Recent discussions of intrinsicness highlight how effective these arguments can be, but don't thoroughly discuss the theoretical foundations for the argument. I seek to update older, more theoretical discussions of the argument, in the hopes that affirmatives will be able to more successfully deploy intrinsicness arguments.
T.A. McKinney provides an enduring explanation of intrinsicness that, with some adjustment, provides a useful grounding for the common 2AC intrinsicness argument. For McKinney, intrinsicness is the idea that the affirmative plan must be a necessary causal impetus for the achievement of advantages and the occurrence of disadvantages. Extending Roger Solt’s analysis of counterplans McKinney divides the genre of intrinsicness arguments into two species, “logical” and “empirical.”
Perhaps the most defensible version of intrinsicness theory is what McKinney, borrowing from Roger Solt, calls a “logical” intrinsicness argument. A logical intrinsicness argument is one that relies solely on logical force to prove that a disadvantage, or advantage is not a necessary result of the plan. In the case of a politics disadvantage, say health care good, the 2AC response of “The disadvantage is not intrinsic, it is possible to pass the plan and health care” is a logical intrinsicness argument, because it demonstrates through logic that the plan is not a necessary causal impetus of the disadvantage.
The right of the negative to make logical intrinsicness arguments against affirmative advantages is so deeply ingrained into debate decision-making that the affirmative rarely, if ever reads advantages that could be so easily defeated by the negative. Imagine an affirmative that read a health care good advantage, the negative counterplan to pass health care clearly demonstrates through logic that the plan is not a necessary causal impetus of the advantage. Allowing the affirmative to make logical intrinsicness arguments only preserves reciprocal access to logical argumentation.
Extending Solt’s analysis about counterplans, McKinney distinguishes logical intrinsicness arguments from “empirical” intrinsicness arguments. Empirical intrinsicness arguments demonstrate through empirical argument, rather than strictly logical argument, that a disadvantage, or advantage is not a necessary causal outcome of the plan. In the case of an Allied Prolif DA, a No-First-Use affirmative could make an argument “The disadvantage is not intrinsic, it is possible to adopt a NFU policy and re-affirm our conventional commitment to our allies.” This is an example of an empirical instrinsicness argument.
Nearly all counterplans are of the empirical variety, but affirmative intrinsicness arguments of the empirical variety are rare. This is probably because negative responses to affirmative intrinsicness arguments are most true of the empirical variety. These include indictments related to the unpredictability of the argument, as well as worry that debates can get very broad, very quickly if we allow these types of affirmative arguments.
Though the negative arguments against empirical intrinsicness arguments are good, the chief justification is grounded in logical policymaking, the foundation of conditionality. According to the theory of logical policymaking, at the end of the debate, the judge should not be forced to adopt the plan, simply because the neg read a counterplan, if the status quo is the best option. It would be illogical to accept an inferior option in the face of better choices. The arguments for empirical intrinsicness are similiary.
The clearest way to explain the way that logical policymaking justifies empirical intrinsicness arguments is related to the reasons why non-competitive counterplans should be rejected. At the end of the debate the question seems to be, does the affirmative have to win that the plan and only the plan should be done, or does the affirmative have to win only that the plan should be done, regardless of what other non-competitive actions should also be taken. Logical policymaking is the idea that the affirmative has to win that the plan is better than any competitive policy options or the status quo. What is left out of this analysis is how non-competitive policy options play into the decision-making of a logical policymaker.
It is clear in the situation where the negative presents a non-competitive policy option, such as a counterplan to fund space exploration. Even if it is true that the USFG should fund space exploration, this does not prove that the USFG should not adopt a No-First-Use policy. Thus the perm was born.
Similarly, it may be true that the USFG should keep good relations with Japan, the DA, but that there are also advantages to be had from passing an NFU policy. It may be the case that the optimal situation is one in which an NFU policy is adopted but also that we should take steps to alleviate the potential impact on US-Japan relations. Currently there is no ability for the debate judge to adopt the most optimal solution to the problems of the status quo because of the strenuous dismissal of empirical intrinsicness arguments.
Perhaps the most strenuous objection related to the intrinsicness argument is that no negative disadvantage is truly intrinsic to the plan because there is always some intrinsicness response that proves the disadvantage isn’t true. For example, if the negative has read a Deterrence DA with a bio-terrorist impact against an NFU aff and the 2AC says “Not intrinsic – pass the plan and have terrorists not attack anyone with bioweapons.” Obviously if this argument is allowed then no disadvantages could meet the test of intrinsicness, so obviously all intrinsicness responses should be disallowed right? Wrong.
This is just like saying that because the idea of the counterplan allows similar arguments against affirmative advantages that therefore no counterplans should be allowed. There are many arguments about what types of counterplans are legitimate, with these types of counterplans (object fiat) clearly among those that are illegitimate. Similarly we can argue that these types of intrinsicness arguments are illegitimate, mostly because of the agent involved in the transaction. The debate critic has no control over the actions of terrorists, and so it is clearly out of the range of available arguments to allow a decision regarding their actions. There is one agent that the debate critic clearly has decision-making power over, the United States federal government. In cases, most politics disads, where the negative advances a disadvantage that implicates USFG action the debate critic has the power of fiat to avoid actions that may be undesirable (such as not passing health care reform).
By drawing a distinction between logical intrinsicness arguments that are generated with regard to the resolutional agent and other types of intrinsicness arguments, it seems clear that the most logical, reciprocal model of debate is one that allows, rather than prohibits some type of affirmative intrinsicness arguments.
Given the arguments made, there is very little justification for eliminating affirmative intrinsicness arguments that are of the logical species and operate under the rubric of a United States federal government decision-maker as those avoid the most damaging forms of intrinsicness and reflect contemporary debate practices.
