Definitions

Whilst you may think it obvious what your topic is about, it is important that the topic is clarified so that both teams agree on the meaning. Even the simplest and most straightforward topic needs a definition.

How to come up with your definition

During preparation, both teams should think about the definition. The first affirmative speaker must define the topic, and the negative team should be thinking about how they would define the topic if they were the affirmative team. This is so the negative team is prepared for any definitional issues that might occur in the debate, even though they are not required to provide their own definition unless major differences arise.

The definition should not be taken from the dictionary (unless there are words that are overly complex or might have multiple meanings). Debating definitions are more like scientific definitions, they provide scope/limits for what will be included and excluded.

You should think about the definition by asking the question “What is the debate about?” Look at the key words in the topic and ask yourselves what they mean. Here are a few examples.

That smoking in public places should be banned

What is a “public place?”. What do bans do and why should we use them in this case? What does “smoking” mean? Hopefully this will not be a debate about smoked meats!

That languages other than English should be compulsory at school

We all know what a school is! But is the topic suggesting that it should be compulsory in all schools, or just secondary ones? What does “compulsory” mean? You should be thinking about what an average reasonable person would think when asked if students should be made to study another language.

The definitional rule: the "most reasonable" definition prevails

Sometimes teams disagree as to what the definition should be. Definitions rarely influence the outcome of the debate, but adjudicators may look favourably or unfavourably at definitions depending on how “reasonable” they are.

A reasonable definition is almost always the most obvious one. Teams usually get into definitional troubles when they have tried something obscure or clever with the definition, to give their team an easier argument, or create difficulties for the opposing team. The reasonableness of a definition is assessed from the viewpoint of an average reasonable person – so ask yourself what the person in the street would think the debate was about if you gave him or her the topic. If your definition would not be obvious to a member of the public, then it may be seen as unreasonable.

For example, if, on the topic “That Australia should accept more refugees”, the affirmative team defined “more refugees” as being one more person than the previous year’s intake, this could be viewed as unreasonable. Most people would expect the debate to be about a significant increase – otherwise it isn’t worthwhile debating at all! Moreover, proposing such a small change makes it much harder for the affirmative team to make a compelling case about the differences between what happens now versus after the change they are proposing.

On the other hand, the negative team might want to have “more” defined as ”one million more”, and argue that such large increases are a bad thing. This definition would also be unreasonable because it is designed to give the negative an easy argument and the affirmative an almost impossible one.

Other definitions to be avoided

Certain other types of definitions are not allowed:

Truisms/Self-proving: This is when the topic is defined in such a way as to make it absolutely true, something which cannot be argued against. For example, if the topic was “That tomorrow is another day” and “tomorrow” was defined as being literally the day after today, then that definition is a truism – because it is impossible to argue against that statement of fact. Truisms can easily be avoided by making sure that your definition sets out something that can be argued against.

Time or Place Set: We expect that teams will take a reasonable approach to the time and geographical setting of debates. You should not “set” the debate in a particular time , eg the 1920s. This does not mean that you cannot use historical examples; only you cannot define a whole debate so that it takes place in the past. You also cannot unreasonably place-set a definition, e.g. defining a debate to be about what the Latvian government should do about smoking in public places would be unreasonable. But there is nothing to stop you from setting a debate in terms of what the Australian, or Victorian government should do.