Resolution Criteria
This market resolves YES if historical records confirm that Christopher Columbus made landfall in the Americas on October 12, 1492. It resolves NO if historical evidence indicates he did not reach the Americas on that date.
Background
Christopher Columbus, an Italian explorer sailing under the Spanish flag, embarked on a westward voyage across the Atlantic Ocean in 1492, seeking a new route to Asia. On October 12, 1492, Columbus and his crew landed on an island in the Bahamas, which he named San Salvador. This marked the first documented European contact with the Caribbean since the Norse expeditions centuries earlier.
Considerations
Columbus did not actually reach the mainland of what is now the United States during this voyage, but rather landed on an island in the Bahamas.
Columbus believed he had reached the East Indies, not a new continent, which is why he referred to the indigenous peoples he encountered as "Indians."
The Americas were already inhabited by indigenous peoples for thousands of years before Columbus's arrival.
Some evidence suggests other Europeans, such as Norse explorer Leif Erikson, reached parts of North America around 500 years before Columbus.
1,000🏅 Top traders
| # | Name | Total profit |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ṁ141 | |
| 2 | Ṁ56 | |
| 3 | Ṁ43 | |
| 4 | Ṁ7 | |
| 5 | Ṁ5 |
This market resolves YES if historical records confirm that Christopher Columbus made landfall in the Americas on October 12, 1492.
I decided to search for historical records. In my search, I learned that no original copies of records from this voyage still exist, but there was a document produced in the mid 16th century based on (through some amount of indirection) the original records of the trip.
I located a book scan from the Library of Congress which claims to be a translation from that manuscript. Whether this entire chain of evidence is rock solid is probably a different question, but it appears to be generally accepted by society today.
On page 32 and continuing to page 37 is an account of the night of 11 October 1492 into the morning of 12 October 1492. The passage claims men from the expedition made landfall on an island that is part of the Americas, on 12 October 1492.
Although several market participants hold No shares and there was an effort by spiderduckpig in the comment section to advocate for a No resolution, I'm going to call this a blatantly misresolved market and resolve it Yes instead of the creator's original No resolution:
The creator appears to have used an AI tool to create this market, and the AI tool obviously has no idea what it is doing. It introduced contradictory information in the criteria which we cannot trust.
The creator does not seem to have any justification for resolving No.
Several market participants holding No shares appeared to be 'having fun' and 'making memes' in the comment section. I'm not convinced they were taking this seriously.
No one showed up with anything approaching "historical evidence" indicating he did not reach the Americas on this date (required for a No resolution)
If you're not happy about this, take it up with SirSalty.
@Eliza Hello, Sorry I've been not feeling well. I marked it as no, because the first use of the word America's wasn't until 1507. Christopher Columbus landed on a outcrop of land, that didn't exist to the old world until he did, the world wasn't named the Americans by the natives. He didn't land in the Americas. He landed on sand in the middle of the ocean. But if that's the wrong assumption then so be it. But my autistic brain thinks that's well fine answer. @Eliza do you get paid for this job? Because you better. I read every single message of yours and it's just the upmost professionalism. If I marked it wrong. I'm sorry.
@Hash breaking character for a moment, I genuinely think you're right, there is real ambiguity in whether he discovered anything (natives were already there), whether it was America (he reached islands not the mainland, and it hadn't been named America yet), and whether it was on that date (conflicting Julian and Gregorian calendars), so much do that I really do think NO or 50% would be more logical resolutions.
Arguably no further historical evidence is even needed since I'm reasonably sure the translation of the copy of the original expedition logs would corroborate the points about natives, it being an island, and it not yet being named America.
@SirSalty do you feel the re-resolution was correct?
@TheAllMemeingEye the criteria for a yes resolution only require landfall, not discovery. The journal-based texts back the landfall date. Everything else in the description is just some kind of (un-??)intentional hand-waving to confuse people.
You're right that everything else is up for debate, but the part under "resolution criteria" is going to carry the weight in the end.
@Hash not entirely clear what's going on here but make sure you have reviewed the community guidelines and understand your role as question creator. You're allowed to create and manage fun markets, but resolutions still need to be based on...something. The description here talks about things like historical evidence, but I don't see much of that going on in the comment section.
There's some chance you could get the benefit of the doubt the first time around, but if this becomes a repeat occurrence it will be under a lot of scrutiny.
@Eliza What do you mean by what happens next? Isn't the market just clearly misresolved? I don't have a stake in it.
@spiderduckpig the mod guidelines paint a very murky line between a "blatantly misresolved" market and a ""misresolved"" market. So asking the creator about their intentions is a reasonable step to take to evaluate the situation. I have an idea how this might turn out, but if I start taking a bunch of actions before the creator responds, things get even more confusing.
The market's title doesn't quite match the resolution criteria part, and no one seems to have presented the "historical evidence" in any convincing manner...but the creator can possibly clear this up. Also the market seemed to have the default 1 week closing date and perhaps the creator is unaware they could have chosen to leave trading open longer.
@Eliza It hasn't quite been 24 hours yet but at this point I'm going to unresolve the market and leave trading closed. The creator has not shown up to make any attempt at defending this resolution.
