Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Sat, 1 Feb 2020 at 18:20, James Cook wrote: > Bah, sorry, I overlooked the stuff about ordering of facts when I wrote that. I mean ordering the evaluation of legal fictions.
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Sat., Feb. 1, 2020, 12:57 James Cook, wrote: > Finally had time to read this sort-of-carefully. It do like it better > than the current "minimally modified" language for ratification. > > Wasn't there a time in the past when ratification worked by the rules > simply declaring that when a document is ratified, it becomes true at > the time specified? I don't have the text in front of me now, but it > seems to me that your proposal is quite similar to that, with the > difference being you go to great pains to define what a legal fiction > is. Assuming that's the case, a question: how is your proposal > practically different from that? What do we gain by an explicit > definition of "legal fiction"? > > I'll allow that your proposal explicitly deals with the case of a > ratification that would prevent itself from occurring. But I don't > think you need all the groundwork about defining legal fictions just > to do that. > Bah, sorry, I overlooked the stuff about ordering of facts when I wrote that. The more I take the time to think about it, the more I like it. I still wonder if it can be made shorter (not by removing examples; I like those). Still curious to hear about how things worked on the old days. Also I think it would be nice if we didn't need this juggling of inconsistent facts at all. I think my proto night successfully avoid that, at the cost of having to specify effects more explicitly. If my proto doesn't take, I'll probably be in favour of yours. - Falsifian
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
Finally had time to read this sort-of-carefully. It do like it better than the current "minimally modified" language for ratification. Wasn't there a time in the past when ratification worked by the rules simply declaring that when a document is ratified, it becomes true at the time specified? I don't have the text in front of me now, but it seems to me that your proposal is quite similar to that, with the difference being you go to great pains to define what a legal fiction is. Assuming that's the case, a question: how is your proposal practically different from that? What do we gain by an explicit definition of "legal fiction"? I'll allow that your proposal explicitly deals with the case of a ratification that would prevent itself from occurring. But I don't think you need all the groundwork about defining legal fictions just to do that. One minor comment inline... On Thu, 30 Jan 2020 at 18:18, Alexis Hunt via agora-discussion wrote: > A legal fiction must be defined with respect to a specific point in > time, or to a specific period of time, which CANNOT be in, or extend > into, the future beyond its creation. A legal fiction's direct effects > are retroactive to the time so specified, for which it operates > notwithstanding any rule to the contrary. Beyond that time, its > effects are limited to the natural consequences of its direct effects What is a "natural consequence"? Given that the rule defines "natural facts", one guess is it means only changes in natural facts (not legal facts) that would result, which is probably not what you mean. - Falsifian
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Thu, 30 Jan 2020 at 18:18, Alexis Hunt via agora-discussion wrote: > Well, the outcome is defined by a calculation given by the rules. So > if, say, an AI=1 proposal has votes FOR equal to votes AGAINST, then > its outcome is REJECTED. So ratifying outcome means ratifying that > F>A. But what does that mean, exactly? Do we ratify the existence of > one more vote FOR? If so, who cast it? I suspect this causes the > "unique minimal change" criterion to fail and the ratification overall > to fail. R2034 doesn't say the outcome is ratified. It does say it had "the number of voters indicated", but I'm not sure the gamestate modification needs to invent a particular change to the set of voters. The past is already a legal fiction contained in the gamestate; does the "number of voters" recorded in that legal fiction need to match the size of the "set of voters" recorded in that fiction? I don't really like the "minimally modified" language because of questions like this, but it's possible this one works out. - Falsifian
