Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
On Thu, 21 Feb 2019, Kerim Aydin wrote: On Thu, Feb 21, 2019 at 12:57 AM Gaelan Steele wrote: The proposed rule is a prohibition on a certain type of change. Because 106 says “except as prohibited by other rules”, it defers to this rule. Deference clauses only work between rules of the same power. Power is the first test applied (R1030). I think the "Except as prohibited by other rules" is a condition, and _possibly_ also a deference (it depends on exactly what deference means). But because it's a condition rather than just something like "This Rule defers to blah blah blah", it also naturally prevents a conflict from arising, and therefore the fact that it's a deference shouldn't matter. Greetings, Ørjan.
DIS: Re: BUS: (Proposal) Spaceship armour fix
That particular item of the Rule was just amended to change that text, although it still needs a default. Greetings, Ørjan. On Wed, 20 Feb 2019, Timon Walshe-Grey wrote: Amend Rule 2591, "Spaceships", by replacing the following: * Armour (an integer switch limited to values from 0 to 10 inclusive). with: * Armour (an integer switch limited to values from 0 to 10 inclusive, defaulting to 10).
DIS: Re: BUS: Victory by Apathy
On Wed, 20 Feb 2019, James Cook wrote:
5. Rule 2465 says: "Upon doing so, the specified players win the game."
When we talk about "Doing X" for any X, we almost always take X to refer
to the Action ("Declaring apathy") and not the method (without
objection). R2125 supports this in that it separates Action from
Method. Therefore, "Upon doing so" refers to the action but not the
method.
Although the CFJ seems to be judged false for other reasons, I'd like to
mention that I don't agree with this point - "so" naturally refers to the
entire scenario of the previous sentence, including the without objection
part.
Greetings,
Ørjan.
Re: DIS: Relics
On Tue, 19 Feb 2019, Cuddle Beam wrote: Going to use Gluttony instead of Cincinnatus because it's just easier to remember and type off the top of my head and it's more on the theme of cardinal sins and having amassed all that power feels obese. There's also the issue that once you have that kind of omnipotence, if Relics even "matter" anymore. You could just self-assign to yourself all of the Relics you want anyways. Or wins, for that matter. It's weird. But so are scams! So I'll add it anyways for the Fun of it, what is Agora without Fun anyways. The Cincinnatus suggestion was because he was famous not just for getting absolute dictator power (several republican Romans did that, as it was an emergency war custom), but for _giving it up early_ the moment the war was won. I see your current proto does not really mention that aspect, so perhaps Gluttony is a better name for it. Greetings, Ørjan. PROTO: ---*--- - Wrath Relic: When a person performs a regulated action upon another person without their Consent, while they are able to perform a different regulated action that requires that person's Consent to perform the same effect, you earn a Wrath Relic. - Pride: I don't know how Instruments work lmao, I should read it up in order to write this (yes I know Read the Ruleset Week was a while ago, I didn't read the whole ruleset...) - Gluttony: When a single person, without aid of the action of other persons, can change the content of a Power-3 rule, they earn a Gluttony Relic. ---*--- Also, ty G. for the alternative rulemasonry for the first parts of this. I'll go with that. I'll call them Ribbons (not "Ordinary", just plain Ribbons) and Relics and both are Decorations.
