Trinidad

It sure is fielding. The question is whether fielding is illegal when you field based on the cards you hold in your hand and bridge logic, rather than prior experience with partner. The reason why "fielding" is illegal is not because it is -in itself- illegal to conclude that partner has misbid or psyched. The reason is that fielding often is based on prior partnership experience, leading to an implicit partnership understanding. This implicit partnership understanding needs to be disclosed (and it may be an illegal understanding). So, the question is whether this is illegal fielding. East can see that something odd is going on, there are simply not enough clubs in the deck. East has seen that West runs from 2♣ doubled to bid 2♦. That sure doesn't sound like someone with a lot of clubs. East knows from his general bridge experience that many people would play 2♣ in this auction as showing the red suits. The fact that West is running to 2♦ seems to confirm that. I don't think that East needs to have any prior partnership experience to come to the oonclusion that West, despite their agreement that he has shown clubs, most likely has the reds suits. If East and West were complete strangers, I could easily see East bidding 3♥ here. --- The other question is whether West used UI (from East's explanation) to bid 2♦. I don't think that passing is an LA with a void in clubs and a sixth diamond. Rik

Isn't this exactly how one would calculate a weighted assigned adjusted score? Pretty much, except that I made an assumption of the weighting (1:4:6:4:1 /16). I think that if the outcomes start to be "too numerous" then it doesn't make much sense to assign a weighted score. The weighting factors are getting pretty arbitrary. The factors that I came up with at least had some (also arbitrary) reasoning behind them, but often one sees weighting factors that seem to simply be random guesses. These guesses can still be reasonably accurate when there are two or three possible outcomes, but when you get to five it starts to be silly. Rik

Bull sh-t! (Before someone else takes the opportunity. ;) ) Rik

Perhsps so, but it would be nice if you would provide some arguments. a line of reasoning, or a reference to some authority why it is nonsense. In a discussion forum, we discuss, we do not simply throw around qualifications. Rik

I agree. In stores the rule is: "You break it, you buy it." In international politics the rule should be: "You bomb it, you take the refugees." Rik

Ok, suppose in this case that there would be 5 different possible outcomes: 2♠-2 (+100) 2♠-1 (+50) 2♠= (-110) 2♠+1 (-140) 2♠+2 (-170) Then I don't have any problem with a TD who: looks at the score sheet sees that the possible results for NS vary from 10 (2♠+2, -170) to 50% (2♠-2, +100) and for EW from 50 to 90% decides to give NS 40% and EW 80%, giving them both some benefit of the doubt (since "on average" they would get 30% and 70%). I am certainly not advocating that the TD starts to calculate (e.g.): MP for +100 x 1/16 MP for +50 x 4/16 MP for -110 x 6/16 MP for -140 x 4/16 MP for -170 x 1/16 Total: MP for AS So, I am not against an artificial AS. I am against the automatic 60%-60% since these might be results that would have been impossible without the irregularity. Rik

You are a chemistry teacher and you have three students. It is your job to test them and give them a grade for their report card at the end of the term. You have come up with 8 tests that they need to take. Case 1 Unfortunately, the first one is a lab test and one of the three students blunders and blows up the building. You cannot give any tests anymore. What grades are you going to hand out? Case 2 Student A has aced the first 7 tests with flying colors. He is headed for a straight A, as long as he doesn't blow up anything. Student B has had major trouble getting sufficient grades, he might pass or he might not. Student C is hopeless. He has no chance whatsoever. The last test is a lab test and student C (who else) blows up the building. What grades are you going to hand out? Answers: Case 1: the student who blew up the building won't pass. The other two get the benefit of the doubt and will get a passing grade: a B. Case 2: Student C will not pass. Student B gets the benefit of the doubt and gets a B. Student A also gets the benefit of the doubt and will get an A. Except if the chemistry teacher is Pran, then student A and B both will get a B, because the possible outcomes of the final grade are "numerous". Rik

The point behind artificial adjusted scores and non artificial adjusted scores: Before there is any significant action on the board, all scores are possible (or more correctly, just as likely as at any other table). NS might obtain 100% or 33% or 24%. If some irregularity occurs that makes any further play impossible, it is perfectly fine to come up with an artificial adjusted score. If there has been significant action on the board, e.g. because the auction is over and a contract has been reached, the number of possible table results is limited. After the auction is over, there are at most 14 possible outcomes (and usually much less realistic outcomes). It is entirely possible that NS will never be able to score 60%, or even 30%, e.g. because they missed an obvious game. The object of the laws is to restore equity after an irregularity: We try to assign a score that would have been obtained if the irregularity had not occurred. That means that you don't give NS 60% if without the irregularity they would have been able to achieve a score between 0 and 30%. Similarly, you don't give EW 60% if they were headed for a score between 70 and 100%. That is not restoring equity. That is why you should not give artificial adjusted scores when there has been significant action on the board and the number of possible results are limited. In the case of this thread, there are only two results that are realistically possible: 2♠c and 2♠-1. Then you should base your AS on those two possible outcomes and not give an AAS of 60-60 which has nothing to do with restoring equity. 60% might correspond to a score of 4♠ E -3 or 1NT S c. Is that the AS you want to give? Rik

