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Sample Global Warming Debate

I. Introduction - the judge introduces the debate – this would be your teacher in the class debate

(Judge) - Good morning ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for joining us. Today we will be debating about the current global warming trend that our planet is experiencing. On the one hand we have team natural. They will be arguing that global warming is a naturally occurring phenomenon and that human contributions are negligible, if any. On the other hand we have team human. They will be arguing that human actions are accelerating the rate at which the Earth is currently heating up, making things noticeably more extreme than they would be otherwise. Let the debate begin! We will allow team natural to choose who goes first for our opening statements.

(Team Natural) – We want to go first.

(Judge) – Excellent, the floor is yours

II. Opening Statements – reminder, this part can be a little “fluffier” and does not need to be backed up with data. This is your team’s chance to make a good first impression. Opening statements should be no longer than two minutes.

(Team Natural) – Good morning ladies and gentlemen of the jury and honorable judge. You all look well today. My friends, global warming is a very heated topic these days (no pun intended). Throughout the course of this debate my team will show you that while it is true that global temperatures are on the rise, we should not be blaming humans and their carbon dioxide production. The views that we share with you are not simply opinion, they are fact. They are backed up by scientific research and solid data. Keep that in mind as we all discover together what the true cause of global warming is today – Mother Nature.

** The time keeper records the time for team natural as 52 seconds **

(Judge) – Thank you. Team human, you’re up.

(Team Human) – Respected jury members, honorable judge, we look forward to sharing with you just how wrong our opponents are in their belief that this is just a natural phenomenon. Is it true that global warming has occurred in the past without any help from humans? Of course. Does that mean that it cannot occur as a result of human activity? Of course not. As a team we will be calling on scientific study after scientific study to show you that human-caused global warming is not just our opinion, it is

Debaters – Use this document to help you in preparing for your own debate. It models for you all of the elements that you will see in your debate – opening statements,

arguments, rebuttals, audience questions, and closing statements.

Jury Members - Passed out to you along with this paper is a score sheet. The real debate will be using a score sheet that looks very similar. To help you warm up for the

real debate you will need to score the sample debate that is written on the following pages. You will also need to answer the questions on the back side of your score sheet.

This assignment is worth a total of 30 points. Happy judging!

the opinion of the scientific community! The data speaks for itself and its message is clear – humans are contributing to and accelerating current rates of global warming. Thank you.

** The time keeper records the time for team human as 55 seconds **

(Judge) – Thank you. We’ve now heard from both teams, jury members please score the opening statements. We will give each team a minute or so to prepare for the round 1 arguments. Team human will be going first.

** About one minute is given to each team to talk and prepare **

III. Arguments (round 1) – there are four things to remember when considering scores for the argument portions of the debate: (1) the arguments should generally be backed up with resources (2) every time a team cites one of their sources they should be awarded a bonus point – up to two bonus points per source (3) if the other team interrupts during the argument portion of the debate then they should be penalized (4) teams are allowed three minutes for their arguments, if they go over this time then they should be penalized.

(Judge) – Okay, time’s up. Team human, you have the floor.

(Team Human) – How can you look at the world today and all of the CO2 that we produce and say that it does not have any effect? Studies by Stanford University show that doubling the amount of carbon dioxide in a system leads to an increase of 3-6 degrees in temperature. Here, take a look (a graph is passed around for the jury to see). A 3-6 degree rise in temperature! In order to double the amount of carbon dioxide in the actual atmosphere it wouldn’t take nearly as long as you might think. Humans are putting over six billion tons of carbon dioxide into the air every single year. Do you realize how big that number is, it’s huge! In the past, CO2 levels have never really been more than .03% of our atmosphere’s gases – today it’s around .05%. This graph shows that rise (a graph is passed around for the jury). Remember how the temperatures increase by 3-6 degrees if CO2 doubles? Well, we have almost reached that doubling point. What can we expect to happen to our temperatures? I think that it’s pretty obvious to see, it will also increase, and who should we thank for that? Mother Nature? No! She’s not the one that changed that CO2, it’s because of humans. Humans are responsible for global warming. Thank you. I will now turn the time over to my colleague to say more.