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Sat, Feb 1, 2020 at 12:21 AM James Cook wrote: > On Fri, 31 Jan 2020 at 01:30, Tanner Swett via agora-discussion > wrote: > > then a legal fiction is established that the belief was true at the time of > > the earliest public message indicating the belief; and the gamestate is > > therefore altered as though the belief had been true at that time, in order > > to cause the gamestate to essentially match, as closely as possible, what > > the players believe it to be. > > "earliest public message indicating the belief" doesn't quite seem > right. Consider this timeline: > > T1: I submit proposal X, which most people think will have effect Y, > but actually has effect Z. > T2: Before X is adopted, I start acting as if effect Y has already > happened. People assume I'm being goofy and ignore me. > T3: Proposal X is adopted. > ...60 days pass; everyone acts as if the proposal had effect Y... > T4: I point out due to subtle phrasing, the effect of the proposal was > actually Z. This rule triggers, and the "earliest public message > indicating" belief Z was at time T2, not T3. Ooh, clever. (I'm guessing that in the description of T4, instead of the second mention of Z, you meant Y.) Perhaps it would have to be changed to something like "the earliest public message indicating that the belief was held reasonably." (Then again, I don't think anyone—including me—is particularly interested in enacting an "automatic implicit ratification" proposal like this one in the first place.) —Warrigal
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Fri, 31 Jan 2020 at 01:30, Tanner Swett via agora-discussion wrote: > then a legal fiction is established that the belief was true at the time of > the earliest public message indicating the belief; and the gamestate is > therefore altered as though the belief had been true at that time, in order > to cause the gamestate to essentially match, as closely as possible, what > the players believe it to be. "earliest public message indicating the belief" doesn't quite seem right. Consider this timeline: T1: I submit proposal X, which most people think will have effect Y, but actually has effect Z. T2: Before X is adopted, I start acting as if effect Y has already happened. People assume I'm being goofy and ignore me. T3: Proposal X is adopted. ...60 days pass; everyone acts as if the proposal had effect Y... T4: I point out due to subtle phrasing, the effect of the proposal was actually Z. This rule triggers, and the "earliest public message indicating" belief Z was at time T2, not T3. Probably there's some way to work this could contribute to a diabolical scam. - Falsifian
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Thu, 30 Jan 2020 at 20:11, omd via agora-discussion < agora-discussion@agoranomic.org> wrote: > > A legal fiction must be defined with respect to a specific point in > > time, or to a specific period of time, which CANNOT be in, or extend > > into, the future beyond its creation. > > By analogy with the officeholder-despite-non-player example, if a > legal fiction is established that a second legal fiction exists > despite the point in time being in the future, does that state persist > until disturbed? > That's a good catch, I would exempt the rules about legal fictions from being subject to the impossible-state exception. > > A legal fiction's direct effects > > are retroactive to the time so specified, for which it operates > > notwithstanding any rule to the contrary. Beyond that time, its > > effects are limited to the natural consequences of its direct effects > > Missing a period at the end of the paragraph. > Good catch. Hopefully I remember to fix it when I address comments. What is a "direct effect"? What is a "natural consequence"? > > How complicated can the natural consequences be? You establish later > that it can be something like "Michael Norish is the Registrar despite > not being a player". Can the complexity be extended to effectively > amount to a rule, like "Michael Norrish CAN submit a proposal by > announcement, despite not being a player"? If not, it should be more > clear why not. > The intent is that a direct effect is the thing actually specified by the legal fiction, such as that a player is the officeholder. The natural consequences include both things that follow by forward reasoning at the time at which the legal fiction takes effect (say, that the person's voting strength is calculated based on eir holding the office) and consequences that occur at a later time (such as that the player is still the officeholder until something changes it). Suggestions to improve the wording are encouraged. As for the rule-by-legal-fiction, I don't want to say yes, but I do not see why not. It's worth noting that the entirety of the impossible-state thing is based on a) it was my belief that it matches existing jurisprudence, but this appears to be more complicated, as I discus below b) it promotes clarification of uncertainty even when such has silly results. As for jurisprudence, I totally missed in my haste that the current ratification rules explicitly prohibit the creation of inconsistency between game state and rules, but I nonetheless thought that there was precedent that if, say, a rule came to hold a power greater than 4, it would remain such until some effect