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
On Fri, 2019-02-22 at 10:45 -0800, Kerim Aydin wrote: > On Fri, Feb 22, 2019 at 10:22 AM D. Margaux > wrote: > > > On Feb 22, 2019, at 12:39 PM, Kerim Aydin wrote: > > > Every so often, someone decides "we're not really playing Agora > > > anymore" because (in their perception) we improperly papered over > > > some > > > platonic truth that made everything freeze. > > > > That point of view makes me think of the “sovereign citizens” who > > believe that their view of the law is > > somehow platonically right, and that it means they don’t have to > > pay taxes or whatever. > > Never made that connection! Given that, unlike countries, Agora is > an > entirely voluntary organization, my personal worry about Agora is not > a "full ossification that almost everyone agrees happened" nor "1 or > 2 people saying we were playing wrong" but a situation where two > similarly-sized camps disagree with an aspect, and end up trying to > run two entirely separate games (separate reports, etc.) on the same > list while arguing that theirs is the One True Way. This might be an awkward situation, but both camps would see it as undesirable, and thus I suspect there would be an intentional attempt to converge. We've done this before, even with interpretations of the rules that most players rejected (e.g. Wooble's theory that converting registration into a switch deregistered everyone; I think most people disagreed with that theory, but we took steps to converge the gamestate in the case it was correct, IIRC involving a temporary forum that would only be public in the Woobleverse, and performing the convergence actions there). -- ais523
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
> That doesn’t mean pure logic is unimportant; but it does mean that logic “works” only to the extent it can persuade the relevant legal actors. I agree with that entirely. Perspectivism and shit. It's why we have CFJs and stuff, people disagree all the time. On Fri, Feb 22, 2019 at 7:50 PM D. Margaux wrote: > > > > On Feb 22, 2019, at 1:45 PM, Kerim Aydin wrote: > > > > Given that, unlike countries, Agora is an > > entirely voluntary organization, my personal worry about Agora is not > > a "full ossification that almost everyone agrees happened" nor "1 or 2 > > people saying we were playing wrong" but a situation where two > > similarly-sized camps disagree with an aspect, and end up trying to > > run two entirely separate games (separate reports, etc.) on the same > > list while arguing that theirs is the One True Way. > > Wow! This actually sounds kind of fun. It’s like a nomic civil war! > > Not saying that we should actually try to have that happen though...
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
On Fri, Feb 22, 2019 at 10:22 AM D. Margaux wrote:
> > On Feb 22, 2019, at 12:39 PM, Kerim Aydin wrote:
> > Every so often, someone decides "we're not really playing Agora
> > anymore" because (in their perception) we improperly papered over some
> > platonic truth that made everything freeze.
>
> That point of view makes me think of the “sovereign citizens” who believe
> that their view of the law is
> somehow platonically right, and that it means they don’t have to pay taxes or
> whatever.
Never made that connection! Given that, unlike countries, Agora is an
entirely voluntary organization, my personal worry about Agora is not
a "full ossification that almost everyone agrees happened" nor "1 or 2
people saying we were playing wrong" but a situation where two
similarly-sized camps disagree with an aspect, and end up trying to
run two entirely separate games (separate reports, etc.) on the same
list while arguing that theirs is the One True Way. The oldest
existential crisis from Nomic World ("Lindrum World") was a crisis of
this type, and it was only ended when both camps agreed to a method to
converge the gamestate while never agreeing on which was the "true
path" they took to get there, with lots of arguments and rage-quits
along the way.
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
> On Feb 22, 2019, at 1:45 PM, Kerim Aydin wrote: > > Given that, unlike countries, Agora is an > entirely voluntary organization, my personal worry about Agora is not > a "full ossification that almost everyone agrees happened" nor "1 or 2 > people saying we were playing wrong" but a situation where two > similarly-sized camps disagree with an aspect, and end up trying to > run two entirely separate games (separate reports, etc.) on the same > list while arguing that theirs is the One True Way. Wow! This actually sounds kind of fun. It’s like a nomic civil war! Not saying that we should actually try to have that happen though...
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Victory by Apathy
On Fri, Feb 22, 2019 at 7:06 AM Cuddle Beam wrote:
> > I feel like my understanding is a bit lacking, though. R2125 + R2152
> > tell us that attempting to raise a banner by a method outside the
> > rules is "unsuccessful". But it feels a bit similar to the rules
> > claiming that I don't exist, or that faster-than-light travel is
> > possible, or that ducks can't fly. When R2438 says "This causes that
> > person to win the game.", what tells us us that "This" refers "Raising
> > a Banner in a way the rules deem to be successful", rather than just
> > "raising a banner" in a literal sense? Is it because Raising a Banner
> > is capitalized and/or a term of art? Is it because it's game custom to
> > interpret the rules this way? Or is there another reason?
There's a game custom to accept "terms of art" in general in the name
of adding color, mainly by associating them with a method ("by
announcement" etc.). However, the line of what constitutes a term of
art is blurry, practical, and case-by-case. Here's two CFJs that
directly contrast treatment of a speech act ("to celebrate") with an
impossible act ("landing on the moon"), noting that neither was
defined in the ruleset at the time:
https://faculty.washington.edu/kerim/nomic/cases/?2149
https://faculty.washington.edu/kerim/nomic/cases/?2150
These two judgements distinguish speech acts as being treated
differently than other types of terms-of-art. The recent cases are
all terms of art involving speech ("declare", "state") etc. that can
be done by common definition just by sending an email, so there could
be genuine confusion about whether an email "declaring" something
works. In contrast, we've tended to say that things that were clearly
"outside" of sending emails (raising banners, etc.) are clearly
regulated terms-of-art, though I'm not saying there's any hard logic
there.