(Another Member from Team Human) Here’s another thing to consider. As humans continue to use fossil fuels and cut down more trees, and they keep on littering and destroying habitats, more and more species are going extinct every day! For all we know, we may have already destroyed our only cure for cancer – all because humans wanted to live a more comfortable life. Global warming isn’t just about us – we have to think of the other species that we share this planet with.

** The time keeper records the time for team human as 2 minutes, 48 seconds **

(Judge) – Thank you. Jury, we’ve just heard round one arguments from team human, go ahead and score them based on what you’ve seen and please be sure that you are marking the correct team. Team human is the second column. Okay, we will now hear round one arguments from team natural. Go ahead team natural.

(Team Natural) – Thank you judge. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, there is a lot of focus on CO2 these days, so let’s go ahead and start there. In a study that was done by the National Atmospheric Society which analyzed ice core data for past periods of global warming, it was shown that CO2

actually does have a relationship with temperature – but NOT the one team human is telling us. It turns out that CO2 levels go up after the temperature rises. How can the increase of something cause a rise in temperature if it didn’t even increase until after the temperatures rose? It doesn’t make sense. It turns out that an increase in temperature causes an increase in CO2, not the other way around. Why is this? The reason, according to another study by Santa Clara University is the oceans. The oceans have a lot of CO2 inside of them, but when it gets hotter, the oceans will release more CO2 – that is why CO2 and temperature travel together, not because more CO2 equals higher temperatures, but because higher temperatures lead to more CO2. So, now we know about CO2. Is it causing climate change? No. It is caused by climate change, that’s why you always see them together. So, should we blame humans? No, because CO2 is not what is causing global warming. Thank you.


(Judge) – Alright, thank you to both teams for your round 1 arguments. Jury, please be sure to give team natural a score for their round 1 arguments. Now before we head into the first round of rebuttals I would like to remind both teams what the rebuttals are about. Rebuttals are a time for you to try and focus on what the other team has said, it’s not really the time to introduce new arguments. If some new things come up then that’s okay, but remember this is really supposed to be the time to focus on what has already been said. So, before we start rebuttals I’ll give a quick recap of what each team said and then I will give each team around one minute or so to talk and prepare.

** The judge then gives a quick recap of what each team said during their arguments and gives the teams a little bit of time to prepare for their rebuttals **

IV. Rebuttals (round 1) – there are three things to remember when scoring the rebuttal portions of the debate (1) Teams should focus on attacking what the other team said – if they keep on getting off topic and introducing new material then they probably shouldn’t receive a very good score. (2) Interruptions are allowed during rebuttals and should not be docked, the judge will manage things and appoint speakers if things are getting too chaotic. If participants are disregarding the judge’s instructions then the judge can instruct the jury to dock that team in the interruptions category. (3) There is an overall time limit of five minutes for the rebuttal section, but there are no time penalties. Once the time limit is up the judge will appoint a team to have the last word and will ask all others to remain quiet.

(Judge) – Alright, let’s get started with the rebuttals. Jury, please make any notes that you need, but do not give a final score until the end of the rebuttals. Who would like to go first? Okay, team natural, you have the floor.

(Team Natural) – You guys said that doubling the amount of CO2 would increase temperatures by, like, 3-6 degrees, right?

(Team Human) – Yeah.

(Team Natural) – Well maybe that’s true in laboratory experiments, but what about in the real world? Has any scientist tested CO2 on real world climate? You can’t because there are so many other things and you can’t get the CO2 alone. There are so many other things to consider – water vapor, solar activity, seasons – you just can’t use a laboratory experiment to judge how things are going to happen in the real world.

(Team Human) – Okay, well maybe you can’t measure how it’s going to be in the real world, but sometimes you just have to make guesses based on –

(Team Natural) – So you’re just making guesses?

