- I agree that what's allowed is not the same as what happened, but I think the basic notion that a group of people can agree that a certain allowable subset is acceptable even if none of them personally would choose that exact subset is very similar to the basic notion that group of people can agree that they will all call certain things as fouls even if none of them personally would choose those exact things.
- One doesn't blow a whistle when nothing has happened. (indeed, one doesn't blow a whistle even when something has happened, but it would be to the advantage of the fouling party if play were to stop). It's easy to tell who is at fault with a spurious lawsuit, to wit: the filer.
The situation I was describing is one where it's obvious from the geometry that someone must have fouled (because otherwise the play would not have included an element of danger) but it is not obvious which player was responsible (because, especially among professional players, a significant part of the game is faking other players into committing fouls on you, so when you get two of these people in a play, each trying to sucker the other, determining which one was actually the victim becomes ... difficult*)
The sort order is not (arbitrary hash, justice), it's (justice, arbitrary hash).
* As a player, given that there are usually dozens of fouls called per game, if you want to win, you have to be able to win even with a couple of bad calls — because that's how everyone wins. A legal system is willing to take years to reduce (but not eliminate) arbitrary factors; a leisure sport accepts more arbitrariness in exchange for getting decisions made in under 5 seconds.
In upper league play, one has two officials on the field, who attempt to coordinate such that at all times one of them is looking down the axis of play and the other is perpendicular to it, and one official elevated as much as possible, who breaks ties in case (in a private official only discussion) the first two each call the foul on opposite players. Even with this set up, when the third may call "no foul", the third should call a foul (deciding for one of the field officials or the other, arbitrarily if necessary) in cases of significant danger. The role of keeping play safe is (for the officials at least, and we'd hope also for the players) much more important than the role of helping determine who prevails that match.
It's not impossible to be just with a spurious lawsuit; the just resolution is to throw it out (and sanction repeat offenders).
Maybe there's a misunderstanding about what the judge meant? He was talking about how sometimes things are not as fungible as the law would like to pretend. So take Solomon and the baby. Solomon chose to award 1/2 the baby to each claimed mother. An actual judge would have to award a whole baby to an arbitrary mother, along with a monetary transfer from that one to the other one, which may be a lawfully equitable judgement, but lacks the justice of Solomon's.
> > One doesn't blow a whistle when nothing has happened.
> You don't get to choose.
Are we mixing the judges' problem with the referees'? I absolutely get to choose when to blow the whistle; I'm wearing it. (as mentioned earlier: as foreseen by the rules, if the fouling team would benefit, I should not whistle)
The scenario is similar to Solomon's: the merits the claimants have are equal, but the thing they're laying claim to is not divisible/fungible.
An arbitrary claimant gets the thing and pays the other one half the value of the thing. If that is wrong (very wrong), what would be right? Should we be cutting babies in half?
I'm sure we must be talking past each other, but I don't see where. My original point is that people would like just outcomes, but are satisfied with impartial ones, which is (IMO) the mechanism that allows us to come to consensus on a collective opinion even when no consenting individual holds that exact personal opinion.
- One doesn't blow a whistle when nothing has happened. (indeed, one doesn't blow a whistle even when something has happened, but it would be to the advantage of the fouling party if play were to stop). It's easy to tell who is at fault with a spurious lawsuit, to wit: the filer.
The situation I was describing is one where it's obvious from the geometry that someone must have fouled (because otherwise the play would not have included an element of danger) but it is not obvious which player was responsible (because, especially among professional players, a significant part of the game is faking other players into committing fouls on you, so when you get two of these people in a play, each trying to sucker the other, determining which one was actually the victim becomes ... difficult*)
The sort order is not (arbitrary hash, justice), it's (justice, arbitrary hash).
* As a player, given that there are usually dozens of fouls called per game, if you want to win, you have to be able to win even with a couple of bad calls — because that's how everyone wins. A legal system is willing to take years to reduce (but not eliminate) arbitrary factors; a leisure sport accepts more arbitrariness in exchange for getting decisions made in under 5 seconds.
In upper league play, one has two officials on the field, who attempt to coordinate such that at all times one of them is looking down the axis of play and the other is perpendicular to it, and one official elevated as much as possible, who breaks ties in case (in a private official only discussion) the first two each call the foul on opposite players. Even with this set up, when the third may call "no foul", the third should call a foul (deciding for one of the field officials or the other, arbitrarily if necessary) in cases of significant danger. The role of keeping play safe is (for the officials at least, and we'd hope also for the players) much more important than the role of helping determine who prevails that match.