It's interesting to note, in this context, that "supporting" and
"objecting" in R2124 are not a term of arts, nor are withdrawing
support/objections - they refer to the natural speech acts. R2124
says that "if someone has (previously) publicly objected, they are an
objector". But nothing says "a person CAN object by announcement",
instead we assume that a person can object and withdraw objections
"naturally" as acts of speech (or if you prefer, as acts of standard
legislative function used in committee meetings etc.) via an email
(with the limit that the speech must be "public" to count).
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
> On Feb 22, 2019, at 12:39 PM, Kerim Aydin wrote: > > Every so often, someone decides "we're not really playing Agora > anymore" because (in their perception) we improperly papered over some > platonic truth that made everything freeze. That point of view makes me think of the “sovereign citizens” who believe that their view of the law is somehow platonically right, and that it means they don’t have to pay taxes or whatever. It’s based on a fundamental misunderstanding of what law means; it’s a fundamentally social institution, and so the law really /is/ what the relevant legal actors believe it to be. That doesn’t mean pure logic is unimportant; but it does mean that logic “works” only to the extent it can persuade the relevant legal actors. Seems similar to nomic in that respect. The actual game “rules” are, in a sense, what the players believe them to be, using whatever interpretive tools are more or less convincing to them, within a certain overall structure of decisionmaking (e.g. proposals, CFJs, etc.).
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
On Fri, Feb 22, 2019 at 6:34 AM Cuddle Beam wrote: > >> (It's instructive to note what happened to B Nomic; it was also rather > >> long-running in terms of gameplay, but when the players noticed that it > >> had been ossified for years, it just died altogether; there were never > >> enough players interested in a revival.) It wasn't just that there "weren't enough players" interested. Nomic can be played with a very small number of players. Part of it was, on the few occasions that someone tried to re-start, there was direct vocal opposition from persons on the mailing list, saying "B-nomic is frozen in amber, we like it that way, regardless of whether you call it a reboot or continuation, don't try to restart play on this mailing list." So there's an active defense of its frozen state being played out via control of the medium (at least there was a couple years ago).
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
On Fri, Feb 22, 2019 at 6:31 AM Cuddle Beam wrote: > IMO the game has already been “ossified” for a while (or > miscalculated/unacknowledged by the consensus so far) because I’m convinced > that all actions are regulated. Every so often, someone decides "we're not really playing Agora anymore" because (in their perception) we improperly papered over some platonic truth that made everything freeze. At least one instance of this sentiment that I remember (from Kelly for old-timers, though I forget the details) predates the ossification and the current Regulated Action rules, so that ossification rule was never created in One True Original Agora (tm) anyway. :P
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Victory by Apathy
The rules don’t have to be consistent with reality. Or itself lol. Because we can write pretty much anything to Agora’s ruletext. As fun as it would be to try to nuke Agora with the Principle of Explosion, I doubt it would actually work. We even have paradoxes in the game that somehow don’t obliterate the entire formal space. Or, it does. But people just shrug and carry on lol. On Fri, 22 Feb 2019 at 03:34, James Cook wrote: > Hm, that's a good point about capitalization. I'm not really familiar > enough with game custom to say. > > Your idea about raising a real-life banner has got me thinking... > > Raising a banner is a regulated action (R2125), so even if we assume > capitalization doesn't matter, and that you did raise a banner in real > life, Rule 2125 would say that you didn't raise a banner, because you > didn't do it using "the methods explicitly specified in the Rules". > > I feel like my understanding is a bit lacking, though. R2125 + R2152 > tell us that attempting to raise a banner by a method outside the > rules is "unsuccessful". But it feels a bit similar to the rules > claiming that I don't exist, or that faster-than-light travel is > possible, or that ducks can't fly. When R2438 says "This causes that > person to win the game.", what tells us us that "This" refers "Raising > a Banner in a way the rules deem to be successful", rather than just > "raising a banner" in a literal sense? Is it because Raising a Banner > is capitalized and/or a term of art? Is it because it's game custom to > interpret the rules this way? Or is there another reason? > > On Wed, 20 Feb 2019 at 07:32, Cuddle Beam wrote: > > > > On a side-note, if capitalization no longer denotes terms of art and > should > > be interpreted literally, I got to go look for a real-life banner to > raise > > some time in the future... > > > > On Wed, 20 Feb 2019 at 08:20, Cuddle Beam wrote: > ... > > > I argue that Agora is written in an Agora-dialect English. And in that, > > > capitalization does denote terms of art. >
