I may feel threatened by the idea, and that threat may eventually evolve into anger. This may result from one side feeling that the other is insensitive to a certain idea, through truth or misconception. However, passion is never a bad thing in debate. As long as it is directed properly, it can be a useful tool in argumentation.

I disagree with your definition of devil's advocate. A devil's advocate need not agree with the belief, but argues it anyway. One does not need to be against the belief, but the person picks the side not for beliefs, but for argument's sake.

However, you are correct. The devil's portion is figurative and is irrelevant to an atheist's beliefs.