Published in: Debate Theory, Debate Pedagogy
Comments
The difference between "empirical" and "logical" intrinsicness arguments seems a bit contrived. In a debate round I could see the aff saying "we'll only make "logical" intrinsicness arguments, as opposed to empirical intrinsicness arguments intrinsicness arguments. But that doesn't make sense, given that both logical and empirical intrinsicness stems from the USFG being able to take multiple actions at once.
I agree with faber that every disad could be proven not intrinsic by only using USFG action. It seems the disads that are closest to being intrinsic are those based on the idea that other entities would perceive the plan and thus lead to x. But even those perceptions could be changed by USFG action, like will said, the Allied Prolif DA could be circumvented by arguing "the USFG should do the plan and reaffirm our conventional commitment to our allies."
Disads based on how the USFG would react are easily dismissed by just fiating the government ban/mitigate the impact. Getting rid of RRW, Politics, START, or Conventional weapons shift would be easy by just saying (in the case of RRW,) "ban RRW" or for Politics "pass HC or Cap and Trade or LOST/ whatever" etc.
Will, what DA on this topic would you consider completely intrinsic?
Eric –
Difference between Logical and Empirical Intrinsicness
The difference is anything but contrived. Consider a case that isn't in a debate round. Let’s say I am faced with a decision about where I wish to eat lunch. I offer the plan to eat lunch at Five Guy's burgers. You say, "But you have to pick up your dry cleaning." I say "Dry Cleaning disad - Not Intrinsic - I can eat five guys and pick up my dry cleaning."
This is an example of a logical intrinsicness argument. If I am a logical decision maker, a point in some dispute, then it would illogical to reject eating at five guys to pick up my dry cleaning; because I have the power to do both.
Lets say you offer a different disad like "You shouldn't eat five guys because they rely on CAFO's = animal abuse." I could say, "Not Intrinsic - Eat at Five Guys and donate $1000 to PETA."
In the second case, my intrinsicness argument relies on empirical argumentation about the effectiveness of PETA addresing animal abuse to mitigate my burger eating habit. You could muster a wide variety of arguments in response, things like “PETA doesn’t solve animal abuse because they only focus on the warm cuddly kind” or even “PETA = capitalism = bad.”
The first case is analogous to presenting a politics disad on the floor of congress, something to the effect of "If we pass an NFU policy, we will not be able to pass a health care policy." Presumably, if I have the power to pass an NFU policy, I also have the power to pass health care, there is no logical tradeoff.
The second case is analogous to a situation where a team reads an allied prolif disad and the affirmative makes the intrinsicness argument everyone dreads so much: “the USFG should do the plan and reaffirm our conventional commitment to our allies.” In the face of such a potent response to a disad, the negative would have no arguments, no evidence that could overcome this ultimate slayer of the disad, right? Again, very wrong. There are many arguments and many of them based in evidence that suggest that no matter what other actions the US takes, the declaration of an NFU policy, or De-Alert, etc. would irreparably damage the US extended deterrent. There are also good reasons why expressly affirming our commitment to conventional weapons is bad.
Loss of Valuable Disads
Many of the disadvantages that you have listed would not withstand a test of their logical intrinsicness from the perspective of the USFG. Is that a problem? What is so great about the health care politics disad? Except perhaps that it allows us to calmly make illogical decisions.
Eric, I have a question for you; imagine a situation where an NFU affirmative has read one of those disadvantages as an advantage. Let’s say Health Care Reform Good, the negative counterplans with “Pass Healthcare.” Though this counterplan is the very definition of object fiat, we do not hesitate to allow it, and rightfully so. The reason we allow it is because as logical USFG decision-makers there is no logical intrinsic link between adopting an NFU declaration and passing Health Care. We value the logic of our decision over the fairness of the action. If that is true for affirmative advantages, why is it not true of negative disadvantages?
You ask, “What DA on this topic would you consider completely intrinsic?” What do you mean by “completely intrinsic?” If your question is “What DA on this topic is immune from all affirmative intrinsicness arguments?” Then the answer is: there isn’t one. Probably all disadvantages are at least somewhat susceptible to affirmative intrinsicness responses, though I don’t think that is a problem. If we as a community decide that allowing intrinsicness responses of the empirical variety makes debates too complicated and unpredictable then it is simply a matter of rejecting the argument in the face of a well reasoned theory argument.
If your question is “What DA on this topic is defensible from both logical and empirical intrinsic attacks, in a way that allows a rich debate through evidence and logical argumentation?” Then the answer is: many of them, the chief of which is probably the deterrence disad.
If you scoff at the notion that there is no disadvantage completely immune from intrinsicness answers then I have a question for you: What affirmative advantages on this topic are “completely intrinsic” and thus immune from intrinsicness tests in the form of the CP?
Essentially my argument boils down to this – we should eliminate disadvantages that cannot withstand a logically intrinsic test from the perspective of the resolutional agent, i.e. disads that rely on some future USFG action to generate an impact. (This would also include court politics disads on a courts topic.) We should do so because they force us to make illogical decisions against affirmatives that never occur against the negative. We should seriously evaluate the way that we allow the negative to access the benefits of a logical decision maker model, while limiting the affirmative’s access to those very same benefits.
"we should eliminate disadvantages that cannot withstand a logically intrinsic test from the perspective of the resolutional agent, i.e. disads that rely on some future USFG action to generate an impact."
