COURT GAZETTE (Arbitor's weekly report)
Date of last report: 07 Jan 2019
Date of this report: 20 Jan 2019
Disclaimer: Informational only. No actions are contained in this report.
Information in this report is not self-ratifying.
Open cases (CFJs)
-----------------
3695 called 15 January 2019 by twg, assigned 16 January 2019 to G.:
"Tenhigitsune has fulfilled eir obligation, detailed in the rule
entitled 'Space Battles', to 'once communicate to the resolver the
amount of Energy [e wishes] to spend" in Space Battle 0001."
3696 called 15 January 2019 by twg, assigned 16 January 2019 to G.:
"D. Margaux has fulfilled eir obligation, detailed in the rule
entitled 'Space Battles', to 'once communicate to the resolver the
amount of Energy [e wishes] to spend" in Space Battle 0001."
Highest numbered case: 3696
Context/arguments/evidence are included at the bottom of this report.
Recently-delivered verdicts and implications
--------------------------------------------
3692 called 8 January 2019 by ATMunn, assigned 9 January 2019 to
Trigon, judged IRRELEVANT 19 January 2019 by Trigon: "In the message
quoted below, twg successfully earned 5 coins for publishing the
Treasuror's most recent report."
3693 called 10 January 2019 by G., withdrawn 11 January 2019 by G.:
"The zombie auction for January 2019 has been terminated."
3694 called 11 January 2019 by twg, assigned 20 January 2019 to D.
Margaux, judged FALSE 20 January 2019 by D. Margaux: "It is generally
IMPOSSIBLE for a zombie to be transferred to the winner of a lot in a
zombie auction."
Day Court Judge Recent
------------------------------
D. Margaux 3685, 3686, 3690*, 3691*, 3694
[11/2 11/2 12/25 12/25 01/20]
G. 3679, 3680, 3688, 3691, 3695, 3696
[11/2 11/2 11/11 12/2 01/16 01/16]
Murphy 3682, 3678, 3687, 3689
[11/1 11/4 11/10 11/14]
Trigon 3683, 3684
[11/1 11/1]
Weekend Court Judge Recent (generally gets half as many cases)
------------------------------
ATMunn 3690
[12/2]
* Indicates that the CFJ was reassigned to this judge.
(These are informal designations. Requests to join/leave a given court
will be noted. Individual requests to be assigned a specific case will
generally be honored, even for non-court judges.)
Context/arguments/evidence
--------------------------
********************* CFJ 3692
*** 3692 Caller's message from ATMunn:
because why not, I CFJ on the following:
In the message quoted below, twg successfully earned 5 coins for
publishing the Treasuror's most recent report.
> On 1/8/2019 11:38 AM, Timon Walshe-Grey wrote:
>
> Defining some shorthand:
>
> To "quang" an office is to earn 5 coins for publishing that office's most
> recent report.
> To "quang" a player is to act on the player's behalf to transfer all eir
> liquid assets to oneself.
> I quang Treasuror. I quang Referee. I quang Tailor. I quang Tenhigitsune.
> -twg
*** 3692 Judgement by Trigon:
JUDGEMENT OF CFJ 3692
This case concerns a message sent by twg on the eighth of January. In
this message, twg defined two definitions to the word "quang" as an
unofficial term undefined by the rules. While it is true that shorthand
is tolerated in Agora and is somewhat of an integral part of our
culture, what with constantly using "TTttPF" to correct our mistakes, it
is also true that such terminology only gains its meaning from the
acceptance of the Agoran community at large and not from the rules
themselves. Because of this, I judge this case IRRELEVANT.
********************* CFJ 3693
*** 3693 Caller's message and arguements:
I terminate this auction, as per R2552.
I CFJ: The zombie auction for January 2019 has been terminated.
Arguments
Flipping the zombie master switch is Secured-2, as per the first sentence
of R2532. "Transferring" a zombie as the result of an auction is defined in
Rule 1885 (also power-2) as a flip of the master switch, however there's
nothing there that explicitly says that the Auctioneer CAN make the
transfer/flip (i.e. there's nothing that says that Agora CAN flip the switch
as the result of the auction). If the auctioneer CANNOT, then my
announcement above terminated the auction as per R2552.
On 1/10/2019 10:51 AM, D. Margaux wrote:
> I initiate a zombie auction, with the following lots (each zombie a
> separate lot) ordered as follows (highest-bid first):
>
> 1. L
> 2. nichdel
> 3. Telnaior
>
> Agora is the Auctioneer, and the Registrar is the Announcer. The
> currency is Coins with a minimum bid of 1.
