Argumental

I love a good debate, and never more than when the person I'm debating with is enjoying it too.

One of my favourite topics is "If you could combine two animals into one 'super animal' to take over the world, what would your 'super animal' be?" My stock answer is the "wasp-shark"; agressive, angry, mobile in the water, air and on land (to a degree). I'll happily challenge anyone to come up with a more deadly combination - and will even more happily debate the flaws in their assertions. This is fun debate.

What riles me is when an outsider from said debate gets 'uncomfortable', and starts trying to 'calm people down', as if we're on the verge of pulling out pistols or having a full-on fist-fight. There's one thing that gets my back up like nothing else - and that's someone telling me to calm down when I'm already perfectly calm.

So why do people get uncomfortable in the presence of two people having an animated debate? Without being allowed to debate, should we just accept everything another person says? Of course not - we are born to challenge, and this makes us mentally stronger and ultimately better equipped to challenge ourselves.

Please don't confuse healthy debate with shouty argument - they are two entirely different concepts.