This makes sense to a degree, but I'm not convinced that discusses an inate difference in the two types of intrinsicness argument, rather than a difference of semantics. For example, with the example that I gave above of terrorist attacks, the negative is implicitly making the claim that the US border protection services (or whoever) will fail to prevent terrorists from entering the country. This must be a component of the disad, because otherwise the terrorists wouldn't be in the US releasing a bioweapon. So, I can just rephrase my intrinsicness arg so that it attacks that internal link: The US could pass plan and not allow terrorists to enter the US. This seems to meet the logic standard you articulated. In the example that you gave above of "eat at 5 guys and pick up drycleaning", I can still read the "uses more gas" disad, or even the "uses more gas than you can afford to put in your car" solvency takeout, so susceptibility to substantive arguments can't be the standard used to distinguish logical from empirical intrinsicness args.
I'll admit that if you can demonstrate your assessment that negatives lose disads that require USfg action to reach an impact, that would be pretty cool. Negatives will need to change their disads to make these arguments valid. The court politics/capital disad will get turned into an internal link story for the court legitimacy disad, budget tradeoff disads will get turned into internal links for more generic-style budget/spending disads, and the congressional politics disad will go the heck away.
This also means that negatives have to be careful about their internal link stories, generally. EG, for a while, the impact to terrorism scenarios was a piece of ?Alexander? '01 evidence, that said the US would respond to a terrorist attack by unleashing its nuclear arsenal on everything that moves in the Middle East. Do I understand correctly that the affirmative could make the logical intrinsicness argument "Do plan and don't nuke the Middle East when a terrorist attack occurs" ? Admittedly this would only solve the one impact scenario, but still, useful for that.
How about strengthening arguments claiming that the negative needs to read specific evidence to demonstrate their impact scenario? EG, the neg reads an economy disad with a Mead impact. Affirmatives often say "Mead just says that economic downturn increases the probability of war. If the neg doesn't demonstrate a credible scenario for war, don't give them an impact." Could the affirmative now couple that with "Impact not intrinsic - the US could do plan and not initiate a war because of any resultant economic downturn. Make them show that someone else would start the war" ? Or if the negative read the Lewis 98 card, the aff could say "Impact not intrinsic - the US could do plan and also not fight neocolonial wars to keep 3rd world countries in the global economy. No one else would start those wars if the US refused to do so. Make them read evidence that some other developed country would fight that war when the US stayed on the sidelines.
I think Will’s distinction is pretty clear and correct. Logical intrinsicness you don’t have to read a solvency card for, because it on face makes sense, whereas empirical intrinsicness you do. Do the plan and don’t pass healthcare – you don’t need a solvency card. Do the plan and don’t need terrorists into the U.S. – you do. I think it’s a sound distinction for the reasons Will points out.
I still don’t buy the arg for logical intrinsicness.
I don’t understand how its logical to eliminate what are potentially real-world DAs. If Obama actually tried to ram the CTBT through Congress, it would probably completely de-rail healthcare. Obama doesn’t get to say, “No Congress, you should pass the CTBT, and also pass Healthcare!” It seems completely illogical to me that debaters should be allowed to step out of the potential real world consequences of the plan. It seems absurd that we should be debating about the CTBT without debating its political consequences. Politics is why things don’t get done, and should be apart of our discussions. Ag topic was a pretty fantastic example of this.
There are also obvious ground concerns. I’m not sure why logic should be king. People complain about intrinsicness args because often the most generic DAs are non-intrinsic. Why should I lose my politics and reverse spending DA in the name of logic? It helps one team (the aff, by causing the neg to lose ground) but gives the other very little (the neg, since debate being more logical doesn’t help you win). Perhaps you will point out that it gives the neg something – they get to prove aff advantages are non-intrinsic. But affs have been doing just fine even though they can’t run non-intrinsic advantages. I have a feeling that without the politics DA, the neg would lose quite a bit more often. Moreover, affs seem to have far less of a problem researching truly intrinsic advantages. This makes sense given that teams can research their affs far more thoroughly than when they’re neg when teams have to research lots of affs, and thus can’t really go in depth on many of them.
Finally I think it’s far from reciprocal. Consider the aff that has an NMD bad advantage (plan stops NMD deployment). Neg easily CPs out of it, but now potentially links to other DAs they read, has to read cards to defend this, and has to seriously deal with theory args (they can’t just say “reject the argument,”). If the aff had 4 non-intrinsic advantages, and the neg CPed out of all of them, the neg would really have to spend some time on theory if every plank was conditional. When the aff says the politics DA is non-intrinsic, it is virtually no risk. The argument takes about 10 seconds to make in the 2AC, the neg has to spend time answering it, and at worst the aff can say “Reject the argument.” The aff can make a non-intrinsicness arg on every DA, but never has to spend any time defending the new conditional plan-planks. Theoretically speaking it’s certainly not reciprocal. And could the neg read cards that the aff perming the DA means they don’t solve some of their advantages? Not really, given time constraints and ease of the aff kicking the intrinsicness arg. It’s far from accepted that the neg can go to an advantage, say “non-intrinsic” and just move on. If the neg was allowed to do this, and didn’t have to accept any of the other potential problems from running a CP, I’d have far less of a problem.
Ok I'll agree that there is a brightline between empirical and logical intrinsicness arguments, but even if there is a difference that difference shouldn't logically preclude empirical intrinsicness arguments. It definitely would be contrived to exclude empirical intrinsicness arguments, considering they are both based off the framework that the USFG can do additional things to preclude DA's from occuring.
Furthermore, as McKinney pointed out, the aff could just say that the DA's to the intrinsicness arguments presented in the 2ac aren't intrinsic either. Using the Allied prolif DA, the aff in the 2ac says "DA isn't intrinsic, the aff can reaffirm security commitments using conventional weapons", so the 2nc says "reaffirming security commitments using conventional weapons is bad because it leads to PGS" so the 1ar can get out of this new DA by arguing that we'll do the plan, reaffirm security commitments, and ban PGS. Admittedly, this is a little farfetched, but all it takes is for the 2nc to read the DA to the intrinsicness argument.
