[blml] DWS - internal inconsistencies in lawbook

[David Burn]

[HdW]

And isn't that "indicating that 4NT was not Blackwood"?

[SP]

You are always returning to your understanding of "indicate that an error
has been made" in Law 20F5 and refuse to see that this understanding can be
false.

[DALB]

I seem to remember suggesting not all that long ago a useful legal fiction:
my partner is assumed to be deaf and blind to anything I might do other than
the legitimate calls or plays I make. Indeed, it seems to me that the Laws
may function best if this approach is adopted.

Thus, a correct answer to an opponent's question about our methods is not
legally an indication of anything at all as far as Law 20F5 is concerned.
After all, the only person that might benefit from this "indication" is
partner, and he can't legally see the indication.

Moreover, since I am legally deaf and blind to partner's explanation of 4NT,
I do not legally know that a mistake has been made, so how can I indicate
that it has?

Recent discussion on some other thread (or it may have been the same one -
the dWS has been haunting all of us for many years) confirms the notion that
"in any manner" may originally not have been intended to refer to answers to
questions, but may have meant no more than "by any mannerism". I expect it
probably did; Edgar Kaplan always knew what he meant, even though he didn't
always trouble to say it. His successors may need to take more care.

David Burn
London, England