(Team Human) – Let me finish, I was about to say sometimes you have to take what you know and make inferences – you remember what an inference is from class? Probably not. Maybe you can’t test it directly, but don’t the laboratory tests at least show us that CO2 can warm things up? Do you even believe that CO2 is a greenhouse gas?

(Team Natural) – Yes, but you can’t say it’s going to heat up Earth like it did in that experiment, in the experiment it was –

(Team Human) – You just said it’s a greenhouse gas, greenhouse gases heat things up. If you increase a greenhouse gas you get more heating up! It doesn’t matter if it’s an experiment or in the atmosphere.

(Team Natural) – But in nature it’s not that easy, it’s always moving. Remember the carbon cycle? Probably not. Carbon is always coming out of the atmosphere and going back in and moving around. In your tests it was just sitting there, so of course it was going to get hotter.

(Judge) – Team human, any last response before we move on to another topic?

(Team Human) – Yeah, a couple of things. First, that when you double CO2, temperatures go up. Second, look at Venus – why is it the hottest planet in the solar system? Not because it is the closest to the sun, but because of its greenhouse effect. And what is the number one gas in Venus’s atmosphere – carbon dioxide.

(Another Team Human Member) – Boom.

(Team Natural) – Duh, Venus is –

(Judge) – Sorry team natural, you guys started this topic, so team human gets the last word. Let’s move on to another topic. Team human, did you have anything?

(Team Human) – Yeah. You guys were saying that CO2 comes up after temperature rises? First off, not even all scientists agree on that, but also even if it was true does that mean that it’s true today? Maybe CO2 didn’t cause global warming in the past but what about today? How does –

(Team Natural) – It’s not any different today.

(Team Human) – So temperatures came up before CO2 today?

(Team Natural) – Yes.

(Team Human) – Can you prove that?

(Team Natural) – Yeah, go look it up.

(Team Human) – That’s not proving anything, for all we know you could just be making things up.

(Team Natural) – We already told you, according to… (looking through papers)… according to the National Atmospheric Society the relationship between CO2 and temperature is that temperature goes up first

(Team Human) – Yeah, but that was about the past. Just like you guys were saying that we can’t compare experiments in the lab to the atmosphere, well you can’t compare the past to what’s going on now, cause it’s different.

(Team Natural) – That’s not the same thing. We’re comparing the atmosphere to the atmosphere. You were comparing an experiment in a lab to the atmosphere.

(Team Human) – No, you’re comparing the atmosphere before humans to the atmosphere after humans, it’s totally different, we’ve changed the atmosphere, we’ve –

(Team Natural) – I haven’t changed the atmosphere.

(Team Human) – Well, okay duh, you know what I mean. Sorry, maybe not you, but for sure humans have being putting CO2 into the atmosphere and we’ve changed it.

(Judge) – Team natural, any last response before we move on to another topic?

(Team Natural) – Just that they didn’t have anything to say about how temperatures rise before CO2. If CO2 rises after temperature then it can’t be causing global warming.

(Judge) – Any other topics for our rebuttal from either team?

(Team Natural) – Yeah, you guys were saying how all of these species are going to go extinct because of global warming, but that could be true whether it’s human or natural.

(Team Human) – Yeah, but it’s because of humans.

(Team Natural) – I thought this debate was supposed to be about who’s causing global warming, not about what global warming does or how it can hurt things.

(Team Human) – Yeah, but if humans are the cause then we need to be more responsible.

(Team Natural) – Just saying, that has nothing to do with who is causing global warming.

(Team Human) – Oh, so you guys think we can just do whatever we want?

(Team Natural) – No, we believe in taking care of the planet, we’re just saying, that what you said has nothing to do with who is causing global warming, just what might happen as a result of global warming. (Judge) – Alright, time is just about up for the rebuttals. We gave the first word to team natural so we’ll give the last word to team human. Team human, anything you’d like to finish up with?