>
>
>
*** 3693 Gratuitous counterarguements from D. Margaux:
> On Jan 10, 2019, at 1:17 PM, Kerim Aydin <ke...@uw.edu> wrote:
>
>
> I terminate this auction, as per R2552.
>
>
> I CFJ: The zombie auction for January 2019 has been terminated.
Gratuitous counterarguement:
The CFJ is FALSE, because a necessary implication of the Rules is that
Agora CAN transfer a zombie pursuant to a properly initiated Rule 1885
zombie auction.
Under Rule 2545 (power=2), “An Auction is a way for entities to give
away items in exchange for a currency.” By necessarily implication,
if a Rule with high enough power authorizes some player to initiate an
auction with a particular item as a lot, then that Rule also
necessarily authorizes that player to initiate a process that would
“give away [that] item[] in exchange for a currency.” That’s what an
auction _is_ under the Rules.
Under Rule 1885 (power=2), at the start of the month, “the Registrar
CAN put [a] zombie [that meets certain conditions] (along with any
other zombies that fulfill the same conditions) up for auction.” By
necessary implication, read in conjunction with Rule 2545, that means
that a zombie can be transferred pursuant to that auction. Otherwise
it wouldn’t be an auction at all—a way of transferring an item for
currency. It would be something else entirely.
This interpretation is consistent with the best interests of the game
and ordinary language. There’s no reason to adopt a contrary
interpretation, which would break auctions and zombies.
***3693 Gratuitous arguement from twg responding to D. Margaux:
Well this is an interesting argument. The implication would seem to be
that rules can redefine what other rules mean. I.e., in this case,
there is a rule that says there is a process by which zombies can be
transferred as part of an auction, so there is such a process, even
though the rules that are supposed to define the process technically
don't.
I think this argument doesn't work because, according to the FLR, CFJs
1911-1914 set the precedent that "Physical realities supersede the
Rules by default" - in this case, the physical reality that no rule
defines a process for zombie transferral overrides the rule that says
zombie transferral is possible, somehow, as part of an auction. But
I'm not confident enough in that interpretation to judge the case.
-twg
***3693 D. Margaux's message pointing out CFJ is trivially TRUE:
Oh no!
Telnaior has a resale value of 0. As a result, I believe this attempt
to initiate an auction is invalid under any interpretation of the
rules. In particular, under Rule 2549, “An Auction also CANNOT be
initiated unless the Auctioneer is able to give away each item in each
of the Auction's lots”, and under Rule 2574 “A zombie with a resale
value of 0 CANNOT have eir master switch flipped to a player other
than emself, rules to the contrary notwithstanding.”
As a result, I think it is trivially correct that the below was an
INEFFECTIVE attempt to start an auction.
If people generally agree with that, then I’ll re-initiate the auction
with the remaining two lots.
I intend with Notice to deregister Telnaior.
***3693 Caller's message withdrawing CFJ in light of new revelations:
Yoiks! I withdraw my most recently-called CFJ.
***3694 Caller's message from twg:
Oh, and since we've established that the quoted CFJ (CFJ 3693) is
trivially FALSE since the auction never technically began, I CFJ: "It
is generally IMPOSSIBLE for a zombie to be transferred to the winner
of a lot in a zombie auction." - which should get to the heart of the
matter.
Gratuitous arguments: [All gratuitous arguments submitted against CFJ 3693.]
-twg
********************* CFJ 3694
***3694 Caller's message from twg:
Oh, and since we've established that the quoted CFJ (CFJ 3693) is
trivially FALSE since the auction never technically began, I CFJ: "It
is generally IMPOSSIBLE for a zombie to be transferred to the winner
of a lot in a zombie auction." - which should get to the heart of the
matter.
Gratuitous arguments: [All gratuitous arguments submitted against CFJ 3693.]
-twg
***3694 [All arguements from 3693 are also relevant to 3694]
***3694 gratuitous arguement from Oerjan:
> On Thu, 10 Jan 2019, Timon Walshe-Grey wrote:
>
> I think this argument doesn't work because, according to the FLR, CFJs
> 1911-1914 set the precedent that "Physical realities supersede the Rules
> by default" - in this case, the physical reality that no rule defines a
> process for zombie transferral overrides the rule that says zombie
> transferral is possible, somehow, as part of an auction. But I'm not
> confident enough in that interpretation to judge the case.
