What made the whole concept easy for me to think about, was that when you're trying to find the center point of something that is circular, you have to read an equal point on both sides of the curve and do the math to find the center.

Plus you can verify the timing marks on the balancer are correct. 2 birds/1 stone!

1) Millions of cams have been installed without degreeing.
2) Degreeing a cam does not make it the right or best installed position, it just makes it a known position. If you don't plan on going back into the motor and changing the cam position, arguably there is no need to degree it. Degreeing it does not mean it will run better.

What you do get is knowing that the machining (that effects cam timing) of the cam/both gears, and crank are correct. You can make adjustments to install it per the manufactures recommendation, if that matters to you and, what I think is honestly the best reason for a typical guy to degree his cam is that if there are problems with how the motor runs, you will know that cam timing is not the problem.

I disagree with the motor won't run better with the cam degreed in It will, every Mopar V8 I have tested on the dyno and at the track, run worst if it is retarded at all

That is what you have found. That is not what I have found. Nor is it what everyone has found.

Back in the late '70s when I degreed my first cams, I think the first three I did were advanced if you lined up the dots. I even had a more experienced person check my work on the first one 'cause it was advanced 5 degrees out of the box! After several more cams were also found to be advanced (one a pontiac) my friends and I came up with a theory.
Since most beginning rodders are tempted to pick too big a cam for a street car, we decided the manufactures were grinding them advanced on purposed so the car would run ok and the owner would be happy! I think they figure that experienced rodders/racers would buy the correct cam and then DEGREE it!
That first cam was a Cam Dynamics that I put in a '72 340, it sounded very nasty, after being retarded 5 degrees, I wish I had just lined up the dots on that one!

Always degree, you'll know for sure were it is and most important it verifies the timing cover and damper are correct for TDC. my .02$

Degreeing the cam on the #1 cylinder is only part of the story. As long as you are that far along, it would be a real good idea to check #8 and compare it for "Twist". I have heard of some cams being off as much as 6 degrees front to back. Good luck trying to find a performance problem on that after the engine is assembled.

I always check the LSA on #1 and #6 to make sure the cam is ground correctly, I have had one early hemi cam that was FUBAR by Sig Erson Very frustrating You don't know what you don't know
I've also had more than one Mopar LA engine cam have the exhaust lobes ground wrong on the duration at .050 and the LSA

On the first roller I put in my 340 I lined
up the dots to start with and was gonna check
it.. I TRIED to roll the crank over and it
stopped dead... after checking things out I
found the key way on the cam was 23* off.. the
lobes were right so I degreed it in and was fine
so I always degree them in.. and I advance them
if I want to lower the torque rpm curve IF I dont
need the upper rpm level.. on a street car you can
use the lower torque rpm since you rarely use the
high rpm