On Fri, 6 Sep 2019 at 02:45, Jason Cobb <[email protected]> wrote:
> On 9/5/19 9:48 PM, Kerim Aydin wrote:
> > Of course it's worth asking whether "amount of (items)" in R2550
> > is similar enough to "number of (items)" in R2550, but it seems fairly
> > close to common sense that (items) is the governing part of the
> > definition.
>
>
> Ah, glorious quotation marks. This may be hyper-textualist (and I don't
> know if there's precedent for this), but I would think the quotations
> marks demand matching exactly that pattern (modulo formatting,
> apparently), so it wouldn't apply to "amount".
>
> --
> Jason Cobb

CFJ: Jason Cobb has placed a bid of 2.1 Coins on the current zombie auction.

Argument:

Quoting R2550:

> A person authorized to bid on an Auction CAN do so by
> announcement, specifying the amount of the Auction's currency to
> bid. A bid placed on an Auction before it is initiated, or after
> it has ended, is INEFFECTIVE.

Where the text says "specifying the amount ... to bid", it does not
give any explicit guidance on what an "amount" can be. Ordinary
language is full of ambiguities, and reading in interpreting it is
generally a process of making common-sense inferences about the
intended meaning. For example:

* I think we would all interpret the "CAN do so" as meaning "CAN bid
on that same auction e is authorized to bid on", rather than CAN bid
on an[y] auction", even though the latter may be consistent with the
text in some pedantic sense.

* We understand that "A person ... CAN do so..." isn't just an
assertion that there exists at least one person somewhere in the world
who is authorized and also CAN bid on an auction; it's saying that
every authorized person can. Similarly, "A bid placed ... is
INEFFECTIVE" isn't informing us that there exists some bid somewhere
that was placed at the wrong time and is also INEFFECTIVE; it's saying
that every bid placed outside the time of the Auction is INEFFECTIVE.

Furthermore, note that the text says "the amount ... to bid", no "an
amount ... to bid", implying that it's referring to a notion of
"amount to bid" that is already understood by the reader.

Along the same lines, consider H. Judge D. Margaux's argument for CFJ
3694 [0], which e included in eir judgement [1]. E argued that R2545's
text "An Auction is a way for entities to give away items in exchange
for a currency" allows us to infer that the lots in an auction can be
transferred. I think it is similarly reasonable to understand that the
bids in in auction are intended to be paid.

So, let's use some common sense in understanding what this text is
saying. A bid in this auction is an amount of Coins. 2.1 is not an
amount of Coins any more than "town fountain" is an amount of coins:
Coins are indivisible entities. You certainly can't transfer 2.1
Coins. So 2.1 Coins is not a bid.

[0] 
https://mailman.agoranomic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/private/agora-discussion/2019-January/052940.html
[1] 
https://mailman.agoranomic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/private/agora-business/2019-January/039764.html

--
- Falsifian

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