Each contestant is an owner who picks a team of intellectuals. An owner wins if the intellectuals on his or her team outscore intellectuals on other teams.
For the draft, the commissioner's office will randomly select the draft order. Consider a league with five teams, each picking seven players. Suppose that the order for the first round is that Team A chooses the first player, followed by B, C, D, and E. In the second round and third rounds, the order will be reversed. In round 4, we revert to Team A going first, in round 5 we revert to Team E going first, and we continue to alternate. The draft will be held live, but owners are expected to submit a list of desired players to the commissioner's office ahead of time, so that in case an owner cannot make the live draft the commissioner's office will make selections from the owner's list.
Each owner is responsible for submitting points for that owner's players. I anticipate that there will be a form for doing so, and a report that all owevers can see of approvals/denials of point requests for all leagues. If you own a player that is also owned in a different league, you may copy approved point suggestions from that other owner.
A key element in each scoring category is a specific proposition, called the question. In a formal debate, there is a question, and one side argues in favor of the affirmative and one side argues against it. The question should be stated as a complete sentence, if not by the player then by the owner claiming the point on the player's behalf. An example of the question might be "Will a minimum wage increase of $4 reduce low-skilled employment by 500,000 or more?"
A less precise but still valid question would be "Would increasing the minimum wage would be bad for low-skilled workers?" If the proposition is too vague, such as "Arguing against a minimum wage increase," it is not really a question. The difference between approval or denial is likely to depend a lot on whether there is a clear question.
There are eight scoring categories: A (devil's advocate), B (thinking in bets), C (caveats), D (debate), K (kick off a discussion) O (open to reconsideration) R (evaluates research, S (steel-mans other point of view)
A: Devil's Advocate
To score a point, you must interview a guest (the guest does not need to be on a FITs team) and prompt the guest to clarify/defend a position on an affirmative by posing a challenge. Multiple points can be scored about the same question by posing multiple challenges. Additional points can be earned if there are additional questions that are challenged by the intereviewer. The interview can take place on a podcast or in a written format.
Thinking in Bets
To score a point you must:If a probability range is given, it must be less than 10 percentage points. "More than 50 percent" does not count. "Between 50 and 59 percent" does count.
Multiple bet points can be scored from a single essay or podcast episode, as long as a reason is given for each bet.
Caveats
To score a point, you must state a position that you hold on a question and point out a weakness in that position. For example, "Vaccine passports would be useful for managing COVID going forward, but I do worry that they could lead to a loss of privacy."
Each caveat that you give is worth a point.Debate
To score a point, you must participate in a debate in which each side is given a fair opportunity to make its case, without having to shout over one another. There must be a specific question, e.g. "Should the U.S. should adopt a UBI?" Each side of the debate is given at least 10 minutes to make its case. If a debate takes place within a podcast that also dwells on other issues, it could count as long as each side gets at least 10 minutes of time. A debate in written format can count, as long as the each side gets at least the written equivalent of 10 minutes to present its case.
Kick off a discussion
A position on a question that you articulate or have articulated in the past stirs other people to devote a total of at least 1500 words to talking and/or writing about it. Call your discussion-starter K and call the words that others use in discussing it D.
A particular K can earn no more than one D per season.
The D material could come from one person, or it could come from a formal symposium of commenters, or it could come informally, as several columnists and bloggers make comments. The D material has to involve analysis and commentary, not mere mention. Again, 1500 words in total.
Another issue with earning a kick-off point in a particular time frame is that the K could have been published last year and the D takes place this month. The point should be considered earned during the season that the D appears, regardless of when the K was written. So if D material appears in June related to an essay that McWhorter posted in March, the point goes to McWhorter in June.
The D should include at least some praise that is not motivated entirely by tribal loyalty. Some K's are not tribal (e.g., "It is wise to be anti-fragile" or "Average is over, meaning that success now tends to be much more concentrated than it was a generation ago."), which makes it easy. But if Victor Davis Hanson were to write an essay that gets no praise from the left, or Paul Krugman were to write an essay that gets no praise from the right, then no kick-off point is awarded, regardless of how much such an essay gets discussed.
Suppose that one player kicks off a discussion and another player starts from that and kicks off a different branch of discussion. In that case, the D material could win a point in a different category.
Note that the D category is unique in that it rewards being stimulating, not just being careful. So in spite of the challenges with administering the category, it is worth trying to sustain.
open to reconsideration
To score a point, a you must state a position on a question, such as "Vaccine passports will promote better public health" and say something like:
"I have changed my mind about ____, because ___", or
"I will change my mind about ____ if _____", or
"I have not made up my mind about ____, because _____"
You cannot get a point for something vague, such as "I changed my mind about Trump supporters." You cannot get a point for a change of mind that took place in the past, "I used to support the Iraq war, but I don't any more" (it is unlikely that you changed your mind about the war just now). You cannot get a point for saying that you now believe you are more right ("Those Republicans are even worse than I thought!")
evaluates research
You get a point for discussing research findings on an interesting question and for providing reasons to trust or distrust the research. You could do this by comparing research that has different findings and/or by showing how the methods by which the study was conducted were notably biased or notably designed to be unbiased. Simply citing a study because you agree with the findings does not count as an R point. You can get only oone R point per topic per season.
steel-manning
Think of steel-manning as engaging in a structured debate in which you have to present both sides--your side and the opposing side. It is the opposite of straw-manning, in which you argue against a weak or non-existent version of the other side's point of view.
Steel-manning is not just acknowledging that other people disagree and offering kind words about them. It means giving a fair representation of their ideas.
Just as with a debate, a steel-man requires a specific question. Consider the example of "Will a higher minimum wage would help alleviate poverty?" Suppose that you are arguing in the affirmative and steel-manning the other side. First, you identify a particular opponent, such as Tyler Cowen, or "economists who believe that a minimum wage should not help alleviate poverty." Then you spell out the strongest arguments that opponents typically make against a minimum wage hike. Finally, you make your case for the minimum wage hike, addressing those arguments.
On any given topic, such as minimum wage hikes, you can only get one steel-man point per season. This might be relaxed if after one steel-man someone were to introduce a new argument on the topic and you address the new argument.
This is another important category that may pose scoring challenges. The scorekeeper must evaluate how well you represent the other side's point of view, not just whether you mention it. In principle, both sides should be as well represented as if they were present and participating in a debate.