I know McKinney concluded that it was implausible that the aforementioned scenario would happen, but all it takes is a paradigm shift to actually debating intrinsicness arguments more fully before people start cutting DA's to intrinsicness claims.
I appreciate Will's in-depth discussion of intrinsicness. As we move down the path toward greater (if not full) acceptance of conditionality, intrinsicness is the logical AFF counterpart.
I hashed this out with Nick Agnello in the van once, and used every conditionality good argument he made to justify intrinsicness. It also seems this is what the NEG does with conditional cp's all the time (here's a hypothetical way to solve your advantage, one we are not responsible for).
Let me suggest an alternate pathway by focusing on the locus of the decision-maker in the intrinsicness question. We could call this "resource intrinsicness:"
I agree with Nick that killing the politics disad is a devastating indictment to intrinsicness. The way intrinsicness is currently conceived of, the politics disad would be destroyed, and I think there is merit to considering politics both for educational reasons and for real-world reasons.
For education, I think it is important that students learn a great deal about the present-day political situation. The health care debates are worthy on their substance--students learn a great deal about an issue of public policy of pertinent concern NOW. This alone, is enough to kill intrinsicness in my mind.
One question I have is whether or not we can "save" intrinsicness and the politics disad at the same time (as a real world policy maker, this seems a valuable concern). Is there a way to say the agent of action of the intriscness argument--instead of being the USFG--is the individual decision-maker? IE Obama would have to say--if I push this de-alerting policy, it will likely divert from the health care debate--ergo I should not push de-alerting.
Here's the key--Obama can't get health care passed on his own. From the logic of the individual decision-maker, political capital is an "intrinsic consideration." What the AFF intrinsicness argument instead should focus on, is the intrinsic ability to persuade others. If I lose the ability to persuade others by pushing the plan, that is an intrinsic loss. Perhaps I could "get it back" by PUSHING something else, but the individual decision-maker doesn't have the ABILITY to pass something else.
A variant of Will's "dry cleaning example" above will suffice here.
Plan: Buy a house
Disad: Won't be able to buy a car if you buy the house
Non-intrinsic: buy both
But you don't have the resources to buy both. If we view political capital as a resource, and if we view intrinsicness from the locus of the decision-maker, the argument of "do plan + pass health care" makes no sense. It would instead be:
Plan: Expend the political capital necessary to pass the plan
Disad: Expenditures of political capital mean no health care
Non-intrinsic: Expend political capital on both...
And now, my politics disad is intrinsic.
This might be a long way of saying: do plan + pass health care is a dumb intrinsicness argument because it allows the decision-maker to have full control over both actions, which they don't.
At the same time, if Will wants to buy me some Five Guys, I'm in.
Just some thoughts. Consider: resource intrinsicness. Or maybe: locus of decision-maker intrinsicness.
Or, don't allow the NEG. to run multiple conditional counterplans. Or stick the AFF with their intrinsicness answers. That's an old school thing Ahilan used to want (you want to build up our conventional deterrent to protect Japan--I have other disads to that I should get to run versus your intrinsicness answer).
I feel like I've been time-warped back to 1991, btw. Anyone want to talk about counterplanning in uniqueness in the 2nc?
RG
I'm busy voting aff 1000x for WMJ on this.
In response to the "thought experiment."
I've seen these debates before, and they are ugly. A few debates I was involved in during the early 90's were "conditionality justifies intrinsicness." The 2ac would then rattle off about 10 or 11 one sentence intrinsicness answers to a disad--ones that would stop the disad in a heartbeat. If we allow widespread intrinsicness, we are going to have messy debates with multiple conditional AFF additions to the plan. The fact that it is real hard to be NEG against this is beside the point...the debate becomes incredibly messy very quickly. Also, it becomes difficult for the NEG to make the logical answer back to intrinsicness (if we did your idea to solve this disad, it would lead to another disad).
In 1993 at the Wake tourney, a Georgetown team out of the blue counterplanned to do the CWC to every country but India new in the 2nc--net benefit--US-India relations. They claimed the counterplan was conditional in the c-x.
I argued that new conditional counterplans (since they added to the neg advocacy prior in the debate) justified intrinisicness. I rattled off about 6-7 intrinsicness answers like "double India's foreign aid" "concede to India on every issue it wants" etc. Hard to survive that "test" of the disad.
I also think considering the political ramifications of actions is a useful tool for debaters. Will claims that the politics disad can survive his intrinsicness test, but doesn't provide a tangible example. Two thoughts:
1) Politics as presumption: I've written an NCA paper on this question before, but the real reason why most politicians don't do things is because of the political ramifications. I'm convinced that if we had true campaign finance reform we'd have universal health care in a heartbeat, our foreign policy to the Middle East would be drastically different, environmental policy would be different, etc.
But politicians don't do these things. The reason why is because they make an assessment as to their ability to get other things done. To take this a step further...so do university administrators, department heads, businesses, etc. If debate is supposed to teach us real world decision-making skills-the notion of "political capital" is at the top of the list. Wishing it away by saying that a "logical" policy maker could just take two separate actions without looking at the political ramifications of those actions is a tough call.
Will makes some arguments about different levels of FIAT and whether or not cp's also link to politics. I think I could agree with him on both levels (teams should clarify what they mean by FIAT, teams should argue counterplans link to politics), but still say we've gotta consider political ramifications of arguments.
In some ways, politics may be the height of "illogic." Virtually every study concludes that universal health care would be better for the economy and better for Americans. Why don't we do it? Because of good ole fashioned politics. It is something we should learn more about it.
