Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The wire that transforms much of Manhattan into one big, symbolic home (2017)

atlasobscura.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 313 posts

Re: The wire that transforms much of Manhattan into one big, symbolic home (2017)

#51

Post by lmm »

shermantanktop wrote: post #50
lmm wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because under any normal circumstances we'd call this a trick? Like, imagine someone under house arrest trying to argue they were allowed to go all around Manhattan because of this wire - we'd quite rightly jail them for contempt.

Sure, after determining that the offered definition of “house” using the wire didn’t apply. That’s not a trick, that’s the system at work. The legal system and morality and all areas of any complexity require judgment and decision making. It might satisfy a certain type of person to have explicit, highly detailed mechanistic rules for human conduct, with no exceptions. But even where that’s been tried, 50 years passe…

> after determining that the offered definition of “house” using the wire didn’t apply. That’s not a trick, that’s the system at work.

> The legal system and morality and all areas of any complexity require judgment and decision making.

I don't think it requires much real judgement to say that a wire does not make a home and that whole area is not a single big home. This is not some finely balanced call that requires the greatest legal minds. Judges can and do strike or ignore definitions that pervert the meaning of a statute too far from the plain reading, and they're right to do so.

In areas of law - or of everyday life - that we take seriously, we would not tolerate such a twisted reading of a rule.

Re: The wire that transforms much of Manhattan into one big, symbolic home (2017)

#53

Post by tptacek »

femto wrote: post #24
pclmulqdq wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the Jewish tradition, nobody is tricking God. There's a long history of legalism in the religion - God sets out his commandments in language and you take that language at face value. Exact interpretation of that text is then debated by religious scholars, but the meaning of the words is entirely contained in the text. For Christians and those raised in the Christian tradition, this is entirely foreign. The rules a…

> For Christians and those raised in the Christian tradition, this is entirely foreign. I'd say it is quite familiar to Christianity. Canon Law mirrors the secular legal system, complete with its own lawyers, courts and so on. (Arguably, it's the other way around: secular Western law that mirrors Canon Law.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_law

At this point in the conversation I would like to once again point out that Catholics once considered beaver tails (but not beaver bodies) "fish" for purposes of meatless Fridays.

Re: The wire that transforms much of Manhattan into one big, symbolic home (2017)

#57

Post by defrost »

anduril22 wrote: post #52

[flagged]

> Do [ other groups ] get similar perks of using public space

Yes, it's public space.

> and encroaching on others?

An eruv wire looks just like any other wire strung on a pole, save it's and thinner, doesn't carry electricity or communications .. so it "encroaches" on your life just as much as any other utility wire .. even less if you spend little time in jewish neighbourhoods that actually string such things.

Re: The wire that transforms much of Manhattan into one big, symbolic home (2017)

#58

Post by gizmo686 »

lmm wrote: post #51
shermantanktop wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, after determining that the offered definition of “house” using the wire didn’t apply. That’s not a trick, that’s the system at work. The legal system and morality and all areas of any complexity require judgment and decision making. It might satisfy a certain type of person to have explicit, highly detailed mechanistic rules for human conduct, with no exceptions. But even where that’s been tried, 50 years passe…

> after determining that the offered definition of “house” using the wire didn’t apply. That’s not a trick, that’s the system at work. > The legal system and morality and all areas of any complexity require judgment and decision making. I don't think it requires much real judgement to say that a wire does not make a home and that whole area is not a single big home. This is not some finely balanced call that requires…

This has been litigated well over a thousand years ago. To put it in modern legal terms, the legitimacy of an Eruv is a super precedent. It is discussed in depth in the Talmud, which is the clearest source of Jewish law.

Even in modern law, courts can and do come up with some fairly peculiar readings at times. Particularly with old laws or the constitution itself which can, at times, be vague at best when applied in a modern context.

The rules that the Eruv is a loophole for do not even come from God. They come from the specific interpretation that has developed about those relatively vague laws.

There is an old "joke" in Judaism that God has no place in interpreting Jewish law. I put joke in quotes because the Oven of Akhnai is itself part of the Talmud and is generally read as establishing that exact principle.

This type of "trick" is foundational to both Judaism and every common law system.

Re: The wire that transforms much of Manhattan into one big, symbolic home (2017)

#59

Post by kennethrc »

vrosas wrote: post #22
egypturnash wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article really neglects to explain what an eruv is and why you would want it. Wikipedia's much more helpful: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eruv Basically if you are an observant Jew then you are forbidden from doing work on Saturdays. There are some extremely specific rules about what "work" is. One kind of forbidden work is taking things outside of your house; the eruv symbolically turns most of the city into "h…

My Jewish friend once told me, specifically discussing this wire, that Jews consider finding loopholes in their own rules a national pastime. The same thing goes for the hotels where someone is paid to wave their hand in front of automatic doors so the guests don't force the door to "work" for them or the elevators that run 24/7, stopping at every floor so they don't have to even work by pressing a button.

I've been a "Sabbath Goy" a couple of times for some of my friends :)

Re: The wire that transforms much of Manhattan into one big, symbolic home (2017)

#60

Post by jkaplowitz »

anduril22 wrote: post #52

[flagged]

From the article:

> The eruv is funded entirely by the Jewish community, with a considerable portion of that support coming from wealthy philanthropists.

So, no, you're not paying for this.

I'm quite sure that any religion that wanted to fund the cost and follow the proper permitting procedures could similarly run wires for religious purposes, otherwise NYC would have a First Amendment problem. But I don't think any other religions want to run wires for religious purposes.

And yes, other religions can and do use public space in myriad ways too. As for encroaching on others, the eruv doesn't really encroach on anyone - I'm a secular Jew who has lived in NYC for most of my life, and while I've heard about this before, I've never actually noticed it in person, even when I've probably been within eyesight of it.

Post reply on HN