Standards for Evidence

[jmiller]

If you take a look at the China Aff blogspot- who's the person in the majority of the wrongs- Justin Skarb. I'd also like you to take a glance at the Author Profile of these blogs (http://www.blogger.com/profile/18425141111127641996)

The Horizon Institute? Although it really exists, it sounds as if the author is trying another ploy to come up with a fake institutional name.

[Debate101%]

I agree that the actions of scarb were unethical. he deserves to be held accountable. but i think this damien-emails-omg thing is getting out of hand. this was a seperate debate last year, and now this forum has concluded that this act was clearly cheating. i agree marbury wasnt cool, but the emails are different.

Two things:
First, Damien never got solvency evidence from emails. They had a direct solvency advocate (gill or shinn, something like that) that was in the literature prior to the affirmative being run. This was clearly an advocacy made by authors in the public health field, and teams should have found the evidence (given the china DA, im sure there were tons of Africa w/25 United States w/25 China searches).

second, Damien read the emails in the least shady way possible. The emails were to incredibly qualified sources, and the entire correspondence was posted online, question and answer. When Damien read the cards, they included the entire question and answer, and flagged that the evidence was an email. if you thought the questions were leading, they were there for you and the judge to read.

it seems like they went our of their way to be ethical on the email question. while the scarb-marbury shenanigans were illegit to the max, i dont see why the entire team should be blamed or why the email connection is even an issue.

[I<3topicality]

The emails were made public, and if they are so "illegit" then why don't they become a theory debate on a topicality flow? If you can debate conditionality, whats the difference with the other?

I'm pretty sure skarb doesnt check online forums PACRANKING.

[PacRankings]

Originally Posted by I<3topicality

The emails were made public, and if they are so "illegit" then why don't they become a theory debate on a topicality flow? If you can debate conditionality, whats the difference with the other?

I'm pretty sure skarb doesnt check online forums PACRANKING.

Credibility lost

[mikey13]

Originally Posted by I<3topicality

The emails were made public, and if they are so "illegit" then why don't they become a theory debate on a topicality flow? If you can debate conditionality, whats the difference with the other?

The competitive format, combined with time constraints and the necessity of strategy make debate rounds a poor forum for evaluating the legitimacy of these types of research practices. It's also important that these are community discussions that achieve some form of consensus rather than round by round determinations. Your "debate it out" solution is troubling: at best it makes an individual judge (sometimes not more year removed from high school competition herself) responsible for determining important community standards, and at worst it allows the best debaters to create all their own evidence as long as they can prove it's legit on the line by line.

Originally Posted by I<3topicality

I'm pretty sure skarb doesnt check online forums PACRANKING.

Funny that skarb avoids online forums despite his great affinity for blogs and comment pages.

[I<3topicality]

Originally Posted by mikey13

The competitive format, combined with time constraints and the necessity of strategy make debate rounds a poor forum for evaluating the legitimacy of these types of research practices. It's also important that these are community discussions that achieve some form of consensus rather than round by round determinations. Your "debate it out" solution is troubling: at best it makes an individual judge (sometimes not more year removed from high school competition herself) responsible for determining important community standards, and at worst it allows the best debaters to create all their own evidence as long as they can prove it's legit on the line by line.



Funny that skarb avoids online forums despite his great affinity for blogs and comment pages.

lol, these "research practices" are just as legit as anything else. The reason they would/could be bad is because of the cases that they would make topical - ie limits. So if you do have real reasons why its bad, debate it instead of whining. If they were to win because of an email that they had, it means that the debate should center around the context of evidence and whether or not it supports a good practice for debate.

Whatever makes you laugh, but I doubt he cares what high school kids think whereas if he is trying to get involved in publishing some articles, he would look at blogs.

[cryptic]

I have read this thread with increasing interest. There seems to be an emerging consensus that the damien kids should not be blamed. Especially since they were not complicit in the alleged unethical behavior. It would be interesting to get more information about what the other damien coaches knew and why they decided the matter was internal given the possibility that other programs might use the evidence or be influenced tactically by it.

I do think there needs to be caution in unproven accusations against an individual who has not been afforded due process. Certainly this situation highlights a need for a more formal dispute resolution mechanism for high school programs and no one should rush to judgment until all sides have a chance to explain.

