4 ms·

No, the solution is to fix the bugs that are found.

friend_and_foe 4y ago
You're right, that was very unforgiving of me, and not the best interpretation of what you said. To continue this analogy, I think the problems are, the process to fixing it is arduous and difficult, as much as writing it to begin with, bugs become expected behavior and have to continue being supported, and the "business case" executives have too much say in writing it.
- chrisbolt 4y ago
  And to further continue the analogy, the problems would be avoided if the (tax) code was simpler.
Hermitian909 4y ago
There's no guarantee that this fixes the problem. Imagine that I'm trying to disallow a particular type of fraud that's difficult to define. I might spend years or decades trying to write down the perfect law of what some unethical finance people shouldn't do all while they get away with a thousand variations of the "I know it when I see it" crime. Implied by this, we have to choose between: 1. Very frequently updated laws everywhere (multiple orders of magnitude faster than today) 2. Criminals get away with crimes that could totally be prevented with "gray area" laws. (1) does not seem compatible with democracy and (2) is not politically viable in any country. Things like food safety scares require immediate and effective action by government or bedlam follows.
- Kinrany 4y ago
  > Very frequently updated laws everywhere (multiple orders of magnitude faster than today) This generally works by giving a government agency the ability to frequently redefine the placeholders in the laws > does not seem compatible with democracy Democracy is inherently a poor choice whenever expertise is needed. It's better to let experts do their thing and then hold them accountable for the results.
  - Hermitian909 4y ago
    We generally agree except that: 1. Agencies necessarily have limited scope and tools available. 2. In practice, not all complex topics can be handed wholly to agencies in a democratic system, inevitably people and legislators want a say on some of the bigger issues (housing, healthcare, etc.) It's worth noting that agencies today are heavy users of gray area laws and still often find themselves overburdened with policy decisions. Iterated gamesmanship can only make that load heavier.

You're right, that was very unforgiving of me, and not the best interpretation of what you said. To continue this analogy, I think the problems are, the process to fixing it is arduous and difficult, as much as writing it to begin with, bugs become expected behavior and have to continue being supported, and the "business case" executives have too much say in writing it.

chrisbolt 4y ago
And to further continue the analogy, the problems would be avoided if the (tax) code was simpler.

Hermitian909 4y ago

There's no guarantee that this fixes the problem. Imagine that I'm trying to disallow a particular type of fraud that's difficult to define. I might spend years or decades trying to write down the perfect law of what some unethical finance people shouldn't do all while they get away with a thousand variations of the "I know it when I see it" crime. Implied by this, we have to choose between: 1. Very frequently updated laws everywhere (multiple orders of magnitude faster than today) 2. Criminals get away with crimes that could totally be prevented with "gray area" laws. (1) does not seem compatible with democracy and (2) is not politically viable in any country. Things like food safety scares require immediate and effective action by government or bedlam follows.

Kinrany 4y ago
> Very frequently updated laws everywhere (multiple orders of magnitude faster than today) This generally works by giving a government agency the ability to frequently redefine the placeholders in the laws > does not seem compatible with democracy Democracy is inherently a poor choice whenever expertise is needed. It's better to let experts do their thing and then hold them accountable for the results.
- Hermitian909 4y ago
  We generally agree except that: 1. Agencies necessarily have limited scope and tools available. 2. In practice, not all complex topics can be handed wholly to agencies in a democratic system, inevitably people and legislators want a say on some of the bigger issues (housing, healthcare, etc.) It's worth noting that agencies today are heavy users of gray area laws and still often find themselves overburdened with policy decisions. Iterated gamesmanship can only make that load heavier.