On Tue, 10 Feb 2009, comex wrote: > Therefore, > there is nothing implicit in the definition of a proposal to prevent one > from being amended; as the attributes of proposals are not secured, it is > possible for a Rule to (grant permission to) amend them.
General counteragument: A rule specifically allowing a proposal text to change is no more difficult to accept than one changing chamber, AI, etc. But what's important is what is needed to actually *adopt* a Proposal. That is defined under Agoran Decision rules, not proposal rules. Specifically, in R107 and elsewhere, an Agoran Decision is a decision on a "matter" to be decided on, which I argue could be defined as referring to a particular and specific version of a text, not a different version which later bears the same ID number. The specific matter must be in the initiation notice for the decision[*]. I fully admit that's a "for the good of the game" style argument relying on comparing a general definition of a "matter" against a general definition of "document", "text", etc. provided by comex. [*] Note that the example in R107(a) is shorthand as it doesn't include the full text of the proposal and thus doesn't show the "matter" - therefore it is an incomplete example - ID numbers themselves are not a "matter" but a handy method for referring to a "matter" as long as there is no reasonable ambiguity (the example in R107(a) predates ID numbers). It would be keeping with very long Agoran custom and English definitions to rule that a "matter" in R107a consists of an entire proposal text of a specific version published at the initiation of the decision. -Goethe
