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I'm not necessarily arguing that smart contracts shouldn't exist in the first place - perhaps they have a valid future role in effectively and cheaply adjudicat

I'm not necessarily arguing that smart contracts shouldn't exist in the first place - perhaps they have a valid future role in effectively and cheaply adjudicating small claims where currently it might not be worth to enforce a contract due to the effort and costs of the legal process; something vaguely like what arbitration was intended to be. This use case would IMHO have a quite large market, and it would be perfectly compatible with those smart contracts having a proper (non-code) appeals process explicitly designed in the system - the benefit would be that the third party (arbiters, or state, or whatever) is not used in most cases, because that would be costly.

hn_throwaway_99 5y ago
Again, though, in that case, as with many use cases where people like to yell "blockchain!!", just use some code running on top of a database. Blockchain adds a ton of cost and complexity precisely because it is completely "autonomous" with no enhanced trust relationship for anyone. The second you have some people with an enhanced trust relationship, then the whole reason for using blockchain falls apart.
TheCoelacanth 5y ago
The premise that you can opt out of the laws in the jurisdiction that you're operating in seems faulty. Smart contracts can let you enforce things that aren't enforceable otherwise, but they aren't going to let you avoid having things enforced through other means.