What do lawyers do? • Hacker News Board

Re: What do lawyers do?

#111

Post by adrianmonk » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 6:34 PM UTC

t_mann wrote: post #83

> Law is an impressionistic business, much less scientific than macroeconomics or inflation management Not sure if this is an intended jab at economists or just an ironic misconception. Macroeconomics is arguably the academic discipline with the worst track record in terms of prediction, and inflation is the biggest mystery within there. I remember in 2014, then ECB president Mario Draghi was asked whether stimulus m…

I don't see how saying "my professional (law) is worse than that other profession (macroeconomics)" is a jab.

A jab would be the other way around: "the only thing worse than my profession is that other profession".

Re: What do lawyers do?

#112

Post by adrianmonk » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 6:36 PM UTC

atwood22 wrote: post #16

berberous wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have some sort of personal dislike for the period?

His lawyer advised him not to end sentences.

I thought lawyers usually focus on not starting them.

Re: What do lawyers do?

#113

Post by billyhoffman » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 6:36 PM UTC

rgifford wrote: post #101

throwaway5752 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great point. The difficult thing, on this forum, is it is weighted towards younger and very accomplished computer scientists. Sometimes the impulse, when seeing complexity that's hard to understand (medicine, regulation, law), is to be frustrated and dismiss it. Law is amazing and much older than programming, and one of the underrated human inventions. The fact we aren't constantly killing each other over small dispu…

> Law is amazing and much older than programming... And boy does it show. Recent events have me examining The Supreme Court and American law from a programmers perspective. And let me tell you, there are warts: The Supreme Court is comprised of lifelong appointees, mostly in the dwindling twilight of their cognitive ability. This made sense when we didn't understand cognitive decline. Now with the rapid pace of techn…

I understand what you are saying about declining cognitive abilities, and don’t necessarily disagree. However the lifetime appointment of US Supreme Court justices is a purposeful designed feature, not a bug. It is to foster an independent justice branch that is not beholden to the president that appointed them, because the justice can simply “outlast” the presidents term

Re: What do lawyers do?

#114

Post by staticman2 » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 6:40 PM UTC

_rutinerad wrote: post #110

staticman2 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"A great lawyer can achieve a settlement against a party like this without the need to throw sacks of cash onto a firepit." A lawyer, good or bad, has no control whether the other party settles.

In the same way that a parent has no control over whether their child goes to sleep.

The lawyer can control whether the opposing party settles in the same way I can control whether you retract you post and concede I was correct.

Re: What do lawyers do?

#115

Post by staticman2 » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 6:42 PM UTC

shon wrote: post #108

staticman2 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"A great lawyer can achieve a settlement against a party like this without the need to throw sacks of cash onto a firepit." A lawyer, good or bad, has no control whether the other party settles.

This is incorrect in my experience. My company was sued by LinkedIn about a year after receiving a $1MM seed round. We were low on money with about $250K left and raising when the suit hit. This is a game of leverage. Lawyers are tools that have to be used effectively to apply leverage. Like any tool, good ones make a big difference. At the time LI was worth about $30 Billion, we had $250K. We convinced LinkedIn to s…

If Linkedin decided they wanted to put you out of business the lawyer would not be able to arrange a settlement. A lawyer does not even control whether their own client settles.

Re: What do lawyers do?

#116

Post by Sharlin » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 6:44 PM UTC

AlbertCory wrote: post #73

Sharlin wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Goes to show that theoretical knowledge doesn't nearly always correlate well (or at all) with practical skill, and vice versa.

You're assuming the barrister doesn't have theoretical knowledge, which I can tell you from experience is not true. Good lawyers have an incredible ability to grasp the theoretical underpinnings of almost anything very, very quickly.

Hm? I meant the exact opposite. The barrister in the GP's anecdote had intricate theoretical knowledge of a very technical subject matter, despite not being able (or not bothering) to debug a simple Wi-Fi problem, which surprised the GP.

Re: What do lawyers do?

#117

Post by TheOtherHobbes » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 6:51 PM UTC

rgifford wrote: post #101

throwaway5752 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great point. The difficult thing, on this forum, is it is weighted towards younger and very accomplished computer scientists. Sometimes the impulse, when seeing complexity that's hard to understand (medicine, regulation, law), is to be frustrated and dismiss it. Law is amazing and much older than programming, and one of the underrated human inventions. The fact we aren't constantly killing each other over small dispu…

> Law is amazing and much older than programming... And boy does it show. Recent events have me examining The Supreme Court and American law from a programmers perspective. And let me tell you, there are warts: The Supreme Court is comprised of lifelong appointees, mostly in the dwindling twilight of their cognitive ability. This made sense when we didn't understand cognitive decline. Now with the rapid pace of techn…

You misunderstand. Law is about persuasion - which is to say it's a combination of marketing, power plays, intimidation, theatrical performance, bureaucratic procedure, and politics.

