On Mon, Jan 12, 2009 at 4:07 AM, Alex Smith <ais...@bham.ac.uk> wrote: > It's pretty rare for them to actually work; even the Gnarly Contract > (the only recent one I can remember working) needed two tries. Also, can > we please fix that loophole, now? (I submitted a proposal to fix it, but > IIRC it was voted down.)
With respect to the Gnarly Contract, Goethe did relatively recently post the interesting interpretation that a contract, as a primordial sort of thing external to the Rules, must communicate its state to them, for which the usual standards for clear communication apply. Under this interpretation, which I think probably makes more sense than any of those brought up in the Gnarly case, the scam should have failed as the contract did not clearly communicate pledginess-- therefore, no matter what it said, it could not be a pledge. (Of course, it's too late to appeal the CFJ now.)