4 ms·

I've thought a lot about how absurd it is that the rules we must follow are so obtuse that an entire profession exists to advise and argue if we and others are

I've thought a lot about how absurd it is that the rules we must follow are so obtuse that an entire profession exists to advise and argue if we and others are following the rules. But I've come to believe we just live in an absurd reality, and there's no possible way to communicate a set of rules to everyone, or even to get everyone to agree to one set of rules in the first place, so the legal profession is an unfortunate necessity. Of course, that doesn't preclude lawyers from sometimes being unscrupulous.

gosub100 2y ago
I think of case law as like a git repo of every function and subroutine anyone ever wrote. So on one hand it makes sense to need a specialized education to use it (so we don't waste time arguing the same noob points over and over). But on the other hand, you shouldn't need a law degree and bar license to sue an insurance company to pay up. Their client hit you, you're injured, now pay up or have a judge order you to. But the lawmen have carved out their own moat that puts ordinary people in a position to rely on them.
Enginerrrd 2y ago
Writing laws to cover complex situations is really not THAT different from writing software. Laws are programs. In that context, does it really seem so absurd that the rules are "obtuse"? Many people feel that way when reading someone else's code, but that doesn't mean all the weird conditionals are unnecessary.
- echoangle 2y ago
  The problem is that the output of the program determines if you’re going to jail. There are laws that many people might break just because they have no clue that there’s even a law about that. Realistically, you’re probably not going to go to jail immediately but you can have a bad time if you’re caught doing some things you didn’t even know were illegal.
- dragonwriter 2y ago
  > Writing laws to cover complex situations is really not THAT different from writing software. I’ve done software (a lot) and worked in a legislative office (a little), they are extremely different. > Laws are programs. Laws are not programs, or even meaningfully analogous to anything so deterministic. They are more like, if we must make a computing analogy, components of prompt templates (other portions of which will be filled by evidence and…well, a bunch of other stuff you don’t control when writing the laws) that will be used by an extremely high temperature LLM. Which you can’t actually test freely against, though you can observe past behavior – but, even then, you are stymied by the fact that the LLM itself is constantly updated with retrained, and sometimes rearchitected, versions, without useful release notes.
  - unyttigfjelltol 2y ago
    No, law is code. It's just that the programming language is mushy-- 400 definitions of the word "set" is the example my AI offers-- and the interpreters vary. In a pinch, the code writers know that nearly anything they write can be rescued by the chief interpreter, which has led to a model of legislatures intentionally writing ambiguous code and top-level courts interpreting with an emphasis on public good. But, when you go down some arcane rabbit hole that will normally be interpreted by functionaries -- bankruptcy comes to mind-- suddenly everything is prescribed with remarkable precision and it becomes obvious again, law is code.
    - dragonwriter 2y ago
      > But, when you go down some arcane rabbit hole that will normally be interpreted by functionaries -- bankruptcy comes to mind-- suddenly everything is prescribed with remarkable precision If this were really true, there would be zero appellate cases (and probably not even trial cases, as the clear and only correct resolution would be apparent to all parties without a trial which would only add expense) in these areas, and yet... That's very much not the case. If law, even in these areas, is “code”, it is so more in the sense of the Pirates Code in Pirates of the Carribean, not computer software.
      - 2y ago

gosub100 2y ago

I think of case law as like a git repo of every function and subroutine anyone ever wrote. So on one hand it makes sense to need a specialized education to use it (so we don't waste time arguing the same noob points over and over). But on the other hand, you shouldn't need a law degree and bar license to sue an insurance company to pay up. Their client hit you, you're injured, now pay up or have a judge order you to. But the lawmen have carved out their own moat that puts ordinary people in a position to rely on them.

Enginerrrd 2y ago

Writing laws to cover complex situations is really not THAT different from writing software. Laws are programs. In that context, does it really seem so absurd that the rules are "obtuse"? Many people feel that way when reading someone else's code, but that doesn't mean all the weird conditionals are unnecessary.

echoangle 2y ago
The problem is that the output of the program determines if you’re going to jail. There are laws that many people might break just because they have no clue that there’s even a law about that. Realistically, you’re probably not going to go to jail immediately but you can have a bad time if you’re caught doing some things you didn’t even know were illegal.
dragonwriter 2y ago
> Writing laws to cover complex situations is really not THAT different from writing software. I’ve done software (a lot) and worked in a legislative office (a little), they are extremely different. > Laws are programs. Laws are not programs, or even meaningfully analogous to anything so deterministic. They are more like, if we must make a computing analogy, components of prompt templates (other portions of which will be filled by evidence and…well, a bunch of other stuff you don’t control when writing the laws) that will be used by an extremely high temperature LLM. Which you can’t actually test freely against, though you can observe past behavior – but, even then, you are stymied by the fact that the LLM itself is constantly updated with retrained, and sometimes rearchitected, versions, without useful release notes.
- unyttigfjelltol 2y ago
  No, law is code. It's just that the programming language is mushy-- 400 definitions of the word "set" is the example my AI offers-- and the interpreters vary. In a pinch, the code writers know that nearly anything they write can be rescued by the chief interpreter, which has led to a model of legislatures intentionally writing ambiguous code and top-level courts interpreting with an emphasis on public good. But, when you go down some arcane rabbit hole that will normally be interpreted by functionaries -- bankruptcy comes to mind-- suddenly everything is prescribed with remarkable precision and it becomes obvious again, law is code.
  - dragonwriter 2y ago
    > But, when you go down some arcane rabbit hole that will normally be interpreted by functionaries -- bankruptcy comes to mind-- suddenly everything is prescribed with remarkable precision If this were really true, there would be zero appellate cases (and probably not even trial cases, as the clear and only correct resolution would be apparent to all parties without a trial which would only add expense) in these areas, and yet... That's very much not the case. If law, even in these areas, is “code”, it is so more in the sense of the Pirates Code in Pirates of the Carribean, not computer software.
    - 2y ago