Call For Judgement Archive (641-655)


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Call for Judgement 641 - August 4, 1998
Subject: True Names
Initiator: K 2 (Sent 4 Aug 1998, 14:32 Acka time)
1st Judge: Niccolo Flychuck (Selected 06 Aug 1998, 18:25 Acka time)(deadbeat)
2nd Judge: J. M. Bear (selected 15 Aug 1998, 03:52 Acka) (deadbeat)
3rd Judge: Memo (selected 22 Aug 1998, 04:35 Acka) (deadbeat)
4th Judge: rufus (selected 29 Aug 1998, 18:58 Acka)
Judgement: FALSE (promulgated 4 Sep 1998, 05:16 Acka)
Appellant: K 2 (at 8 Sep 1998, 03:07 Acka)
Cortex: /dev/cortex (/dev/joe and Mr. Tambourine Man) (8 Sep 1998 15:27 Acka)
Judgement: TRUE

Statement:

No player of Ackanomic has ever had an Ackanomic name (as distinct from a real name) of Tom Walmsley.

Reasoning:

When the entity then known as a-collection-of-numbers-that-I-can-never-remember-which-relate-in-some-manne r-to-the-string-"Jenny" attempted to change eir name the registrar (JT - an altogether easier name to remember) objected on the grounds of "Malenkai's Loophole". As a result the change did not occur.

Judge's Reasoning:

False. JT lacked the power to deny the change.

Appellant's Reasoning (K 2):

Rule 251 stated in part: " In addition, if the name change has not yet been accepted as described in the following paragraph, the Registrar may object to the name change if e feels that the new name is either a) too close to an existing player name(i.e. differs by only one or two characters), or b) is intended only to exploit Malenkai's Loophole(see Rule 721).
If the Registrar acknowledges a legal name change, or after three days have passed if the Registrar neither acknowledges the change nor objects to it(and the new name complies with all applicable rules), then the name change is accepted and occurs, at which time the player in question shall pay the Standard Harfer Fee. "
In accordance with this:
On 26 Jul 1998 14:52:45 JT stated:
As I warned Mr. Tambourine Man that I would, I object to this name change on the grounds that I believe it is designed to exploit the lexical equivalence between the attempted Ackanomic Name and the Real Life Name of another player, thus potentially opening up an abuse of Malenkai's Loophole.
and later:
On 26 Jul 1998 15:19:45 JT stated:
And similarly to how/why I rejected Mr. Tambourine Man's name change, I reject this name change.
These messages on JT's part clearly indicate a belief (feeling) that the name change is/was an attempt to exploit Malenkai's Loophole. Since the first of the quoted paragraphs permits the Registrar (JT) to object on these grounds, the second quoted paragraph takes effect and denies the name change. Thus 867-5309 failed to change eir name to Tom Walmsley.

Cortex's Reasoning:

We at /dev/cortex agree with the appealer. Specifically we questioned JT about his objections on IRC and although we have no proof that e is telling the truth we have no option but to take what e says as true. Here is the relevant extract cut and pasted from IRC:
[MTM] JT, when you objected to my name change to Eric Plumb and 867-5309's to Tom Walmsley were you doing it (in all honesty here) because you believed that it was intended only to exploit Malenkai's loophole.
<JT> Yes, I was MTM.
<JT> I was concerned that it could in fact cause some things to get screwed up.
<JT> because there might have been places that referred to Tom Walmsley that were important in some acka document.
<JT> where it would be possible for confusion to the arise.
[MTM] Okay then, thank you. And you're sure that when you objected to it you believed that this was the *only* reason for the change?
<JT> I believed that causing confusion was in fact the only reason for the change, yes.
[MTM] Okay. That should allow Joe and I to reach a judgement. Thank you.
<JT> since the only way that confusion could arise would be an exploitation of Malenkai's loophole, yes, I believed an exploitation of Malenkai's loophole to be the only reason for the change.
* JT grins.
* JT swears to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, unless you ask me about sexual affairs with Whitehouse interns :)
* MTM bursts out laughing.
[MTM] And you are aware JT, that Malenkai's loophole is defined thusly:
[MTM] II. Malenkai's Loophole
[MTM]
[MTM] Exploiting lexical equivalence to alter, or attempt to alter, the interpretation of a word or phrase in any Ackanomic document,
[MTM] [in the judgement of a judge], is Annoying.
<JT> Yes.
<JT> I believed you were attempting to alter or attempt tto alter the interpretation of the phrase containing you real life name
<JT> in an effort to be annoying and confusing :)


