No, that's great, Smuppet! I think it was really well argued. You convinced me. :) Love the 'learning to ride a bike' analogy.
Could we also add in this point -
There is farseeking, as previously mentioned, to cover communication to humans, coercing for protection and healers and herb lore for healing. But we in this current day and age have two things that the beforetimers did not. Empathy and Beast speaking (both mental and finger speech). These two allow for greater and better communication, and naturally a better future for all creatures, not just humans, especailly now that Talented Misfits are slowly being accepted into society and are able to make their abilities available to all.
Yes, misfit abilities are very useful. We are not suggesting that we should somehow take away misfit abilities, but we would merely give all people the same ability to heal and communicate.
This idea that misfits should be the only ones to wield the power to heal and protect themselves does not seem fair at all. Shouldn't everyone have these rights? And what if there are no misfits around when someone is taken deathly ill? Is the affirmative team saying that it is acceptable for people to die because they won't let Untalented people have the ability to heal?
This is also going against everything that the misfits worked for. They want to be accepted in the community and to feel normal. Denying ordianry people this technology will probably make them resent and fear the misfits.
With beforetime technology, everyone could be equal. This would lessen prejudice against misfits, and allow everyone the ability to heal and defend themselves.
Also, in our 4th speech I think we're supposed to rebut against
all of the Affirmative team's arguments. The actual speech part of it is only supposed to be small, because we are just re-iterating our previous points.
So, I think we should do a list of all of the affirmative team's main arguments, and think of rebuttals for them. That way we can completely shoot their argument down. A lot of debates depend almost entirely on the last speech.
affirmative points:
1. We don't need Beforetime tech because we have - misfits, herb lore, our own technology, etc.
I think we've pretty effectively shot this down in our speech anyway.
2. Discovering Beforetime tech would make people more curious, and curiosity can lead to dangerous obsession. eg. the Tecknoguilders.
3. Using Beforetime tech would interrupt our natural development.
4. We don't have the resources to use Beforetime tech, and Beforetime tech can cause more damage than good.
5. We can still learn about Beforetime tech while still 'leaving it in the past'.
This is pretty ridiculous really, so it should be easy to rebut.
I think that's pretty much it, so if we can rebut all of those arguments, we'll be doing really well. :) I'll try and think of rebuttals now. my brains a bit smooshed from lack of sleep.
Edit: Also, could we rebut this point -
...poisonous blacklands means that none can cross them. Especially not to put in 'fellytone' wires.
But there is Beforetime technology that can combat these poisons and allow people to cross the blacklands. Ex. (the suit thingy... can't remember what it's called.)
The Farseekers are a modern version of communication devices and it is in all ways a better form of communication.
But farseekers cannot communicate over tainted ground, or during storms. Beforetime technology could. And it would make communication over long distances possible for everyone, not just farseekers. The affirmative team has said that methods of Farseeking will improve so that everyone can be reached, not just Talented people. But the evidence shows that the opposite is occurring - more and more people are developing natural mind-shields that the farseekers can't breech.
Also, the farseeker's range is limited. Take what happened when Elspeth was trying to get a message from Sutrium to Obernewtyn quickly and safely. She could not reach over such a large distance. She had no messanger birds, and besides, messenger birds can be shot down (as seen in TKP, when a vital message was delayed due to the unreliability of messanger birds).
These problems could be solved by using Beforetime communication technology.
If the teknology that the negative team is so supportive of was brought back even in a revised form, it could in fact be a disadvantage.
A disadvantage to be able to get massages quickly and easily to people over long distances, and without being influenced by weather or tainted ground? Now, there's just something wrong about that...
What of the people who were trapped on the West Coast because a message couldn't be given to the rebels in time? What of all the people who lost their lives, when this incident could have been avoided by the use of Beforetime technology. I have already given the example of Elspeth needing to get information to Obernewtyn. And, as we have said, communication allows us to learn from people. We could gain better medical and political skills. Not to mention being able to communicate and make friends with people who are living far away. I am sure that Elspeth would have appreciated Beforetime technology when Dameon was in Sador, and they could communicate only through the occasional letter.