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> I mean, not everyone would read the code to see what it really does, so what happens in that case? This is true with real world contracts too, that's why peo
by maedha 9y ago
> I mean, not everyone would read the code to see what it really does, so what happens in that case?
This is true with real world contracts too, that's why people hire lawyers - they understand the "code" of contract law.
- nerdponx 9y agoBut real world contracts are never 100% clear, and can be modified retroactively in court when their terms violate the law, are vague, or are otherwise deemed unenforceable.
- throwanem 9y agoSo can "smart contracts".
- mannykannot 9y agoUnless the attacker is careless enough to reveal his identity, or puts his ill-gotten gains at risk of being hacked back, or the victims are Ethereum foundation members, your chances of restoration are slim to none.
- throwanem 9y agoSo I'm actually at a disadvantage here, compared to plain old contracts.
- nerdponx 9y agoYes. If one party makes a mistake, or does something underhanded/surreptitious, you have no recourse. This exact situation (a bug in the DAO contract leading to a malicious actor stealing from the DAO) led to the recent Ethereum fork: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14819268 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14819268
- dragonwriter 9y agoWell, the Ethereun fork itself reveals that there is some recourse. It may be less attractive recourse than exists with plain contracts for many potential participants, though.
- nerdponx 9y agoSort of, but it's also insane. Forking Ethereum because of the DAO hack is a bit like forking the US dollar after the crash of 1929.
- throwanem 9y agoWhich is just my point. It's not that no means of recourse exists outside the contract code; it's that there exists no option between zero and global thermonuclear war. The broad range of subtleties that contract law has developed to answer complex situations, and the option to exercise judgment in those cases not yet captured by precedent, is completely absent in Ethereum, because the people who designed it saw no reason why any such thing should be needed. Unfortunately, that they failed to see it doesn't mean it isn't so, and now every new conflict among blockchain participants is an exciting new opportunity to reinvent another piece of several hundred years' worth of too hastily discarded prior art.
- roywiggins 9y agoWe did devalue the dollar against the gold standard significantly in 1934. Not entirely unlike a "fork", since it's a declaration that, whoops, your dollars are now worth 40% less gold than you thought. In 1931 Britain floated the pound, which arguably the US ought to have done too. Suddenly, your paper is no longer convertible to gold at a fixed rate. That's an even more dramatic change than the Ethereum fork.
- throwanem 9y agoMore accurately - judges and lawyers interpret law, contract and otherwise. This sort of interpretation is explicitly ruled out in Ethereum's case, except when enough stakeholders decide it's not.
- mannykannot 9y agoExcept that in real-world contract and criminal law, there are various mechanisms that attempt, with some degree of success, to dissuade fraudulent behavior and allow for some form of restitution. Blockchain currencies, on the other hand, have been promoted partly on the premise that they are free of this sort of governmental interference.
- mbrock 9y agoPromoters gonna promote. Governments gonna govern.
- vincnetas 9y agoYou can put anything in "real world" contracts (in a 'put words on the paper' sense), but there are things that would be considered illegal if brought to court. In a sense there are reasonable defaults. So if you sign without reading a contract that 'you sell your self as a slave to me' this contract would have no power because slavery is illegal.