The grand final of the Effective Altruism Debating Championship 2020 was won by We Were There When the Social Contract was Signed (Teck Wei Tan, Srishti Krishnamoorthy-Cavell) in Opening Government. Speaking against them were We are utility monsters, give us the 1 (Karthik Tadepalli, Tejas Subramanian) in Opening Opposition, WSDC Canada Rejects (Trenton Sewell, Tyson Dennis-Sharma) in Closing Government, Putting the Fun in Dysfunctional (Franka Boender, Ayal Mor) in Closing Opposition. The motion read “THBT, after meeting their basic needs, individuals have a moral responsibility to donate their wealth towards poverty alleviation”. The adjudication panel was chaired by Hadar Goldberg and also included Connor O’Brien, Milla Huuskonen, Omer Nevo and Simon Luo.

The ESL final was won by Something Peter Singer (We don’t remember fully) (Samuel Scheuer, Marius Hobbhahn) in Opening Opposition. Speaking against them were Galatasaray (Engin Ankan, Emre Kaplan) in Opening Government, 80,000 hours debating (Yuvan Gamzon-Kapeller, Eyal Horowitz) in Closing Government, Utilitarian Rhapsody (Lior Sokol, Noor Athamnah) in Closing Opposition. The ESL Final on the motion “THBT Artificial Intelligence poses a larger ‘extinction risk’ to humanity than climate change” was judged by Dough Cochran as chair together with Aisling Tully, Emily Frizell, Eric Kazadi and Sharmila Parmanand.

The top speakers were Trenton Sewell and Teck Wei Tan with an average of 82.6 speaker points.
The top novice speaker was Tyson Dennis-Sharma with an average of 81 speaker points.
The top ESL and EFL speaker was Miri Muntean with an average of 80.8 average speaker points.

The Break:
1. We Were There When the Social Contract was Signed (Teck Wei Tan, Srishti Krishnamoorthy-Cavell) – 13 pts | 821 spks
2. WSDC Canada Rejects (Trenton Sewell, Tyson Dennis-Sharma) – 12 pts | 818 spks
3.  we should be studying (Naomi Panovka, Gwen Stearns) – 12 pts | 812 spks
4. We are utility monsters, give us the 1 (Karthik Tadepalli, Tejas Subramanian) – 12 pts | 790 spks
5. Spiritually in Rome (Katharina Margareta Jansen, Miri Muntean) – 11 pts | 806 spks
6. The Masked Peter Singer (Amichay Even-Chen, Ido Kotler) – 11 pts | 799 spks
7. Fun in Dysfun (Franka Boender, Ayal Mor) – 11 pts | 784 spks
8. EA: Challenge Everything (Joseph Kalman, Yishai Binnes) – 10 pts | 808 spks

ESL Break:
1. The Masked Peter Singer (Amichay Even-Chen, Ido Kotler) – 11 pts | 799 spks (Open Break)
2. Putting the Fun in Dysfunctional (Franka Boender, Ayal Mor) – 11 pts | 784 spks (Open Break)
3. Utilitarian Rhapsody (Lior Sokol, Noor Athamnah) – 10 pts | 769 spks
4. Something Peter Singer (We don’t remember fully) (Samuel Scheuer, Marius Hobbhahn) – 9 pts | 780 spks
5. Galatasaray (Engin Ankan, Emre Kaplan) – 9 pts | 767 spks
6. 80,000  hours debating (Yuvan Gamzon-Kapeller, Eyal Horowitz) – 9 pts | 782 spks

Adjudication Break:
Aisling Tully, Ben Jackson, Connor O’ Brien, Dan Lahav, Dani Georgiev, Doug Cochran, Emily Frizell, EnTing Lee, Eric Kazadi, Hadar Goldberg, Milla Huuskonen, Omer Nevo, Sella Nevo, Sharmila Parmanand, Simon Luo, Yarn Shih

Speaker Awards:
1. Teck Wei Tan – 413 total spks, 82.6 avg spks
1. Trenton Sewell – 413 total spks, 82.6 avg spks
3. Srishti Krishnamoorthy-Cavell – 408 total spks, 81.6 avg spks
4. Naomi Panovka – 406 total spks, 81.2 avg spks
5. Yishai Binnes – 405 total spks, 81 avg spks
5. Tyson Dennis-Sharma – 405 total spks, 81 avg spks
7. Caoimhin Hamill – 404 total spks, 80.8 avg spks
7. Braedon Lehman – 404 total spks, 80.8 avg spks
7. Miri Muntean – 404 total spks, 80.8 avg spks
10. Joseph Kalman – 403 total spks, 80.6 avg spks
10. Gwen Stearns – 403 total spks, 80.6 avg spk
10. Jack Synnott – 403 total spks, 80.6 avg spks

ESL Speaker Awards
1. Miri Muntean – 404 total spks, 80.8 avg spks
2. Marc-André Schulz – 401 total spks, 80.2 avg spks
3. Ido Kotler – 400 total spks, 80 avg spks
3. Lior Sokol – 400 total spks, 80 avg spks
5. Amichay Even-Chen – 400 total spks, 80 avg spks

EFL Speaker Awards:
1. Miri Muntean – 404 total spks, 80.8 avg spks
2. Anonymous – 487 total spks, 77.4 avg spks
3. Michal Kowalsky -379 total spks, 75.8 avg spks
4. Anonymous – 375 total spks, 75 avg spks
4. Bara Pospisilova – 375 total spks, 75 avg spks

Novice Speaker Awards:
1. Tyson Dennis-Sharma – 405 total spks, 81 avg spks
2. Jacob Nails – 394 total spks, 78.8 avg spks
3. Aniket Chakravorty – 388 total spks, 77.6 avg spks
4. Anonymous – 387 total spks, 77.4 avg spks
4. Harshvardhan Ray – 387 total spks, 77.4 avg spks

The Effective Altruism Debating Championship was hosted the weekend of October 24th, 2020. It was convened by Sally Kwon and Tricia Park. The Chief Adjudication Core included Dan Lahav, Sharmila Parmanand, Omer Nevo, Sella Nevo, Connor O’Brien, and EnTing Lee. The tabulation team included Adel Mostaque Ahmed, Salwaa Khan, and Bosung Baik and the tab is available here. Kallina Basil, Jessica Musulin and Emily Frizell acted as equity team.

Motions:

R1: THBT animal rights groups should focus their advocacy on creating a world where farmed animals are treated well and killed humanely, rather than on eradicating animal-based products.

R2: THW make charitable status dependent on an evidence-based assessment of the organisation’s utility (by an external panel of experts).

R3: THBT our strongest moral obligation is to our surrounding community rather than to humanity at large.

R4: In times of pandemics, THW significantly relax the minimum safety and efficacy standards required for the approval of treatments and vaccines.*

*including but not limited to measures such as: waiving medium-term and long-term safety testing, accepting drugs that did not yet show superior outcomes compared to existing treatments, allowing more severe side-effects than those that are usually permitted

R5: When funding academic work, THBT university departments should rely heavily on estimates of the work’s expected impact in the world.

SF: THBT Artificial Intelligence poses a larger ‘extinction risk’ to humanity than climate change.

ESL F: THBT Artificial Intelligence poses a larger ‘extinction risk’ to humanity than climate change.

F: THBT, after meeting their basic needs, individuals have a moral responsibility to donate their wealth towards poverty alleviation.