On 1 July 2013 03:14, Fool <fool1...@gmail.com> wrote: > > There was some talk of legalism/logicism or idealism/pragmatism. Maybe > relative to the group I'm very far off one end of these scales. I also > expect the question of _objectives_ made a big difference. On the last > turn, a fairly large coalition simply voted themselves joint winners. I'm > curious _when_ did this coalition form? And generally, to what extent were > people trying to win? >
I didn't find out about Agora XX until June 24 when Blob alerted me to it -- I didn't receive Yally's email to the ancients. I sent the following message to Goethe shortly after I registered: From: Steven Gardner <steven.gard...@monash.edu> > Date: 25 June 2013 09:18 > Subject: What is to be done? > To: ke...@u.washington.edu > > Hi Kerim. Or perhaps that should be Goethe. > I have no plans at all, and really no idea what is going on, but I feel > like we should be conspiring to do something, just for old times' sake. > The main thing I can think of to do is of course to try and win Agora XX. > My only idea so far is try and get a proposal adopted just before the game > ends to amend the scoring rule to declare, say, you, me, Chuck, Murphy and > Michael the winners of Agora XX. Five votes might be enough in blitz nomic. > But if you've any better ideas you need co-conspirators for, count me in. > Steve So the basic idea to try and win and the outlines of how to do it was there from the beginning -- not very stylish, but acceptable given there were only 5 days to go. Personally, I'm a big fan of the Win by Paradox; I've always thought it's the most stylish way to win, and the method most resonant wit the deep spirit of the game. After all, Suber called his book the 'The Paradox of Self-Amendment'; love of paradox obviously runs deep in the game's inventor. I sent this message to all six old timers on 26 June: From: Steven Gardner <steven.gard...@monash.edu> > Date: 26 June 2013 13:49 > Subject: Re: For Old Time(r)s' Sake > To: Malcolm Ryan <malco...@cse.unsw.edu.au> > Cc: games...@chuckcarroll.org, Kerim Aydin <ke...@u.washington.edu>, > michael.norr...@nicta.com.au, emurph...@socal.rr.com > > My only plan at the moment is to put up proposal to enact or amend a rule > to declare us the winners. There are, at least potentially, 6 of us, and > with a 24 hour voting period, that might be enough. From a tactical > standpoint, we also need to think about how to vote on proposals being made > by others which affect our chances of success. For example, amending rules > is tricky when they keep changing numbers! For another example, proposal to > extend the game beyond June 30 might complicate matters. > Of course I'd prefer to win by by paradox - much more stylish. My instinct > is to start with the judicial system - tie that up in logical knots and it > becomes impossible to determine the game state - but I've no concrete ideas > about how to do that, particularly not in 3 or 4 days. > Let's spend the next 24-36 hours exploring ideas. Then we can settle on a > plan. To my surprise and delight, Chuck almost immediately discovered the germ of an idea for a plausible Win By Paradox. I would have been very happy to see Chuck declared sole winner in this fashion. But Walker and Michael patiently and ingeniously picked apart his argument. In a fascinating sideline, which Michael pointed out to us in a private message, the path to a win by paradox remained open even after Michael's Judgement on Chuck's second CFJ. As Michael pointed out in his Judgement, Chuck's idea was basically sound, it's just that Chuck had made his move too early, when the relevant rule defining the end of voting periods was the old 205, not the new 333. So a new CFJ, referring to the close of the voting periods of proposals 348-362, might have worked. My final comment on this intricate passage of play is that it also might not have worked. It would have been open to the Speaker to try and 'collapse the game state', a manouevre with a long history in Agora Nomic going back to its early Platonic days, though I'm not sure it has been needed for many years since pragmatism was written so deeply into Agora's ruleset. The set of voters on proposals 348-362 was nearly identical for each of those proposals; there were only minor variations. So the Speaker could have tried identifying each of the different possible sets of Judges for such a CFJ, and rolling a die for each such set. If the same Judge is selected in each of the 'legally possible worlds', then voila! -- instant gamestate collapse, and the legality of selecting that Judge could be determined with finality after all. Alas, all this remained, as they say in chess, 'in the notes'. Steve -- Steve Gardner Research Grants Development Faculty of Business and Economics Monash University, Caulfield campus Rm: S8.04 | ph: (613) 9905 2486 e: steven.gard...@monash.edu *** NB I am now working 1.0 FTE, but I am away from my desk** on alternate Thursday afternoons (pay weeks). *** Two facts about lists: (1) one can never remember the last item on any list; (2) I can't remember what the other one is.
