Implicit Contracts

[jimmy]

@nibbler491

I hereby declare, from my position as supreme overlord of you lesser beings, that you, a year-old, are fit to manage yourself to some degree, but are not yet fit to make a decision of this sort soley on your own.

OK so here’s a trickier one. Imagine that you have the apparent consent of, say, a 5 year old girl to work in your brothel in Sydney (where prostitution is legal). In fact prostitution is not legal for 4 year olds in Sydney but do you agree or disagree that it should be (in view of the fact that it’s legal for 18 year old girls)?

Do you think a 5 year old girl is sufficiently mature to make a decision about whether or not she wants to be a prostitute or not? Do you think that it is reasonable to allow a 5 year old girl to enter into such contractual arrangements, providing both she and the other parties are cool with it?

A question like that should force you to check how far you’re willing to go with your argument… Is someone able to enter into contractual arrangements on anything and everything as soon as they’re able to give their apparent verbal or written consent? Or should we reserve the right to enter into contracts until people are somewhat less naive and, if so, on what grounds?

[scineram]

A 5 year old cannot be a prostitute.

[Brainpolice]

Hat tip to Juan and JC for pointing out that arbitrary local authoritarianism isn’t consistant with the NAP, that custom cannot be placed above NAP because that functionally annialiates its meaning and justifies total open-endedness.

[hayekianxyz]

BP, you’re making baseless assertions now. What is the prolem with implicit contracts? As for the social contract my point was that one does not need to reject implicit contracts in order to be able to refute implicit contracts. Rather one can refute it because it rejects the notion of self ownership that would be required to sign any contract. Moreover, it begs the very point in contention. Being implicit has nothing to do with it.

In any case, I’ve not ever claimed that legitimacy in ownership allows the owner to do what they wish. I believe if I invite you on to my property I have no right to stab you then and there. However it could well be an implict agreement that you have no right to use certain language or to use drugs on my property, despite this agreement not being explicit. The nature of what can be said to be agreed implicitely would be decided by private courts and local customs, and need not come into contradiction with the NAP.

No my attempt does not fail, implicit contracts are everywhere. If I lend you my car in return for $50 I needn’t tell you that you can’t crash in the meantime. The problem with the SC has nothing to do with the fact that it is allegedly implicit.

[hayekianxyz]

@nhaag

Either a contract is a consensual agreement to exchange or it is any form of human interaction.

What is the issue with the first definition, which I agree with? You and I may have a consensual agreement that you are allowed on to my property, need I list every action you are forbidden to do? Hardly.

@nhaag

In short, a contract is a spefic form of human interaction that aims on the exchange of goods, hence change in property in some way or another. Tresspassing is not a violation of a contract but rather a violation of property rights.

What is the issue? If you come on to my property, I am giving you the good of being on my property. Clearly, I own it and I am letting you use it. It is an exchange on goods, only, you are not giving me a good hence it is more similar to a gift, regardless, it is a contract.

@nhaag

An implicit contract is like non frozen icecream.

How so? A good example is dealing with corporations, in dealing with corporation I implicit agree not to go after the shareholders should I wish to sue the corporation.

[hayekianxyz]

@JCFolsom

@nhaag

Stealing the meatball, and it was theft, regardless whether he was aware of it or not, is a crime. Where is the issue? A second question is what a proper compensation for this crime might be. Again, this quesion has nothing to do with law of the land, but with what has to be done to compensate the victim.

For something to be a crime, you must violate another’s rights either negligently or with intent. If an exploding transformer blows me onto your lawn, I have not tresspassed because it was not my action which caused me to be on your lawn. Likewise, if I have your meatball because you put it in my hand, I have not stolen it. You stole from yourself, as it were, by assuming I’d know about and agree to your nonsensical “implied” contract. If there is any theft here, it comes from your negligence, not mine.

Hardly, there was an implicit contract that in exchange for the meatball you give me money. Now, as you said, you rejected this. In which case you must reject the contract entirely. If he is still offering you the meatball, he has the subjective intention of exchanging that for money, clearly not giving it to you for free. You can assume otherwise or reject the contract. If you assume otherwise and turn out mistaken, ignorance is no excuse and you must pay him compensation for accepting a contract in which you had no intention of holding up your side of the deal. It is fraud, regardless of whether or not you intended it to be so.