Call for Judgement 642 - August 13, 1998
Subject: Rule Existence
Initiator: Slakko (Sent 13 Aug 1998, 13:02 Acka time)
1st Judge: Studge (chosen Aug 13, 1998 13:02 Acka) (deadbeat)
2nd Judge: Vynd (chosen Aug 21, 1998 04:17 Acka)
Judgement: TRUE

Statement:

There is no Rule 1319.

CFJ Reasoning:

On the 13th of July, K 2 achieved a Winning Condition by a method described in what was, at the time Rule 1319.2. The achievement of that Winning Condition caused some other effects to occur, as follows:
"However, upon eir return, e shall achieve a Winning Condition. At this time all the entities donated to the CEIS shall be destroyed, except for the spacecraft which shall be Decommissioned. This Rule, as well as Rules 1319, 1319.1 and 1320 [the RERS, FEPS and End of the World rules], shall be repealed then, and all occurrences of the word "flat" in Rules 1307 and 1309 shall be replaced by "cubical", all occurrences of the text "the topside of the earth" in Rule 1309 shall be replaced by "the other faces of the earth", and all occurrences of the text "the underside of the Earth" in Rule 1311 shall be replaced by "the face of the Earth which includes Ackanomia". "
Since this time, no Proposal creating a rule numbered 1319, or renumbering a rule to 1319 has passed. Hence there is no Rule 1319.

Judge's Reasoning:

I concur with the initiator on all counts. Rule 1319.2 was indeed triggered, and the events described therein occured. It is possible (I don't know one way or another) that the Rule Harfer or Web Harfer made some sort of error by maintaining a copy of Rule 1319 as if it had not been repealed. Even if this was the case, the error in no way altered the fact that Rule 1319 was in fact, repealed. Rule 701 specifically exempts "events which occur automatically" from its so-called pragmatism clause, and there is substantial game custom to support the claim that the repeal of Rule 1319 was "automatic." I judge this CFJ to be TRUE.


Call for Judgement 643 - August 17, 1998
Subject: Expiration of Voting Period
Initiator: Publius (sent Aug 17, 1998, 16:26 Acka)
Judge: Vynd (selected Aug 17, 1998, 17:06 Acka)
Judgement: INVALID

Statement:

The proposals for which voting expired during the period that the Muppetlabs harddrive was down have not been legally accepted or rejected, since players did not have seven full days during which votes were being accepted -- or, if they did, it was not clear from messages posted as a public action by breadbox that this was so.

Reasoning:

I was not aware that votes were being accepted during the weekend. It was my understanding that the harddrive was down, and that the only way to communicate was by sending email to all players individually. I believe that the unusually large number of abstentions on the proposals in question show that I was not the only one who thought this to be true. No alternative means of voting was made known to the players during this period. In some cases, had one abstention been converted to "aye" or "nay", the outcome would have been different.
Note: This CFJ is made without any intention of hostility towards anyone. I simply believe the matter was overlooked.