I can't stop being confused. You can stop me from being confused by clarifying what your opinion is. Are you now for or against allowing people to work and live in other countries (obviously including the U.K.)? A simple answer of "for" to that question should remove all the confusion. And if the answer is "against", the question remains why you allow yourself to live and work in other countries, but not other people. Rik

I thought you were opposing those "tens of thousands of migrants from across the Mediterranean". I must have misunderstood. Sorry. Rik

So, you are saying that you are allowed to live and work in another country (or even three of them), but other people don't? Rik

Ok, NS make 4♥, vul with an overtrick. How many percent do they get for that? Rik

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There is nothing wrong with having membership duties and rights. That is true for any club. The problem addressed is about the right to become a member of the club. How do you generally feel about clubs that limit membership to those whose parents are a member? My children are Dutch citizens. I would think that the logical reason for that (if there would be a reason for it at all) would be the fact that they live in the Netherlands, are growing up in the Netherlands, are going through the Dutch school system, speak Dutch, have Dutch friends, eat Dutch food, support Dutch sports teams, have Dutch hobbies, get warm feelings when they see tulips and windmills or Arjen Robben, in short: because they are Dutch. But none of these are the reason why they are Dutch citizens. The only reason why they are is because I am a Dutch citizen. And to complete the picture: My children are as Dutch as they are because they now live in the Netherlands by coincidence. Before my (non-Dutch) wife found her dream job in the Netherlands, we were living in Sweden where the kids were born. And we intended to stay in Sweden. The kids started to grow up in Sweden, started in the Swedish school system, spoke Swedish, had Swedish friends, ate Swedish food, supported Swedish teams, had Swedish hobbies, got warm feelings when they saw lakes and Falu rödfärg, or Daniel Sedin, in short: they were Swedish. But they never had the Swedish citizenship. They were Dutch, though they had never lived in the Netherlands, didn't speak a single word of Dutch and had never seen a windmill. The only reason for their Dutch citizenship is the fact that their father happens to have the Dutch citizenship. If you think about it, how silly is that? Suppose we would have stayed in Sweden, my kids got married to a Fin and a German, and I got grandkids. These kids would have Dutch citizenship, but not Swedish. And to use your terms: that means that they would have rights and duties (e.g. military service!) in the Netherlands, a country that they would only know as "Nederländerna" from their geography lessons. Oh yeah, and grandpa had something with that... Rik

Have you ever tried to calculate a percentage without using scores from other tables? So, any score in percentages takes the results at other tables into account. The same is true for any score in IMPs (or Cross-IMPs). The law that you quote has an important condition: "When no result can be obtained". In this case, and all cases where the play has started, a result can be obtained. It may be a complicated weighted result, but not an impossible result. Suppose, for the sake of argument, that EW hadn't been playing 2♠, but were in 7♥XX played by West. In addition, the play hadn't gone relatively normal. Because West is annoyed with partner's bidding, and since he knows it will be a bottom, no matter what he does, West throws away high cards from his hand and dummy. In trick 7, NS end up with a penalty card and the TD makes his error. You think it is difficult to decide whether 7♥XX will be down 9, 10 or 11 tricks. (Not that it matters, all results lead to 100% for NS.) So, now you give both sides 60%? When NS would have scored 100% without the TD error and EW would have scored 0%? Rik

The problem with puppet is the hand with 5 spades and 4 hearts. The 3NT response is often used for this hand type. This, in turn, means that you have to do something else if you want to play 3NT. Traditionally, players bid 3♣ and ignore the response. They then bid 3NT: to play. This leaks information about declarer's hand. I like to play 3♠ as a puppet to 3NT (opener has to rebid 3NT). It is used to: sign off in 3NT (responder passes) make a quantitative raise (responder bids 4NT) make a slam try in diamonds (responder bids 4♣) make a slam try in clubs (responder cues at the four level) Rik