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
the border of what regulated actions are, are its limit* On Fri, 22 Feb 2019 at 15:31, Cuddle Beam wrote: > IMO the game has already been “ossified” for a while (or > miscalculated/unacknowledged by the consensus so far) because I’m convinced > that all actions are regulated. > > (by ad absurdiam: > > Regulated actions are actions that are limited by the rules. > > Unregulated actions are all actions that aren’t regulated. > > If we have unregulated actions, the border of what regulated actions are > its limit, ergo unregulated actions are limited by something rule-defined > and therefore limited by the rules. So they’d have to be regulated. It cant > be both regulated and unregulated.) > > But, yeah. Even if I’m right (which I believe I am, but I might not be), > the game is more of a social activity rather than real software. For > example, the frequent “oh shiiit” moments where we have to do retroactive > changes and fix the ruleset to what we believed it was. > > As a mental experiment, assuming that we “just accept” the consensus’ > interpretation as Agora’s true reality, a solution to ensure Agora’s > longevity could be to add not very sane players that believe that, no > matter what the Ruleset’s text is, Agora can’t be Ossified. :P > > On Fri, 22 Feb 2019 at 11:29, ais...@alumni.bham.ac.uk < > ais...@alumni.bham.ac.uk> wrote: > >> On Fri, 2019-02-22 at 10:24 +, Timon Walshe-Grey wrote: >> > To be honest I never really understood the problem with ossification >> > - surely if the game accidentally ends we can just start a "new one" >> > with a similar ruleset and gamestate, minimally modified to deossify >> > it? >> >> Many players care about Agora having been a continuous game that's been >> running for a really long length of time. Letting it die and restarting >> it would violate that. >> >> (It's instructive to note what happened to B Nomic; it was also rather >> long-running in terms of gameplay, but when the players noticed that it >> had been ossified for years, it just died altogether; there were never >> enough players interested in a revival.) >> >> -- >> ais523 >> >>
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
IMO the game has already been “ossified” for a while (or miscalculated/unacknowledged by the consensus so far) because I’m convinced that all actions are regulated. (by ad absurdiam: Regulated actions are actions that are limited by the rules. Unregulated actions are all actions that aren’t regulated. If we have unregulated actions, the border of what regulated actions are its limit, ergo unregulated actions are limited by something rule-defined and therefore limited by the rules. So they’d have to be regulated. It cant be both regulated and unregulated.) But, yeah. Even if I’m right (which I believe I am, but I might not be), the game is more of a social activity rather than real software. For example, the frequent “oh shiiit” moments where we have to do retroactive changes and fix the ruleset to what we believed it was. As a mental experiment, assuming that we “just accept” the consensus’ interpretation as Agora’s true reality, a solution to ensure Agora’s longevity could be to add not very sane players that believe that, no matter what the Ruleset’s text is, Agora can’t be Ossified. :P On Fri, 22 Feb 2019 at 11:29, ais...@alumni.bham.ac.uk < ais...@alumni.bham.ac.uk> wrote: > On Fri, 2019-02-22 at 10:24 +, Timon Walshe-Grey wrote: > > To be honest I never really understood the problem with ossification > > - surely if the game accidentally ends we can just start a "new one" > > with a similar ruleset and gamestate, minimally modified to deossify > > it? > > Many players care about Agora having been a continuous game that's been > running for a really long length of time. Letting it die and restarting > it would violate that. > > (It's instructive to note what happened to B Nomic; it was also rather > long-running in terms of gameplay, but when the players noticed that it > had been ossified for years, it just died altogether; there were never > enough players interested in a revival.) > > -- > ais523 > >
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
On Fri, 2019-02-22 at 10:24 +, Timon Walshe-Grey wrote: > To be honest I never really understood the problem with ossification > - surely if the game accidentally ends we can just start a "new one" > with a similar ruleset and gamestate, minimally modified to deossify > it? Many players care about Agora having been a continuous game that's been running for a really long length of time. Letting it die and restarting it would violate that. (It's instructive to note what happened to B Nomic; it was also rather long-running in terms of gameplay, but when the players noticed that it had been ossified for years, it just died altogether; there were never enough players interested in a revival.) -- ais523
Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
To be honest I never really understood the problem with ossification - surely
if the game accidentally ends we can just start a "new one" with a similar
ruleset and gamestate, minimally modified to deossify it?
