Morgan's Negative Case

Thomas Edison once said "invention is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration" This qoute perfectley illustrates the way that goals are achieved. Not through ideals but through action and work.

Good afternoon, My name is Morgan Sipe and I will be the negative speaker for this debate round.My value for this round will be progress and for the purpose of upholding my value I stand,resolved that when in conflict pragmatism ought to be valued over idealism. In this case I will demonstrate how my value of progress dictates that we negate the resolution.

My value for this round,Progress is defined by Websters Ninth New Collegiate dictionary as a forward or onward movement to an objective or goal(page 940).
Progress is the most important reason for someone to negate the resolution because Pragmatism achieves progress and it is only through progress that we reach our goals.This leads me to my first Contention

First Contention:
My first contention is that Pragmatism is in the process.

Statement: When idealism and pragmatism conflict it is only in the process. Pragmatism isn't in the conception of goals and ideals;nor is pragmatism in the end of achieving those same goals by definition Pragmatism is in action. It is in process and as Thomas Edison Said that is 99% of the operation and represents the more important aspect.Someone doesn't value the 1 cent that makes up a dollar over the other 99 cents that complete it.The 99 cents are more valuable.The same is true with Pragmatism and idealism as Pragmatism gets progress and progress is more important when striving for a goal .Which in turn means that Pragmatism,which achieves Progress is more Valuable.This brings me to my second Contention.

Second Contention: my second contention is Pragmatism achieves Progress.

Example #1 the Pacific war presents a great example to explain my point. In the world War 2 when Americans fought the Japanese in the Pacific our strategy was to skip the well defended Japanese Islands in favor of the less defended islands.In this way we managed to proceed through all the Japanese lands and in the end achieve victory by capturing all of the Japanese territories.Through this Pragmatic way of "Island Hopping" America managed to progress in WW2 and finally achieve victory. Yet this was not the Idealist way if we had been idealistic about it we would have fought against all the Japanese islands in order to achieve "full" victory.If we had followed Idealism we may have lost many more lives than were neccesary and in the end not have progressed as far or as quickly as Pragmatism, because Pragmatism is not hindered by Ideals.Not that Idealism doesn't gain Progress,it will,but only to a certain point because it is restricted by itself. Pragmatism is needed to aquirre progress quicker and more consistently.
Third Contention:
TAG: When pragmatism is undervalued, idealism can't be achieved.

For example when someone joined the continental army during the revolutionary war, they signed up supporting the ideals of freedom and independence. In order to serve in the army these same men had to give up their freedom and their independence in order to support the greater cause. They had to follow orders without question, and live within a very strict and highly controlled environment. This was the
pragmatic way of achieving their sought after ideals. If they held their ideal of freedom above the pragmatic means of achieving freedom, this ideal would never have been achieved.

(insert Rebuttal)

Closing quote
Henry David Thoreau once said "What I began by reading, I must finish by acting."

Hey man, I've got some advice for your case. Just some thoughts....

First off, that's a really good quote you found by Edison. That's a great opener to your debate.

Secondly, it seems to me like you are assuming that idealism doesn't have any action involved; that it is just believing or thinking. Most affirmative speakers aren't going to use a definition like that for idealism, because it makes the affirmative a tough position to defend. The kind of definitions an affirmative would probably use for idealism would be like these...

Encarta Dictionary--belief in perfection: belief in AND PURSUIT OF PERFECTION AS AN ATTAINABLE GOAL

Merriam-Webster's--the practice of forming ideals or LIVING UNDER THEIR INFLUENCE

Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary--a principle or a WAY OF BEHAVING that is of a very high standard

Webster's New World Dictionary, 4th Ed.--BEHAVIOR or thought based on a conception of things as they should be or as one would wish them to be; idealization

Anyway, my point is that the affirmative would probably use a definition of idealism where idealism is more than just thought or belief, but is also action towards the goal or ideal. If you want to continue using idealism as if it is only thought or belief it would be a good idea to have an alternative definition of idealism ready that more supports your case.

Also I really like your revolutionary war example. It illustrates your point well.

Hope this critique helps, man. Keep up the good work!

Morgan, I agree with Adam on this being a good example, one thing I want you to work on is clearing up the wording a bit. Tags need to be simply stated and stand alone statements.

Quote :

Second Contention:
When pragmatism isn't used ,ideals are forced to break themselves because often times the way to reach an ideal is the pragmatic way.

Example #1
Here is a historical example to explain my point.In the revolutionary war,when someone joined the Continental Army they joined for the Ideals of Freedom and Independence
In the Continental Army however,you were expected to take any order at any time without question and resignation was not an option; they had to stay until their enlistment was over.
Until then a soldier lived in a virtual dictatorship,that was their in order to gain Independence.That way of Organizing an Army was the pragmatic way and in no way did it support Freedom
but was used because it was the only way to achieve their ideal of Freedom. The way of organizing an army according to Liberty would have failed and because of that Freedom would never have been achieved.

TAG: When pragmatism is undervalued, idealism can't be achieved.
For example when someone joined the continental army during the revolutionary war, they signed up supporting the ideals of freedom and independence. In order to serve in the army these same men had to give up their freedom and their independence in order to support the greater cause. They had to follow orders without question, and live within a very strict and highly controlled environment. This was the pragmatic way of achieving their sought after ideals. If they held their ideal of freedom above the pragmatic means of achieving freedom, this ideal would never have been achieved.