On 2/1/2011 4:43 PM, Yuriy Milov wrote:
> The only place
> where things are supposed to be managed by discrete categories absolutely is
> a legal system - otherwise people cannot folow laws if the laws are not
> written by letters and if the legal comments are not understandable by
> common sense (common logics?). (01)
The categories of the law may be clear, but their application to
the real world has to deal with a continuous infinity of possible
variations and combinations. (02)
For a discrete system of rules that apply to a discrete set of elements,
consider the laws of chess. Those laws are so precise that they can be
implemented on a computer and be carried out precisely. (03)
But when two humans are playing across a table at a tournament,
disputes can arise whether one player deliberately or accidentally
touched a piece, whether one player was doing something to distract
another player, etc. (04)
Then consider games with continuous motion of people and physical
objects, such as basketball, baseball, football, soccer, etc. (05)
Huge numbers of disputes can arise about whether a ball or a human
body part was inside or outside a boundary line, whether one player
deliberately or accidentally hits, bumps, interferes with another.
These situations are very far from clear, and the rules of the
game, by themselves, cannot account for all possible interactions. (06)
Then take the laws for just a small subset of a community: the
traffic laws. The number of conditions is much smaller than the
full set of laws, but just consider all the possible variations
in the world: (07)
1. Static configurations of roads, highways, intersections,
stop signs, traffic lights, obstructions such as trees,
bushes, parked cars, curbs, railings, buildings, etc. (08)
2. Dynamic interactions with other cars, trucks, pedestrians,
animals, sunlight and other distracting light sources, etc. (09)
3. The condition of the vehicles, their brakes, steering,
tires, etc, and the liability for unsafe conditions
caused by the manufacturer, service station, owners... (010)
4. Weather conditions, road conditions, and the responsibility
of individuals or governments for causing or fixing them... (011)
Even trying to think of all the possibilities is mind boggling.
It's impossible to anticipate all of them, and even more difficult
to decide what to do about them and record them in the legal code. (012)
John (013)
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