-twg
‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐
On Thursday, February 21, 2019 8:56 AM, Gaelan Steele wrote:
> Maybe you’re right. Either way, you could do any number of
> not-quite-ossification things (for instance, proposals authored by anyone
> other than you can only amend if the author published the full text of the
> proposal 3.5+ weeks ago).
>
> Gaelan
>
> > On Feb 21, 2019, at 12:52 AM, Madeline j...@iinet.net.au wrote:
> > Wouldn't it just be ossified because arbitrary rule changes cannot be made?
> > The "and/or" does function as an or!
> > On 2019-02-21 19:37, Gaelan Steele wrote:
> >
> > > I create the AI-1 proposal “Minor bug fix” with the following text:
> > > {
> > > Create the power-1 rule “Don’t mind me” with the following text:
> > > {The rules CANNOT change by any mechanism.}
> > > }
> > > Why that works (at power 1):
> > > 106/40: "Except as prohibited by other rules, a proposal that takes
> > > effect CAN and does, as part of its effect, apply the changes that it
> > > specifies"
> > > 106/40: "Preventing a proposal from taking effect is a secured change;
> > > this does not apply to generally preventing changes to specified areas of
> > > the gamestate”
> > > The proposed rule is a prohibition on a certain type of change. Because
> > > 106 says “except as prohibited by other rules”, it defers to this rule.
> > > The second quoted clause fails to prevent this, because the rule
> > > "generally [prevents] changes to specified areas of the gamestate.”
> > > 1698/5 "Agora is ossified if it is IMPOSSIBLE for any reasonable
> > > combination of actions by players to cause arbitrary rule changes to be
> > > made and/or arbitrary proposals to be adopted within a four-week period.”
> > > Note the “and/or.” Nothing here prevents arbitrary proposals from being
> > > adopted—it just prevents them from changing the rules upon doing so.
> > > Therefore, Agora isn’t ossified.
> > > I retract the above proposal.
> > > Gaelan
> > >
> > > > On Feb 21, 2019, at 12:21 AM, Timon Walshe-Grey m...@timon.red wrote:
> > > > Yes, the "gamestate" includes the rules, and I initially assumed the
> > > > same thing as you. But ais523 pointed out a few days ago that rule
> > > > 105/19 says
> > > >
> > > > A rule change is wholly prevented from taking effect unless its
> > > > full text was published, along with an unambiguous and clear
> > > > specification of the method to be used for changing the rule, at
> > > > least 4 days and no more than 60 days before it would otherwise
> > > > take effect.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > which overrides the passage in rule 106/40 that says
> > > >
> > > >Except as prohibited by other rules, a proposal that
> > > > takes effect CAN and does, as part of its effect, apply the
> > > > changes that it specifies.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > -twg
> > > > ‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐
> > > > On Thursday, February 21, 2019 2:47 AM, James Cook
> > > > jc...@cs.berkeley.edu wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > > I'd prefer to just repeat the cleanings. Mass changes to the ruleset
> > > > > > are one of the riskiest things you can do in Agora (which is why
> > > > > > there
> > > > > > are so many protections preventing them being done by accident).
> > > > > > My proposal says "The gamestate is changed...". I assumed that
> > > > > > includes the rules, making re-cleaning unnecessary. Is there
> > > > > > precedent
> > > > > > for what "gamestate" means?
DIS: Re: BUS: Not so fast!
On Friday, February 22, 2019 4:08 AM, James Cook wrote: > Adoption Index: 3.05 Don't think anyone's spotted this yet, but AI can only be a multiple of 0.1. If I recall correctly, invalid values default to 1.0, which wouldn't work here. (Or even worse, might work _only in part_.) -twg
