[blml] 'normal'

[Eric Landau]

On Nov 6, 2007, at 11:09 AM, Grattan Endicott wrote:

>
> Grattan Endicott
> gesta at tiscali.co.uk
> [also geggeg at tiscali.co.uk]
> *************************
> "The multitude of the sick shall
> not make us deny the existence
> of health."       [Emerson]
> vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Eric Landau" <ehaa at starpower.net>
> To: "Bridge Laws Mailing List" <blml at amsterdamned.org>
> Sent: Monday, November 05, 2007 3:20 PM
> Subject: Re: [blml] 'normal'
>
>
>> On Nov 4, 2007, at 7:26 AM, Grattan Endicott wrote:
>>
> (Eric):
>>>> But it no longer appears in the footnote.  That
>>>> raises a new concern:  not whether a player's
>>>> ability is relevant to "irrational", but whether
>>>> "irrational" is relevant to L70D and L71, from
>>>> which the refererence to it has been expunged.
>>>> Tim's point, as I understand  it, is that while it
>>>> may be true that it is no longer relevant to the
>>>> consideration of plays that are careless or
>>>> inferior, it may remain relevant to consideration
>>>> of plays which are neither (like trump squeezes
>>>> when Mrs. Guggenheim declares).
>>> '''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' 
>>> ''
>>> (Grattan)
>>> +=+ I wonder whether what is not being absorbed
>>> here is the requirement in the substantive law that
>>> the Director shall only postulate plays that are, in
>>> bridge terms without reference to the class of player,
>>> normal. If a play would be abnormal whoever might
>>> make it then the Director is not entitled to consider it.
>>> To that extent irrational plays would be excluded
>>> from the Director's mind.
>>
> (Eric):
>> That is not being absorbed because that is not what it says.  What it
>> says is that "'normal' includes play that would be careless or
>> inferior".  Which means that "normal" includes play that is any of
>> (a) "dictionary" normal, i.e. plays that would be considered normal
>> were there no footnote, (b) careless, or (c) inferior.  Which means
>> that it excludes only play that is none of (a), (b) or (c).  Very few
>> "irrational" plays, however defined, would qualify as none of (a),
>> (b) or (c).
>>
>> Grattan's suggested criterion is precisely what the 1997 laws, as
>> written, called for.  If that was the WBFLC's intent, there was no
>> need to change the footnote; all it needed was to be "un-
>> reinterpreted".  If it was felt that clarification was needed, they
>> could have used Grattan's words above, leaving the existing words
>> unchanged but (redundantly) appending "without reference to the class
>> of player".  Or simply deleted "for the class of player involved".
>>
>> Moreover, if such an exception were implicit in the new footnote, as
>> Grattan suggests, it would surely not appear explicitly in L70E.  The
>> author(s) of L70E must have meant *something* by putting it there,
>> and it must be something that they didn't intend should apply to L70D
>> or L71.
>>
>> I don't understand how TDs are supposed to "absorb" this implicit
>> exception for irrational plays in contexts in which neither of the
>> words "rational" nor "irrational" appears in the relevant law.
>>
> +=+ Not quite what I said. My view is that the word 'normal' excludes
> the abnormal, and that anything irrational is abnormal. However, if a
> correspondent as rational as Eric thinks this is unclrear then I do  
> have
> an anxiety. I know that in removing 'irrational' from the footnote and
> relying upon the meaning of 'normal' (in the Law itself) the intention
> was to exclude consideration of any play that, for any and every  
> player,
> is irrational. Whether this needs be further clarified is not  
> something that
> one of us alone can decide, but my inclination is to wish that  
> there may
> be no doubt of it.

Let's see if I can reduce what needs to be clarified to its essence:

The purpose of the footnote is to tell us what should be included in  
"any normal play" [L70C3], "an alternative normal line of  
play" [L70D1], "alternative normal plays" [L70D2], "any normal line  
of play" [L70E1], or, again, "any normal play" [L71.2 -- BTW,  
shouldn't that be L71B?].  Whatever it means specifically, it defines  
the set of plays or lines of play which the TD is to consider when  
"ascribing" a potential line of  play for the purpose of assigning an  
adjusted score under any of these five laws.  L70E, and only L70E,  
reduces that set by excluding alternative lines of play the  
"adoption" of which would be "irrational".  What is the difference  
between the reduced set to be considered when applying L70E and the  
unreduced set to be considered when applying the other four?

As Grattan suggests, the presumably intended answer is that there  
isn't any -- that the explicit exclusion in L70E is actually implicit  
in all five places -- and I agree that that's probably what we want.   
I can twist and torture interpretations of bridge law with the best  
of them, but I just don't see how to justify reading that intention  
into the actual words.


Eric Landau
1107 Dale Drive
Silver Spring MD 20910
ehaa at starpower.net