The content of the Rules surely must be the exactopposite of what
"physical reality" refers to in those judgements?
Greetings,
Ørjan.
***3694 response by twg to Oerjan:
All right, I'll concede the text of the rules is technically a
"physical" reality. But if, say, we had a rule saying "All rules begin
with the word 'Tangelo'.", a statement which is manifestly untrue (at
least at present), surely that should not be interpreted as a
requirement to play the game _as if_ every rule began with the word
"Tangelo". (Perhaps it could be interpreted as a redefinition of the
word "rule", but then it would need to be at least power 3, to
override rule 2141.) I think the logic is similar.
-twg
***3694 response by D. Margaux to twg:
Meant to reply to twg’s comments on the zombie auction CFJ earlier,
but got a bit busy this week. A few thoughts for your consideration:
> Twg wrote:
>
> The implication would seem to be that rules can redefine what other rules
> mean.
This does seem to me to be one reasonable approach to interpreting a
code of rules—to interpret a provision in light of provisions in other
rules, in a manner that tries to harmonize the rules into a consistent
whole. That might feel reasonable to me because it’s a common
discursive move in the area of my specialty (law). People from other
backgrounds might find it less satisfying or reasonable, though, which
could be an example of the sort of diversity of interpretive method
that I think can be very cool about Agora.
> But if, say, we had a rule saying "All rules begin with the word 'Tangelo'.",
> a statement which is manifestly untrue (at least at present), surely that
> should not be interpreted as a requirement to play the game _as if_ every
> rule began with the word "Tangelo". (Perhaps it could be interpreted as a
> redefinition of the word "rule", but then it would need to be at least power
> 3, to override rule 2141.) I think the logic is similar.
In this hypothetical, i can see several approaches:
Maybe the Tangelo Rule would have no effect if it were contradicted by
a higher powered rule (e.g., Rule 105, which purports to be the “only
mechanism by which rules can be created, modified, or destroyed, or by
which an entity can become a rule or cease to be a rule”).
Absent a contradictory higher powered Rule, I think the Tangelo Rule
(1) could invalidate any lower powered Rule that does not begin with
Tangelo, on the theory that it wouldn’t actually be a Rule, or (2)
alternatively, it could cause us to insert the word “Tangelo” at the
beginning of any lower powered Rule, on the theory that the lower
powered Rule, qua Rule, must include the word “Tangelo” at the start.
And for higher powered Rules, we might either (1) insert “Tangelo” at
the start (if that does not affect the functioning of the higher
powered rule) or else (2) ignore the Tangelo Rule altogether (because
contradicted by higher powered Rules).
I suppose we could also just decide that the Tangelo Rule states an
untrue fact about the world and therefore has no effect, but that
approach seems to me to be in tension with Rule 217: “When
interpreting and applying the rules, the text of the rules takes
precedence.” Simply disregarding as factually wrong a
high-enough-powered Tangelo Rule, I think, would give precedence to
something other than the text of the rules. Maybe.
*** 3694 judgement by D. Margaux:
I judge this FALSE for the reasons I have previously given regarding
this CFJ and CFJ 3693.
********************* CFJ 3695 and CFJ 3696
***3695 & 3696 Background message from twg:
I act on behalf of Tenhigitsune to announce that e will spend rau
Energy in Space Battle 0001, where "rau" is a word in twgese, which is
a constructed language invented by me. (Other twgese words include
"quang" and "spaaace".)
Go ahead, CFJ this. You know you want to
***3695 & 3696 response by ais523
I recommend searching the CFJ archives and/or Agoran mailing lists for
"nkeplwgplxgioyzjvtxjnncsqscvntlbdqromyeyvlhkjgteaqnneqgujjpwcbyfrpueoydjjk".
(It's not a very commonly used word, after all!)
And as a followup, the most relevant of the many nkep precedents
appears to be CFJ 2625 (which is almost exactly this situation,
attempting to act on behalf of another player using a word that has not
been publicly defined). I disagree with the outcome of that case (as
you can see from the arguments), and I'm not sure it gives us any
guidance for sorting out this situation anyway (as unlike in CFJ 2625,
there's no reason to suppose that the player in question knows the
meaning of the word, nor that they are paying enough attention to the
game to object to an attempt to use it incorrectly).
***3695 & 3696 arguement from D. Margaux:
I have no idea how this resolves.
