Debate. Whatever it may be, the internet is chock-full of it. Yet combative dialog is the common currency of not only the online world, but as some would say democratic and liberal society itself. No view should go into the public mind unpressed by the rigor of scrutiny, and debate, be in online, in person, in written publications, or elsewhere is a widely favored method of this scrutiny. I think however the public's trust in this "institution," if you will, is misplaced; if our objective is to find and communicate truth, debate is quite poor at both and has a bias to the sensational and rhetorical.
Acclaimed biologist Richard Dawkins for all his controversy in the realm of religious commentary, is known for his continuing refusal to debate in an open forum with a creationist. His decision is not necessarily an unwise one. Surely his potential adversaries advertise this refusal as a kind of obstinance or acknowledged weakness of his stances, but more important on the grand scale is Dawkins' attempt is to stray from legitimizing a breed of thought which stands so shamelessly in front of scientific consensus with naught but flawed reasoning and distorted evidence seeking undeserved legitimacy.
Saying this is not meant to compare anyone wishing to debate with a creationist, far from it, but like creationists, many seem to believe the path to public consensus, scientific or otherwise, is thru open discussion in the public's ear. Just as creationists should file their academic papers⸮ in accredited journals, so should proponents of various pop-diets as well as political radicals. If they have a shred of cogency, their authors needn't worry for there are many waiting for the next credible scientific game-shifter, the problem is that such a thing likely does not exist. I, nor anyone else, am not the entryway to credibility; do not suggest to debate with me hoping it will make you be taken seriously elsewhere.
Debates also have a scope far too limited to present accurately all possibilities. Nearly all political discussions come in two popular endorsed simplifications and a one-on-one debate helps to ferment this. Self-assuredly keen "third-wayers" like to note one should not legitimize a "binary" viewpoint of ideas; this is probably right, but I do feel that it quite human to imagine the world binarily. That said, a public debate often puts too many issues on the table and arguers are forced to pick a choice from many, arraying them in a way that may not represent all perspectives.
More importantly, I do not debate because it is the format of debate which is constructed to resist finding and interpreting facts correctly. Whether we speak of high-school debate clubs or fora arguments, we have the idea that two sides with their own viewpoints clash with one which will be the victor. The problem with this is firstly that the viewpoints are inseparably linked to the debaters; one cannot, say in formal policy debate, change his interpretation, he having seen sufficient evidence to persuade him; neither side, at that, has any reason to reach a reasonable conclusion, only to propagate their predetermined one whatever be the cost. In this format the debaters are not debaters, but soulful extensions of their arguments who are just as much in risk in dignity and fame as these arguments themselves. This traditional format of debate doubtlessly appeals to a more simian sliver of the human brain and the conversation of disputation is raptured away in the heat.
That said, I think that an ideal format for a "debate," if it could be called such, would be that multiple unaligned parties convene with various sources of facts and together try to arrive at the most reasonable conclusion. To some this may sound like some politically correct stultification, like a T-ball game without score kept, but in style it is quite similar to our scientific method on a small scale. By detaching people from alliances and loyalties, they have diminished incentive to arrive at a preferred conclusion. Of course although they would hate to admit it, people in academia do indeed carry their own biases, but the strength of the intellectual community is that all work to temper the thought of others to what's actually observed in reality. Debate could serve to highlight the charismatic persona of an intellectual, but it's the community of many intellectuals which gradual is edged to truth.
My purpose here is not to defame the style of debate nor say that it should not be practiced; I hold only that it should not be held as a measure of truth because it is indeed quite a poor one. It is true that a public debate may successfully quell popular, yet unfounded political, scientific, or economic myths with overwhelming evidence and rhetorical pounding. Yet equally as true it can be that a proponent of mythology can earn a stepping stone into the spotlight and can even embarrass well-founded scientific consensus with distortion and yet more rhetoric. The fact is debate as a tool should not be thought as something inherently light-bringing, but a tool that to inform must be carefully preformed and desensationalized.