status: https://faculty.washington.edu/kerim/nomic/cases/#3888
(This document is informational only and contains no game actions).
=============================== CFJ 3888 ===============================
On or about 00:15:33 UTC on 12 Nov 2020, in a message entitled
'[Stonemason] Throwing Stones', Jason made a pledge.
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Caller: Jason
Judge: nix
Judgement: FALSE
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History:
Called by Jason: 14 Nov 2020 17:01:47
Assigned to nix: 15 Nov 2020 20:13:26
Judged FALSE by nix: 28 Nov 2020 20:06:54
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[Message in question]
https://mailman.agoranomic.org/cgi-bin/mailman/private/agora-official/2020-November/014385.html
Caller's Evidence:
Rule 2450/10 (Power=1.7)
Pledges
If a consenting Player makes a clear public pledge (syn. Oath) to
perform (or refrain from performing) certain actions, then
breaking the pledge is ILLEGAL; doing so is the Class N crime of
Oathbreaking, where N is the value explicitly stated by the
pledge, or 2 if the pledge does not explicitly state a value.
Allowing a pledge to expire without carrying out an action one
pledged to do in it constitutes breaking the pledge.
The time window of a pledge is W days, where W is the value
explicitly stated by the pledge, or 60 if the pledge does not
explicitly state a value. A pledge ceases to exist at the end of
its time window.
If breaking the pledge harms specific other parties, the Referee
SHOULD solicit the opinion of those parties in determining an
appropriate fine.
The Notary CAN destroy a pledge Without Objection, but SHOULD NOT
do so unless the pledge no longer serves any significant purpose.
Caller's Arguments:
Making a pledge is not a by announcement action, and only require the
pledge to be "clear". This means that a player need not clearly and
unambiguously specify the action of making a pledge in order to do so,
and I imagine it was phrased this way to allow enforcement of natural
language promises. In the message referenced in the statement, Jason
initiated an auction with an auction method that purports to place a
"SHALL" requirement on em. Auction method regulations are not given
enforcement power by the rules, and auction methods appear to not be
binding upon the auctioneer. However, it may be the case that the
requirement was "clear" enough for it to constitute a pledge on the
auctioneer publishing them.
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Judge nix's Arguments:
The caller asks if making a "SHALL" statement that does not have legal
effect constitutes a pledge. E correctly points out that a pledge does
not need to be by announcement, and so indeed it seems that pledges
could be implied. However, this is not the sole limitation the rules put
on creating pledges. From Rule 2450, "Pledges":
If a consenting Player makes a clear public pledge (syn. Oath) to
perform (or refrain from performing) certain actions, then [...]
Pledges cannot be made by any player, they must be made by a "consenting
Player". Agora has a standard of consent in Rule 2519, "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.
Conditions 2 and 3 are irrelevant in the current discussion. Condition 1
seems unlikely to be met, because Jason did not mention a pledge (or
Oath) in the original action, nor has e since stated that e is agreeing
to any such pledge.
Condition 4 is the trickiest, because it applies a very subjective
standard of "reasonably clear from context". From my own personal
perspective, I did not interpret any actions in the message-in-question
as a pledge when I read the message. I asked Jason if e did, and e
responded with:
No, I wasn't. I only thought it might be a pledge until a
little before I called the CFJ.
This response makes me think that even to em it was not "reasonably
clear". Thus, it does not appear that, by Agora's own legal standard of
consent, Jason was a "consenting Player" when the purported pledge was
made. I rule this CFJ FALSE.
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