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Re: Evidence and ethics

On Thu, 20 Apr 1995, Russell T. Church wrote:

> On Thu, 20 Apr 1995, Steven Hunt wrote:
> > 
> > The standard has always been she/he who utilizes a card a piece of 
> > evidence in the debate sense is responsible for it. Is this still a good 
> > standard a reasonable standard in the time of Lexis Nexis, handbooks, 
> > squad brief and evidence files, Massive trading????????
> > 
> I agree with Steve Hunt on all of his other observations about evidence.  
> My response to his question about who is responsible is that it seems 
> more than ever that we have to hold the user of the evidence responsible 
> for its authenticity.  Otherwise, we would probably discover that all bad 
> evidence came in a bad trade or from a freshman who quit the team soon 
> after turning in this research (historical allusion or illusion depending 
> upon your point of view).  
> 
> I would have a very hard time with the view that it is not the debater's 
> fault. I believe that all advocates have to be accountable for their 
> advocacy including the integrity of the evidence.  This used to be the 
> universally held belief.  I don't think that more evidence sources or 
> less reliable sources changes anything, except the need to be more 
> careful in the sources you use and the people you trade evidence with.
> 
> However, I am always interested in other points of view. I would like 
> someone who genuinely feels that the debater is not responsible for what 
> he uses as evidence to put forth a rationale for that view.
> 
> The only unclear area, I believe, is the idea of context.  I think the 
> idea of quoting contrary to context is clearer than out of context.  I 
> think that debaters who quote the ideas of authors as conclusions when 
> the authors have concluded differently is a grave ethical violation, 
> especially if the conclusion is completely at odds with the quoted 
> material.   I also think it is unethical for a debater to quote a summary 
> of points of view as if they were the author's.  These two violations are 
> clear to me and I could vote and give zero points based on these violations.
> 
> Russ Church
> 
>
References:
Archive created by Jonathan Stanton (jonathan@cs.jhu.edu)
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