came along to change it. I am okay in principle with reintroducing the idea that inconsistency cannot be created, but we need to be more explicit about when we evaluate such inconsistency, something which the current ratification rules are unclear about on inspection. For instance, if a non-player was ratified to hold an office that e had attempted to resign after the ratification point, would the ratification succeed? The actual game state to be ratified would be consistent with the rules, even though the calculation based on the past would require the game to temporarily be in a consistent state. One other thought here that occurs is what should happen when the resulting game state is underspecified. The existing ratification rules address this by causing the ratification to fail. Should we do similar here? I imagine that the backwards reasoning prohibition goes a long way to preventing these sorts of things, but I'm not sure. > Regardless, there should be an office responsible for tracking ongoing > "natural consequences" of (known) legal fictions. > I think that this should be restricted to ongoing contradictions, possibly only in information that's otherwise tracked. I'm otherwise open to the idea but would prefer it as a separate proposal. > > A legal fiction does not operate retroactively prior to the specified > > time, nor does it reason backwards to affect the preconditions for the > > state it specifies. Thus, it CAN cause result in a state which would > > Extraneous "cause". > > > otherwise be IMPOSSIBLE to have attained under the rules at the time. > > Such an impossible state CAN persist beyond the time of effect, > > provided that nothing occurs or has occurred since to disturb it. > > "occurs or has occurred" is redundant; pick a tense. > > CAN is probably the wrong term here and elsewhere: what does it mean > exactly that "attempts to perform the described action are > successful"? (Under your other proto, could any person cause an > impossible state to persist beyond the time of effect with Agoran > Consent? You can't say it's not an action, since it says "action" > right in the definition.) I'd just say that the state does persist > beyond the time of effect. > I like it. > > [I would love to be more clear with the last sentence, but I do not > > want to be because either way
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Thu, Jan 30, 2020 at 5:30 PM Tanner Swett via agora-discussion
wrote:
>
> I have a half-serious half-proto-proposal:
>
> "Implicit Ratification", AI: 3
>
> Repeal all rules relating to ratification. Enact the following rule: {
>
> In the course of playing the game, it is inevitable that from time to time,
> an error in recordkeeping will occur and go unnoticed for such a long time
> that it is difficult to determine what the correct gamestate is. In such
> circumstances, it is desirable to ignore the erroneousness of the reported
> gamestate and proceed as though it had been correct all along. Therefore:
>
> If, due to an error in recordkeeping or a similar mistake,
>
> (a) the player base at large has come to a belief about the gamestate, as
> clearly evidenced by public messages, and
> (b) these public messages indicate that the player base has had this belief
> for at least 60 days, but
> (c) the belief is false,
>
> then a legal fiction is established that the belief was true at the time of
> the earliest public message indicating the belief; and the gamestate is
> therefore altered as though the belief had been true at that time, in order
> to cause the gamestate to essentially match, as closely as possible, what
> the players believe it to be.
>
> }
60 days is way too long. No comment on the rest of it yet.
-Aris
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
I have a half-serious half-proto-proposal:
"Implicit Ratification", AI: 3
Repeal all rules relating to ratification. Enact the following rule: {
In the course of playing the game, it is inevitable that from time to time,
an error in recordkeeping will occur and go unnoticed for such a long time
that it is difficult to determine what the correct gamestate is. In such
circumstances, it is desirable to ignore the erroneousness of the reported
gamestate and proceed as though it had been correct all along. Therefore:
If, due to an error in recordkeeping or a similar mistake,
(a) the player base at large has come to a belief about the gamestate, as
clearly evidenced by public messages, and
(b) these public messages indicate that the player base has had this belief
for at least 60 days, but
(c) the belief is false,
then a legal fiction is established that the belief was true at the time of
the earliest public message indicating the belief; and the gamestate is
therefore altered as though the belief had been true at that time, in order
to cause the gamestate to essentially match, as closely as possible, what
the players believe it to be.
