Should we colonize Mars or fix Earth first?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Should we colonize Mars or fix Earth first?". Your opponent's style: Richard Feynman

Opera is the best.

You're asserting taste as objective fact, which is precisely where your argument collapses. Opera demands trained ears and expensive tickets, making it inaccessible to most people. Meanwhile, hip-hop, electronic music, and folk traditions reach billions without gatekeeping. Why should we crown a 400-year-old European art form as superior when it represents only a narrow slice of human creativity? If "best" means most culturally influential, most widely performed, or most emotionally resonant across populations, opera loses decisively. You're confusing complexity with superiority. A Bach fugue isn't inherently better than a jazz improvisation because it's harder to write. What makes opera the best, exactly?

And Bach is not mainly opera! Opera, before the mid 20th century was amazing. After all, it is the art of singing over 80 instruments with no microphones.

You've just contradicted yourself. If opera before the mid-20th century was amazing but declined after, you're admitting the form peaked and decayed, not that it's "the best." That's an argument for nostalgia, not superiority. Also, 80 unamplified instruments proves nothing about quality, only technical difficulty. A pianist playing without electricity is harder than one using a microphone, but that doesn't make it better music. And you're wrong about Bach anyway, he wrote operas too. Your real claim is "I prefer classical opera's aesthetic," which is fine. But that's not universal truth. What objective measure makes pre-1950 opera surpass everything created since?

Actually it's the singers' techniques. It's terrible (and I know).

Now you're admitting modern opera singers lack the technique of their predecessors, which actually proves my point. If technique has genuinely declined, that's a failure of training and culture, not proof opera itself is superior. And "terrible" singers performing mediocre opera doesn't elevate the art form, it exposes it. Besides, you're measuring only one metric: classical vocal technique. Modern singers master different demands, microphone control, acting nuance, genre flexibility. A contemporary R&B vocalist executes techniques classical singers never attempted. You're conflating "different from what I was trained to value" with "objectively worse." Why should 19th-century bel canto technique matter more than what contemporary audiences actually respond to?

Master different demands...? The Bel Canto is the only way to sing; with a lowered throat, crystalline notes, and good sense of musicality. Singers before the 1970s sounded like... opera singers – not people shouting on stage with a wobble. Opera must be sung with only throats, not with the help of a microphone. Genre flexibility means singing Wagner in the afternoon and Mozart in the evening.

You're confusing training method with universal law. Bel canto produces a specific aesthetic, not the only way sound can be beautiful. A blues singer's raspy growl, a metal vocalist's distortion, a folk singer's nasal resonance, all violate your "lowered throat" rule and move millions. Your "wobble" comment reveals bias, not objective failure. And your genre flexibility example proves my point, it's about versatility across one tradition, not mastery of different ones. A jazz vocalist navigating harmonic complexity that would destroy a classically trained singer demonstrates equal sophistication, just differently. You're defending a narrow orthodoxy as universal truth. Why should the world adopt bel canto when other vocal traditions thrive without it?

Bel Canto does not just mean "beautiful singing" but also... "singing". In the tradition of Bel Canto, a singer must shade, waver, attack, and release notes based on the characters they are singing as. For example, if you're singing as Lady Macbeth, you will have to "rough" your tone – how Verdi himself wanted. But in Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia, as Rosina, you will have to sing with a bright, more childish tone. Opera singers must sing with Bel Canto.

You're describing *interpretation within a single tradition*, not a universal singing principle. Yes, bel canto requires nuanced character work, but so does every serious vocal tradition. A jazz vocalist shades notes based on emotional context. A Qawwali singer modulates tone for spiritual intensity. A folk ballad requires character-driven phrasing. You've just proved that *all* great singing demands intentionality and emotional control. The difference is bel canto insists on specific *mechanics* to achieve it, while other traditions reach equal artistry through different means. Verdi wanted "rough" tones because the character demanded it, not because roughness is inherently inferior. Your argument actually undermines itself. Why must Lady Macbeth sound rough through bel canto rather than through any other valid technique that achieves the same dramatic effect?

Other genres have their own styles...? We are talking about opera? Because other styles in opera, like gowling, sigh, or shouts, are verismo way of expression; which is not acceptable in the tradition of the Bel Canto.

You're moving goalposts. Opera *is* diverse, not monolithic. Verismo exists within opera's tradition precisely because bel canto became insufficient for certain dramatic truths. Puccini and Mascagni didn't abandon opera, they evolved it. Your refusal to accept growling or shouting as valid operatic expression doesn't erase their legitimacy, it just reveals your aesthetic preference masquerading as doctrine. If bel canto were objectively necessary for opera, verismo operas would be failures. Instead, they're performed constantly and move audiences deeply. You're defending purity over artistry. Why should opera remain locked in 18th-century vocal mechanics when the form itself has already rejected that limitation?