That noted, if after due process there is reason to believe that a coach deliberately created evidence that included inappropriate and misleading authorship attributions then I am curious to hear why the entire program should not be placed on probation. College athletics follows this model. If a coach violates NCAA policy their entire program suffers and that serves as a relatively powerful deterrent to rules violations. Is this college model wrong? Should college athletes bear no responsibility if their coaches cheat? Or is this a poor analogy? I am not sure I have an answer and I am oscillating back and forth between the idea that a team is more than a group of individuals and the point that people should not be blamed for crap they had nothing to do with. I'd like to hear some explanations for why the idea of probation is appropriate or inappropriate if allegations of cheating are proven.

The other thought I had relates to what other teams did when they discovered this evidence. Did any teams switch their strategy prior to the toc because they felt this evidence was potentially too devastating? The "no harm" claim that damien did not run this evidence really should be considered in light of what the effect was on others. Was there any effect on the decisions of other programs? Is there an actual team that was impacted in terms of strategic choices or in terms of an actual debate or is this all hypothetical abuse?

[computerwhizldk]

My thoughts

1. I agree w/Ms. Tate and others that blaming Damien as a whole is unfair. Reid is a good friend of mine and I know most of the Damien debaters personally and I have no reason to believe that they would not do anything unethical. This is something Skarb did and they should be left out of it. It's unfair that their reputation be tainted for something stupid

2. Anyone defending what Skarb did is just being stupid.

a. No one is saying debate coaches can't write articles. But have the balls/whatever anatomy you want if people think that's sexist, to use "Justin Skarb" as the name. The ONLY reason it was under Marburry was b/c people knew who Skarb was so it couldn't be used in a debate round.

b. The quals were fabricated. It's not like just a pen name. Were it just a random dude it would functionally be a blog (still unethical, but not as bad). Saying he's an "independent researcher" and listing his degrees would be, in ANY university, grounds for expulsion. Undeniably.

c. The timing makes it exceptionally sketchy. If Skarb were writing cuz he wanted to express his profound views on SPS he obviously wouldn't do it when he's working his ass off for the TOC.

d. He's not an expert. The article was literally 3 DA links and a CP. Anyone who thinks he doesn't have a vested interest in this is being silly. This is nothing like Sovacool. Sovacool may have been a debater but does not coach and is an expert who writes about RPS as his career.

c. It wasn't used. Great. And? It was still 100% cheating and written to be used.

[The Tick]

Originally Posted by I<3topicality

The emails were made public, and if they are so "illegit" then why don't they become a theory debate on a topicality flow? If you can debate conditionality, whats the difference with the other?

The practice of emailing authors to ask directed questions about frequently cited debate articles is nothing new. Check the archives of e-debate, it happens quite frequently. I have not seen emails organized into a blog before etc, and that practice is relatively shady. Do I believe that once emails are published to the internets that they can be used as evidence. I think not, however, I do think it is interesting to see if we are using the academic materials within the scope of the author's intent.

I also agree with what several individuals have said in discussing this issue above. I think this discussion loses any productivity when it devolves into "skarb is a liar" or "damien = barry bonds." Leave the kids out of this, and really constantly calling Justin a cheater accomplishes nothing.....the productivity comes from addressing the legitimacy of blogs/ev qualifications...etc...

I now return you to your regularly scheduled mudslinging....

[Rhizome]

open source debate evidence would solve all of this! Lexington was right!!!!

[TimAlderete]

Two caveats that seem obvious to me, but apparently are obligatory.

One: I am not defending anyone or any actions – that’s not my place.

Two: I am not condemning any students – that shouldn't be the point here.

Other than melodramatic distraction, this “Incident” and “Discussion” do raise some real and interesting questions:

Is it okay to read evidence from debate coaches? What does it mean to say “It is written to be used in a round”? Does it matter if that is Your coach, or someone else’s? Does it matter if it is about that year’s topic? Does it matter if it is an issue that comes up year after year? What is “published”? What is “close enough to published”? What are qualifications? Are editorial practices as important to credibility as qualifications?

Can evidence be “illegitimate” or is it just “poor quality evidence/easily beaten”?

There are clear cases. Sovokal – former debater who ran RPS ( I think), writes a hyper power worded RPS article with lots of conspicuously good States Counterplan answers. Totally legit – not written for a team, or as a coach, and about something that he is an expert. Probably knows, while writing, that these are good debate cards, and probably could foresee that they would be used in debates, but not written for that purpose. It is also published in a law review, which is going to meet any standard. We read tonnes of cards from former debaters who write law reviews. Not surprisingly, they often write about topics that they got interested in from debate, and many still have the debate habit of talking and writing in our idiom. We read Neal Katyal, Colin Kahl, Becky Kidder, Patty Spice, etc cards all the time.

