So I watched an overly long atheist/theist debate on YouTube the other day.  It was held by an American Muslim organization and featured two Muslim debaters and two atheist debaters.  It was depressing and nightmarish to watch.  I thought the atheists did a horrible job, frankly, and let the other side get away with dodgy logic and word games.  In their defense the environment wasn't friendly to them in the least, but they weren't really doing anything that would have won the crowd over.

After the sorry affair was over, I found myself wondering what possesses atheists to want to debate the existence of God or Allah or what-have-you.  I can understand giving a talk, taking questions and answers, writing an essay, but a debate?  Would you debate the existence of the tooth fairy?  What's the point?

We hold political debates to see how potential representatives think on their feet, but not to find the truth.  As I have long noted, debates are not about truth, they are about winning, and this is precisely why I do not like them.  You get people playing semantical games with each other and trying to win over the audience instead of working together to reach truth or at least understanding.  And since the most outspoken debaters tend to insult each other, or each other's position, they do little to convince anyone of anything.  Instead these events tend to drive wedges between people instead of bring them together.

So if it is about winning as opposed to truth, what good does debating the existence of supernatural entities serve?  Even if you win you haven't proved anything beyond the fact that you are the better debater.

Personally I think irrational beliefs are not the sort of thing you want to try to debate--your theistic opponents will simply expand their belief beyond the boundaries you try to set for them--whether it makes sense or not.  And why wouldn't they?  The beliefs were irrational in the first place.  As the old saw goes you can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into.