}
—Warrigal
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
I’m not Alexis, but I do have some replies of my own. On Thu, Jan 30, 2020 at 5:11 PM omd via agora-discussion wrote: > > > A legal fiction's direct effects > > are retroactive to the time so specified, for which it operates > > notwithstanding any rule to the contrary. Beyond that time, its > > effects are limited to the natural consequences of its direct effects > > Missing a period at the end of the paragraph. > > What is a "direct effect"? What is a "natural consequence"? > > How complicated can the natural consequences be? You establish later > that it can be something like "Michael Norish is the Registrar despite > not being a player". Can the complexity be extended to effectively > amount to a rule, like "Michael Norrish CAN submit a proposal by > announcement, despite not being a player"? If not, it should be more > clear why not. > > Regardless, there should be an office responsible for tracking ongoing > "natural consequences" of (known) legal fictions. I’m not sure I see the need, but if we do, the FLR annotations would seem to be the closest analogous model. > > > or > > whose establishment would paradoxically prevent itself from being > > established, > > Why include this? There's nothing inherently problematic about > ratifying a document which implies that the ratification process would > have failed – especially compared to the continuous rule-contradicting > effects that you allow elsewhere. Yes there is. If it implies that it’s own ratification failed, then does the legal fiction exist or does it not? > Wording could be improved to tie this better into the previous > paragraph: "ratifying the document ratifies only its main section" is > self-contradictory if taken literally. > > > Text which serves only to document the existence of legal fictions, > > and ratifications in particular, is exempt from ratification. > > Why? It’s in the current rules, and is a good safety catch to avoid chains of legal fictionality. > General notes: > > - You should add a clause about how CFJs interact with legal fictions – e.g. > they take into account legal fictions that existed at the time of > initiation, > but not ones established thereafter. I strongly agree, and also would prefer it be implemented as specified in your example. > > - I'm tentatively positive about this new approach, but even though it fixes a > lot of issues with ratification as it currently exists, it's scary in > entirely different ways. That's a good way of describing my position too. -Aris
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Thu, Jan 30, 2020 at 10:18 AM Alexis Hunt via agora-discussion wrote: > A fact is either a natural fact or a legal fact. A natural fact is a > fact which is extrinsic to Agoran law, such as whether a message > expresses a particular intent, or whether or not an entity is an > organism. A legal fact is a fact which is intrinsic to Agoran law, > such as the state of a rule-defined value. A legal fiction is a kind > of legal fact which overrides other natural and/or legal facts. Legal > fictions must be established explicitly. I agree that it's not clear from this proto why we need to differentiate natural facts from legal facts. One potential reason I can think of is that the rules can change legal facts, whereas they can only paper over natural facts. But the definition of legal fiction here seems to pick the "paper over" approach regardless of the subject. > A legal fiction must be defined with respect to a specific point in > time, or to a specific period of time, which CANNOT be in, or extend > into, the future beyond its creation. By analogy with the officeholder-despite-non-player example, if a legal fiction is established that a second legal fiction exists despite the point in time being in the future, does that state persist until disturbed? > A legal fiction's direct effects > are retroactive to the time so specified, for which it operates > notwithstanding any rule to the contrary. Beyond that time, its > effects are limited to the natural consequences of its direct effects Missing a period at the end of the paragraph. What is a "direct effect"? What is a "natural consequence"? How complicated can the natural consequences be? You establish later that it can be something like "Michael Norish is the Registrar despite not being a player". Can the complexity be extended to effectively amount to a rule, like "Michael Norrish CAN submit a proposal by announcement, despite not being a player"? If not, it should be more clear why not. Regardless, there should be an office responsible for tracking ongoing "natural consequences" of (known) legal fictions. > A legal fiction does not operate retroactively prior to the specified > time, nor does it reason backwards to affect the preconditions for the > state it specifies. Thus, it CAN cause result in a state which would Extraneous "cause". > otherwise be IMPOSSIBLE to have attained under the rules at the time. > Such an impossible state CAN persist beyond the time of effect, > provided that nothing occurs or has occurred since to disturb it. "occurs or has occurred" is redundant; pick a tense. CAN is probably the wrong term here and elsewhere: what does it mean exactly that "attempts to perform the described action are successful"? (Under your other proto, could any person cause an impossible state to persist beyond the time of effect with Agoran Consent? You can't say it's not an action, since it says "action" right in the definition.) I'd just say that the state does persist beyond the time of effect. > [I would love to be more clear with the last sentence, but I do not > want to be because either way could have bad effects. If we become too > sensitive to definition changes, then they could cause massive > unwinding of legal fictions. But if we are too strict, then > redefinition of terms could cause previous legal fictions to propagate > in an undesirable manner. And I tried to