Kerpen – former debater, writes for NRO or CATO or Americans for Prosperity or whatever. Many power worded economic impact cards. Clearly legit – while Phil definitely knows that his writing will be used in debates, he would Definitely be writing crazy libertarian stuff even if it wouldn’t be quoted, and he isn’t just writing to be quotable – he has always been…. blunt. He is pretty widely quoted and respected in the field of politics and economics. Or respected enough to be widely quoted. Much of what he writes is published by reasonable, if totally right wing, sources. (Whoever would have thought that I would defend both NRO and Phil Kerpen as reasonable… Dirty Frank is laughing somewhere).

Gordon Mitchell – former debater, debate coach, published author on security and rhetoric issues. Very power worded NMD and Bush Doctrine evidence, widely used framework evidence. Clearly legit – definitely knows the framework evidence is going to be used in rounds, potentially by his own teams – it was in the DRG, after all. But that is where articles about debate practice get published, and it’s Intended to spark discussion in rounds, so why not quote it. Gordon is obviously pretty uniquely qualified on the issue of the impact academic debates have on policy formulation – that is one of the focuses of his writing and participation in the DAWG. Funny story – I watched an NMD debate with the Neg reading Mitchell impact evidence and the Aff reading answers from Dani Reiter, and the Aff said “What does this Mitchell guy know about NMD – he is just a debate coach.” And Dani Reiter’s debate partner in College.

Side question – do Handbooks count as “published”? The DRG certainly went further than just providing cards, but the DRG is mostly the exception. Do we want to have to listen to cards from the intro to every self “published” handbook out there?

Berube – debate coach, I assume he debated too. I don’t know his exact connection with nano technology, but I understand that he is widely written/read on that subject. Very power worded dehum impact, quoting and expanding upon a previous dehum impact card (Montague). Definitely knew evidence would be read in rounds, potentially by his own teams. Seems pretty legit – I don’t have the card in front of me, but I think it wasn’t self published on a blog, and he is pretty reputable in the area of technology and ethics, which is the context of the card.

The questions that these raise – about former debaters, current coaches, intent to use in a round, the credibility of the source that they are writing in, and the qualifications on the topic they are writing on; in clear cut cases these trend toward legitimacy, even if one might not. Like a law student might not be the most qualified person to write about the impact to prolif, but the intention and publication issues seem to make up for it. Kerpin might know that he is going to be carded, but his quals and the sources he writes for make up for it.

For me, one of the dividing questions was always the legitimacy of the publication, and I tend to hold blog cards to a higher standard than other publications. But there is really no going back on blogs – both in the debate sense and in terms of the demise of the print publication – there is increasingly less and less difference between Publish and Blog. There are quite a few former debaters who write blogs, like Nate Silver, or Glenn Greenwald, or Ed Brayton, or Tom Goldstein, who get quoted all the time. (I’ve even cut cards from Julia Allison…) And they use the debate idiom, even if unintentionally. For example, Silver writes great Political Capital cards, because he uses the word a lot and uses it the way a debater does, because that is where he first encountered it. His blog, fivethirtyeight.com, gained a lot of respect in the last election cycle, he is widely quoted on political statistics, and that is his background of study, so he is actually pretty qualified. But still, I am sometimes leery of the nature of the blog – bloggers tend to write the first thing that comes to mind, and don’t have any/ much editorial supervision. Nate, for instance, probably should have waited a day or two before calling that Zogby poll a “push poll”. Newspaper or published articles, even when they are written by less qualified sources, have to take more time, have to be more careful about sources and references and facts and attribution, and they have editors to oversee their excesses. Even REALLY qualified bloggers sometimes shoot off cards too quickly. No one would say that Paul Krugman isn’t one of the most qualified economists in the world, but his published positions and papers always seem to be more well thought out, and certainly more temperate, than his blog. This is even more true of writing in the comments section of blogs. There, there is almost no control for qualifications, no reflection – it’s basically the wild west in the comments section. I often mouth off in the comments section of NRO or Powerline, just to mouth off.