(Team Human) – Well, our opponent doesn’t seem to care about the environment, so of course they are going to say that global warming is natural.

(Judge) – Alright, thank you to both teams. Jury members, think back on everything that happened and please score both teams based on their rebuttals. We’ll give both teams about one minute to talk and prepare and then we will move into the round 2 arguments. Team natural will be going first.

** About one minute is given to each team to talk and prepare **

V. Arguments (round 2) –

(Judge) – Okay, time’s up. Team natural, you have the floor.

(Team Natural) – Humans are amazing creatures – they really are. But what are we really when compared to the force of nature? We are nothing! We have already shown that CO2 never caused climate change in the past, and even our opponent agreed with us.

(Team Human) – No we didn’t!

(Judge) – Quiet down please, it is team natural’s turn.

(Team Natural) – So, if it’s not CO2 then what does cause climate change? Go outside, and look up – what’s that big glowing thing in the sky? The sun! According to Columbia University, they have shown that the number one cause of climate change is the amount of activity coming from the sun. The sun goes through stages where it is more active and less active. We call these stages “Milankovitch Cycles.” Milankov –

(Team Human) – Actually, that’s not what Milankovitch Cycles are.

(Judge) – Save it for the rebuttals please, team natural has the floor.

(Team Natural) – Yeah. So like I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, it’s changes in solar activity that causes big changes in climate. Periods of low solar activity are called ice ages. Periods of high solar activity are called global warming periods – it was true in the past and it’s true now. Guess which one we’re in now? That’s right, a period with high solar activity. Thank you.

(Another Member from Team Natural) – I want to talk about money. We all like money, right? Well, global warming is all about money. Everyone knows about global warming. It has gotten so much recognition and become such a big deal that a lot of scientists have switched over from whatever they were doing to study global warming so that they could get more money. If it turns out that global warming is natural, which it is, then a lot of people would be out of jobs and hundreds of scientists would lose money. Do you think they care whether it is really caused by humans – no. They care about money and their jobs – and as long as they say that global warming is caused by humans they will still be able to do research because they will have more funding. So, in conclusion, global warming is about money and people say that it is human caused just so that they can make more money. Thank you.


(Judge) – Thank you. Jury, we’ve just heard round two arguments from team natural, go ahead and score them based on what you’ve seen and please be sure that you are marking the correct team. Team natural is the first column. Okay, we will now hear round two arguments from team human. Go ahead team human.

(Team Human) – Thank you. You know, there has been a big emphasis placed on scientists and research today. Our opponent would want you to think that scientists are lying to get paid or that scientists can’t agree on global warming, and that every scientist has a different opinion. Well that is not true. According to a study by The Science Academic Journal, out of 980 scientific articles – that’s almost a thousand articles published by scientists – not a single one disagreed that humans are causing global warming. Not a single one! This doesn’t sound like a debate to me. That is a lot of scientists and a lot of studies and not a single one says that the current global warming is natural. Some scientists interpret data one way and some interpret it another way, but the majority of scientists, the huge majority of scientists are on our team – they agree that more CO2 is causing the current global warming that we see. Thank you.

(Another Member from Team Human) – Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, what do you see here? (shows a picture of a pie chart) This is a chart showing you all of the different greenhouse gases that humans are putting in the atmosphere (passes the chart around to jury members). That big one is CO2, which we have already talked about, but it is not the only greenhouse gas that humans are putting out, we’re also putting out large amounts of methane, which is a greenhouse gas, and nitrous oxide, which is also a greenhouse gas, and lots of other chemicals. So, just remember that humans are putting lots of pollution into the atmosphere and causing the Earth to get warmer. Thanks. That is all.


(Judge) – Thank you to both teams for your round 2 arguments. Jury, please be sure to give team human a score for their round 2 arguments. Before we start rebuttals I’ll give a quick recap of what each team said and then I will give each team around one minute or so to talk and prepare.