think of an interpretive > guide based on the actual effect of a legal fiction relative to an > underlying fact, in the manner similar to focusing on the ratio > decendi of a judgment, but that undermines the idea that legal > fictions created by mechanisms like ratification are intended to > eliminate the need to look at the underlying facts.] Meh. I understand the motivation to avoid specificity, but the resulting text is *very* vague. The example helps, though. > Even with such a > rule, however, if a legal fiction was established that the person held > the office for a period of time, then e would be the officeholder for > that entire time, and would not constantly oscillate in and out of > office. While I understand what you mean, the use of this particular example is somewhat confusing given that typical ratification of office holdings (in the form of the ADoP's report) covers an instant rather than a period of time. > [Detailed examples are unusual in Agora, as in law, but I see no > reason not to include one here, and sometimes they serve as the best > interpretive guides.] I agree. > Legal fictions are evaluated in chronological order, What does it mean for a legal fiction to be evaluated? Does the first thing to be evaluated take precedence, or the last thing? > and CAN override > previous legal fictions or result in reinterpretation of history so as > to result in the establishment or non-establishment of legal fictions > in the intervening time. So it retroactively creates or destroys 'real' legal fictions? Or does it just create a
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Thu, Jan 30, 2020 at 11:21 AM Alexis Hunt via agora-discussion wrote: > > On Thu, 30 Jan 2020 at 14:00, Aris Merchant via agora-discussion > wrote: > > Please cut the natural fact/legal fact distinction. It isn't helping > > anything, and is just confusing and unnecessary complexity. > > Hm, I'm not entirely sure it is, because this wording makes it very > clear that legal fictions override natural facts. If you have an > alternative wording that can accomplish the same goal, I'd appreciate > the suggestion. "A legal fiction is a fact, as defined by this rule, that is held to be true for game purposes, regardless of whether it is otherwise objectively correct". That's terrible wording, but I'm sure you can rephrase it a bit to come up with something you like. The key point is the "that is held to be true for game purposes", since it captures the idea that it is correct as far as the game is concerned. -Aris
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Thu, 30 Jan 2020 at 14:00, Aris Merchant via agora-discussion wrote: > Please cut the natural fact/legal fact distinction. It isn't helping > anything, and is just confusing and unnecessary complexity. Hm, I'm not entirely sure it is, because this wording makes it very clear that legal fictions override natural facts. If you have an alternative wording that can accomplish the same goal, I'd appreciate the suggestion. > Oh, I caught another thing. For "Legal fictions are evaluated in > chronological order", is that chronological order of creation (which I > think you mean) or chronological order of > starttime/midtime/endtime/something else? Please make it explicit in > the text. > > -Aris Good catch, I thought I had specified chronological order of their establishment. I realized that there actually is some other cleanup attempt required to deal with the following scenario: - At point C, Legal Fiction 1 is established that something was true at point A. - At point D, Legal Fiction 2 is established that something was true at point B. - Legal Fiction 2's establishment requires either A or B being true. - Legal Fiction 1's establishment requires either A or B being false. So the application order looks like this: At point C, we apply LF1 at point A. We revise the timeline from points A to C. When we get to point C, we verify that the conditions for LF1 continue to apply. They do, so we are good. Subsequently, at point D, we apply LF2 at point B. We revise the timeline from points B to D. When we get to point C while revising the timeline, we discover that LF1 no longer applies because B and A are both true. Thus we need to re-revise the timeline from points A to C, which will be identical to the original from points A to B. When we get to point C while again revising the timeline, we discover that now LF1 does apply, because while B is still true, A is not. Paradox. This results in LF2 failing. However, if LF1 would I should also add "It is a defense to a charge of breaking the rules that the rules violation exists only due to subsequently established legal fiction, except if the person accused of having violated the rules was acting unreasonably in light of impending legal fictions of which e was aware." I know that retroactivity is dangerous, but I think that this route is probably the better one to go down if we can make it work. I'll definitely prioritize getting a proof of this out, though, and won't distribute that until it's done unless it requires some revision. -Alexis
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
Oh, I caught another thing. For "Legal fictions are evaluated in
chronological order", is that chronological order of creation (which I
think you mean) or chronological order of
starttime/midtime/endtime/something else? Please make it explicit in
the text.
-Aris
On Thu, Jan 30, 2020 at 10:56 AM Aris Merchant
wrote:
>
> On Thu, Jan 30, 2020 at 10:18 AM Alexis Hunt via agora-discussion
> wrote:
> >
> > Ugh, so, I just realized with G.'s recent point about the tally of
> > votes in Agoran decisions possibly being self-ratifying, that
> > ratifying the outcome of a decision could have all sorts of
> > backwards-propagating effects and, in particular, possibly prevents
> > self-ratification of incorrect outcomes altogether, especially after
> > my currently pending proposal to make the tally not part of the
> > self-ratification.
> >
> > Why?