But what can you do? You can’t stop reading cards from blogs – there is too much highly qualified, well researched, in depth evidence on blogs, even if they don’t follow the same standards for publication. I mean, if John Mearsheimer writes a response to a colleague’s post on some Neo-Realism Fanboi website somewhere, it just seems okay to use it, doesn’t it? What about when a Blog, or the comments section of a blog quotes another source – is there a responsibility to make this clear than with any other source? What if a school was, for instance, reading a card from a blog, that quoted the NYT in the blog, but referred to the entire card as being from the NYT. Is it legitimate to call them out?

At the end, it doesn’t seem that any one aspect of the Marburry article is against any rule or norm by itself. We read unqualified evidence all the time, we read evidence from blogs, we read evidence from comments sections, we read evidence from former debaters, even when they are not really experts on their topic, we read evidence from coaches with current teams, we read evidence intended to be used in debate rounds, and we read evidence from coaches whose debaters could potentially use that evidence in rounds. So how is it that this article is illegitimate (and I do think that it is illegitimate)? Is it just the combination of all of those factors? Is it the obviousness of it? I don't think that writing / reading this article is legitimate, and I agree that it isn't even debatable, even though I can't point to a rule or norm broken. THAT is and should be the point of this discussion - to clarify where the line is that was crossed.

Is it just the fact that Marburry is a pen name? If that is the case, do you think that it would have been completely okay if he had used his real name the first time? IDK about that. I am uncomfortable with coaches being able to write evidence for their teams even if it is done openly.

Obviously, some of those questions are ways to compare evidence in a round, as much as that is practical given time constraints. But are all of those Only questions of a card’s credibility? IDK about that either.

[computerwhizldk]

Alderete, I think what people have a problem with is the pen-name with made-up qualifications that at first had no skarb-reference. Dheidt on "the 3NR" made a reference to the LOST article that a BC debater wrote. Clearly legit. It's the fact that this wasn't just an article with a targeted interest, but no way to know that this was just Skarb. People can be like "Kerpen is writing with maybe some interest in publishing sweet ev"

[Sha Sha]

My two cents:

1. None of this really matters anymore. Reid and Sean are not going to NFL from what I heard, and I can't blame them, because I'd love to end MY year in semifinals of the TOC, after taking the proverbial cake at NDCA.
2. If Skarb chooses not to come out and say if he did or didn't do it, that's his choice. It's not like there's any punishment - all the Damien teams I debated and watched this year (Ed/Jeremy, Velto/Nadeem, Reid/Sean, Christian/Greg, Pablo/Eric) were very well-versed and could defend a piece of evidence written by their own little sister. No debates came down to this Skarb card - no punishment at all.

[mikey13]

Originally Posted by I<3topicality

lol, these "research practices" are just as legit as anything else.

Obviously this isn't the case because if there were "just as legit as anything else" there wouldn't be such a heated debate over the legitimacy of emails in debate.

Originally Posted by I<3topicality

The reason they would/could be bad is because of the cases that they would make topical - ie limits. So if you do have real reasons why its bad, debate it instead of whining. If they were to win because of an email that they had, it means that the debate should center around the context of evidence and whether or not it supports a good practice for debate.

Topic limits really are the least of concerns when it comes to emails as evidence in debate. Other reasons this practice is often deemed illegit have to do with the ease of fabricating such exchanges, the incentive to cherry pick expert responses so only "useful" evidence is made public, the logistical impossibility of verifying every exchange, and the ease of leading emailed authors into using topic language.

I listed a few reasons that debate rounds are not an appropriate forum for determining the legitimacy of emails in debate, you pretty much suggested once again that we should "debate it out." This really is irresponsible as it sanctions potentially illegit practices and creates perverse incentives for debaters.

Originally Posted by I<3topicality

Whatever makes you laugh, but I doubt he cares what high school kids think whereas if he is trying to get involved in publishing some articles, he would look at blogs.

If he's trying to get involved in publishing some articles he probably shouldn't have posted such an embarrassing hack job in the first place. After reading the article one can clearly understand why skarb didn't want ppl to know he wrote it.

edit: More generally, people seem to think it's impossible to punish this type of behavior. It seems to me that tournament directors have the discretion to not invite certain members of the debate community to tournaments, or perhaps refuse to let certain members fulfill a judging commitment. I disagree with the above suggestion that an entire HS debate team should be sanctioned for poor behavior by a coach. HS debate is not the NCAA, HS debate is primarily an educational activity instead. Students shouldn't be held responsible for poor decisions made by educators. HS debaters are only teenagers, their coaches are presumably adults.