One reason this might not work is that the rule requires Tenhigitsune
to “communicate” eir choice, and Rule 2466 prohibits you from acting
on behalf of em to send a “message” (or synonymously, to “publish”
something). The only thing you can do is take the underlying game
action on eir behalf—but here there seems to be no action separate
from the very act of sending a message (i.e., “communicat[ing]”).
***3695 & 3696 response by twg to D. Margaux:
I see your Rule 2466/1 and raise you CFJ 3649.
-twg
***3695 & 3696 response by twg to ais523:
Actually, I don't think this is the same scenario. twgese is just a
mechanism for ensuring that the value of the number Tenhigitsune has
announced is unknown to D. Margaux; the nature of the action that is
being taken is perfectly cromulent to everybody. (Unless it fails for
another reason.)
-twg
***3695 & 3696 arguement from G. responding to twg:
There's a fairly established set of decisions that says public communication
has to be intelligible to "a typical Agoran" and not just a single Agoran -
that's the AGAINT precedents, arguably more famous than nkep.
History of AGAINT: Someone privately communicated with the Assessor
ahead of voting to say "when I vote AGAINT, it's a vote FOR." Everyone
not in the know assumed it was a typo and a clear vote AGAINST. Result:
using a private language/code doesn't work, it either fails entirely or
has the assumed typo meaning (depending on context).
***3695 & 3696 response by D. Margaux:
Here’s a thought experiment to sharpen the point.
Imagine that I don’t know any Spanish at all, but I’ve been told that
“uno” is a number in that language (but not which number it is). I
then give the message, “I spend uno energy.” If twg speaks Spanish and
knows that word, then have I communicated to him a choice of energy
expenditure here? I think yes: the communicative content of the
message does not depend on my internal mental state, but instead upon
the signs that I am transmitting in broader social context, which is
one where “uno” definitely means “one” (even if I don’t know that
myself).
Or what if I am told that -e^(i * pi) is a positive integer, but don’t
know which one it is and refuse to google it. Do I communicate a valid
choice if I tell twg that I choose -e^(i * pi)?
If “rau” signifies a number in a legitimate language that twg
understands (twgese), then my election of rau+1 should work in the
same way as “uno” and “e^(i * pi)” do in the above hypotheticals.
However, I think that “rau” actually doesn’t signify a number in any
language (because private languages are impossible), and so twg didn’t
actually communicate a number when e sent eir message and my election
of rau+1 also doesn’t work.
> On Jan 15, 2019, at 6:16 PM, D. Margaux <dmargaux...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>> On Jan 15, 2019, at 5:49 PM, Timon Walshe-Grey <m...@timon.red> wrote:
>>
>> Actually, at the time you posted the quoted message, "rau" meant "a pigeon
>> or dove", so your statement is clearly incorrect. twgese is, after all, an
>> evolving language - the meanings of words change all the time.
>
> I apologize, I should have been more precise.
>
> I spend rau + 1 energy, but I use the word “rau” in this context in an
> anachronistic sense to mean what “rau” meant in twgese at the time you sent
> your first message with the word “rau.” Hope this clarifies things. :-)
>
>> Also, I think your attempt to announce the Energy you will spend fails,
>> because I have no idea what you thought "rau" meant, so your message did not
>> communicate that information to me.
>
> I don’t think this is quite right. You can never know precisely what I think
> anything means, because you can’t perceive directly into my mind.
> Accordingly, it cannot be a precondition to successful communication that you
> must know my private mental meanings if any (because that could never be
> satisfied). Instead, what you can perceive are the signs and symbols that I
> convey to you; and those signs and symbols are imbued with meaning by their
> history of usage by a community of language speakers/writers. So you don’t
> need to know what (if anything) I “thought rau meant” in my mind; instead,
> all that is required for successful communication is that you evaluate the
> meaning of the signs and symbols I convey to you in their full social context.
>
> Here, evidently, rau is a twgese word that had a particular meaning that you
> yourself know at the time you first used it. So that’s what I’ve communicated
> to you in my message. :-)
>
> [[As a more serious aside, I think the logic I’m laying out in this email is
> essentially the reason why the later Wittgenstein demonstrated that private
> languages such as twgese are impossible. So actually “rau” has no meaning in
> either of our emails. But it’s been a long time since I had to think about
> Wittgenstein, so I may have garbled the logic of it.]]