> >
> > Well, the outcome is defined by a calculation given by the rules. So
> > if, say, an AI=1 proposal has votes FOR equal to votes AGAINST, then
> > its outcome is REJECTED. So ratifying outcome means ratifying that
> > F>A. But what does that mean, exactly? Do we ratify the existence of
> > one more vote FOR? If so, who cast it? I suspect this causes the
> > "unique minimal change" criterion to fail and the ratification overall
> > to fail.
>
> *groans*
>
> > Having ratification possibly have to compute backwards onto
> > preconditions was a terrible idea. My recent proposal
> >
> > I don't have any better ideas to fix this than the explicit legal
> > fiction idea I proposed before, so here is an approach to that:
> >
> > Proposal: Ratification by Legal Fiction (AI=3)
> > {{{
> > For greater certainty, text in square brackets in rule text in this
> > proposal is comments and is not included in the actual text enacted.
>
> Unnecessary; comments are now auto-stripped.
>
> > Enact a new Power-3.1 rule entitled Legal Fictions, reading as follows:
> > {
> > A fact is either a natural fact or a legal fact. A natural fact is a
> > fact which is extrinsic to Agoran law, such as whether a message
> > expresses a particular intent, or whether or not an entity is an
> > organism. A legal fact is a fact which is intrinsic to Agoran law,
> > such as the state of a rule-defined value. A legal fiction is a kind
> > of legal fact which overrides other natural and/or legal facts. Legal
> > fictions must be established explicitly.
>
> Please cut the natural fact/legal fact distinction. It isn't helping
> anything, and is just confusing and unnecessary complexity.
>
> > [Mostly per the proto-proto, except moving away from "Questions" and
> > focusing just on facts, in order to improve clarity and avoid the
> > other aspects which aren't currently needed.]
> >
> > A legal fiction must be defined with respect to a specific point in
> > time, or to a specific period of time, which CANNOT be in, or extend
> > into, the future beyond its creation. A legal fiction's direct effects
> > are retroactive to the time so specified, for which it operates
> > notwithstanding any rule to the contrary. Beyond that time, its
> > effects are limited to the natural consequences of its direct effects
> >
> > A legal fiction does not operate retroactively prior to the specified
> > time, nor does it reason backwards to affect the preconditions for the
> > state it specifies. Thus, it CAN cause result in a state which would
> > otherwise be IMPOSSIBLE to have attained under the rules at the time.
> > Such an impossible state CAN persist beyond the time of effect,
> > provided that nothing occurs or has occurred since to disturb it. When
> > a legal fiction specifies that something satisfies or does not satisfy
> > a definition, the amendment of that definition CAN, but does not
> > necessarily, amount to a natural consequence which disturbs the legal
> > fiction's effects. Whether it does or not is interpreted on a case by
> > case basis in accordance with the usual rules of interpretation.
> >
> > [I would love to be more clear with the last sentence, but I do not
> > want to be because either way could have bad effects. If we become too
> > sensitive to definition changes, then they could cause massive
> > unwinding of legal fictions. But if we are too strict, then
> > redefinition of terms could cause previous legal fictions to propagate
> > in an undesirable manner. And I tried to think of an interpretive
> > guide based on the actual effect of a legal fiction relative to an
> > underlying fact, in the manner similar to focusing on the ratio
> > decendi of a judgment, but that undermines the idea that legal
> > fictions created by mechanisms like ratification are intended to
> > eliminate the need to look at the underlying facts.]
> >
> > For instance, if only players can hold offices, then the establishment
> > of a legal fiction that a person, who was not a not a player, held an
> > office at a specific point in time causes em to, as of that particular
> > point, hold the office notwithstanding
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Thu, Jan 30, 2020 at 10:18 AM Alexis Hunt via agora-discussion
wrote:
>
> Ugh, so, I just realized with G.'s recent point about the tally of
> votes in Agoran decisions possibly being self-ratifying, that
> ratifying the outcome of a decision could have all sorts of
> backwards-propagating effects and, in particular, possibly prevents
> self-ratification of incorrect outcomes altogether, especially after
> my currently pending proposal to make the tally not part of the
> self-ratification.
>
> Why?
>
> Well, the outcome is defined by a calculation given by the rules. So
> if, say, an AI=1 proposal has votes FOR equal to votes AGAINST, then
> its outcome is REJECTED. So ratifying outcome means ratifying that
> F>A. But what does that mean, exactly? Do we ratify the existence of
> one more vote FOR? If so, who cast it? I suspect this causes the
> "unique minimal change" criterion to fail and the ratification overall
> to fail.
