BlogNomic: The First Dynasty of Desertfrog

Why would adding a subrule cause the rule to stop existing?

I think this should be worded as:

(italics)The intent of this proposal is to clarify the Instrumentation rule, which has been proposed as follows:    Each Musician may be playing a single Instrument, tracked in the GNDT.

  Any Musician who isn’t playing an Instrument may start playing one by adjusting the GNDT appropriately. The Conductor may stop a Musician from playing any Instrument, at any time.(/italics)

So, if Instrumentation does not exist, with the above text, this proposal, if enacted, will do nothing.

Otherwise, it will amend Instrumentation to say, in its entirety:

  Each Musician who is not the Conductor may be playing a single Instrument, but not more than one, tracked in the GNDT.  A Musician may also be playing no instrument at all.  The Conductor may play the Baton.  A Section Leader cannot play the same Instrument as another Section Leader.
  For each of the following Instruments, there cannot be more than one Musician playing the Instrument, respectively: Baton, Chimes, Organ, Timpani and Cannon.
  If a Musician changes the Instrument e is playing, starts playing an Instrument, or stops playing an Instrument, the Musician shall post a blog entry within 10 minutes of changing the GNDT which includes a statement of the new Instrument status.

(of course, that could probably use improvement too.. but you get the idea)

Fristly, Section Leaders are just Admins—it’s not cool (IMO) to have other Rules baggage associated with adminhood.

Secondly, the proposed rules don’t resolve conflicts at all.  What if Section Leaders DO play the same insturment?  Does that make it illegal to enact this proposal?  Or does the Blognomic universe explode?  (Hey!  Is that what you meant by ‘If the Rule called “Instrumentation” still exists…’?)

Would’ve been a quick end…

From the original nomic (starts as immutable),

111. If a rule-change as proposed is unclear, ambiguous, paradoxical, or destructive of play, or if it arguably consists of two or more rule-changes compounded or is an amendment that makes no difference, or if it is otherwise of questionable value, then the other players may suggest amendments or argue against the proposal before the vote. A reasonable time must be allowed for this debate. The proponent decides the final form in which the proposal is to be voted on and, unless the Judge has been asked to do so, also decides the time to end debate and vote.
...

I believe that rules are sets of conditions that -must- hold at all times (excluding reasonable software transitions and the like).  If it is impossible for a rule to hold, then the entire structure of the game breaks down.  This is probably why the original nomic had immutable and mutable rules; if there was a mutable rule passed which eventually resulted in a contradiction, it could be superceded by the ‘contradictory’ immutable and voided.

(you guys probably know about this, but I wanted to know if I had the right idea)

While I’m clarifying things, does the verb ‘may’ simply resolve ambiguity?  If a rule says that I ‘may’ play an instrument, what was keeping me from playing an instrument before?  (Does ‘may’ have a special meaning with respect to GNDT?)  I understand ‘may not’ as a synonym for ‘shall not’, and ‘It is not the case that ... may’ as probably void, ‘can’ as something that prevents other rules from saying ‘can not’, and ‘can not’ simply means ‘may not’=‘shall not’?  [Or not.. someone help?]

epylar said:
“If a rule says that I ‘may’ play an instrument, what was keeping me from playing an instrument before??”

The answer is: “The Ruleset and Gamestate can only be altered in manners specified by the Ruleset.”