Fearahn,+Nicole

Nicole J. Fearahn Morristown High '08 Harvard College '12

I debated LD for four years for Morristown High (NJ) with local and national circuit experience. I'm now studying philosophy at Harvard.

I'm willing to vote on anything that is well-warranted, successfully extended, and clearly impacted. I am not predisposed for or against any forms/styles of argumentation. I will gladly listen to: ** ** **
 * ARGUMENTS
 * Critical Args** ** - I have a thing for unique, creative, and/or brilliantly original positions that are really, really well-run (high speaks, maybe?). BUT, a weird/unique position that is poorly argued or straight up confusing will turn me off big time (low speaks, definitely). So if you plan to run something critical, please a) articulate and warrant it clearly, b) prove its relevance, and c) assume that I have zero familiarity with what you are talking about. Sure, I'm a philosophy major, but that does not make me the Stanford encyclopedia of phil. Assume that I'm unfamiliar with the specific thinkers or concepts you reference in your K but smart enough to understand a concise explanation of anything.
 * Theory** ** - feel free to run theory, but please do so only when there is a really good reason to. I will need you to a) convince me that it is legit and necessary for you to be running theory in this specific round and b) make it extremely clear just how and why your theory arg should impact my decision. If you don't do this, I won't vote on it.
 * Traditional/Stock Args** ** - don't hesitate to run these either. Just as I love ingenious, well-run creative positions, I love it when a debater is able to run something stock and argue for and win off of it in a new or especially intelligent way (high speaks again!). I love unique positions, but args don't have to be critical/weird to be unique! And what I love more is good substantive debate that directly engages the resolution, so traditional args are fine by me.

****The only args I refuse to vote on** ** are those I straight up can't understand. If I don't understand an arg the first time you make it, I will be hugely reluctant to vote on it. I will be nice enough to give you appropriate body language (putting down my pen, furrowing my eyebrows at you) to indicate to you that this arg is not going down on my flow. To be eligible as a voter, any initially over-abstruse args must be // crystal clear // to me by CX (the CX during which you are answering) at the very latest, and even then I will be reluctant to vote on anything that I don't understand at its first mention. You can't just up and suddenly explain an arg with perfect clarity in a later rebuttal. This is for the sake of fairness to your opponent and the integrity of my decision calculus.

DECISION CALCULUS Please write the ballot for me! I hate hate hate to intervene, so help me not to :) Tell me exactly where you want me to vote, justify why I should vote there, and weigh your voters against those of your opponent. When I look at my flow at round's end, I will vote at the clearest place possible. Make that place yours. ** I'm always impressed by a debater who has solid command over all the different layers of argumentation going on in a round (yay speaks!). Good impact analysis, for me, entails the following: a) make it clear what mechanism(s) you think should be used to adjudicate the round and why (I'll pull the trigger on anything - a value criterion, something a priori, theory, K's, burdens, whatever).* b) articulate which args you are winning c) impact those args clearly to the adjudicating mechanism(s)
 * Impact Analysis**: This is ridiculously important. It doesn't matter if you are winning all of your args and have left your opponent with only one viable piece of offense - if he impacts more effectively than you do, I will pick him up. I would much sooner pick him up than make your impacts for you, aka intervene.
 * d) weigh those args/impacts against your opponent's args/impacts to justify why yours are more important **
 * If and only if the debate over how to adjudicate the round is extremely muddled and otherwise irresolvable, I will default to values/standards weighing analysis.

a) Extend warrants and impacts along with claims. This means no blippy arguments; you can extend them all you want, but without warrants/impacts they won't affect my decision. b) I never vote on anything new in the last two speeches. This includes attempted extensions of args/warrants/impacts that you neglected earlier in round, even if your opponent has no ink against them. c) Never extend through ink; you must at least acknowledge your opponent's replies to your args, no matter how unclear or implausible, before you can extend them. d) SIGNPOST. I'm good at flowing, but that doesn't mean I've memorized exactly where on the flow each argument appears - before you extend anything, make clear reference to a card name or something else that delineates its position on the flow
 * Extensions:** Make sure they're legit-

I can handle it, and I don't mind it, as long as you are not foaming at the mouth or going into anaphylactic shock. If your spit lands on my face or you forget to inhale for a minute straight, I might feel uncomfortable. Moreover, if this is happening you are likely speaking too fast for me to understand, in which case I will stop flowing and grimace at you awkwardly. People have told me that my body language gives off really obvious signs. Hopefully you'll be able to read them. **
 * SPEED

I average around 27-28. I will focus on how impressive you are in round as a debater rather than on your rhetoric or presentation. Clarity is awesome, airtight logic is hot. Rude, screaming, obnoxiously cocky, or otherwise offensive debaters get 23s or worse. Other than that, unless you intentionally get on my nerves or are debating downright horribly, you probably won't get below a 26 from me. ** 30 - I'm impressed, you're amazing, I like you and hope you win! 29 - I think you're awesome and definitely deserve to clear 28 - I think you're good and probably deserve to clear 27 - I think you're okay and could clear if lucky 26 - Meh 25 - No 24 - Ew
 * SPEAKS

Remember to have fun!! Feel free to ask me questions about any of this before or after the round, or whenever- I'd be happy to talk about my rfd, or anything else (college, philosophy, life in general), with you :)