** The judge then gives a quick recap of what each team said during their arguments and gives the teams a little bit of time to prepare for their rebuttals **

VI. Rebuttals (round 2) –

(Judge) – Alright, let’s get started with the rebuttals. Jury, please make any notes that you need, but do not give a final score until the end of the rebuttals. Do we have anyone who would like to go first? Team human it is. Go ahead.

(Team Human) – Yeah, so first off you guys were making a big deal about money. Do you guys have any scientists that agree with your side?

(Team Natural) – Yeah, of course.

(Team Human) – And do you think that they make money or do they just work for free?

(Team Natural) – Well, they –

(Team Human) – Of course they make money. People need to make money, they need to provide for their families and everything. There’s so much money put aside for global warming research because global warming is a major topic. It’s like, if something else was a really big deal and people were worried about it, that’s where the money would be, but right now global warming is what people are worried about.

(Team Natural) – Yeah, but you make more money if you say that it is human-caused

(Team Human) – What? No you don’t, how do you know that?

(Team Natural) –That is according to, let’s see (looking through papers) ah, okay, well according to Dr. Aaron Clark, a scientist, he says that if you request funding for your field of study but you don’t mention global warming then you may not get your funding, but if you mention that it has something to do with global warming then you are more likely to get your funding.

(Team Human) – Well, he probably just means that global warming is getting more money, not that the scientists on one side or another are getting more, just that the government has set aside more money to research this topic because they want to know if it’s human caused or not. But scientists on both sides are getting more funding because global warming is a big issue.

(Team Natural) – No, it’s not the same for our side, because if your side says “Oh, it’s human caused, the temperature’s going to go up by ten degrees by next week unless you stop driving your car!” or whatever then it becomes more of a big topic for the public so it’s going to bring more funding. If someone on our side is like “no, it’s a natural process” people won’t pay as much attention because that’s not scary, people are just like “oh, okay”.

(Team Human) – That’s the media, not scientists. Wait, how many published scientific articles were there saying that global warming is natural… oh, that’s right, zero.

(Team Natural) – So what, the person who did that study could have been ignoring the articles that say global warming is natural, because we found plenty. “Oh, out of 1,000 articles that say humans cause global warming, all of them say that humans cause global warming.” Duh, you’re only using the articles that support your team.

(Judge) – Alright, let’s move on to another topic, does anyone else have something?

(Team Natural) – Not about that, but about something else.

(Judge) – Great.

(Team Natural) – Well, you guys were saying how more scientists agree with your side and how it’s the more popular side and everything, but look back at the history of science, just because the majority of scientists think one thing doesn’t mean that it’s right.

(Team Human) – Yeah, but this is different, I mean we have better technology and the way that people do science is better – everybody is checking everybody else and making sure that we don’t have mistakes.

(Team Natural) – The majority of scientists probably always think that they’re right because there are more of them, but there not always right. Look at Galileo with the planets, or Alfred Wegener when he said that the continents were moving.

(both teams are quiet)

(Judge) – Is that all? We can take more time on this if you want… (the judge waits) no?

(Team Human) – Well, actually, yeah, you guys said that the majority of scientists can be wrong, and that’s true, but most of the time they’re right. So if you go by statistics or the odds or whatever, then they’re probably right this time too.

(Team Natural) – Yeah, but most of the scientists for team human just focus on CO2 and they don’t look at other things. That’s the reason why more and more scientists are switching over to team natural, because they started looking at the whole thing – like the sun, and natural cycles, and water vapor – and it made more sense.

(Judge) – Alright, team human, do you want the final word before we move on to another topic?

(Team Human) – Well, I just think that the team human scientists are right because if you look at all of the world’s top scientists they all agree that it’s human-caused. According to the IPCC, which is the International Panel for Climate Change – they make up the top climate scientists from all over the world – and they say that there is more than a 90% chance that humans are the ones causing global warming. So if most of the world’s top scientists from a lot of different places think that then I’m pretty sure they’re right.