I agree with you, but I realize that it is a very elitist point of view. You and I can think and live across borders, but most people are not capable of doing that. To them, different people are scary people. We can easily step over those differences and see what people have in common. And then those borders are a nuisance to us. I live in the Netherlands and work in Germany, but part of the time from home. That makes life complicated. When my boss and I had to deal with Dutch and German authorities on how to arrange this with taxes, social security, liability, insurances, etc. my boss at some point exclaimed: "I didn't draw that line on the map!" Her feeling was: "If Rik and I both think that it is a good idea that Rik works for me, and we can overcome our differences, then why are governments making life so difficult by drawing this imaginary line somewhere between us?" The people I talk to, whether in the Netherlands or in Germany, are all perfectly fine with the idea that I work/live across the border. But most of them wouldn't do it themselves: the "others" are scary (fill in the various prejudices against Germans/Dutchies). So, if we want to remove those borders, we should remove the prejudices and emphasize what we have in common. When Vampyr writes about how the British supposedly pay for the sangria that the Spanish olive farmer is enjoying, my hands are itching to point out that the Dutch used to pay for the firemen (stokers) on electric train engines in the UK and that at least the Spanish olive farmer is working and growing olives whereas these firemen were just sipping tea and not working. But that isn't helping. Instead, I should point out that people, whether in the UK, the Netherlands, Germany or Spain are people. They pursue a happy, safe and secure life, for themselves and for their kids, neighbors and friends and should allow others to do the same. Whether we drink tea or sangria doesn't matter. It is only superficial. What matters is our common ideal of happiness. Rik

B.B. King What will Lucille be without him? Rik

An artificial adjusted score, by definition, takes the results at other tables into account. An adjusted score is supposed to be the score that would have been achieved had the irregularity (in this case: the TD error) not occurred. That may be difficult to determine, but it is not difficult to set limitations. Given that the auction was over and 4 tricks had been played (split 2-2), possible scores varied from 2♠+3 to 2♠-6, for a total of 9 possible scores. Of those 9 possible scores, most are impossible for the purpose of an AS: they require revokes or players throwing away obvious tricks. In practice, there is only one question to answer: Will NS get a diamond ruff or won't they? This limits the possible outcomes to 2♠-1 (+50 NS) and 2♠= (-110 NS). VixTD gave NS 100% diamond ruff (+50 NS) and EW 100% no diamond ruff (+110 EW), giving both sides all the benefit of any possible doubt. Both sides got the best result they could possibly achieve. These are concrete, real scores and they will have a corresponding percentage (whether you like it or not). Similarly, your 60% NS and 60% EW will have a corresponding table result. What if these were the percentages corresponding to +100 (3♠-2) and +90 (1NT c)? You will have given NS a better score than they could have ever achieved and EW a worse score than they could have ever achieved. Rik

So, the chronology was as follows: The UK government applied to join in 1961. The application was rejected because Charles De Gaulle (France) used his veto. In 1967, the Uk reapplied and when George Pompidou succeeded De Gaulle, there was no French veto anymore. Edward Heath, the UK prime minister, negotiated the UK membership and the treaty was signed in 1972. On January 1st 1973, the UK became a member of the EEC. More than a year later there were general elections in the UK. This led to the formation of a Labour minority government. This led to new general elections in October 1974. Labour won and formed a government. This government organized a refererendum to see whether the UK should stay in the EEC. This referendum was held in June 1975, when the UK had been an EEC member for two and a half years. The result was that more than two thirds of the electorate voted to stay in the EEC. So, there never was any referendum to join the EEC. So, why should the fact that there never was a referendum to approve the adaptations to the EEC treaty to form the EC and EU be a relevant argument, when the decision to join the EEC in the first place was also only made by the UK government, with parliamentary approval? Rik

Help me out here. Did the UK actually hold a referendum before they joined the European Economic Community on January 1st 1973? Or was it the Edward Heath government that simply decided to join (backed by the democratically elected parliament)? Rik

Suppose the entire EW field would be playing in 4♠, going down several tricks. Then NS at this table are going to get a zero and EW are going to get a top, irrespective of what the TD decided to rule (correctly or incorrectly). Yet, you give NS 60% and EW 60%. That is a mistake. It may be difficult to come up with a non-artificial adjusted score, but it isn't impossible. Rik

The first paragraph of the statute: And "open land" is nicely defined: So, unless Yellowstone National Park is an incorporated city, town, approved subdivision or approved development, it is "open land". Entering Yellowstone National Park to "collect resource data" without permission of the owner is now defined as a new crime: "trespassing to collect resource data". No, since I live in a city. Well, I don't live in Wyoming, anyway. But "backyards" are typically found in residential areas: incorporated cities, towns, subdivisions. So, this law doesn't forbid anybody from taking samples from somebody's backyard. (Perhaps another law does, I don't know.) Rik

If I understood the statute correctly, I might already be getting in trouble if I, say, witnessed a kidnapping in Yellowstone National Park and submit my testimony in writing to the nearest sheriff's office. This is particularly true if I saw something odd happen and decided to "access Yellowstone National Park" to check out what was going on. After all, then I accessed Yellowstone National Park with the intent to collect data. Rik

I don't know why god has to be so boring, but the question seems off-topic. Rik