Judge's Reasoning:

I judge this CFJ INVALID, as its "statement" includes what I consider to be two distinctly different statements. As is customary, however, I'll include my thoughts on the intent of this CFJ here.
I do not believe that the results for any proposals which came due while the muppetlabs hard drive was down are incorrect. As has been discussed at some length in the public forum, it was possible to vote on these proposals during the entire time that muppetlabs was down. Indeed, even if the entire internet were burn to the ground, we would still have exactly the same amount of time in which to vote on any pending proposals. Since voting is not a public action, it can be conducted through any means a player sees fit, including telephone calls, conventional mail, candygram, the list goes on. While in practice it would be highly impractical to vote this way, the Tabulator is required to accept anything submitted to him as a vote, assuming he can figure out what it is. So if this was the only statement I had been called upon to judge, I would have rendered a verdict of false.
Now, was the fact that it was still possible to vote while muppetlabs was down clearly expressed in the public forum? I would have to say that no, it was not. Mind you, I'm not going to slog through the email archives on this, I'm rendering an INVALID judgement, after all, but I can recall no general anouncement to this effect, and clearly some players were confused. I'm not surprised myself. This is something that I have always felt was confusing to newer players, and when I am a mentor I go to great pains to make it clear that anything sent to the tabulator that can be recognized as a vote will be accepted as such. Under the circumstances, however, I don't think anyone can fault breadbox for not explaining things to everyone. He was busy trying to correct the problem. If this was the only statement I had been asked to judge, I would render a verdict of true. But it wasn't the only statement, and everyone should be clear that whether breadbox communicated the situation clearly or not has no effect on whether or not the proposals in question were correctly tabulated.


Call for Judgement 644 - August 22, 1998
Subject: Happy Number Timing
Initiator: Alfvaen (sent Sat, 22 Aug 1998, 00:04 Acka)
Judge: 867-5309 (selected 22 Aug 1998, 04:21 Acka)
Verdict: TRUE

Statement:

The Happy Number is 105.

Alfvaen's Reasoning:

My score was 101 when I posted "Happy! Happy! Happy!", because my attempt at converting Swingpoints to points was thwarted by a change in the Rules.
Rule 1131, "Happiness", states:
If any time it is publically knowable that a player has a score exactly equal to the Happy Number, that player may point this fact out by publically stating: "Happy! Happy! Happy!". E then gains a probabilistic Boon of the Ancients and the Happy Number becomes a random integer between -60 and the Magic Number.
When my score was not 105, then it was not publicly knowable that my score was exactly to the Happy Number(which was 105 at the time). Thus, I was unable to "point that fact out" at the time.
This would mean that I didn't get that valuable Automatic Sculpture, either.

Judge's Reasoning:

[none]


Call for Judgement 645 - August 24, 1998
Subject: Existence of Eleusis Game
Initiator: JT (sent 24 Aug 1998 11:53 Acka)
Judge: Slakko (chosen 24 Aug 1998 14:51 Acka)
Judgement: FALSE

Statement:

Eleusis Game 1 still exists with a 'bot' playing for 867-5309.

Reasoning:

When 867-5309 left the sub-game known as Eleusis Game 1, I attempted to replace him with a bot in order to keep the game moving/going.

I believe this worked since the rules for Eleusis do not specify what happens when a player leaves the game, and therefore by rule 101, I am in fact allowed to replace em with a bot that makes the default actions.

Slakko questioned whether or not the game still existed since it now has less than the 4 real players, and I concede that this might be a problem even if I did succeed in replacing 867-5309 with a bot. I believe it might for the following reasons.

Given the statement 'If a limit is specified as an expression, it shall be evaluated when the Game is instantiated, and shall not "float" while the Game is in progress, unless the Game's rules specify otherwise.' there is at least some basis that the 'number of players' in a game is only looked at for starting a game, not for determining if it continues once it's underway.

At no point in the rules does it imply that a game which arrives at less than the minimum number of players during the course of the game becomes a non-game at that point.

Judge's Reasoning:

This CFJ was sent after Proposal 3439's acceptance was notified (or so the timestamps indicate on comparison - as I received the CFJ notice at least six minutes later than the Proposal notice). Hence Eleusis Game 1 exists, and 867-5309 is, once again, a player. Hence there is no bot playing eir moves for em, e is merely making the default actions. The rule mentions no bot.

Sorry JT, but you were too slow. The statement is FALSE.


