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Unexpected things that are people

bengoldhaber.substack.com

111–120 of 312 posts

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#111

The first example about ships is inaccurate. A ship isn't treated as a person in the law; it's treated as the thing that it is. There's a specific type of jurisdiction known as "in rem" ("over the thing") that differs from the typical "in personam" ("over the person") that gives the Court the ability to dispose of property without needing jurisdiction over its owner (otherwise known as an ex parte case). These differ…

Exactly. I expected reference to all sorts of things that have been held at customs. I remember one old case titled something like "New York v. a shipment of dildos." I also remember some state law where guns were 'persons'. If cops wanted to destroy siezed guns they had to go to court, where the guns would be represented by a lawyer who would argue for sale over destruction. (Arizona iirc)

Damn dildos get more representation than me.

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the US, a corporation needs a business bank account, and that account must be registered to one or more corporate officers with legal identification.

You absolutely do not need a bank account for an LLC. It makes accounting easier, but it's not a requirement.

In Czechia, you need a specific sort of account to start a LLC, an account that is only used to contain the initial capital.

The bank will issue a confirmation to the notary that the money is present in that account, the notary will sign the founding papers, and the account is then liquidated again. You can take the money out, or move it to [different] regular account, or have none and operate in cash, as long as your transactions don't exceed a certain limit.

The exception is when you become a VAT payer. In that moment, you have to have at least one bank account. IIRC VAT registration is only required if your yearly revenue exceeds approx. 70 thousand dollars.

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amusingly enough, corporate personhood is one relatively straightforward pathway for a capable AGI to attain legal personhood. No novel legislation required. Just some legal grey areas and a whole lot of scheming.

Good for the AI (though who are its stockholders or the members of its board of directors?), but not so great, perhaps, for all the individuals who enabled it, who might now all be deemed to be partners in a general partnership with the AI and therefore jointly liable for the acts and liabilities of all the other partners.

A sufficiently long circle of corporations would be difficult to follow. Corporations can in some jurisdictions be secretary or indeed directors.

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#114

Thought provoking. Most people who (quite reasonably) hate corporate personhood would probably have a knee-jerk reaction that personhood for a river can/should be normalized. The thing with temples stems ultimately from fairly practical matters if they hold such treasure, but it's a magnet for strife, and actually kind of surprising that in the case-study mentioned they resisted the opportunity to justify abuse of po…

> Most people who (quite reasonably) hate corporate personhood would probably have a knee-jerk reaction that personhood for a river can/should be normalized. Only if/because they are reading too much into the concept of legal personhood. A thing being a person doesn't mean the thing is equivalent to a human or that it has every right that every human has. It generally just means that the law attributes certain rights…

Its just not logical to argue, either they are or they arent.

For instance, corporations can be bought or sold, but people cannot per the 13th amendment.

Help me understand how these inconsistent principles are allowed in the supposedly rigorous logic of the legal system

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#115

The first example about ships is inaccurate. A ship isn't treated as a person in the law; it's treated as the thing that it is. There's a specific type of jurisdiction known as "in rem" ("over the thing") that differs from the typical "in personam" ("over the person") that gives the Court the ability to dispose of property without needing jurisdiction over its owner (otherwise known as an ex parte case). These differ…

I am continually baffled by the "logic" behind laws and the justice system. If corporations are people, then how can they be bought or sold considering the 13th amendment? How can money be speech, if the constitution allows congress to regulate commerce, but prohibits it from abridging speech. It just seems like in a common law system we're forced to live with half-assed arguments that corporate lawyers dreamed up wh…

Composition, not inheritance.

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. I expected reference to all sorts of things that have been held at customs. I remember one old case titled something like "New York v. a shipment of dildos." I also remember some state law where guns were 'persons'. If cops wanted to destroy siezed guns they had to go to court, where the guns would be represented by a lawyer who would argue for sale over destruction. (Arizona iirc)

In most of the world, "a shipment of dildos" cannot be a participant of a trial, this is a US curiosity.

But nearly every country will put an empty chair on trial (in absentia). Dead people can also sometimes be represented in tort cases. Historically, kings and traitors have even been dug up to appear in court after death, literally. And the US regularly puts pre-verbal children on trial (immigration courts). Compared to that, the crate of dildos seams downright normal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadaver_Synod

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. I expected reference to all sorts of things that have been held at customs. I remember one old case titled something like "New York v. a shipment of dildos." I also remember some state law where guns were 'persons'. If cops wanted to destroy siezed guns they had to go to court, where the guns would be represented by a lawyer who would argue for sale over destruction. (Arizona iirc)

In most of the world, "a shipment of dildos" cannot be a participant of a trial, this is a US curiosity.

I believe that in most parts of the world you will regularly find shipments of dildos participating in trials.

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am continually baffled by the "logic" behind laws and the justice system. If corporations are people, then how can they be bought or sold considering the 13th amendment? How can money be speech, if the constitution allows congress to regulate commerce, but prohibits it from abridging speech. It just seems like in a common law system we're forced to live with half-assed arguments that corporate lawyers dreamed up wh…

The law is very much like a programming language in that it is attempting to abstract a concept from practice, so that it is useful in many applications instead of just one. In both cases these abstractions are always flawed. In the law's case, that's why we have judges.

The problem is judges, especially in a common law system.

Computers follow the machine code PERFECTLY. For the legal system judges get to embark on a jazz odyssey of bullshit.

Were living in an easy to track, decades long legal conspiracy to abuse power for corporations - based on the Powell memo.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLYoqcr7bAIs7kdyMhh-9m...

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#119

The first example about ships is inaccurate. A ship isn't treated as a person in the law; it's treated as the thing that it is. There's a specific type of jurisdiction known as "in rem" ("over the thing") that differs from the typical "in personam" ("over the person") that gives the Court the ability to dispose of property without needing jurisdiction over its owner (otherwise known as an ex parte case). These differ…

The first example was corporations which also aren’t people because that isn’t what corporate personhood means.

Re: Unexpected things that are people

#120

The first example about ships is inaccurate. A ship isn't treated as a person in the law; it's treated as the thing that it is. There's a specific type of jurisdiction known as "in rem" ("over the thing") that differs from the typical "in personam" ("over the person") that gives the Court the ability to dispose of property without needing jurisdiction over its owner (otherwise known as an ex parte case). These differ…

I am continually baffled by the "logic" behind laws and the justice system. If corporations are people, then how can they be bought or sold considering the 13th amendment? How can money be speech, if the constitution allows congress to regulate commerce, but prohibits it from abridging speech. It just seems like in a common law system we're forced to live with half-assed arguments that corporate lawyers dreamed up wh…

A corporation is a person, not a human. Person is an abstraction used by law, but it has no direct relation to a human being.
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