What is information gathering in a debate? How can you gather information while also forming an argument against your opponent?
Debating requires you to do many things at once. While your opponent is giving their argument, you also have to ask the right questions to receive more information that can be used against them.
Discover how to gather information while you’re opponent has their turn to talk.
Information Gathering
While Trey Gowdy encourages knowing how to gather as much information as possible about the topic and your opponent before attempting to persuade them, asking questions can be a useful tool for information gathering in the moment. Non-leading questions seek basic facts and information—what happened, where it happened, who was involved, and so on. Unlike leading questions, they don’t suggest a possible answer in the asking of the question, but Gowdy argues that they can still be used strategically. For example, asking a coroner to provide graphic details of a body’s condition in a murder case can elicit sympathy from the jury, even if the witness doesn’t themselves call for the accused person to be prosecuted.
(Shortform note: Outside of a courtroom setting, seeking facts about the subject of disagreement can still give you ammunition or elicit sympathy from bystanders. For example, if you and a roommate are arguing over kitchen cleanup duties, asking them to name each time they’ve cleaned up after themselves—with specific examples—may reveal the disparity in how often the job has fallen to you instead, as well as the fact that it’s an ongoing problem rather than a one-time issue.)
“Why” questions, on the other hand, give your opponent a chance to articulate what they believe and the reasoning they followed to reach their conclusions. While Gowdy warns that the questioner can lose control of the conversation if they allow their opponent to speak for too long, generally asking questions breaks up the flow of your opponent’s argument and allows you to deconstruct it one claim at a time. You can put them at a disadvantage by asking about holes or weak points in their argument that they would likely have otherwise ignored, and even manipulate their emotional state by asking “soft,” easily answered questions or “hard,” more challenging questions at different times.
| Playing Hardball The terms Gowdy uses, “soft” and “hard,” come from American sports. While baseball or “hardball” is highly competitive and the speed at which a ball is thrown can make or break a game, softball uses a larger ball thrown underhand and is generally played by children or students rather than professionally. Softball questions are thus easy questions designed to make the interviewee look good (such as “To what do you owe your success?”), while hardball questions are more challenging and even accusatory. One place you may have encountered these kinds of questions is in a job interview. A softball question like “What are your strengths?” gives you an opportunity to praise yourself, while the more challenging “Why should we hire you?” forces you to compare yourself to other potential candidates. “Why” questions tend to be harder by default, but the same question can be reframed to be soft or hard depending on your goals—consider the difference in tone between “Why do you like this candidate?” and “Why should we vote for this candidate again when he’s failed to keep his campaign promises?” |
