[blml] Interaction between L27B1 and L10C1

[Eric Landau]

On Apr 1, 2008, at 9:10 PM, Stefanie Rohan wrote:

>>> EL:
>>>
>>  But it cannot succeed
>> in doing so unless the "meaning" of the IB, as defined by the IBer's
>> "intent" (actually his specific misperception of the auction at the
>> moment of the IB) is known and taken into account.
>
> I feel that since partner doesn't know the specific  
> misinterpretation of the
> auction it cannot matter. The IBers "intent" would be UI specifically
> prohibited by the new Law 27.
>
>> L27B1(b) requires
>> that the meaning of a proposed replacement call "be[] fully contained
>> within the possible meanings of the insufficient bid".  Stefanie's
>> view would require us to interpret "the possible meanings of the
>> insufficient bid" as all of the possible meanings given all of the
>> possible intents.
>
> Yes.
>
>> It's really hard to construct a non-trivial
>> example in which that interpretation would lead to any bids ever
>> meeting that criterion. Consider just the ambiguity between a 1H
>> opener or response in Stefanie's example.  As the former would  
>> show 13
>> + HCP and the latter 6-10 HCP (or thereabouts), the RC, to meet the
>> test of L27B1(b), would have to have a range that was "fully
>> contained" within both 13+ and 6-10 simultaneously -- no L27B1(b)
>> correction allowed there!
>
> Oh, I see. This is just a difference in systems. Here in the UK a 1H
> response shows from 6 HCP to pretty much unlimited. An opening bid  
> shows 12+
> to about 22, and sometimes promised 5H. So these meanings are not  
> disjoint,
> as they are in the methods you cite, so a 2H bid (10+ HCP, 5+ H)  
> would, in
> theory, be permissible.

My apologies for a poorly chosen example (1C-P-1H is 6+ over here  
too, limited only to less than a strong jump shift), but it does  
serve as an illustration, albeit a silly one.

>> With the IBer's intent known, it is at
>> least possible that we will offer one or more additional penalty-free
>> corrections beyond those available via the 1997 law or L27B1(a).
>> Lack of knowledge of the IBer's intent can only preclude, never add,
>> potential L27B1(b) corrections.
>
> Not really, because (Law 40B3, probably due for a rewrite, not
> withstanding), the partnership is not supposed to have new methods  
> for this
> situation. So what is important is not the intent, but whether the  
> hand you
> wish to show is a possible 2H response, with the IB not adding more
> meaning.. In the methods commonly in place in the a 2H response  
> coule not be
> 6-10, but would be 10+. But opening hands and 1H responding hands  
> could all
> be hands worth 2H over 1S.
>
>> And even were the possibilities Stefanie allows for (opening or
>> responding) not disjoint,
>
> Again, this is not true in the UK.
>
>> if we don't resolve them to a single
>> possibility, how can we take just those that occur to someone other
>> than the bidder (presumably the TD) as "likely" or "logical" as a
>> starting point?  If we don't know whether they were opening (thought
>> they were bidding to P-P-) or responding (to 1C-P- or 1D-P-), how do
>> we know they weren't overcalling (P-1C-, say)?  Or even free-bidding
>> (1C-1D-)?  (Or even -- God help us! -- overcalling an opponent's IB
>> per L27A1?!
>
> This approach is counterproductive. If guidelines for determining  
> intent are
> developed, then surely the IBer's partner will know the original  
> intent, and
> the auction will be too severely tainted with UI in order to possibly
> continue. What the IBer's partner should know is the meaning of the
> replacement bid, and it should be correct in his system and he  
> should treat
> it as such.
>
>> And that's not even considering that they may not have
>> been attempting to bid at all.)  That makes disjoint possibilities a
>> virtual certainty.
>
> Not in the case under discussion, given UK methods. I guess if this  
> were
> true for every other case it would be a virtual certainty...
>
>> IBs in more complex auctions could have hundreds
>> of possible meanings, and if you don't base your ruling on the one
>> intended by the IBer, you must account for every last one of them!
>
> Again, you cannot base the ruling on the intention, because then  
> the IBer's
> partner will know the intention. *This* would result in no possible
> penalty-free replacements.
>
>> Try doing that after, say, P-2S-P-2H (a mere one-round auction to the
>> two-level, hardly all that complicated).  I'll even let you use your
>> own bidding methods for the exercise, but keep in mind that at the
>> table you will have to do this analysis using the IBer's methods.
>> I'm confident that actually working that exercise will convince
>> anyone that this isn't the approach they want to be taking at the  
>> table.
>
> Well, this simply highlights the more fundamental problem of  
> answering the
> question "what does an insufficient bid mean?" I do not think that  
> there is
> an answer to this question.

But if we do not determine the "meaning" as being what the IBer  
intended it to be (determined by the specific auction that he thought  
he was bidding to), we must consider all possibilities.  What we  
cannot do is say, as we seem to have done here, that because we think  
it most likely to have been intended as either an opening bid or a  
response to 1C or 1D, that we will consider only those possibilities  
and ignore the rest.  And *all* of the possbilities means literally  
any auction on which the IB would have been sufficient.

>> And now that I think of it, you're overwhelmingly likely, somewhere
>> in all those possibilities, to find at least one that wouldn't be
>> "incontrovertably not artificial", so you'll almost certainly wind up
>> with no allowable L27B1(a) correction either!
>
> This is one of the problems with the new Law. It is specifically a  
> problem
> with my interpretation, but I do not think that any other  
> interpretation can
> be taken seriously.

Have you tried my suggested example:  P-2S-P-2H?  I made it easy by  
suggesting you assume the IBer was playing your favorite methods.  If  
we need to determine the possible meanings of 2H  without  
ascertaining the intent of the 2H bidder, we will need to know the  
potential meanings of, well, let's see...

P-P-P-2H, P-P-1C-2H, P-P-1D-2H, ... , P-P-2D-2H, ... that's eight ...
P-1C-P-2H, P-1C-X-2H, P-1C-1D-2H, ... eight more ...
P-1D-P-2H, ... and so on, until we get to 1NT-2C-2D-2H.  That comes  
to a couple of hundred possible "meanings".  Be glad I offered only a  
one-round auction, or we could have thousands.

My favorite bidding methods are overwhelmingly natural and  
straightforward.  Most of these auctions will be natural, but many  
will not.  Most will show hearts, but the list includes auctions that  
show clubs, diamonds, spades, two-suiters, three-suiters, and a  
virtually meaningless all-purpose game force.

How much will you enjoy running this exercise using the system played  
by a pair of strangers who just called you to the table?

It's not clear, if we are consider all possible meanings, whether the  
"more precise meaning than" criterion in L27B1(b) is to be applied to  
all of them (as I would read the law) or any of them (as Stefanie and  
Steve do), but either reduces L27B1 to a virtual no-op in all but the  
simplest cases.  If the former, there will be no calls the IBer can  
make without penalty.  If the latter, I would be hard-pressed to find  
a single call that would *not* be allowed without penalty.

Note that this is true not just for L27B1(b), but for L27B1(a) as  
well.  It seems quite clear that the new L27B1(a) was intended to be  
functionally identical to the old (1997) one.  If Stefanie were  
correct in arguing that the IBer's intention should not be taken into  
account, we would have to have been ruling accordingly under the 1997  
law.  Had we been doing so, we would have seen an order of magnitude  
or so fewer penalty-free corrections over the last 10 years.


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