Call for Judgement 646 - August 24, 1998
Subject: Location of the Chartreuse Goose
Initiator: Tom Walmsley (sent 24 August 1998 16:22 Acka)
Judge: JT (selected 24 August 1998 17:06 Acka)
Judgement: FALSE

Statement:

The Chartreuse Goose is Somewhere Else.

Initiator's Reasoning:

Essentially I'm not sure where it is. The recent events that could have caused it to be transferred are (I think):
MTM having a PWCFJ ruled FALSE by Vynd.
Rex Mundi got the ancient one result on the Ackanomicon.
/dev/joe had a CWCFJ ruled FALSE
/dev/joe's CFJ was overturned to TRUE.
Where the Goose is therefore depends on which of the first three events happened most recently. I don't know which one it was and I leave that up to the judge to research. The reason I am calling this is that last time I looked Alfvaen and K 2 were disagreeing as to who had the Goose, and we probably ought to make certain.

Judge's Reasoning:

Looking through the archives, provides the following information. On Tue, 14 Jul 1998 02:41:40 -0400 (EDT), Alfvaen returned the judgement of FALSE on CFJ 630, giving the Chartreuse Goose to /dev/joe. On Fri, 17 Jul 1998 19:43:47 -0400 (EDT), Rex Mundi read from the Ackanomicon and read the page 'Ancient One' which gave him the Goose.
According to rule 620, the second condition upon which the goose would be transferred Somewhere Else reads as:
>2) Upon a verdict on a Winning Condition CFJ being overturned to TRUE,
>   the Goose goes Somewhere Else, if and only if the player possessing it
>   was the initiator of the CFJ in question. If this judgement is not
>   overruled, then the player who called for judgement is declared the
>   winner of the cycle; the win occurring at the time it becomes illegal
>   to appeal the CFJ under the current rules. 
Since Rex Mundi (and not /dev/joe) possessed the Goose at the time CFJ 630 was overturned, the Goose remains in eir possession and thus is not transferred Somewhere Else.


Call for Judgement 647 - August 25, 1998
Subject: Debunk and Repeal Equivalence
Initiator: Alfvaen (sent 25 Aug 1998 20:04 Acka)
Judge: rufus (selected 26 Aug 1998 17:57 Acka)
Judgement: FALSE

Statement:

There is no Rule 594.6.
Alfvaen's Reasoning:
Proposal 3443, which was accepted, said:
"DEBUNK The blueprint for the Gravitational Monopole (Rule 594.6)".
The Rule-Harfer's claim was that, since the Rules only allowed Discoveries to be Debunked, this was a Null Proposal.
I refer to the precedent of CFJ 383, which settled the issue of whether or not part of a Rule may be repealed. I feel that the same reasoning can be used to support the Debunking of Blueprints.
It was not at all ambiguous what the author of the Proposal meant to happen if it passed. Perhaps with reference to a non-Blueprint Rule, it would have been meaningless, but I don't believe this is the case.

Judge's Reasoning:

While it may bve clear what the proposal intended to do, it did not have that effect. The Rules clearly give two things that may be debunked: Discoveries and Church Organizational Actions. Rule 594.6 is neither a Discovery nor a church Organizational Action. Therefore debunking it has no effect on its status as a rule. As for CFJ 383, Rule 104 still says "If the proposal consisted of a list of one-time effects, such as changes to the rules, then those effects shall be applied, one at a time, in the order in which they appear in the proposal. (Ambiguous, retroactive, and/or meaningless effects are ignored.) " Proposal 3443 is a one-time effect, yes, but it is a meaningless one time effect, since the rules don't tell us how to debunk blueprints, and do tell us how to do debunk other things


Call for Judgement 648 - August 27, 1998
Subject: Validity of Exiting Gaol once Released
Initiator: JT (sent Aug 27, 1998 15:00 Acka)
Judge (Thread T): K 2 (selected Aug 27, 1998 15:13 Acka)
Judge (Thread F): Rig R. Mortis (selected Aug 27, 1998 15:13 Acka)
Retracted by JT at Fri, 28 Aug 1998 03:59:40 -0400.