*** 3695 & 3696 proto-judgement from G.:
The exact CFJ statement does not extend the quote far enough. The full
text is:
> SHALL each once communicate to the resolver the amount
> of Energy they wish to spend in the battle, via any method that
> cannot be understood by the other combatant until e has also
> fulfilled this obligation.
The "via any method that cannot be understood" is part of the SHALL
requirement. So the requirement is fulfilled when a combatant communicates
to the resolver, without being understood by the other combatant.
Now, to communicate is to be understood; that is, common use of the term
includes the notion that information is successfully imparted, and if
understanding is not actually received, communication did not occur (example
use: "what we have here, is a failure to communicate.")
So: the combatant must be understood by the resolver, without being
understood by the other combatant.
No one can ever be sure that anyone else truly "understands" something, but
we can use the standard of what a "typical current Agoran" might understand.
So the communication must be made via a method that a typical Agoran would
understand, but a different typical Agoran wouldn't understand.
Clearly, this is impossible if the method uses public information for all
communication on the matter. To use the "typical" Agoran as a standard is
to assume that both parties, given the same public information, would come
to the same understanding. If a hash (or "secret language") is used, then
when the hash is first published, neither party understands/has been
communicated to. When the translation is published, both parties
understand. There is never a time when one of the typical Agorans
understands, but not the other.
Of course, if one of the Agorans is possessed of private information (e.g. a
code arranged with the resolver ahead of time, that e understands), this is
trivial to arrange, as it becomes "a typical Agoran with information X
understands X, something that a typical Agoran without information X doesn't
understand". Which makes perfect sense.
But under the assumption that the method of communication is entirely
conducted in public, FALSE: these conditions are never met.
***3695 & 3696 response by twg to proto-judgement:
On Wednesday, January 16, 2019 12:48 AM, Kerim Aydin <ke...@uw.edu> wrote:
> Of course, if one of the Agorans is possessed of private information (e.g. a
> code arranged with the resolver ahead of time, that e understands), this is
> trivial to arrange, as it becomes "a typical Agoran with information X
> understands X, something that a typical Agoran without information X doesn't
> understand". Which makes perfect sense.
Hold on, isn't that exactly what happened here? "rau" is effectively
(if we strip away all the fluff about constructed languages, which was
a fun excuse but isn't really relevant) a secret code devised for
communication between the resolver (me) and the person who first used
it in a public message (coincidentally, also me).
If the original attempt failed at all, I would have expected it to be
because of R2466's prohibition of sending-messages-on-behalf. I
realise that contradicts CFJ 3649 but to be honest I'm not 100%
certain, in hindsight, that that judgement was correct anyway.
*** 3695 & 3696 response by G. to D. Margaux:
On 1/16/2019 5:37 AM, D. Margaux wrote:>
>> On Jan 16, 2019, at 4:10 AM, Timon Walshe-Grey <m...@timon.red> wrote:
>> If the original attempt failed at all, I would have expected it to be
>> because of R2466's prohibition of sending-messages-on-behalf. I realise
>> that contradicts CFJ 3649 but to be honest I'm not 100% certain, in
>> hindsight, that that judgement was correct anyway.
>
> I agree that CFJ 3649 is poorly reasoned and probably shouldn’t be
> followed. It’s not obvious that the judge of that CFJ knew of the
> prohibition against sending messages when “acting on behalf.”
I remember disagreeing with 3649 it at the time, can't remember if I
attempted to file a Motion or just discussed it a bit and let it pass. In
any case, here's my take on Tenhigitsune's case (proto-judgement):
tl;dr you can't "communicate to" someone on behalf of a zombie because you
can't send messages on their behalf.
In general, in Agora, we abstract a lot of things (real currencies become
virtual currencies, etc.) However, we are grounded in some baseline
realities. Of course, some of those "realities", such as whether free will
exists, are deep philosophical questions - over time, Agora has built up
some precedents around those.
One such precedent is in CFJ 1895 (a discussion of free will and
Aristotelian causality). This found that a "baseline axiom" in Agora is
that the game is played by discrete, identifiable agents of free will -
i.e. "natural persons". The assumption is that "personhood" is absolute -
you can create a legal construct that accepts one person's actions on
behalf of another, but the agent never "becomes" the other person.
This fundamental assumption extents to the concept of "knowledge". Because
each person's knowledge is fundamentally independent, an actor cannot "pass
on a principal's knowledge" (i.e. "communicate to") a third party. Again,
we could put in Rules-language to create a legal fiction that allows it,
but such communication cannot happen naturally.