2) Limit intrinsicness: My above effort is an effort to do so. I think that putting the judge in the role of a decision-maker goes above and beyond what the final vote is: it also entails how the individual arrives at that vote. I might be willing to listen to an argument that says "pass the plan + add sweetners to health care to make sure it passes." That folks, is real world. Then, the neg should get to argue that either: a) sweetners wouldn't be enough b) they kill the effectiveness of health care reform c) cause push for other sweetners by other politicians either gutting effectiveness of bill or undermine ability to get the bill passed.
I am finding this interesting however. I like some of the thoughts under #2 and would lead to more interesting politics debates.
I am glad that there has been a healthy discussion here; it is good to see I am not the only one interested in this issue.
A couple of global points that I think are worthy of consideration.
First, I have taken as my starting point the idea that the debate critic is a logical decision maker who has the ability to make decisions about what the USFG does or does not do.
The central thesis of intrinsicness arguments is that this orientation allows us to make logical decisions about actions that the USFG might take; leading to questions such as “Should the USFG adopt a No-First-Use of nuclear weapons policy? In adopting this policy, is the optimal world one in which no other policy actions are taken?
Should the affirmative win the debate if the optimal world is one in which the plan action occurs, regardless of what other actions are necessary? Or is the only situation in which the affirmative should win one in which the plan and the plan alone is optimal? We already agree that the affirmative cannot win simply because their plan is superior to a proposed counterplan, because it would be illogical to adopt an inferior proposal in the face of a superior one (the status quo).
It is possible that we may decide that we don’t like the ramifications of this orientation, conditionality, intrinsicness, etc. and decide that a different orientation be proposed, perhaps that the debate critic does not have carte blanche decision making powers over all USFG action, but is more like a court judge, narrowly deciding the facts of the resolution. It is also possible that we may reverse direction on the idea that the decision maker is bound by the rules of logic, and impose a different requirement, such as the idea that any and all policy proposals must be advocated by the party presenting them.
Second, I agree that a more widespread incorporation of intrinsicness arguments into debate would change the way that debates happen and the ways that we research to prepare for debates. Some of those changes would be beneficial, such as the increased emphasis on researching disads that do not have easy intrinsicness answers. Other outcomes may be less desirable, debates could become increasingly large and difficult to evaluate because of the added complexity of different intrinsicness responses and their interrelation with the plan and potential counterplans.
I am not necessarily advocating that we uncritically encourage the use of intrinsicness arguments in every situation, just that we examine the terrain of what it means to decide a debate as a logical policymaker and allow both the affirmative and negative teams to access the benefits of that orientation as well as be subject to its pitfalls.
Regarding the Politics Disadvantage
First, the politics disad is not necessarily dead because of intrinsicness responses; there are political ramifications of any policy and those political ramifications are usually carried out in the public arena. The disadvantage would simply have to be re-explained as a reason why the USFG would be forced to take, or forgo, certain action because of a policy decision. It wouldn’t be difficult to say that if the USFG were to ratify the CTBT that there would be a reaction among various lobbying groups and political parties opposed to its ratification would mobilize. Whether they would specifically mobilize against health care or Obama or future arms control measures is obviously up for debate, but that is as it should be.
Second, the politics disad presents difficulties of its own for how a judge should evaluate a debate, a subject that I will undertake in some depth in the future. It presents questions such as: does the judge adopt the perspective of Obama when considering the resolution? i.e. “Obama should be Resolved: That…” Why is there an implicit assumption that when the affirmative plan is passed it requires Obama to divert his focus from health care? If that is true, wouldn’t be equally true of all counterplans that utilized the USFG?
I don’t want to belabor this point, but I think that most interpretations of what allows the politics disadvantage are radically different from the one presented in the 2NC on the conditionality debate, that the judge is a logical policymaker with control over USFG action. If the debate judge has the power over USFG action, then it seems that their authority is not limited to presidential action, legislative action, or judicial action, but some combination of the three.
I am not arguing that we should dismiss the interpretation of fiat that expressly allows the politics disad in its most glorious form, i.e. plan trades off with anything/everything else being discussed/considered/proposed by the Obama, what I am saying is that the negative cannot rely on one interpretation of what it is that the critic is deciding on one hand for the disad, and a completely different interpretation on the other, for the counterplan.
I think that it is a useful thought experiment to consider what debate would look like if the affirmative were allowed to use intrinsicness arguments in much the same way that the negative uses counterplans, as a way to undermine the most obviously ridiculous internal link chains that we can piece together in order to reach an impact.
WMJ
For the defenders of intrinsicness, what is the "status" of the aff intrinsicness argument? Is it -- like a permutation -- a "test" of the disadvantage or is it an advocacy that the neg can straight turn? For example, if the economy DA is answered with "the Fed should just raise interest rates," can the negative win the debate on "higher interest rates bad" or can the aff just say they were testing the DA?
Brad,
My assumption is that most defenders of intrinsicness would say it is a test of the disad.
As I mention in one of my above posts though, the option to read disads to the intrinsicness answer is fertile ground for debate. Frankly, if all the neg gets is that they eliminated one of the multiple tests of the disad, I doubt many negs will research the detrimental effects of the intrinsicness answer and go for theory instead.
The McKinney article (and this post, by consequence) seems to rest on the notion that there is a such thing as an "intrinsic" consequence to a particular plan, or that for any action there is a set of consequences that only that action could produce.
From McKinney: "The essence of intrinsicness is that the affirmative plan must be a necessary causal agent for both the achievement of advantages and the occurrence of disadvantages."
Am I the only one who finds this notion absolutely ridiculous? Are there really that many problems that can be solved by exactly one policy action, no more, no less? Or are there any disadvantages that occur as a result of a particular policy action that no other policy action could prevent?
I learned in history class that World War I was caused by the assassination of Franz Ferdinand. Does anyone really believe that had the archduke not been shot, that the underlying tensions and "entangling alliances" would have peacefully dissipated with no bloodshed? Or was that assassin a "necessary causal agent" of World War I? Really?
