The Great Debate

I think that the debate we had in class this past week was fairly healthy. Unfortunately, time ran out and we never determined who was right and who was wrong. If you think about it, though, the whole thing was quite ironic; we didn’t get to choose which side we were on. We were told which type of thought we would be defending, and then we were given about ten minutes to develop a convincing argument either for or against a subject we knew very little about. Now isn’t that interesting? Just stop and think about it – we were forced to think a certain way and when the time was right we had to come up with several “good” reasons to defend that point of view. Even though we didn’t know that much about what we were defending, we were still able to come up with something to say because our leaders (in this case, our professors) said it was in our best interest. We believed them and this forced-on opinion became our own. So it seems that the process of our debate was a lot like the subject of our debate.

I can imagine that many people during the Enlightenment period supported one view or the other simply because someone told them they should. I would have never thought I could be so easily swayed one way or the other, but then it happened to me! I was so surprised to find myself getting emotionally engaged in the argument – over something as trivial as a class time debate! Just think about how the emotions must have soared over something more serious, like ideals and religious practices. Our debate gave me the opportunity to think about what it really might have been like for one side or the other during the time of the Enlightenment. I think it was a great learning experience and I hope we can hold more debates throughout the year!