[Debatewise RRT] Re: late debates (again)
- From: astha alang <astha_alang@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <debatewiserrt@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 3 Dec 2009 12:59:45 +0000
Dear Alex,
I am very sorry but I will not be able to do any debate till the 20th of
December as I am travelling out of country for official work.
Best,
Astha
From: alex@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To: debatewiserrt@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [Debatewise RRT] Re: late debates (again)
Date: Thu, 3 Dec 2009 11:57:06 +0000
Hi,
I agree with David here the main problem is time. Finding the 10
or so debates I send out on a Tuesday, doing enough research to have the
introduction factually based and not open to criticism and finding links that
provide good information from a diverse range of sources takes me about four
hours which is a fair amount of time at the moment. Obviously if I add more
then the time taken gets longer, this may well be fine after the Copenhagen
conference
is over. But is not going to work at the moment.
It has become the case that I hand out the debates for people to
do but this is not necessarily something that it needs to be me doing. I try to
make the debates as diverse as possible but I know I put in too many politics
and international affairs debates. In order to get round this we need others to
contribute debates on culture, religion, local politics etc.
So yes I agree that we may be in need of a change to the model
of how we do things.
The most obvious way is if we move to a more democratic way of
creating rapid response team debates. I am sure that there are some of you who
particularly like to ask questions and others who like to answer them so feel
free to send out any debate topics of your own and others can take them up or
help with them.
Along with this I want to encourage is the taking of debates by
more than one person with someone arguing for each side, which I was glad to
see happened a fair bit this week.
I could also spread out debates by changing the way I do things,
at the moment I and others at HQ read various papers on a Tuesday to get the
debate ideas and I then research them a little more. This could be changed to me
reading one paper each day (a different one each day so as to overall still get
a more rounded viewpoint) and then sending out a couple of topics each day.
A possible second way of doing things is a radical change in the
way we do things. I could put up all the debates and assign the RRT into teams
who
all then add to all the RRT debates which might prove an interesting change and
allow people to add their views in their own time rather than having a scramble
to grab a debate. It would also be much more in keeping with the original idea
of Debatewise that there should be alot of people arguing their own case
(rather than doing both sides) so as to get the best argument overall.
This would however require more planning, how would I organise
the teams? Is it right that I essentially restrict the side that people are
arguing on when they could contribute to both? Would I need to ask for where
you are on the political spectrum to decide what team you go on? Etc. etc.....
If you have any more ideas feel free to send em out, it would be
a nice touch if I create a debate on any ideas we have.
Regards
Alex
From: debatewiserrt-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:debatewiserrt-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of David Crane
Sent: 03 December 2009 10:23
To: debatewiserrt@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [Debatewise RRT] Re: late debates (again)
Hi Lucien,
There are two current problems we're facing (both of which we are delighted to
have):
1) We've now got a large number of people on the list 100+, which means debates
are taken quickly
2) We're all working very hard on our Copenhagen project (1,000 young people,
130 different countries, debating climate change with Google Wave) and that's
taken our focus away from here a little.
The solution is something we've wanted to do for a long while, which is to give
you more responsibility over the debates we choose and the things we
discuss. This our site - all of ours - and whilst there are certain
things we think it's important to debate we'd love to know what you'd like to
get your teeth into.
So please suggest any ideas for debate you want. What are the burning
issues you think people need help understanding? What are the key things
you'd like to tell people about? What do you read in the paper and think
- I want to know more about that?
Please note: If you want to get a maximum of one email a day from the list let
me know (off-list) and we'll put you on Archive.
Dave
2009/12/3 Lucienne Q. Senna <annlucien@xxxxxxxxx>
Dear Alex,
Either you have too few topics to debate or too many
over-enthusiastic debaters who pounce on the debates before any of the rest of
us get a chance. What are you going to do about this unfair practice as you are
consistently representing a small minority of debaters' opinions?
Lucien
2009/12/2 Alex Helling <alex@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Hi
everyone,
Sorry about sending out so few debates, I spent too long adding up the scores
for debater of the month. We just get too many debates these days to do it
quickly, which is of course a good thing! Even if it does mean more work for
me. It will come as no surprise that Nadia and Sarah are the top two again, I
make it that Nadia had 90 points to 88, so a close run thing, as I almost
certainly missed some will Sarah call in the observers and demand a recount? I
hope not as I don’t have the time! Also congratulations to Helen Doherty
for coming in third.
And
to everyone else thanks for all your contributions as always,
I
promise to send out more debates on Friday/Saturday.
Alex
Dubai
debt crisis signals a further recession.
Dubai
has been the fastest growing financial centre over the past decade, it has been
a showcase to show oil rich countries how to deal with running out of oil.
