Topic Battle

Money emerges victorious by the narrowest of margins, though this verdict requires considerable qualification. The shark represents biological achievement of the highest order, a living fossil that has outlasted 99 percent of species that ever existed. Money, by contrast, is a newcomer, a mere 5,000-year-old abstraction that could vanish tomorrow if humanity simply stopped believing in it. Yet it is precisely this abstraction that grants money its terrible power. Money permeates every aspect of human civilisation in a manner that sharks, however formidable, cannot match. One may avoid sharks by remaining terrestrial; one cannot avoid money whilst participating in modern society. The score of 58-42 reflects money's greater contemporary relevance whilst acknowledging the shark's incomparably superior evolutionary credentials.