Two thousand five hundred years ago, this is what Confucious had to say about debate...
“But the moment eloquence or the language of debate enters, true reasoning becomes impossible. For the purpose of the debater is not to find the truth but to win the argument, and to this end he will often stray as far as possible from the real issues”
“Eloquence and debate are designed, not to decide issues, but to sway people, for this reason they lean heavily on appeals to emotion and prejudice, and make use of neat, clever, and sometimes humorous turns of phrase rather than profound analysis of ideas”
“Of all this Confucious was contemptuous“
Confucious by H. G. Creel 1913, Chapter “The Teacher”
