Re: The Sourceless software in the kernel source GR
Martin Schulze wrote:
>> On Mon, 18 Sep 2006 18:46:50 -0700, Don Armstrong <don@debian.org> said:
>> > But just like the groundwork and foundation of a structure, the
>> > non-actionable content of a resolutions can contain information on
>> > how the actionable content is to be interpreted. As such, it is part
>> > of the resolution, and needs to be included with the content made
>> > available to voters.
>
> Umh, then I need to ask why the resolution is not clear enough
> so that it does not need the preamble to know in which way the
> author has intended its interpretation?
Because it's often impossible to be as clear as you want to be, and
you want to future-proof against your own mistakes?
(That said, I think most of the preambles for the proposed GRs here
make things *less* clear rather than more. The preamble to the GPL,
on the other hand, is an excellent example of a legal preamble: by
stating a clear intent, it means that if someone thinks they've found a
convoluted "loophole" in the GPL text, they can probably be shot down.)
> As Manoj pointed out
> already, courts look at the resolution when *interpreting* it,
> not at the preamble, so it seems pretty useles in that regard.
Not really true, as noted: they look at the main text first, but if there's
an ambiguity, they will look at the preamble.
--
Nathanael Nerode <neroden@fastmail.fm>
Bush admitted to violating FISA and said he was proud of it.
So why isn't he in prison yet?...
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