On Wed, Mar 15, 2023 at 5:18 AM Juan F. Meleiro via agora-discussion <agora-discussion@agoranomic.org> wrote: > > I see. But in that case, isn't the rule authorizing that effect the > lower-powered one? Because if not, a low-powered rule could define terms used > in higher-powered ones to mean whatever it wants. > > For example, a power 0.1 rule could define “entity” to just mean player, > thereby breaking a lot of things. >
Sure - This happened in the past, and so we added this to R217: > Definitions in lower-powered Rules do not overrule > common-sense interpretations or common definitions of terms in > higher-powered rules, but may constructively make reasonable > clarifications to those definitions. For this purpose, a > clarification is reasonable if and only if it adds detail without > changing the underlying general meaning of the term and without > causing the higher powered rule to be read in a way inconsistent > with its text. This means that for common terms like "entity" (that the rules don't explicitly define), a lower-powered rule can't redefine how a higher-powered rule uses that term. However, for definitions that are explicit in the rules and separate from their common definition, R217 says "the text of the rules takes precedence" and a lower-powered rule can define a phrase that a higher-powered rule can use, as long as the use is consistent between them, AND as long as the higher-powered one is the one that provides the final permission to use the ability (and permission need not be explicit with a CAN). But it does introduce a security risk that you mention if the lower-powered definition is changed. This isn't a clean rules interpretation - there's a definite ongoing tension between R217 and R2140's "no entity with power below the power of this rule can [...] set or modify any other substantive aspect of an instrument with power greater than its own (that is, one that affects the instrument's operation)" so I'm describing in general how CFJs have interpreted this tension over time - which could be reversed/interpreted differently. -G.