The logical (verbal) reasoning element is only relevant in those situations where it can be used as a tool of persuasion. It's not the only tool, and it isn't even the most powerful one.

It is absolutely nothing like coding in any sense at all.

For example - term limits seem like an obvious solution. But how would they be administered? For whose benefit? Who chooses replacements? How often, and in what circumstances? How would recalls and impeachments work?

Legislation would have to cover all of those details and more. And the people writing the legislation would be lawyers.

Because you can't just wave a hand and say "term limits, yeh?" and expect that to solve anything.

Re: What do lawyers do?

#118

Post by shon » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 6:58 PM UTC

staticman2 wrote: post #115

shon wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is incorrect in my experience. My company was sued by LinkedIn about a year after receiving a $1MM seed round. We were low on money with about $250K left and raising when the suit hit. This is a game of leverage. Lawyers are tools that have to be used effectively to apply leverage. Like any tool, good ones make a big difference. At the time LI was worth about $30 Billion, we had $250K. We convinced LinkedIn to s…

If Linkedin decided they wanted to put you out of business the lawyer would not be able to arrange a settlement. A lawyer does not even control whether their own client settles.

You think so? Read the case. “LinkedIn v. Robocog”. If you think they let us go out of the kindness of their hearts, I’m interested in hearing more of your thoughts

Also, I didn’t say lawyers control settling. I said they’re tools that can be used to achieve an outcome. And the good ones are very helpful. Force multipliers.

Ours were experts in IP law. They knew it well. We used them along with other leverage points to achieve our settlement.

Re: What do lawyers do?

#119

Post by JumpCrisscross » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 6:59 PM UTC

billyhoffman wrote: post #113

rgifford wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Law is amazing and much older than programming... And boy does it show. Recent events have me examining The Supreme Court and American law from a programmers perspective. And let me tell you, there are warts: The Supreme Court is comprised of lifelong appointees, mostly in the dwindling twilight of their cognitive ability. This made sense when we didn't understand cognitive decline. Now with the rapid pace of techn…

I understand what you are saying about declining cognitive abilities, and don’t necessarily disagree. However the lifetime appointment of US Supreme Court justices is a purposeful designed feature, not a bug. It is to foster an independent justice branch that is not beholden to the president that appointed them, because the justice can simply “outlast” the presidents term

> that is not beholden to the president that appointed them, because the justice can simply “outlast” the presidents term

And to ensure they aren’t beholden to the guy promising them their next job. Compromise could be you become a nonvoting member of the Court after a certain age. You can ask questions at trial, deliberate with other members, et cetera. But you don’t sign opinions or dissents.

Re: What do lawyers do?

#120

Post by rgifford » Sat, Jul 02, 2022, 7:07 PM UTC

billyhoffman wrote: post #113

rgifford wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Law is amazing and much older than programming... And boy does it show. Recent events have me examining The Supreme Court and American law from a programmers perspective. And let me tell you, there are warts: The Supreme Court is comprised of lifelong appointees, mostly in the dwindling twilight of their cognitive ability. This made sense when we didn't understand cognitive decline. Now with the rapid pace of techn…

I understand what you are saying about declining cognitive abilities, and don’t necessarily disagree. However the lifetime appointment of US Supreme Court justices is a purposeful designed feature, not a bug. It is to foster an independent justice branch that is not beholden to the president that appointed them, because the justice can simply “outlast” the presidents term

> However the lifetime appointment of US Supreme Court justices is a purposeful designed feature...

It was a feature in a time when white men lived, on average, to the ripe old age of 38.

I'm tired of treating anything the founding fathers came up with as sacred. Different time, completely different context. Economics, psychology, and almost all of STEM didn't even exist then. They did not know what they were doing. They got lucky in almost every regard.

Keep in mind in all of human history only about 1/4 of violent revolutions are successful, many that "succeeded" left all parties involved much worse off. America, especially in its inception, was an incredible anomaly that far too many paint as something more in the name of American exceptionalism.

EDIT: Look, our legislature is a complete and abject failure. It's completely gridlocked, arguably by the design of private interests. If it were working to reflect popular interest, I imagine American law and government would look very different. I don't think any of what I'm suggesting here would be even slightly controversial to be quite honest.