(Judge) – Okay, any last topics for rebuttals?

(Team Human) – Yeah, you guys said that Milankovitch cycles are changes in how much energy is leaving the sun, but they’re not, Milankovitch cycles are actually changes in the amount of sunlight reaching Earth because of changes in Earth’s orbit and axis and things like that.

(Team Natural) – Yeah, that’s what I meant to say, we just said the wrong thing. I just meant to say that there were natural changes in how much energy the sun gives out.

(Judge) – Okay, anything else with that?

(Team Human) – So are you guys saying that Milankovitch cycles are causing global warming?

(Team Natural) – Umm (talking to each other). We actually don’t know a lot about those, but they could be part of it, we know that they’ve caused global warming and cooling in the past and stuff.

(Team Human) – Well, the sun obviously has a lot to do with climate change but according to a study by NASA, and I quote, “solar activity and natural solar cycles can only account for about 40% of today’s global warming”. So, that leaves 60% of warming from humans.

(Team Natural) – Did NASA say that the other 60% was humans?

(Team Human) – Well, they were saying that the sun isn’t causing all of it. (Team Natural) – Well that doesn’t mean that humans are doing the other 60%, also that’s just one thing, according to Columbia University the sun is what is causing global warming.

(Team Human) – Well, I’m pretty sure NASA knows what they’re talking about.

(Team Natural) – Maybe they just looked at different stuff, like only UV rays or whatever, because I’m pretty sure that our people also know what they’re talking about.

(Judge) – Alright, our rebuttal time is up, so let’s go ahead and call it right there. Since team human brought up the last question we’ll go ahead and say that team natural had the last word. Jury members, think back on everything that happened and please score both teams based on their rebuttals. Next up will be the audience questions so let’s go ahead and give the audience members a little bit of time to come up with questions. We’ll probably only have time for three or four questions, so we may not get a chance to get to yours. We’ll also want to make sure that there are about an even amount of questions for each team. Alright, one minute break.

VII. Audience Questions – this is the part of the debate where the audience gets to ask questions to one or both of the teams. The teams should be scored based on their ability to answer the questions and give clear responses. Jury members should try to come up with good and thoughtful questions.

(Judge) – Okay, so who has a question for one of the teams? Who is your question for?

(Jury Member A) – My question is for team natural. You guys said that global warming is natural because people are leaving out water vapor, but what does that have to do with anything?

(Judge) – Okay, we’ll give you about 30 seconds or so to talk real quick amongst yourselves and then we’ll have you answer that.

** the team is given about 30 seconds to talk and prepare **

(Team Natural) – Well, water vapor is a greenhouse gas, it’s actually a major greenhouse gas, and there’s more of it in the atmosphere then CO2, so you can’t just ignore it when you make a computer model or you do an experiment or whatever because it’s there in the atmosphere.

(Jury Member A) – Are humans affecting the water vapor in the air?

(Team Natural) – No, not really. They probably could if they deliberately tried to, but as of right now they’re not really affecting the water vapor.

(Judge) – Okay, thank you. Jury members, keep these answers in mind, but don’t give any scores yet, we’ll wait until we’re all done with the audience question portion. Okay, does anyone else have a question? Okay, and who is your question for.

(Jury Member B) – My question is for team natural. I know that you guys are saying that humans aren’t causing global warming, but do you think that it’s possible for humans to cause global warming if they kept putting more and more CO2 into the atmosphere?

(Judge) – Okay, let’s give them about 30 seconds to talk that over.


(Team Natural) – It’s hard to say for sure, because the current amounts of CO2 aren’t having an impact, but I mean anything can have an impact if there’s enough of it. So yeah, we think it’s possible, we’re just not there yet.

(Jury Member B) – So how much do you think would finally start heating up the Earth?

