My definition: Law is a top down design for bottom application. Bottom application is implementation and enforcement of the intent of law and its definition of its terms. The law works to control regulate either positive or negative objectives.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law
There is a bottom up assembly in the making of law. It is the formulation of law by those to whom the law will apply in choices of self governance. Some sort of social structure in which this formulation takes place. Once basic structure for making law is established like an operating system then application programs are designed to create laws. These application systems in operation produce feedback for (either or both) modification of the application program and operating system.
In the Information Age more people are learning the structural framework of Operating System and Application Program and applying it as a metaphor model for an increasingly wide range of conceptual systems.
This is the way I see it: Law design structure framework is an Operating System and a multitude collection of Application Programs. What law is and what law does.
There is an ambiguity conundrum in the structure of law. It is designed to be precise but where precision fails it must be subject to judgment in application. That is the problem.
Who and how should the law be judged?
It is a feedback design loop that judges the law itself as well as its application. When must the Operating system be updated? When must application programs be changed?
The whole "Law" thing viewed as a Problem Domain is in the bigger picture a Problem Domain of a Social Operating System and its Application Programs. Putting it in that frame subjects it to analysis in the terms of precise definitions and meanings that domain. For example: Private and Public. Public being Open Source and Private being --well--- being Private and Proprietary in some degree of Ownership. Stakeholder is a concept of the Information Age that relates to "Ownership" concepts of Public and Private. The Public has a "Stake" in the Private sector Operating Systems and Application Programs. That is an interesting point of view, point of entry to the Private Domain. One that the Private Domain has its own view regarding their prerogative's. A private view that they own and are a stakeholder in the Public Sector Operating System and Application Programs.
Who "Owns" What? What rights to what property that is real or conceptual or has a real/conceptual binding in terms of definition that ranges from absolute to whatever can be "proved" to the extent of "fact". To the extent of whatever "proof" or "fact is defined to be and mean?
Interesting thoughts on a Sunday Morning. A time every week to think about such bigger things.
The bottom line of these thoughts is: The Law system has a fundamental "Feedback Control Loop" failure. A failure of implementation at the point of application that does not result in modification of the Application```
Feedback Loop to modify system function operation has both bug and a feature aspects depending on what entity benefits from either aspect.
As a bug Feedback Loop performs serves to identify and correct macro system rule design for the overall improvement of systemic operation to accomplish the benefit of system objectives. Or, below Operating system level modify Application Programs to introduce exceptions to a rule within the domain of the Application Program to benefit Application Program purpose and objective.
Failure of the Feedback Loop to function for Operating System and/or Application Program design intent is a feature to entities that do not want change because it is not in their self interest. What is a feature to that entity is a bug to a mority. If the majority stakeholders in a system do not want a change in the Operating System because it is not to their benefit then it is a good thing....(unless they elect Trump but that is another matter related to deceit).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OODA_loop
When established methods to modify Operating Systems and Application Programs do not work for the benefit of user groups there are options! Social Media is a weaponized tool.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/opinion-biggers-student-walkouts_us_5a942e1ae4b02cb368c4382e
An email I wrote yesterday:
I am a retired resident living in Bend. A year ago I happened to be looking at some residential zoned property within the city of Bend and discovered it had a tax liability warning. The warning was related to it being “Designated Forestland” Mysterious because it was in the city, although near the city limits. I have been searching for answers to this mystery since then. It has lead me ever higher and broader in scope as what I discovered drew a bigger picture encompassing ORS, OAR, various Management Plans, the Dept of Forestry and Dept of Revenue. The picture is now very big and looking at it I found your view at http://www.hfore.com/files/11987_02_Housing_-_UGB.pdf.
All I intended to do was to stick a finger in the dike to stop a leak at a very local level. Penetration to solve the problem went a whole lot farther into the problem domain than I ever anticipated! Planning is forward looking top down analysis. Feedback is bottom up reality that closes the loop to modify initial planning. When initial planning is ensconced in law the feedback loop is severely restrictive.
This is my most recent futile effort to close the loop between the very bottom where the rubber meets the road and the top where the plan was made to steer the intent: An email to Representative Buehler, Bend describing the problem and asking for some legislative action:
No answer yet…of course. I am simply a citizen, not a deep pocket special interest group that writes legislation for him. The only way action will happen is in the court of public opinion. Unfortunate for the democratic process.
Bend is one of the fastest growing towns in the country. It has the potential to generate the greatest amount of feedback necessary to close the loop and correct deficiencies or unintended consequences in state rules and regulations. It is also in a county that seems to have the most open property tax information available to the public including its property data base files in downloadable spread sheet format. The problems are extremely discoverable and stick out as sore thumb anomalies crying for attention but nobody is looking for them. In fact, many would prefer to look the other way for political/social reasons that are not to the benefit of the common good.
Thanks for your excellent analysis contributing to my understanding of a very complex situation that demands analysis and correction. If you or your students want to hunt in a target rich environment to discover things that don’t work or have unintended consequences then I invite an expedition to Bend. One of the major areas that I think needs attention is the legacy of land use and taxation of forestland in Oregon, especially the east side where mills like the one converted to a shopping mall in Bend no longer exist but forestland owned by land speculators within the UGB (as well as at the border) is assessed at $77.07 per acre as expressed in my email to Rep. Buehler.