I have (plenty of) other issues with intrinsicness answers, but that why debate those out when the philosophical foundation is so outlandish?
My main attraction to intrinsicness is that, borrowing the verbiage of Galloway, "the philosophical foundations" of so many negative arguments themselves are "so outlandish."
One need not rattle off a list of some of the dumber negative arguments to get a feeling for why this has intuitive appeal - we only need thing of the central negative blueprint of our moment in debate time - unpredictable counterplan that solves advantages, plus a politics net benefit. When teams (including the ones I coach, guilty as charged) make a living on the neg by researching a "new" strategy to core affirmatives for each tournament, I wonder how much of the actual deliberative vigor we love to tout about debate is actually being captured. I say this on account of the fact that while negation by opportunity cost does, I suppose, disprove the desirability of the plan action (when the plan is weighed in comparison to an infinite number of potential alternative counter-plans), it does nothing to test the validity of any of the claims made by the affirmative, save one IMPLICITLY advanced claim: that the plan is not only sufficient to solve the harms outlined, but necessary, such that it quite literally the MOST desirable means of addressing the harms.
If, in fact, it is unfair for the affirmative to advance intrinsicness arguments against negative disadvantages, I wonder why it's become universally acceptable for the negative to make intrinsicness arguments against affirmative advantages?
Just some food for thought...
Josh and others,
It is illogical that affirmative intrinsicness arguments meet nearly universal scorn but negative intrinsicness arguments (in the form of advantage counterplans) are widely accepted.
I suspect the reason for the ongoing double-standard is pure practicability. We've all settled on a workable model of debate where one team gets these arguments and the other doesn't. The win percentage is close to even and some other absurd conventions favor the aff*. The justifications for the standard are just ex post facto legitimization. Adding intrinsicness to the existing model would dramatically throw off the balance.
I don't see this as a bad thing either. All games have an arbitrary set of rules, both informal and formal. Over time they change as teams get better at adapting to current norms and expectations.
But rules can't follow from pure logic.
First, because that is impossible. To say debate should follow the logic of the policy-maker begs the question of what policy-maker and what logic. Is the judge the USFG or someone comparing the USFG to other agents? If they are internal to the federal government how much control do they real have independent of political questions? These questions can be answered but not in any a priori way because nothing is built into the rules. The question of debatability necessarily re-emerges.
Second, because pure logic is undesirable. The most valuable thing debaters learn is research. Cutting cards, seeking out policy proposals and data to support them. The cost is that in order to incentivize research we have to put a premium on evidence. Consequently, logic divorced from evidence gets undervalued. Every instance where we choose to over-value logic by calling for rational policy-making devalues some form of research. Intrinsicness devalues politics and spending arguments. Conditionality deeper, card-intensive add-ons, due to time pressure and strategic choice.
To return to the original point, deducing rational justifications for aff intrinsicness is bad method and leads to bad conclusions. Setting the rules of debate should be an exercise in practical compromise. Debate isn't perfect but it is workable, and that's important.
* I think another great example of workability trumping logic is the common answer "we'll defend congress for your disads, but not for your counterplans". Same with the claim "plan is immediate but counterplans that PIC out of immediacy are not competitive." Either the plan is immediate and uses congress or it doesn't. But these forced, probably fudged, explanations work well for debate, so we keep them.
As far as rules that benefit the aff, in addition to those two, the move away from philosophical competition has been illogically helpful. If an entire aff is about maintaining hegemony then an offshore balancing CP should, intuitively, compete. But the fact that strictly speaking, you can do both the plan and the CP ends up as a trump card for the aff.
Ryan,
You pose an interesting question, why debate out the merits of whether or not an argument is intrinsic given that the philosophical foundation is so outlandish? One answer is that we already do investigate the intrinsicness of advantages and so, it seems that there are pragmatic and educational reasons for doing so. I defer to Dylan's pragmatic justification here. The second reason is that the philosophical debate regarding essences and intrinsic qualities/values may not hold much relevance for policy debates, but we can utilize the theory of intrinsicness if we limit the agent through which we consider whether or not something is intrinsic. From the perspective of the USFG there are certain consequences, and benefits, that are intrinsic to its actions. Were the USFG to declare an NFU policy there would be loss of credibility to any threats to use nuclear weapons first in the future.
I think that this is a good opportunity to discuss the benefits that we might gain from "exploring" the intrinsic connections between advantages or disadvantages and the plan. As has been pointed out, we already talk about the intrinsicness of affirmative advantages, any worry that no argument is truly intrinsic is just as true for advantages as it is for disadvantages. What I am interested in is the question: "Why do we hold the affirmatives accountable for answering the politics disad but do not hold the negative accountable for answering the politics advantage?"
I think that the answer is that in no way does the counterplan to pass healthcare prove the plan to be true, while arguably the disadvantage proves that the plan is false. The counterplan proves that the plan is not a "necessary causal agent" for the passage of healthcare, while the disadvantage posits that the plan is a "necessary causal agent" preventing health care passage. What I am questioning is this second statement. If the statement "The USFG should pass healthcare" is true, then that does not disprove the statement "The USFG should adopt an NFU policy," unless the negative can prove that there is a necessary tradeoff between the two.
I do think that we should hold affirmative intrinsicness arguments to the same requirements that we hold counterplans, they should have a text and probably should have solvency evidence (if they are of the empirical variety.) If this were the case then debates about the desirability of the plan versus other possible policy options would be more in-depth and well researched by both sides as well as not force judges to make illogical decisions.
Dylan,
Though debate is a pragmatic enterprise in many ways, my concern is crafting a coherent model of decisionmaking as it applies to both teams. I took logical policymaking to be a good starting point because it seems to be the foundation for many crucial debate arguments including counterplans and disadvantages. The historic development of the policymaking paradigm was concerned with how a debate judge could make a logical decision given the arguments in a debate. It would be illogical to vote against an affirmative team that had presented a beneficial policy, even if that policy did not have 100% solvency.
