On Thu, May 25, 2023 at 4:37 PM Kerim Aydin via agora-official < agora-offic...@agoranomic.org> wrote:
> [Apologies for not waiting for more input from the Caller, but if I > don't assign this now it may be nearly a week before I can. Hopefully > Yachay can still provide something timely, or Judge 4st has some > knowledge of the controversy.] > > The below CFJ is 4032. I assign it to 4st. > > status: https://faculty.washington.edu/kerim/nomic/cases/#4032 > > =============================== CFJ 4032 =============================== > > There are some persons right now who have more than 0 Rice. > > ========================================================================== > > Caller: Yachay > > Judge: 4st > > ========================================================================== > > History: > > Called by Yachay: 25 May 2023 19:17:23 > Assigned to 4st: [now] > > ========================================================================== > > Caller's Arguments: > > [none provided so far] > > ========================================================================== > Evidence: Rule 2682/0 (Power=1) The Rice Game The Ricemastor is an office, in charge of tracking Rice, Rice Plans and Signatures. Rice is a fixed asset, ownable only by players. Any active player can create a Rice Plan by announcement, if e hasn't done so yet in the current week. Rice Plans can have Signatures, and each Signature must be of an active player. A Rice Plan has an active player's Signature as long as that player is consenting to it. An active player can destroy a Rice Plan that e has created by announcement. A Harvest occurs at the beginning of each week. When this occurs: - If there is only one Rice Plan with the most Signatures, that Rice Plan is Harvested. - If there is more than one Rice Plan with the most Signatures, the one that was created earliest is Harvested. - In all other cases, nothing happens. And then all Rice Plans are destroyed and the Harvest ends. Rice Plans consist of two lists of players, with each list having no repeated players, and the lists can be empty. One of these lists is its Rice Up list, and the other is its Rice Down list. When a Rice Plan is Harvested, for each player listed in its Rice Up list, if that player is active, e gains 1 Rice; and for each player listed in its Rice Down list, if e has at least 1 Rice then e lose 1 Rice. If after a Harvest there is a single active player with at least 2 Rice and more Rice than any other player, then that player wins the game, and all Rice is destroyed. When the game has been won in this manner three times, this rule repeals itself. Rule 2519/2 (Power=3) Consent A person is deemed to have consented to an action if and only if, at the time the action took place: 1. e, acting as emself, has publicly stated that e agrees to the action and not subsequently publicly withdrawn eir statement; 2. e is party to a contract whose body explicitly and unambiguously indicates eir consent; 3. the action is taken as part of a promise which e created; or 4. it is reasonably clear from context that e wanted the action to take place or assented to it taking place. Rule 2125/13 (Power=3) Regulated Actions An action is regulated if: (1) the Rules limit, allow, enable, or permit its performance; (2) the Rules describe the circumstances under which the action would succeed or fail; or (3) the action would, as part of its effect, modify information for which some player is required to be a recordkeepor. A Regulated Action CAN only be performed as described by the Rules, and only using the methods explicitly specified in the Rules for performing the given action. The Rules SHALL NOT be interpreted so as to proscribe unregulated actions. This judgement was called due to this sentence: "A Rice Plan has an active player's Signature as long as that player is consenting to it." Specifically: whether that sentence allows players to consent to rice plans. So firstly, let's go over "consent". Consent, in natural language and in Agora, is undefined when applied to things that are not actions. In natural language, we don't consent to contracts: we consent to things the contract will do. We don't consent to sex, we consent to the act of sex, and specifically, we consent to particular actions of it. So, just to be perfectly and absolutely clear and unambiguous: consenting to non-actions is undefined and unreasonable to assume, firstly based on Agoran lack of definition, and secondly based on natural language lack of definition. So: this sentence is written poorly based on current Agoran culture and tradition. There are three primary ways to read this sentence atomically. The first is that the "it" in the sentence refers to "that rice plan". A rice plan is not an action. Thus, it makes no sense to be consenting to a non-action, and this is unreasonable to assume. The second is that the "it" in the sentence refers to "that rice plan has that player's Signature." However, this is a state of something: how can we consent to a state of affairs? However, similar to previous examples, we DON'T consent to states of affairs: we don't consent to whether sex happened, but rather, whether it is going to happen, and we don't consent to contracts, but rather what the contract will do. Thus, we reach that third interpretation: we are consenting to that rice plan obtaining or not obtaining your signature. You consent to the change, the action that occurs, or you reaffirm consent that inaction is acceptable: that no change is acceptable. (It is not strictly necessary to reaffirm consent to Inaction, but you can say no or yes to something many times if you'd like to get your point across. Note that inaction can be interpreted as an action in of itself. EG this is how tardiness works: we don't apply the blots to Time, we apply the blots to the player.) Since players are consenting to actions, I should clarify: what does it mean to say "I consent to this rice plan."? This is shorthand for the action: much like "I consent to this contract" and "I consent to sex". Again, it is unreasonable to assume consent to a non-action. Now: with regard to "is consenting to it". This is the final nail we should hammer down. What does it mean to be consenting to something? In R2519, consent is treated like an action in clauses 1 through 3. However, in clause 4, we see some of the natural language definitions appear. This makes consent work in most reasonable situations if it could otherwise not work. However, most of the consent presented for rice plans currently falls under clause 1: we publicly agree to rice plans. If there's any concern about whether we have consented to rice plans, then we can also apply clause 4: it has been reasonably clear that we assented to said rice plans. The full process goes like this for consenting to rice plans, and the signatures being applied: 1. A player consents to a rice plan. 2. The signature is added to the rice plan, as the player consented to this step in 1. 3. That player does nothing with regard to that rice plan. 4. The player is already consenting to that rice plan having that signature (under clause 4 of R2519), so the signature is not removed. If for some reason, the signature was removed, then the signature would be added back to the rice plan, as the player has already indicated reasonably and clearly that e would like that to occur (again, clause 4 of R2519). 5. That player consents to that rice plan (again). 6. If for some reason, the signature was removed, then the signature is added to the rice plan, otherwise, the rice plan already has the signature and no change to consent to occurs, and this is fine. The player has now indicated reasonably and clearly that e'd like the signature to be added, a second time, and this violates no rules. (similar steps occur for withdrawal of consent.) Finally, to close this case: in general, as a point of law, clear public attempts to consent work. The Ricemaster Report is reasonable evidence for who tried to consent, and since I'm [for independent logical reasons] judging that clear attempts work, we can assume the ones in the report worked. THUS, I judge the CFJ to be true. -- 4st Referee & Deputy (AKA FAKE) Herald Uncertified Bad Idea Generator