*groans*
> Having ratification possibly have to compute backwards onto
> preconditions was a terrible idea. My recent proposal
>
> I don't have any better ideas to fix this than the explicit legal
> fiction idea I proposed before, so here is an approach to that:
>
> Proposal: Ratification by Legal Fiction (AI=3)
> {{{
> For greater certainty, text in square brackets in rule text in this
> proposal is comments and is not included in the actual text enacted.
Unnecessary; comments are now auto-stripped.
> Enact a new Power-3.1 rule entitled Legal Fictions, reading as follows:
> {
> A fact is either a natural fact or a legal fact. A natural fact is a
> fact which is extrinsic to Agoran law, such as whether a message
> expresses a particular intent, or whether or not an entity is an
> organism. A legal fact is a fact which is intrinsic to Agoran law,
> such as the state of a rule-defined value. A legal fiction is a kind
> of legal fact which overrides other natural and/or legal facts. Legal
> fictions must be established explicitly.
Please cut the natural fact/legal fact distinction. It isn't helping
anything, and is just confusing and unnecessary complexity.
> [Mostly per the proto-proto, except moving away from "Questions" and
> focusing just on facts, in order to improve clarity and avoid the
> other aspects which aren't currently needed.]
>
> A legal fiction must be defined with respect to a specific point in
> time, or to a specific period of time, which CANNOT be in, or extend
> into, the future beyond its creation. A legal fiction's direct effects
> are retroactive to the time so specified, for which it operates
> notwithstanding any rule to the contrary. Beyond that time, its
> effects are limited to the natural consequences of its direct effects
>
> A legal fiction does not operate retroactively prior to the specified
> time, nor does it reason backwards to affect the preconditions for the
> state it specifies. Thus, it CAN cause result in a state which would
> otherwise be IMPOSSIBLE to have attained under the rules at the time.
> Such an impossible state CAN persist beyond the time of effect,
> provided that nothing occurs or has occurred since to disturb it. When
> a legal fiction specifies that something satisfies or does not satisfy
> a definition, the amendment of that definition CAN, but does not
> necessarily, amount to a natural consequence which disturbs the legal
> fiction's effects. Whether it does or not is interpreted on a case by
> case basis in accordance with the usual rules of interpretation.
>
> [I would love to be more clear with the last sentence, but I do not
> want to be because either way could have bad effects. If we become too
> sensitive to definition changes, then they could cause massive
> unwinding of legal fictions. But if we are too strict, then
> redefinition of terms could cause previous legal fictions to propagate
> in an undesirable manner. And I tried to think of an interpretive
> guide based on the actual effect of a legal fiction relative to an
> underlying fact, in the manner similar to focusing on the ratio
> decendi of a judgment, but that undermines the idea that legal
> fictions created by mechanisms like ratification are intended to
> eliminate the need to look at the underlying facts.]
>
> For instance, if only players can hold offices, then the establishment
> of a legal fiction that a person, who was not a not a player, held an
> office at a specific point in time causes em to, as of that particular
> point, hold the office notwithstanding the prohibition. It does not,
> however, operate to make em a player at any point in time. If no
> effect exists which would have changed the officeholder since then,
> then e would be presently in that office and remain so until something
> does change the officeholder, such as eir resignation. However, if the
> rules provide that, when a non-player holds an office, it become
> vacant, such a rule would take effect immediately after the specified
> point in time and cause the office to
Re: DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
On Thu, 30 Jan 2020 at 13:18, Alexis Hunt via agora-discussion
wrote:
>
> }
> }}}
>
> -Alexis
One missing paragraph:
{
Establish a legal fiction that, for each purported resolution of an
Agoran decision that would have self-ratified, but whose
self-ratification failed only because there were multiple distinct
modifications to the votes made by players on that decision that could
be made to effect the ratification, at the moment that the decision
would have self-ratified, a legal fiction was established that that
purported resolution did in fact resolve the decision with the outcome
it specifies, and if that outcome was to adopt a proposal, that such a
proposal existed, was adopted, and took effect.