I also use logical decision making because it seems to me that there are few alternatives, if any, that provide a coherent model of decision making. I do think that there are ways that we could make this model more coherent though, and one of them may be to allow affirmative teams access to well-crafted and well-researched intrinsicness arguments.
You say that rules cannot be based on logic because most questions are debatable. I am not trying to impose a particular vision on debates, but hopefully this discussion informs the debates that do happen. You ask, "Is the judge the USFG or someone comparing the USFG to other agents?"; an important question to determine what types of arguments are intrinsic to the action of the plan. One thing at least is certain, the judge is in a position to decide whether or not the USFG should take action on this question. The existence of counterplans seems to suggest that the judge can choose to adopt the plan or some other policy or policies instead of the plan. The existence of permutations seems to suggest that the affirmative does not have to win that their plan and their plan alone should be implemented in order to win, but rather just that as long as their plan is included in the necessary changes to the status quo, they should win. What I am suggesting is that the affirmative should be able to question whether or not disadvantages are the inevitable and irreversible result of the plan, or whether some other action could be taken, in conjunction with the plan, that would mitigate or completely negate the disadvantage.
I don't think that your example of aff-biased conventions (agent and immediacy concerns) violate the idea of a logical policymaker. The plan establishes certain parameters of action, within which the judge as a logical policymaker, can vote for the optimal version. A disadvantage to a possible instantiation of the plan does not disprove the plan, it only proves that there are certain undesirable instantiations of the plan.
If the counterplan represents the most optimal version of the plan, but a version nonetheless, then the affirmative should win. If a disadvantageonly applies to one instantiation of the plan, but not another (congress v. courts), then as a logical policymaker the judge can choose the best option. It would be illogical to choose an inferior example of the plan when a superior version existed to be affirmed.
The shift away from philosophical competition may have occurred as debates became more focused on the plan. I do think that there are types of counterplans that can be made competitive based on the aff advantages and how they posit the plan as a necessary and sufficient component of say, US hegemony. In that case, the counterplan combined with hegemony bad arguments would disprove the plan.
WMJ
Will,
My point is basically this: Debate evolves through the application of lived experience. This evolution produces a set of conventions that work but lack logical consistency. When they conflict with the imposition of some rational construct – say logical decision-making – what works should win out.
I think it’s important to point out that this issue is relevant only when the two are in conflict. Intrinsicness is such a case. The agent of the plan is probably another. In many instances our perspectives probably coincide. I think lived experience shows negative fiat is a good thing. It forces people to write better affirmatives and prevents negatives from losing to wanky add-ons or big-stick affirmatives. It’s also fits into a meta-scheme of policymaking.
My argument is, in a word, an impact turn (when has that ever been the M.O.?) Discarding practices that emerged in the marketplace of ideas of debate rounds, simply because they don’t fit into a logical scheme, is a bad thing.
First, because the goal of a logical paradigm possessing internal and external validity is chimerical. My examples of questions about the role of the judge were designed to demonstrate the ultimate failing of logic as an over-arching guide for debate. Namely, logic can’t tell us what paradigm to choose. You suggest that the judge can, under any of these options, logically vote for an intrinsicness permutation. At best this demonstrates that logic compels us to choose intrinsicness under a given set of assumptions, or possibly that several logical paradigms which incorporate intrinsicness arguments have internal validity. The fact that we can’t logically choose between these options still gives up the dream of a purely logical vision of debate. The other problem with this argument is that many judge roles would include the choice of plan v. CP but not an intrinsicness argument:
1. Judge is spectator at a political debate. Each party is presenting their views on a subject – say nuclear weapons posture. The spectator could endorse either sides nuclear posture but isn’t in a position of power. Thus, if one party pointed out the diplomatic capital or agenda-based consequences of their opponent’s position the audience member (judge) could do little to work around that
2. Judge is an advisor at the OMB or CBO writing a report. They can talk about all possible bills on a subject, how much it costs, etc. But their discussion of spending wouldn’t be tied to possible cuts in other areas. They wouldn’t suggest intrinsic permutations because their job is one of limited jurisdiction. They just speculate on immediate consequences of a report.
3. A bit more silly, but judge as congress-member just prior to recess or only as member of a committee. If they were on the defense committee they have to speculate about the budgetary or agenda consequences since appropriations and ways and means, or the full congress, would effect those, respectively.
Now, are any of those three desirable paradigms? Probably not (although I have a soft spot for #2). HOWEVER, what makes us reject them isn’t logic. There’s nothing a priori more or less logical about them than the conventional USFG policy maker role. We choose conventional policy making over these because it’s desirable and produces good debates. That’s what I meant when I said the question of debatability necessarily reemerges. Not just that all issues are contestable but that when logic works its way through the internal mechanics of debate we find the question of efficacy lurking at the bottom. Logic makes debate hold together (maybe… at least it can in some visions) but logic can’t tell us why we choose its form of debate. There’s nothing for it to hook onto outside of the internal practices of debate.
What about internal validity? I suspect that too is a pipe dream but examples escape me for now. So, I’ll spot you for a second that there is at least one form of logically grounded debate that “fits together”. The problem is that, as with any rational construct imposed from above, the cost of making it fit is catastrophic. *
The catastrophe consists of the sacrifice of worthwhile arguments. The politics DA, for example. The more logical you try to get, the more you lose. Agent counterplans lose out but conditioning reenters the debate, etc…
I’m obviously not the final arbiter on these issues. Plenty of people feel they are good or bad in opposition to my own ideas. The issue is that almost every person’s feelings are guided by their experience. They refer to issues like ground and time pressure or lack of truth (especially with politics). Rarely, when I have a strongly worded conversation about these issues is logic the centerpiece. So why try to make logic guide debate practice, when everyone on various sides of these issues things they should be debated in a different way.
