[blml] Seven cases where potential UI is deemed more harmful than MI in the laws

[Jerry Fusselman]

Below are seven seven cases I have found in the laws where UI is
deemed worse than MI---seven cases where the laws tell us to allow MI
to be created or not removed, for no other reason than to reduce UI.
The recent argument by a few on BLML that our law makers consider UI
harmless when compared to MI is therefore false.

Text of the laws appears at
http://www.worldbridge.org/departments/laws/2007LawsComplete.pdf (But
I could not find a definition of MI.)

In all of these cases, potential UI is deemed more harmful than the MI:

1.  When your partner gives a mistaken explanation, you cannot
immediately correct it, and you may not correct it even after the
auction is over, if you are defending.  (L20F5a and L73B)

2.  If your partner has created MI during the auction and you will be
defending, you may not correct it during the clarification period.
(L20F5bi)

3.  When answering a question about your system, you usually cannot
look at your convention card or system notes to be sure that you are
giving an MI-free answer.  (L40B2b---but declarer and dummy can look
during the clarification period.)

4.  If during the play period, a defender gives MI that dummy happens
to know is a misstatement, dummy cannot attempt to clear it up until
after the last trick.  (L9A3 and L43A1b)

5.  (A rarely-mentioned kind of MI, and some might disagree that it is
MI)  Until the end of the play period, neither dummy nor either
defender may draw attention to a card pointed incorrectly (to indicate
the trick winner) after a lead is made to the following trick.
(L65B3)

6.  (Controversial interpretation)  Many have argued that you cannot
ask a question to clear up MI for partner's benefit.  (L20G1)

7.  (Controversial interpretation)  Some have argued that you cannot
ask nonneutral questions to clear up MI even for yourself.

In each case, why is the MI allowed to be created or maintained?  The
answer is surely to reduce UI.  Thus, in these cases, the *risk* of UI
is deemed worse than the known MI.

For me, the great irony is that David Burn, who recently asserted that
MI is harmful and UI is harmless, is also the one who argued most
eloquently that 6 and 7 are cases where the law often requires MI to
remain to avoid the risk of UI.  He certainly convinced me.  If one
wanted to argue that UI is the greater risk, one would do well to echo
David's words.

See http://www.amsterdamned.org/pipermail/blml/2007-March/031898.html
, though the statements below were written in October of 2002 under
the subject of the Kaplan Question (15 and 20 come from the next
message, at http://www.amsterdamned.org/pipermail/blml/2007-March/031899.html
):

1. David Burn:

If your opponents have misinformed your side, then there are ways in
which you may obtain redress at the end of the hand. There are also
positions in which it may be possible, by judicious questioning, to
rectify the situation at the table. But you must not use questions
either to communicate with partner, or to deceive an opponent.

You're supposed to ask your opponents to explain their methods,
not tell them what you think their methods are and see if they
agree with you.

8. David Burn

If, despite your best intentions, it is held that your question
could have communicated with partner, or could have deceived
an opponent, then you are subject to penalty and your score may
be adjusted. Infractions committed by the opponents are *not*
mitigating circumstances in judging infractions committed by
your side.

15. David Burn

<snip>

It is a fundamental assumption in the Laws
that information possessed by the opponents should be available
in equal measure to you. Since you don't play their methods, the
only ways in which this information can be made available to you
are: they write it all down beforehand and you commit it to
memory; or they impart it to you as the need arises at the
table. Of these, the latter is considered the more practical in
most situations.

But there are other fundamental assumptions in the Laws also;
among them the presumption that the gravest possible offence
is illegal communication with partner.

Now, when these two great principles conflict, as conflict they
will if bridge is played without screens or similar devices,
something has to give. Since illegal communication is "the
gravest possible offence", then anything that might be used as a
means of such communication must not be allowed, and you are not
allowed to transmit information to partner by means of
questions.

20. David Burn:

Whereas you are (almost) correct in saying that there are forms
of illegal communication which are not "the gravest possible
offence", that does not mean that there are some forms of illegal
communication that are not an offence at all. So serious are
such offences that *anything* which follows as a consequence
of *any* communication between partners other than by calls or
plays must be annulled, and any advantage therefrom removed.

I would indeed not allow anyone to ask any question at all
containing the words "queen of hearts". The only questions I
would allow anyone to ask are of these forms:

Format 1
[words meaning] "Please may I have an explanation of..." followed
by [words meaning] "...the auction" or "...the call of X" (in
a context where it is permitted to ask about a specific call);

Format 2
The same as Format 1, with the words "an explanation of" replaced
by "some more information about".