I judge 3719 FALSE and adopt the proto judgement.  

Begin forwarded message:

From: "D. Margaux" <[email protected]>
Date: February 20, 2019 at 12:25:45 PM EST
To: Agora Discussion <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: CFJ 3719

> On Wed, Feb 20, 2019 at 7:33 AM D Margaux <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Begin forwarded message:
> 
> From: D Margaux <[email protected]>
> Date: February 20, 2019 at 7:28:31 AM EST
> To: Agora Business <[email protected]>
> Subject: Re: BUS: Victory by Apathy
> 
> 
> 
> On Feb 19, 2019, at 10:56 PM, James Cook <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> I initiate a Call for Judgement, specifying the statement: "Falsifian
> and G won the game."
> 
> 
> CFJ 3719. I assign it to myself.
> 
> It reminds me of another, similar attempted declaration: 
> https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=EuZeff2y32M :-)

Here are my initial proto-judgement, but I am definitely open to being
persuaded otherwise:

* * *

Caller's arguement depends on the idea that to "Declare Apathy" means
the same thing as to "announce" or "publish apathy."  I don't
necessarily agree with that, and so I would judge FALSE.

The word declaration has several meanings.  In the context of Rule
2465, I think "to Declare Apathy" is  a kind of a speech-act: it is a
statement that causes a particular social fact to come into existence
(in this case, it creates a victory by Apathy).  It has a similar form
as when a wedding officiant says "I declare you man and wife," or when
a monarch says "I declare war on [country]," or when the chair of a
legislative body says "I declare that the legislative session is
adjourned."

In each of these examples, the declaration works only if certain
preconditions are met.  The wedding officiant must be vested with some
legal, religious, or other kind of authority to perform the marriage,
and the bride and groom need to express consent and have a valid
marriage license--otherwise the declaration is void.  The monarch must
be vested with the power to declare war, and may lack authority to do
so in a constitutional monarchy.  The chair must actually be
recognized as legitimately presiding over the legislative body, and
certain rules typically must be followed before an adjournment can be
declared.

If authority is lacking, the declaration is void.  So if I were to say
(or announce or publish), "I declare Donald Trump and Hillary Rodham
Clinton to be married," or "I declare war on BlogNomic on behalf of
Agora," or "I declare the U.S. Congress to be adjourned," we would all
immediately understand why the declarations are void.

So too here.  Under certain circumstances, Rule 2465 vests a player
with authority to declare a particular social fact to come into
existence--a victory by Apathy.  The key question is under what
circumstances does that Rule create authority to Declare Apathy?  The
Rule says that "[a] player CAN Declare Apathy without objection,
specifying a set of players."  In my view, "without objection" must be
read as a precondition that must be satisfied before a player is
vested with authority to Declare Apathy.

So what does "without objection" mean?  Well, Rule 1728 says that "a
rule that purports to allow a person to perform an action [without
objection] thereby allows em to perform the action by announcement"
provided certain conditions are met.  Here, those conditions are
plainly not met (and not merely because dependent intents are
currently temporarily broken). So, I think the declaration sadly must
fail (which is regrettable because a TRUE judgement would also give me
a win by Apathy from December 2018).

Reply via email to