Dubai did this by moving into finance, making itself the centre of the Middle
East. However Dubai world, the emirate’s biggest company is in crisis and
its larger neighbour Abu Dhabi is having to bail Dubai out. As a financial
centre, with a ruling family with investments all over the world the crisis may
reach worldwide, hitting confidence that is still not good. This in turn could
mean that the recovery stalls. So are we heading to a new financial crisis?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/27/dubai-debt-crisis-will-it_n_372055.html
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/KL01Dj04.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE5AP1L120091127
Javier
Solana has been a successful representative of Europe
Javier
Solana has served Europe as the High Representative for Common Foreign and
Security Policy for ten years. He represented Europe in areas of foreign policy
where Europe had managed to agree to a common policy. He has been involved in
negotiating numerous treaties for Europe but he has mostly been involved in the
Middle East as Europe negotiates together as part of the Quartet on the issue
of Israel/Palestine and has been working together with Germany, France and
Great Britain to try to solve the nuclear crisis, and has so far not succeeded.
So as he is about to be replaced by Cathy Ashton is his legacy good for Europe?
http://www.europeanvoice.com/article/imported/what-the-eu-can-learn-from-solana%27s-legacy/66524.aspx
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jul/08/javier-solana-eu-foreign-policy
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/6695817/Catherine-Ashton-prepares-to-replace-Javier-Solana-as-EU-foreign-chief.html
Russia’s
strong arm tactics have failed to quell militants
Russia’s
tactics in its separatist regions are very brutal, its opponents are in turn
brutal themselves. The Russians long ago declared that the war in Chechnya was
over yet the separatists have still been involved in bombings since. On 28th
October an express train between Moscow and St. Petersburg was derailed,
investigators have blamed a bomb. Although no one has claimed responsibility
the authorities are blaming Chechen and Ingushetian terrorists for the bombing.
This shows that the Russian tactics may prevent open resistance but is breeding
resentment that surfaces in continuing terrorist attack
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/8383960.stm
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125938999092967765.html
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900SID/SNAA-7WF562?OpenDocument
Should
Serena Williams have been suspended
Serena
Williams’ outburst at a line judge in her semi final of the US open
handed kim Clijsters the match as the decision was made to hand kim a point due
to it being a second penalty. Now it has gone further and Williams has received
a record fine for the offence. She did how ever get away without being
suspended from playing tennis, should she have received this further penalty?
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/sports_blog/2009/09/serena-williams-outburst-video-/comments/page/2/
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/tennis/article6832729.ece
http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/addiction-in-society/200909/mcenroe-serenas-outburst-was-fine
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/tennis/2009-11-30-serena-williams-open-fine_N.htm
Iran
needs the economic reforms proposed by Ahmadinejad
Despite
having some of the largest Oil and gas reserves in the world Iran’s
economy is in dire straits. For example despite being a member of OPEC Iran
imports refined fuels at a high price. This bill would phase out or reduce
subsidies on food and fuel, immense costs to the state, which is clearly
unsustainable. However there are worries that such a change could cause
stagflation, the worst possible problem for an economy. So are these reforms
helpful or not?
http://www.rferl.org/content/Iran_President_Proposes_Economic_Reform_Bill_To_MPs/1365014.html
http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20091112/FOREIGN/711119854/1002
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/11/03/iran_on_the_edge
http://www.rferl.org/content/Iran_MPs_Hand_President_Setback_On_Economic_Reform/1507619.html
Are
Britons becoming lazy?
Britain
is suffering an epidemic of laziness. The government is unable to tackle
obesity and we spend longer and longer in front of the TV. However is this not
how things were supposed to be, as we get richer there is less reason for us to
work continuously, indeed in the 1930’s the economist John Maynard Keynes
predicted we would be working a 15 hour week by 2030, so what’s wrong
with a little laziness?
http://www.politics.co.uk/news/health/britain-s-laziness-epidemic-$1317327.htm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/aug/10/nuffield-health-study-laziness
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/sep/01/economics
Is
the ‘war on terrorism’ winnable?
The
war on terrorism that started after 9/11 is still ongoing, it goes through name
changes but the core of the conflict remains the same, we are involved in a
conflict against a nebulous group of terrorists. This is not a war in the
conventional sense, nor is it winnable in the conventional sense. We win when
there are no more terrorist attacks, even capturing Osama bin Laden no longer
makes more than a symbolic difference. Previous conflicts have shown that
terrorism can be won, for example the IRA gave up its guns and stopped bombing,
but such examples are localised, a deal cant be reached with al Qaeda globally
to make peace, so can it be won, or even end?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jul/19/alqaida.terrorism
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=2602
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=4820
Schools
should have single sex classes to improve academic standards.
Even
in co-educational schools more and more pupils are being taught in single sex
classes. Both male and female students concentrate better in single sex classes
so they should help push up academic standards. Parents are worried that girls
in particular get distracted by the boys so wish to have single sex classes to
prevent this, however the benefits are mainly for the boys. However are
academic standards everything, surely it is a more rounded experience to be
taught together, presumably not everyone benefits by being separated and
schools may well not have the necessary resources to teach things separately
– especially if this requires different styles of teaching.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/article6938112.ece
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2006/jun/25/schools.gender
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/080303120346.htm
Use
Revisewise @ http://revisewise.debatewise.com/
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