Statement:

JT's location is current JT's house.

Reasoning:

After my sentance (given by the rafting trip) expired, I was released from Gaol as per rule 709. According to rule 709, this would be an application of a rule which defined a condition for me to be released. Therefore, I was free to leave the Gaol when I posted the public message stating that I was going to my home.


Call for Judgement 649 - August 27, 1998
Subject: Presence of K 2 in Gaol
Initiator: rufus (sent 27 Aug, 1998 16:34 Acka)
1st Judge: Robin Hood (chosen 27 Aug, 1998 18:36 Acka)
2nd Judge: Joe Java (chosen 28 Aug, 1998 02:45 Acka)
Judgement: FALSE

Statement:

k 2 is ineligble to judge CFJ 648.

Initiator's Reasoning:

He is in jail, regardless of CFJ 648.

Judge's Reasoning:

Judgement of CFJ 648 stands.


Call For Judgement 650 - August 29, 1998
Subject: Negative Ackadollar Cycle Win CFJ
Initiator: JT (sent August 29, 1998 16:09 Acka)
Judge: two-star
Retracted by JT at Sat, 29 Aug 1998 21:16:56 -0400

Statement:

JT has achieved a winning condition during the current cycle.

Reasoning:

With the donation of 'Big Wad of Cash' to the Museum on Sat, 29 Aug 1998 15:59:40 Acka, JT's benefactor value exceeded A$5000.
I will note that the judge of this CFJ does in fact need to determine if I was in fact able to gift negative amounts of A$ to various On-Ice players.
The fact that they were On-Ice doesn't make them ineligible to recieve gifts, so if I was able to gift a negative amount of A$, then I was able to achieve this.
When something is gifted, it is removed from one player and given to another, so once again, if negative A$ can be gifted, then I subtracted the negative amount from my amount of A$, and added it to the recipient of the gift.
So the only question is whether negative A$ are legal to gift.
The fact that trinkets most specifically specify that they have a positive value in A$, as well the fact that players can have negative amounts of A$, certainly bodes well for arguing that a negative amount of A$ can be given.
The rules on trades and gifts only specify that the player must own the quantity to be given. Since I own A$, and I own a larger number of A$ than I attempted to give, this should succeed.


Call for Judgement 651 - August 31, 1998
Subject: Debunking and One-Time Changes
Initiator: Mr. Tambourine Man (sent 31 Aug, 1998 07:53 Acka)
Judge: Weishaupt (selected 31 Aug, 1998 11:37 Acka)
Judgement: FALSE

Statement:

Proposal 3471 created a new rule.

 Initiator's Reasoning:

P3471 did not contain a list of one-time changes to the rules and hence should have been adopted as a new rule.

breadbox's Bronze Torch Reasoning:

This, I believe, is definitely untrue. Proposal 3471 indeed contained a list of a single one-time change to the game state. The fact that that change was meaningless does not change this. Consider the relevant text of Rule 104:
If the proposal consisted of a list of one-time effects, such as changes to the rules, then those effects shall be applied, one at a time, in the order in which they appear in the proposal. (Ambiguous, retroactive, and/or meaningless effects are ignored.)
The parenthetical clause makes it clear that a meaningless effect is still treated as an effect, for the purposes of this rule.

Judge's Reasoning:

My reasoning is stated more succinctly than I could state it by breadbox.


Call for Judgement 652 - August 31, 1998
Subject: Furniture and One Time Effects
Initiator: Mr. Tambourine Man (sent 31 Aug, 1998 08:01 Acka)
Judge: Robin Hood (selected 31 Aug, 1998 08:30 Acka)
Judgement: FALSE

Statement:

Proposal 3470 created a new rule as part of the miscellaneous rulesuite upon it's acceptance.

