Both debates are worthy. The one you describe as unworthy would be my personal preference to see reduced or eliminated, but it is worthy in that it demonstrates how important issues are to our egos as opposed to determining an optimum solution to a problem. In my observation these discussions give me information about human behavior, information that I find equally interesting to the issues them selves. These discussion are a microcosm of the macrocosm of human behaviors. Our egos get in the way of a lot of problem solving. Because of the inability to know everything and because of the inability to know any future with certainty, we can proclaim things knowing that a lot of the things we proclaim can't easily be refuted. So we argue which gives us a sense of satisfaction that we are important even as this process interferes with looking at the "greatest good".
Periodically remove yourself from the investment of the discussion and watch what people say and how they say it. There are patterns we all have. If we can remove our egos from the process human progress would evolve at a much faster rate. Sadly, the ego is hard wired in a manner that makes "objective" thinking very difficult. Survival after all is the strongest biological factor in all life forms that want to survive. The ego is the human manifestation of survival that inserts itself in our "advanced" conscious state.
