This episode of Intelligent Squared U.S. is brought to you by the Great Courses Plus, where you can learn anything that interests you any time.

The Great Courses Plus is giving Intelligent Squared listeners the chance to watch their popular course, argumentation, the study of effective reasoning, and hundreds of other courses for free.

Just go to GreatCoursesPlus.com slash intelligence.

This episode of Intelligent Squared U.S. is also brought to you by Squarespace, whether you need a landing page, a beautiful gallery, a professional blog, or an online store, it's all included in your Squarespace website.

Start your free trial today at squarespace.com and enter offer code Intelligent Squared to get 10% off your first purchase.

So a wealthy American who likes to hunt goes to Africa and shoots and kills an endangered animal, a lion, say, or a black rhino, and it is legal because he has a license, one that he paid thousands or even tens or hundreds of thousands for.

But sometimes when word gets out about the kill, outrage follows, the hunter is severely criticized by animal rights activists and by some environmentalists who condemn the act, insisting that animals need to be protected, not hunted.

But wait, some hunters say, we are the good guys here. Our sport, as they call it, is the best thing that has ever happened to wild animals.

We hunters are history's first true conservationist and still it's most effective, not just the millionaires who are trophy hunting in Africa, but also the deer and the duck hunters in the United States from Maine to Montana.

Hunters conserve wildlife, they argue. So what about that? Well, that sounds like the makings of a good debate. So let's have it. Yes or no to this statement.

Hunters conserve wildlife, a debate from intelligence squared US. I'm John Don Van. We are at the Kaufman Music Center in New York with four superbly qualified debaters who will argue for and against this motion.

Hunters conserve wildlife. As always, our debate will go in three rounds and then our live audience here in New York votes to choose the winner and only one side wins.

Let's meet our debaters first. Please ladies and gentlemen, welcome Anthony Lakata. Anthony, welcome to intelligence squared. Thanks for having me.

Your editor in chief of field and stream magazine, that has an audience of more than nine million hunters and fishermen. You yourself have been hunting since you were 10 years old.

You took a trip out to Alaska on a black bear hunt. You did not come back with a bear. So what made it so memorable for you?

Hunting is about a lot more than just taking an animal on that trip to Alaska. I absolutely fell in love with southeast Alaska. And that's what made it so memorable.

Thank you, Anthony. And tell us who was your partner in this debate? My partner is Catherine Sensor.

Catherine, welcome to intelligence squared. And Catherine Sensor, you are a chief operating officer of humanitarian operations protecting elephants. That's an NGO that works with governments and other organizations to fight against poaching in Africa.

And it seems like every time a controversy comes up involving trophy hunting, people tend to conflate legal hunting and what is called poaching. So in a couple of sentences, educate us. What's the difference between legal hunting and poaching?

Sure, a hunter is someone who pays a fee to pursue game within the context of a conservation program that has government oversight. A poacher in contrast is an outlaw who illegally kills game to supply elicit markets around the world.

The key difference is that hunters support conservation programs and poachers actively undermine them.

Okay, topic will be coming back to you. And thank you. And this is the team arguing for the motion. Hunters can serve wildlife. And we have two debaters arguing against the motion. First, let's welcome Wayne Paselli.

...