Currently, the R2466 explicitly forbids the legal fiction that an actor can
act on behalf of a principal to "send a message". While the context of
"send a message" is generally "send an email", in this case it should be
taken colloquially and broadly - one can "send a message" in a variety of
ways. So in the broader context, "sending a message" is simply to
"communicate" to someone, whether via email, in-person, or a horse's head
in someone's bed.
So an actor cannot communicate with anyone on-behalf-of a principal. In
R2466 this is explicit, but even without the prohibition in R2466, it is
impossible: as per CFJ 1895 "Every assumed act of free will can be traced
to a particular person's desire. Thus, as final cause and intention, this
intention, and free will is, also non-transferable, in the most fundamental
sense." The "act of communicating" is fundamentally an act of free will,
an act traceable to a particular person's desire. And that person is the
actor, not the principal[*].
The Rule "Space Battles" states that a certain action is accomplished by
communicating to another party - the communication is the action. The Rule
is Power-1. R2466 is power-3, so this trumps any ability that might be
implied in lower-powered rules, and as discussed above, there's no
"natural" ability for an actor to communicate on behalf of a principal[**].
Therefore, a person CANNOT act on behalf of another to communicate the
required information.
[*] This is specific to cases where the actor "originated" the original
thought (i.e. the origin of the message was the actor's free will, not the
principal's). For example, if the Principal (of eir own accord) sends a
message to a private party, and the private party forwards the message to a
forum, it's possible to find that the Principal communicated with the forum
"via the private party". But this is only true if the Principal, as an
agent of free will, originated the content of the message.
[**] This discussion of what may happen "naturally" is necessary because
it's physically impossible to block two free agents from communicating: a
rule that says "two people CANNOT communicate about X" would have no
meaning when the two people actually did so, which is why we use SHALL NOT
to control acts of communication between free agents. So if R2466 were
purporting to invalidate communications between free agents, it would fail
due to physical reality.
*** 3695 & 3696 further response by G. to D. Margaux:
On 1/15/2019 4:05 PM, D. Margaux wrote:
>>> I CFJ, barring D. Margaux: "D. Margaux has fulfilled eir obligation,
>>> detailed in the rule entitled 'Space Battles', to 'once communicate to
>>> the resolver the amount of Energy [e wishes] to spend" in Space Battle
>>> 0001."
I think this is a very different situation then the zombie one, and there's
a strong case to be made for TRUE. So starting a different thread here.
Let's say D. Margaux and twg had the following private conversation:
twg: I've picked a secret number - I'll call it tau. Here's a hash so
you know that I've chosen what tau is ahead of time.
D. Margaux: Sure, I'll bite: I wish to spend tau+1.
twg: Right, I now know exactly how much you wish to spend.
Then when twg later publishes both sides, e reveals the hash contents, and
tau has a reasonable, appropriate value.
Now there's two ways to adjudicate this:
1. "communicate to the resolver the amount of Energy" must be judged
strictly with all the onus of communication on the combatant. That is, D.
Margaux's messages alone must contain sufficient information to communicate
a value to any typical Agoran observer privy to D. Margaux's messages (but
not privy to the contents of the hash). This would result in false.
2. "communicate to the resolver [twg]" can include context known to twg.
Here, D. Margaux of eir own free will communicated sufficient information to
twg for the value to be determined by the resolver. While risky on D.
Margaux's part, it was eir risk to take, of eir own free will. This would
result in true.
In general, for private conversations, we've tended to lean towards #2:
allowing lingo and context to evolve, or allowing private contracts /
communications to work. That allows for more flexible, enjoyable gameplay
(where "clever arrangements" are part of that). The downside is, if done in
an official context (not a contract), it puts some onus on the Resolver to
privately decide if weird communication attempts qualify (if e publicly
reveals the two combatant's values, and one turns out to be invalidly
submitted, e's revealed the other combatant's value too early and has broken
the rules). This might be especially onerous/unfair if the duty falls to
"the non-combatant who has least recently registered".
If we find in favor of #2, there's a secondary question: whether we take
twg's word that e had set a definition for tau ahead of time, so that D.
Margaux's 'tau+1' communication uniquely defined a value when it was made.
So it's basically a "what standard of evidence do we accept?" case rather
than a "what constitutes communication".
That's worth thinking about, but first I was curious at other people's
thoughts between #1 and #2.