[dheidt]

For me, the issue that distinguishes Skarb entirely from the other people Tim mentions is almost 100% the attempt to hide his identity. Publishing it before the TOC and the ridiculous nature of the article are maybe contributing factors, but the main issue that makes this cheating is the use of the fake name and the fact that he maintained this charade in subsequent email conversations with other coaches and students.

If Skarb had initially identified he had actually written the article, AND identified he was a debate coach (for debaters not on the national circuit who might come across the article and have no idea who he is), I wouldn't have a big problem with the article. A coach writing a policy-based article against some of his team's competitors is about as bad as bias gets. The use of evidence from "Skarb" would not survive the first cross-x. More likely, it would not make it into the 1nc at all, given that nobody sensible would believe they could defend it.

Instead, Skarb created the appearance that someone else wrote the article, both by thanking himself as providing research assistance, and then responding to multiple emails from coaches and students as "Marburry", in which he did not answer direct questions about his connection to Skarb. He created a false appearance of neutrality and legitimacy that shouldn't have existed. He deceived some students into reading fabricated evidence, and forced others to waste hours developing a response to a strategy that was fabricated.

I wrote elsewhere that I think debaters should follow (and judges should enforce) higher standards of evidence: no message boards, comments or emails (I agree with Tim that blogs have to be an exception, given the number of experts that routinely write in their own blogs). The basic issue is verifiability: it is MUCH easier to cheat by posting a comment to a blog under a fake name with invented quals and create the appearance of authority. Somebody read a similar fabricated card that in front of me before the NDT on the college topic, but it is impossible to prove who wrote the evidence or even blame the team that read it, given that it came up in a google search I did and they may have just found it innocently. Disallowing the sources I listed would not entirely solve the problem: there will always be Skarbs in the world that take the extra step by submitting a fake article to a site with (lax) publication standards. But it would help.

[Antonucci23]

Originally Posted by dheidt

For me, the issue that distinguishes Skarb entirely from the other people Tim mentions is almost 100% the attempt to hide his identity. Publishing it before the TOC and the ridiculous nature of the article are maybe contributing factors, but the main issue that makes this cheating is the use of the fake name and the fact that he maintained this charade in subsequent email conversations with other coaches and students.

If Skarb had initially identified he had actually written the article, AND identified he was a debate coach (for debaters not on the national circuit who might come across the article and have no idea who he is), I wouldn't have a big problem with the article. A coach writing a policy-based article against some of his team's competitors is about as bad as bias gets. The use of evidence from "Skarb" would not survive the first cross-x. More likely, it would not make it into the 1nc at all, given that nobody sensible would believe they could defend it.

Instead, Skarb created the appearance that someone else wrote the article, both by thanking himself as providing research assistance, and then responding to multiple emails from coaches and students as "Marburry", in which he did not answer direct questions about his connection to Skarb. He created a false appearance of neutrality and legitimacy that shouldn't have existed. He deceived some students into reading fabricated evidence, and forced others to waste hours developing a response to a strategy that was fabricated.

I wrote elsewhere that I think debaters should follow (and judges should enforce) higher standards of evidence: no message boards, comments or emails (I agree with Tim that blogs have to be an exception, given the number of experts that routinely write in their own blogs). The basic issue is verifiability: it is MUCH easier to cheat by posting a comment to a blog under a fake name with invented quals and create the appearance of authority. Somebody read a similar fabricated card that in front of me before the NDT on the college topic, but it is impossible to prove who wrote the evidence or even blame the team that read it, given that it came up in a google search I did and they may have just found it innocently. Disallowing the sources I listed would not entirely solve the problem: there will always be Skarbs in the world that take the extra step by submitting a fake article to a site with (lax) publication standards. But it would help.

I agree with every word of this post except one. I bolded it.

I think a carefully crafted exemption could encourage debaters to consult qualified experts. I think that such a collaborative norm, if appropriately controlled and subject to high standards for verification, could improve the intersection of debate and scholarship. Debates might be smarter, and I think that's almost universally a good thing.

Initiating direct conversations with arms control experts or law professors helps debaters research more carefully and get a taste of actual public policy discussion outside of debate's isolated and peculiar confines.