I mentioned some examples of aff biased yet illogical conventions. I maintain these are illogical. Take the question of certainty. If one version of the plan is to do it with certainty, or immediacy, or through congress, then clearly the CP doesn’t compete. BUT… why are we so sure for disads that the plan is immediate, certain and … congress. If the 2AC stands up and says “no elections DA, we happen in 2013 fools”, they will lose quickly. Most judges find that unfair. That wouldn’t change if 2013 was in the plan. YET… if that is true, if for disads the plan is immediate, how can the CP to do it later be another version of the plan. My issue isn’t the perm by itself. I agree, that could be, in some worlds, a version of the text. My issue is that our conventions for disads show that the plan is immediate, but the convention for CP is the opposite. Your post only demonstrates how the permutation could fit into logical decision-making. True enough. But how does that, and our view of disads, fit into any logical paradigm.
One last thing. I think there’s an internal tension to my post as a reaction to your original suggestion. You are, after all, encouraging judges to participate in the marketplace of ideas. I’m suggesting debate is best when it emerges through lived practice. You are encouraging experimentation as part of that lived practice. My best attempt to resolve this tension, for now, is to point out that intrinsicness was tried before and was abandoned for a reason. Better to try more fruitful untested experiments.
* Amazing how debate mirrors the real world. Logical policy-making replicates the socialist error of central planning. We have a vision of debate where all things work because they are all tied to rationality. Or such a vision of the economy. It worked well: ask the Russians, Chinese, North Koreans and Cubans. My vision of debate is one for a free people in a free community. Practice, like in a market economy, emerges from the bottom up because every debate round is a micro-scale test of ideas. Cumulatively these rounds, like everyday commercial interactions in a free market, process far more information that one person (even you Will) can in the quest for a vision of debate. What emerges isn’t pretty. It looks irrational to the untrained eye. The analogy to the question of why we allow neg but not aff intrinsicness might be the question of why we sell milk to countries from whom we also buy milk. Practicality makes it so.
First I have to say that I am very happy that this debate is occurring, I think intrinsicness is an issue that needs to be revisited and this blog now contains the most sophisticated arguments I have seen on both sides of the issue. I just want to make/revisit two points. For those concerned about the educational value of the politics disad I have yet to see an effective response to the lack of a politics advantage. It may be true that universal healthcare has yet to pass only because of political reasons, but similarly many bad policies are passed for political reasons. Most judges would quickly vote against a team that stood up and said “sure our plan is a bad idea, but it is really popular so it gets healthcare passed” in the face of a negative counterplan. If there is a value in learning about politics that alone justifies rejecting intrinsicness, why is this not an acceptable affirmative? I have yet to see an effective response to this argument other than Dylan's argument that nonintrinsic disads provide balance and have been sanctioned by convention.
My second, concern is that the idea of a bottom up approach to debate theory seems to me to be counterfactual. The paradigm debates occurred in debate journals and between coaches as well as in debate rounds. My understanding is the shift to allow for topical counterplans was pushed almost entirely by Ross Smith and a few other Wake folks for the reason that it was only logical to examine them (the very sort of arguments Will is making). . Influential debaters and coaches began teaching topical counterplans at camps and much of the community reluctantly embraced the new argument (go check the journals and you will be surprised at the number of influential judges that opposed the move to topical counterplans). While it is true that intrinsicness arguments have fallen out of fashion the debate world has changed drastically since their heyday. The research tools available (I’m told) made finding specific disads and case turns incredibly difficult, the K didn’t exist, many of the counterplans that are popular today didn’t exist and the affirmative had around a 70% winning ratio. I am generally suspicious of claims that the debate community is always moving towards a more perfect style of debating. Just because a debate practice has been abandoned does not mean it isn’t worth bringing back.
You acknowledge the most important argument against aff instricness claims, namely that there is always a way to show the disad non-intrinsic in some way. You say the way to solve this is by limiting the agent of the instrinsicness claim. But the example you use seems like a straw-man. Intrinsicness claims are hardly ever resolved by addressing the impact, as suggested by using the non-intrinsicness claim "have terrorists not attack". Usually the claim would involve the link or first internal link of the disad, something about the perception of deterrence. And regardless, the aff could make a much more sensible claim about the impact, something like "enforce border security better" or something. How do we keep these in check?
Faber -
The agent consideration also addresses the problems of intrinsicness arguments that attack the first level of the disadvantage with an argument such as "Not Intrinsic - Pass the plan and have allies and enemies perceive the US deterrent as credible." While of the species of logical intrinsicness, this argument does not rely on USFG action, but rather the perception of the US deterrent. This intrinsicness argument does not use the perspective of the USFG when determining intrinsicness, but rather some omnipotent entity. The purpose of introducing the USFG as the limiting agent is because it relies on a foundational theory of debate that we are all comfortable with, the logical policymaker.
You say that "the aff could make a much more sensible claim about the impact, something like "enforce border security better" or something. How do we keep these in check?"
The way to keep these arguments in check is that your example is of the empirical intrinsicness variety, it tests whether or not the US could take other actions to mitigate the impact. We might decide that the introduction of these arguments was simply too unpredictable and we should protect the negative because they shouldn’t have to research their disadvantages as thoroughly as affirmatives have to research their advantages. I do not take up a thorough defense of empirical intrinsicness arguments in this post, focusing instead on logical intrinsicness arguments. Even if we decide that intrinsicness arguments of the empirical species are unfair, that is not a reason to eliminate logical intrinsicness arguments that use the resolutional agent.