}
Extra commentary: I have relatively high confidence that this is
paradox-proof and ambiguity-proof, but I would like to publish a proof
of this, possibly as a D.N.Sci thesis.
-Alexis
DIS: [Proto] [Possibly Urgent] Ratification Changes
Ugh, so, I just realized with G.'s recent point about the tally of
votes in Agoran decisions possibly being self-ratifying, that
ratifying the outcome of a decision could have all sorts of
backwards-propagating effects and, in particular, possibly prevents
self-ratification of incorrect outcomes altogether, especially after
my currently pending proposal to make the tally not part of the
self-ratification.
Why?
Well, the outcome is defined by a calculation given by the rules. So
if, say, an AI=1 proposal has votes FOR equal to votes AGAINST, then
its outcome is REJECTED. So ratifying outcome means ratifying that
F>A. But what does that mean, exactly? Do we ratify the existence of
one more vote FOR? If so, who cast it? I suspect this causes the
"unique minimal change" criterion to fail and the ratification overall
to fail.
Having ratification possibly have to compute backwards onto
preconditions was a terrible idea. My recent proposal
I don't have any better ideas to fix this than the explicit legal
fiction idea I proposed before, so here is an approach to that:
Proposal: Ratification by Legal Fiction (AI=3)
{{{
For greater certainty, text in square brackets in rule text in this
proposal is comments and is not included in the actual text enacted.
Enact a new Power-3.1 rule entitled Legal Fictions, reading as follows:
{
A fact is either a natural fact or a legal fact. A natural fact is a
fact which is extrinsic to Agoran law, such as whether a message
expresses a particular intent, or whether or not an entity is an
organism. A legal fact is a fact which is intrinsic to Agoran law,
such as the state of a rule-defined value. A legal fiction is a kind
of legal fact which overrides other natural and/or legal facts. Legal
fictions must be established explicitly.
[Mostly per the proto-proto, except moving away from "Questions" and
focusing just on facts, in order to improve clarity and avoid the
other aspects which aren't currently needed.]
A legal fiction must be defined with respect to a specific point in
time, or to a specific period of time, which CANNOT be in, or extend
into, the future beyond its creation. A legal fiction's direct effects
are retroactive to the time so specified, for which it operates
notwithstanding any rule to the contrary. Beyond that time, its
effects are limited to the natural consequences of its direct effects
A legal fiction does not operate retroactively prior to the specified
time, nor does it reason backwards to affect the preconditions for the
state it specifies. Thus, it CAN cause result in a state which would
otherwise be IMPOSSIBLE to have attained under the rules at the time.
Such an impossible state CAN persist beyond the time of effect,
provided that nothing occurs or has occurred since to disturb it. When
a legal fiction specifies that something satisfies or does not satisfy
a definition, the amendment of that definition CAN, but does not
necessarily, amount to a natural consequence which disturbs the legal
fiction's effects. Whether it does or not is interpreted on a case by
case basis in accordance with the usual rules of interpretation.
[I would love to be more clear with the last sentence, but I do not
want to be because either way could have bad effects. If we become too
sensitive to definition changes, then they could cause massive
unwinding of legal fictions. But if we are too strict, then
redefinition of terms could cause previous legal fictions to propagate
in an undesirable manner. And I tried to think of an interpretive
guide based on the actual effect of a legal fiction relative to an
underlying fact, in the manner similar to focusing on the ratio
decendi of a judgment, but that undermines the idea that legal
fictions created by mechanisms like ratification are intended to
eliminate the need to look at the underlying facts.]
For instance, if only players can hold offices, then the establishment
of a legal fiction that a person, who was not a not a player, held an
office at a specific point in time causes em to, as of that particular
point, hold the office notwithstanding the prohibition. It does not,
however, operate to make em a player at any point in time. If no
effect exists which would have changed the officeholder since then,
then e would be presently in that office and remain so until something
does change the officeholder, such as eir resignation. However, if the
rules provide that, when a non-player holds an office, it become
vacant, such a rule would take effect immediately after the specified
point in time and cause the office to become vacant. Even with such a
rule, however, if a legal fiction was established that the person held
the office for a period of time, then e would be the officeholder for
that entire time, and would not constantly oscillate in and out of
office.
[Detailed examples are unusual in Agora, as in law, but I see no
reason not to include one here, and sometimes they serve as the best
interpretive guides.]
Legal