A private email isn't legitimate by itself. However, publicly posted emails from qualified authors who give permission to cite their works seem at least as verifiable as any other source.

I realize that this is quite tangential. Given the outrage over this incident, however, it's important to carefully and precisely distinguish between the practices we're condemning.

(Side note: Some of the above posts mention my edebate post on the subject. I appreciate the complimentary tone, but note that I retracted those comments entirely because I didn't know that Marburry was a pseudonym. I really didn't know what I was talking about because I got took.)

[TimAlderete]

Originally Posted by dheidt

If Skarb had initially identified he had actually written the article, AND identified he was a debate coach ... I wouldn't have a big problem with the article.

This raises questions, and red flags, for me.

If it is okay if he attaches his name to it, then is there any limit to what can be said in it?
If the name is attached to it, does it then become the debater's responsibility to question the Quality of the evidence, or is it still Our job to question the Legitimacy of the evidence?
If the name is attached to it, what is to stop the team from saying "Space Review 2009"?
Does the cite on the card have to have the name on it?
Do you think that any, many, most or all judges would be willing to disregard the evidence if there was a lack of counter evidence?

We often cut cards and leave off author names in favor of the magazine, newspaper or law review. Sometimes the authors name is in the small print of the cite, but sometimes its not, and its hard to hold someone responsible for Seeing that in the middle of the round.

And I am not confident that most judges would discount the evidence, since there is unlikely to be any counter evidence, and most judges treat source presses as defensive. I don't think that it is enough to say that more judges Should do this either - most HS coaches might be willing to reject the argument and evidence entirely, but most of our judges don't have the same stake in it.

[TheScuSpeaks]

Qualifications Buffing
While bracketing the Skarb issue, I think one of issues here is the practice of qual buffing when dealing with non-traditional sources of evidence.

For example, you are running your google searches and you see on some forum based website someone named AnarchistGuy69 write that using the threat of nuclear war to ignore poverty is uniquely immoral. So, you go "Sweet!" and you cut the card. You drop an email to AnarchistGuy69 and find out what his quals are, and he emails back that his name is John Smith, and he is a philosophy professor from Random University. Double sweet, great card and the person is (potentially) legit. And suddenly, a random post on a forum based webpage becomes the following header for a card:

Using nuke war to ignore poverty = ontological holocaust
Smith 09, (John Smith, professor of philosophy at Random University, http://www.philosophychat.org/vb/sho...d.php?t=991999, np, May 9th, 2009)

Now, you're reading a bunch of cards in the 2ac, and your opponents are really suppose to figure out the context of every card? One might assume from the web address that that card is from a forum chat, but other web addresses might not be as obvious. Maybe it was an article posted on a legit website, with some form of peer review. How can you know? The person seems kinda legit, well, debate legit at least.

I think this practice needs to end. I don't care if you want to cut a card from AnarchistGuy69, but that is the name that needs to be cited in the debate round! The card's header should read like this:

Using nuke war to ignore poverty = ontological holocaust
AnarchistGuy69 09, (no quals listed http://www.philosophychat.org/vb/sho...d.php?t=991999, presumed pen name of John Smith, professor of philosophy at Random U, np, May 9th, 2009)

And if you are cutting a comments section from the NYT, the author is not the NYT. As a matter of fact, unless it is a group editorial from the NYT, it is authored, and the author is not the NYT.

reading emails as evidence

Unlike other people, I am fairly strongly in favor of making sure this practice has a place in our activity. I just cannot imagine how we can possibly say that primary research has no place in our community. I think if I were to tell someone not associated with debate, but in the academy, that clarifying points through emails was not allowed to be considered in the debate round, they would probably laugh at the activity. Seriously, we have to have a space for students and coaches to do primary research. With that said, I think we do need some community norms when it comes to using primary research materials in debate as evidence. We are not just a pedagogical activity, but also a competitive activity. The academic benefits of research might some require weighing the questions of fairness. Some suggestions:

(1) These materials should be posted and made available to the community in a reasonable place. That doesn't mean blogspot. That means cross-x and/or edebate.

(2) Obviously the issue of authenticity is a problem. However, this activity might require some trust. Obviously, there are going to be cheaters, but a useful and educationally sound tool like primary research should not be discouraged because some people are going to be dishonest. If people want to develop some level of verification when it comes to these practices, I'd support that.