(Team Natural) – Well, obviously we’re not scientists so we don’t know for sure, but there have been times in Earth’s history where there was over five times as much CO2 as there is right now in the atmosphere, but if you use ice cores and things to look at the temperatures for those same times you don’t see them going way up.

(Judge) – Okay, thank you. Does –

(Team Natural) – Oh, sorry, and our source on that is a study done by Professor Joseph Tokelin from the University of Jerusalem.

(Judge) – Okay, anything else?

(Team Natural) – No, that’s all.

(Judge) – Alright, thank you. Does anyone have a question for team human?

(Jury Member C) – When we were preparing for this assignment and doing our background research I read that global warming is also happening on other planets. If it’s human caused on Earth then why do we also see it happening on other planets when there aren’t any humans there?



(Team Human) – Do you remember which planets you read about? (Jury Member C) – I think Mars was one, and I don’t remember the other one, I think Neptune.

(Team Human) – Well, there are probably a couple of reasons. First off, you can’t really compare different places in the solar system because they have completely different setups – like different atmospheres, different tilts, different day lengths, different distance from the sun, different year lengths, etc. – so you can’t really compare them. Also, we never said that the sun wasn’t part of the global warming, the sun is also heating things up, it just can’t explain all of the warming, so maybe it’s happening on other planets because of the sun, it’s just not as extreme as here on Earth because we also have humans contributing.

(Another Team Human Member) – Also it could just be that those places are having seasons. A season on Neptune is like 40 years or something, so maybe it’s just starting to enter its warmer seasons.

(Judge) – Alright, good, thank you. Does anyone have any more questions?

(Jury Member D) – Yeah, this is for team natural. You guys said earlier that you weren’t putting CO2 into the atmosphere or that you weren’t changing the atmosphere, or whatever, but doesn’t using electricity mean that you are putting CO2 into the atmosphere?



(Team Natural) – Alright, so we were kind of just joking when we said that. Our opponent kept saying “we’re changing the atmosphere” like all of us were deliberately trying to destroy the environment when actually my family is really good at being green and stuff. We recycle and we have solar panels, and all of that. So we actually aren’t putting a ton of CO2 in the atmosphere, but yeah, I know that we are still putting some in because we do use some electricity that doesn’t come from solar panels – but, CO2 isn’t what is causing global warming.

(Another Team Natural Member) – Also, all of the carbon dioxide from all of the humans still only equals about 5% of the CO2 put into the atmosphere when compared to the CO2 put into the atmosphere by nature, and that is according to the worldwideclimatereport.com and they were actually just repeating what NASA or someone like that had said.

(Team Human) – Well was it NASA or someone else?

(Judge) – Team human, this is team natural’s question.

(Team Human) – Sorry.

(Back to that Team Natural Member) – It was… (looking through papers) … it was, oh, actually it was professor Robert Essenhigh of Ohio State University. Sorry.

(Judge) – No problem. Okay, anything else?

(Team Natural) – No.

(Judge) – Alright, thank you. Let’s have one last question for team human before we move on.

(Jury Member E) – Okay, so we all know that the atmosphere can be difficult to study so a lot of scientists use computer models and that’s where a lot of the data for global warming comes from. Well, and this actually goes back to something that team natural was saying earlier, but how can we trust computer models if they don’t include all of the variables?

(Judge) – Okay, team human, we’ll give you 30 seconds to prepare.

(Team Human) – Wait, I’m not sure I understand the question, can you reword that?

(Jury Member E) – Yeah, so if most of the data supporting team human comes from computer models that only focus on CO2, or which focus too much on CO2, then how can we trust that data?

(Judge) – Is that better? Do you need any more clarification?

(Team Human) – No, that’s good.

(Judge) – Okay, let’s take 30 seconds.


(Team Human) – Well, first off, that’s probably true for some computer models, but I’m sure that there are a lot of computer models out there that give everything more of a balance. Also, there’s a reason that CO2 is the focus of a lot of those models. It’s not that they are leaving other

stuff out, it’s just that CO2 is the focus because it’s the thing that has really been changing with the rising temperatures.