Initiator's Reasoning:

Rule 104 states:
"If a proposal is accepted, one of two things happen. If the proposal consisted of a list of one-time effects, such as changes to the rules, then those effects shall be applied, one at a time, in the order in which they appear in the proposal. (Ambiguous, retroactive, and/or meaningless effects are ignored.)
Otherwise, the proposal itself changes from a proposal to a rule. [It is assigned a title and number as described in Rules 301 and 303.] "
P3470 consisted of a list of one-time effects *plus* the following:
> This Aardvark is a Modest Proposal.
>
> {{[It seems odd that rule defined trinket creation would not trigger
> Treasury Bankruptcy Proceedings - as unlikely as those are anyway
:)]}}
I would therefore argue that it did not consist of a list of one-time effects. Therefore it shhould have been adopted as a rule.

breadbox's Bronze Torch Reasoning:

This situation is admittedly less clear-cut than CFJ 651.
Aside from the prefatory text quoted in the initiator's reasoning, Proposal 3470 clearly contains a list of three one-time effects. The troublesome text is, then, a single sentence (the rest of the preface being notes).
The initiator is arguing, in effect, that this sentence cannot (or at least should not) be interpreted as a one-time effect to the game state. I believe that it can, though as a meaningless and/or ambiguous effect.
One-time effects are worded in either the declarative mood ("Rule 505 is amended ...") or the imperative mood ("Amend Rule 505 ..."). The first sentence of this proposal is declarative, and the remainder is worded in the imperative. So, "This Aardvark is a Modest Proposal" can be interpreted as "make this Aardvark a Modest Proposal" or "change this Aardvark into a Modest Proposal". Read this way, the sentence is obviously a one-time effect.
So, the real question is: should the sentence be interpreted this way?
Now, text in the rules is frequently declarative; however, it is quite rare for the rules to contain imperative sentences, except when prefixed with a conditional. The three imperative sentences that constitute the bulk of this proposal, thus, strongly argue against treating this proposal as the text of a new rule.
And it must be pointed out that most proposals that actually do contain the text of a new rule can be interpreted as actually being a list of one-time effects without too much perversity on the part of the reader. At times I wish that proposals were required to follow a very rigid format that avoided such ambiguities, but that's not the game we play. In reality most proposals contain imprecise directions - ambiguous (or missing) delimiters, vague specifications of the rule text to be affected, etcetera. Our proposals never have been treated mechanically. And they probably never will, because, truth be told, most of these imprecise directions are actually completely clear to an intelligent reader (as opposed to, say, a computer program).
And, in my time as Rule-Harfer I have yet to see a proposal (or at least not one that was accepted) that wasn't pretty obvious upon reading which of the two types it belonged to.
Finally, I would point out there is strong game custom in favor of treating Proposal 3470 as a list of effects. There have been many proposals in the past that have contained a list of effects prefaced with "near-miss" furniture (e.g., "This is not a Modest Proposal", "This is a Modest Idea", etc etc). None of these proposals were ever treated as the text of a new rule.

Judge's Reasoning

(none)


Call for Judgement 653 - September 2, 1998
Subject: Holder of Historian's Office
Initiator: Mr. Tambourine Man (sent 2 Sep 1998, 17:24 Acka)
Judge: two-star
Retracted by Mr. Tambourine Man. (It had become clear that breadbox was in fact Historian).

Statement:

breadbox is Historian.

Initiator's Reasoning:

I don't know. K 2 (I think) said the office was absent. Slakko says it isn't. If either of them (or breadbox) has any additional information then I owuld hope they would make it public to help whoever is selected here. Whichever way it goes we really should know.


Call for Judgement 654 - September 4, 1998
Subject: Existence of Current Government
Initiator: breadbox (sent Sep 4 1998, 12:02 Acka)
1st Judge: 404 Not Found (selected Sep 4 1998, 12:26 Acka) (deadbeat)
2nd Judge: Eris (selected Sep 11 1998, 19:03 Acka)
Judgement: TRUE

Statement:

There is at this time no Current Government of Ackanomia.