(3) The author of the email should agree to have their emails published for all to see!

(4) The entirety of the email chain should be published, not just the parts that are to be cut.

(5) And the emails need to be published in a timely manner, not the night before or the morning of a tournament.

Using evidence made by participants in this activity

I addressed this earlier in this thread. I don't stick 100% behind those comments, but mostly still see them as valid.

Pen names, anonymity, etc.

I am foucauldian or collectivist enough to believe there is a place for pen names and anonymity. One cannot forget Foucault's interview as "The Masked Philosopher" or Kierkegaard's frequent use of pseudonyms. Also, some of us may at different times publish under collective names, such as Retort, the collective name of the authors who wrote Afflicted Powers.

However, if you are writing in such a way you know is going to be used frequently by the community, I think you have some duty to inform the community that you are behind certain writings.

[dheidt]

I might be convinced that there is a way to use email that does not invite abuse, but I think *some* of the current use of email is has issues, and am afraid of the ramifications if it becomes more widespread. I do think emailing authors is educational, but I see a great potential for abuse if used as evidence.

There is an ongoing conversation about this at the3nr.com that is fairly interesting.

Tim:

I can't imagine a situation where someone would accept the Skarb evidence if it is clearly identified, HS coach or not. The bias could not be more evident. If I'm wrong, than I've misjudged the collective intelligence of this community.

If someone cited evidence that was clearly published by Skarb as "the space review" and not Skarb, that is an instance of the individual team being deceitful, and I think they would be cheating. It's true that sometimes people are lazy and cite things as "NYT" or whatever, but it's rare that this is a coverup for bias. More frequently, it involves lazy people LEAVING OFF qualifications for no reason other than they are careless.

All debaters should be as transparent as possible when cutting cards and include any information that could be evidence of bias.

[Synergy]

Even if the team puts that author is a debate coach, reads that, and the other team wins 100% defense that author is unqualified, the impact is that it's as good as analytics, which absent persuasive offensive counter-arguments still gives some risk to the disad. I think that doesn't even matter even if he weren't a debate coach, no one would really say "prefer our evidence, it's from a guy with an unrelated ASU degree." Really, the team gets no strategic advantage from reading these qualifications. You also can't quantify things like "many years of interest, research and blogging about this area" or "independent analyst/activist" (the best expert and a total novice can claim this equally) since only formal degrees/positions like fellow at an institute or professor can distinguish this.

The tangent of this discussion about considering some forms of publication off-limits is quaint... there are posts here from 2003-2005 making the same arguments about blogs. In a decade at most, it'll be acceptable enough (even if not preferred) to cut evidence from online message boards like this, even citing only screenames, emails, or from comments to blogs and youtube videos. Sometimes good arguments are made in odd places. Example, the marko 3 cap bad card, although not preferred by most, has still been around for several years even though it's published under a screenname (marko) with no quals. The necessity for a particular type of quals and that "disregard cards w/o formal quals" are both arguments that can be beaten by a skilled team. The same reasons we allow blogs now are no different that comments or forums. Sometimes qualified people post good arguments there, too. Yes, that person might have faked his name and quals in a comment reply, but the same can be done with a blog or a website where users can submit articles too. Anonymity, too: The article this thread is about, if the supposed author had not told his fellow coaches about it and had not been so arizona state about the writing style, would probably not have been caught. I agree that it may suck that it is this way, but it is what it is.

BL: Debaters, answer the warrants of the card first, then read a more qualified card for quals-comparison in rebuttals. Tournament hosts, make internet access during rounds easy (provide user/pass to school networks on pairings) so it's easier for debaters to catch and indict suspicious cards in that same round.

[tshuman]

Originally Posted by Synergy

BL: Debaters, answer the warrants of the card first, then read a more qualified card for quals-comparison in rebuttals. Tournament hosts, make internet access during rounds easy (provide user/pass to school networks on pairings) so it's easier for debaters to catch and indict suspicious cards in that same round.

Yes, that would solve everything. Or not...

Seriously, what color is the sky on the planet you live on?