(Team Natural) – What about the water vapor?

(Judge) – Team natural, this is not your question.

(Team Natural) – Sorry.

(Team Human) – Anyways, these models focus a lot on CO2 to try and determine how bad different amounts of CO2 will make things.

(Another Team Human Member) – Also, if there are computer models that focus too much on CO2 for team human then there are probably also computer models that don’t focus on it enough from team natural.

(Yet Another Team Human Member) – And computer models aren’t the only evidence that we use either, people use a lot of other things like direct measurements and averages and satellites and ice cores and all sorts of stuff. Plus the computer models that they use have been programmed so that the variables work together and are adjusted until they correctly predict past climates too, just to make sure that the models are accurate.

(Judge) – Okay, thank you, anything else?

(Team Human) – No, that’s all.

(Judge) – Okay, great. Thank you to both teams and to those that asked questions. Jury, go ahead and give a score for the question portion of the debate and we’ll go ahead and give both teams a little bit of time to prepare for the closing statements. Team human, you get to choose whether you want to go first or second.

(Team Human) – We’ll go last.

(Judge) – Okay, sounds good, go ahead and prepare.

** each team is given about 1 minute to prepare **

VIII. Closing Statements – just like the opening statements, this part does not need to be backed up with sources. This is a team’s last chance to make an appeal based on all of the evidence that they’ve presented so far. Closing statements should not be longer than two minutes.

(Judge) – Okay, time’s up. Team natural, you have the floor.

(Team Natural) – Ladies and gentlemen of the jury and our honorable judge – I’d first like to start off by thanking all of you for being here and being willing to listen to us. I’d also like to thank our opponents, team natural. It’s been a great debate. Let’s take a quick look back at what we’ve learned today. We have showed that temperature goes up before CO2, proving that CO2 is not the cause of the climate change that we see today. We’ve shown how natural changes in the sun’s energy and the Earth’s orbit have always been the major cause of global warming. We’ve shown how human-caused global warming can be exaggerated by the media, making the idea

more scary and bringing more money into global warming research. We’ve shown how most of the scientists who say that this is a human-caused problem focus way too much on CO2 and ignore other things that really matter. That is a lot of evidence. We have shown that even though team human says that all of the scientists agree with them, that that’s not true. There are a lot of scientists that agree that this is natural and there are more and more coming over to our side every day. We would just like to end with this thought: we are not saying that we shouldn’t take care of planet Earth, because we should. We should all try our best to go green and help the environment. We are not trying to argue for how good fossil fuels are; we are here to show you that they are not causing global warming. I hope that you can see that this is true. Thank you.


(Team Human) – My friends of the jury, and respected judge, we’d also like to start off by saying thank you for being here. We would like to finish up with a thought. There is a saying among the Native Americans. They say that “we do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors (pause) … we borrow it from our children.” … (longer more dramatic pause)… think about that. Adults are always saying how they want to give their children the world, well, what kind of world do they want that to be? A healthy planet, and one that our children would be happy to inherit. Our opponents have made a big deal about how global warming is a natural process. I wish they were right, I really do, but the facts simply do not agree. We have already proved that natural causes alone cannot explain all of the global warming that we are experiencing. We have shown evidence that as the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases, so does the world’s temperature. Our opponents have tried to make this sound tricky, it’s not. Greenhouse gases trap heat. More greenhouse gases trap more heat. More heat means higher temperatures. Our addiction to energy – and fossil fuels in particular – is leaving a message to future generations, and that message is this: “The future that we have picked for you is one that we would never pick for ourselves. We are leaving you our mess to clean up.” I hope you will remember this. Thank you for hearing me out today.


(Judge) – Thank you. We’ve now heard from both teams, jury members please be sure to score the closing statements. When you are done please add up the score for the entire debate, including any bonus points or penalties that you have marked. We will then step out into the hall to go over our scores and to decide which team has won today’s debate.

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