Reasoning:

The "Current Government of Ackanomia" is regulated by Rule 320, newly created by Proposal 3495.
Now, Rule 320 states (among other things):
If no Government Type is Active then the Government Type Anarchy (if it exists) becomes Active.
and the final effect of Proposal 3495 was:
{{The Current Government of Ackanomia is set to Democracy.}}
Okay so far. However, Rule 320 has this to say about the existence of Government Types:
All existing Government Types are defined by rules within this rule suite, and then only by rules with a name "Government Type: " where is replaced by a legal Ackanomic name. The name of the Government Type as specified in that rule shall then be. Such rules, and only such rules, are known as Governmental Rules.
Now, I'm still not 100% sure what effect the above has, but I'm fairly certain that, no matter what, there is currently no Government Type of either Democracy or Anarchy. Even if you believe that any of the rules in the Governments Rule Suite fulfill the above requirements, the Government Types they create are certainly not named "Democracy" or "Anarchy". If anything, they seem to be named "" (which would be illegal by Rule 348, but this Rule may take precedence numerically).
All of which leaves us with no Current Government of Ackanomia.
(I'm tempted to throw in some comments on the dangers of voting on a proposal's concept while ignoring its implementation, but this is not a soapbox.)

Judge's Reasoning:

The text which appears to be botched in proposal 3495 is: "where is replaced by a legal Ackanomic name. The name of the Government Type as specified in that rule shall then be." I don't believe that this text can be unambiguously interpreted. Therefore all rules in the 320 rule suite would have to be named "Government Type: ". In short, this would produce no current government of Ackanomia, since type Anarchy could not exist as a legal rule.


Call for Judgement 655 - September 4, 1998
Subject: Voting Eligibility
Initiator: breadbox (sent Sep 4 1998, 12:02 Acka)
1st Judge: Rig R. Mortis (chosen Sep 4 1998, 12:29 Acka) (declined)
2nd Judge: two-star (chosen Sep 7 1998, 08:06 Acka) (deadbeat)
3rd Judge: JT (chosen Sep 14 1998, 12:46 Acka)
Judgement: TRUE

Statement:

breadbox is eligible to vote on proposals.

Reasoning:

If my other CFJ is ruled False, then this CFJ must almost certainly be True. So, assuming the truth of the statement "There is no Current Government of Ackanomia", where does that leave me?
Rule 106 only states how the players that are eligible to vote on proposals may do so. (Though note that Voting Players are specifically permitted to abstain.) And who is eligible to vote? It is nowhere specified in the rules. Rule 320 specifies no provisions for the situation when there is no Current Government and Anarchy is not an existing Government Type.
The fact that I was eligible to vote before Proposal 3495 was adopted doesn't help. Suffrage is not an entity; it is not guaranteed to continue existing when the rules that granted it are removed.
Nor can we fall back on "permissibility of the unprohibited", since the right to vote is clearly still regulated by Rule 106.
The only conclusion I can come to is that no players have been granted the ability to vote on proposals at this time.

Judge's Reasoning:

As breadbox stated in his reasoning, if CFJ654 is FALSE, then this is certainly TRUE. Therefore I only need to concern myself with what happens if CFJ654 is ruled TRUE.
If CFJ654 is ruled true, then there is (or was at the time) no current government of Ackanomic.
In the original proposal (which is what was in effect at the time this CFJ was submitted), we find the following text
>If no Government Type is Active then the Government Type Anarchy (if it
>exists) becomes Active.
This certainly allows no government type to exist since by the assumption of CFJ654 being ruled true, there could have been no government type of Anarchy.
Looking down further
>Governmental Rules should specify who is eligible to vote on proposals
>(if it fails then all active voting players may vote)...
This could be read that if a government rule fails to specify who may vote then all active voting players may vote.
It is certainly true that if there is no government, then the rules for the current government type (none) fail to specify who may vote, and therefore all active voting players may indeed vote.
Therefore breadbox in particular is eligible vote.
and therefore, the statement in this CFJ is TRUE.


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