[Synergy]

No, it wouldn't solve 'everything,' but neither does making a bunch of posts online expressing your feelings about how certain source types should be disallowed. Judging from 3nr/ed/cx, there seems to be a majority against comments/posts and a split on emails, even if there were unanimity it wouldn't just make these source types magically disappear – people would always find gray areas and defend their practices. I also wish that it could be possible to just ban something I dislike from all debates for all eternity, but this is wishful thinking. (Don't reply to this post saying we can change consensus among judges for intervening against this – debate judges don't agree on anything and i can't think of anything in debate that has been successfully disallowed, it only works the other way.) It is what it is, and at least my proposed solution would be something realistic you can actually implement by yourself in that same round.

[Antonucci23]

Originally Posted by TheScuSpeaks

reading emails as evidence

Unlike other people, I am fairly strongly in favor of making sure this practice has a place in our activity. I just cannot imagine how we can possibly say that primary research has no place in our community. I think if I were to tell someone not associated with debate, but in the academy, that clarifying points through emails was not allowed to be considered in the debate round, they would probably laugh at the activity. Seriously, we have to have a space for students and coaches to do primary research. With that said, I think we do need some community norms when it comes to using primary research materials in debate as evidence. We are not just a pedagogical activity, but also a competitive activity. The academic benefits of research might some require weighing the questions of fairness. Some suggestions:

(1) These materials should be posted and made available to the community in a reasonable place. That doesn't mean blogspot. That means cross-x and/or edebate.

(2) Obviously the issue of authenticity is a problem. However, this activity might require some trust. Obviously, there are going to be cheaters, but a useful and educationally sound tool like primary research should not be discouraged because some people are going to be dishonest. If people want to develop some level of verification when it comes to these practices, I'd support that.

(3) The author of the email should agree to have their emails published for all to see!

(4) The entirety of the email chain should be published, not just the parts that are to be cut.

(5) And the emails need to be published in a timely manner, not the night before or the morning of a tournament.

I agree with almost all of this.

re (1): I think that posting a link to blogspot or wordpress from cross-x.com should be fine.

I also feel that such citations should be organized in a distinct forum. It is simply not acceptable to expect students to read citations buried in trash forums, because that may damage their minds.

re (5): I don't see a clear temporal line. I suppose "google-a-bility" (has it been hit by crawlers yet?) might be an acceptable standard, but that's awfully variable and hazy. What's the impact to dropping the interview for your new aff the night before the tournament? You'll still get lambasted after the fact if it's a lie.

Overall: As with many aspects of debate practice, I feel that it would be very beneficial to have some of these norms at least partially codified. Debate used to be governed far more by norms of civility, because the activity placed a heavy emphasis on persuasion. Many of those norms simply aren't in play, given that persuasion's been partially displaced by a more technocratic model. Contemporary debate, in my mind, requires some more explicitly delineated codes.

The NDCA, as an open, democratically elected and largely bureaucracy-free organization, is likely the most logical candidate to promulgate some norms re: evidence, cross-reading, etc. I don't think that they have any particular enforcement power (outside of the NDCA National Championship), but I think that many/most community members would appreciate their guidance.

PRE-EMPT: My support for formal rule-making should not be read as any form of support for substantive or argument regulation. Articulating a norm against pseudonymous posts helps to prevent deception. I think that should be one of the rules of the game, like speech times.

[cryptic]

did skarb modify his judging philosophy on the wiki Monday to include this:

Publishing articles specifically tailored for my team to use at the TOC under a pseudonym: This is illegit? Why didn't anyone tell me?


whats up with this?

[dheidt]

If the Skarb article had been cited appropriately, I don't think a team would have to do more than say "give this zero weight, it's written by a current debate coach with a competitive stake in the activity, any argument he makes is irreparably tainted by his desire to beat this aff". It would surprise me greatly to learn of a judge who didn't think that was sufficient.

I don't think it reverts to an analytic. That might be true in some contexts, not in a context where the ENTIRE argument was made with a competitive stake in mind. Judges evaluate qualifications challenges differently, but this seems to be a unique issue. Maybe I'm wrong; I don't think this is tested though. I would lose all respect for any judge who assigned a risk to an argument fabricated by another coach or debater that still had a competitive stake in the topic. I don't think such a person would be able to render a valuable judgement about what to eat for breakfast, let alone something more complex.

Regarding message boards / comments: norm cultivation is possible if an organization like the NDCA backs it or enough people change. Sometimes qualified people post to message boards, true, and sometimes teams get away with reading crap like Marko. But it is altogether different from blogs: there are MUCH greater issues regarding verifiability, qualifications, etc.

I will say that I am willing to completely discount evidence from such sources.