My understanding of the market, its title, and description indicates that this is not 'predicting' anything, so unless some participants in the comment section can explain what was being predicted more clearly.....here's my best attempt:
There is one reading where the market description was asking participants to bring forth historical evidence, but no one did so within the time the market was open. There was perhaps an argument to be made that the market would resolve No by default if no evidence was presented.
There is another reading where the title of the question makes no sense because it refers to a past time as if it was in the future. In this case, the market seems like it would resolve N/A. It would be a trivial resolution of something that already happened or some form of fraud on behalf of the market creator.
I'm sure some participants will show up now and attempt to provide historical evidence that this event happened on such date, but the market description really muddies the waters about what does and does not count.
The questions from the memeing eye were not answered/clarified
The questions from Stop Punting were not answered/clarified
The market closed with no evidence in the comments, or any other indication where to look for this evidence
Unless someone can show something very convincing, this seems destined to be N/A.
@Eliza Imo it's not that deep, the market creator just made a joke market and misresolved it, and it should obviously be reresolved to N/A or NO
@spiderduckpig the moderation guidelines give immense deference to market creators who resolve their own market. Joke or not, I'm giving everyone involved the opportunity to weigh in.
@Eliza I guess the resolution seems unambiguously wrong enough to me that I feel like it should just resolve to YES. The two other interpretations you provided seem too implausible.
When you say, "There is one reading where the market description was asking participants to bring forth historical evidence," I just can't see that here. The market description just says the resolution will be based on historical records, not records provided by Manifold users specifically.
And I feel like N/Aing a market based off of the title being in the wrong tense isn't something that mods would do in any other market, so why this one? Especially when the description correctly uses the past tense. "Discovers" is only two letters off from "discovered," and someone using an incorrect verb form isn't even that uncommon, especially among non-native speakers. Also, the market creator probably didn't even write this title, it looks like it was shortened automatically by that new "concise title" generator Manifold has implemented.
The resolution is trivial, and it's asking about a historical event that unambiguously happened — hence the controversy over the misresolution — but lots of markets can only ever honestly resolve one way, my understanding of guidelines is that they're only supposed to be unsubsidized.
Obviously I'm biased — I hold more YES shares than everyone else combined — but I think mods should go for the accurate resolution here rather than just cancelling the market.
@evan I couldn't find the market, but I remember there was a market about half a year ago that had a controversial resolution. The creator argued that he had proof for the resolution but couldn't post it on Manifold because that would be revealing official documents and some kind of crime. This is a different situation since the historical evidence is not a secret, but my point is that I think proof to resolve a market should be posted inside of the market, at least in cases when the resolution is controversial.
That said, I agree that this market should resolve YES. As stated in the description, "This market resolves YES if historical records confirm that Christopher Columbus made landfall in the Americas on October 12, 1492. It resolves NO if historical evidence indicates he did not reach the Americas on that date.". Note how the argument that the market would resolve NO by default does not apply here. No historical argument can be presented for NO, but there's proof for YES, and since at this point the market was unresolved and the discussion opened for what to do next, I think presenting the evidence for YES within this discussion should be allowed.
@Eliza behold this here majestic work of cartography by one Henricus Martellus Germanus
One beholdeth no such "Americas" yonder, for none doth exist, nay further evidence be required, this here market must be returned to the blessed and godly resolution of NAY at once.
If one insisteth upon a different resolution, then I instead advocate a compromise of fifty per cent, thusly may it account for the many crucial ambiguities I had raised in mine earlier letter, the answers to which very much would sway the verdict to either of YAY or NAY depending upon the market creator's revelations.
@evan As I noted above, I have to approach this with the mod guidelines in mind. Maybe you are accustomed to dealing with cowboy moderators elsewhere, but I'm going to consult the guidelines, apply them to what I see, and if you're not happy about it you can petition to change the guidelines. By unresolving the market I'm already pushing the boundaries of the guidelines!
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In this case, the creator chose a resolution that not everyone agrees with. The fact that the creator chose this resolution is very important in determining what to do next. If the creator had bailed and not offered any input, that would be a different situation.
What we have:
The market title
The description
The originally chosen market closing date
The choice of the creator to resolve the market No
No other comments or hints from the creator, even after pinging
The moderation guidelines give immense, broad, sweeping power to a creator on their own market, especially if the creator chooses a resolution themselves.
There are only ~three cases where I am allowed to unilaterally change the resolution to the opposite of what the creator did:
When is it okay to change the resolution of a market?
The creator “misresolves” the market but there is room for interpretation and it’s defensible, even if poorly. In these instances you can comment suggestions, but not change the resolution, and leave it at the creator’s discretion.
If the creator is a large benefactor of an ambiguously resolved market then give them the benefit of the doubt the first time with a warning unless it’s very obvious it’s fraudulent. If it’s fraudulent or a repeat infraction, N/A if ambiguous or correct it if there is a correct resolution and report it to the admins for potential fines/bans.
If it was a repeat incident of creating and resolving markets in questionable but defensible ways. In this case, it's the first time the creator has ever resolved a market, so we're not in that territory.
If it's "fraudulent". This could potentially apply in this case, but there is no evidence that the creator was aware they would benefit from resolving a certain way and they haven't done anything else on the site since resolving it. I don't see any evidence the creator set out to 'scam everyone' here. The guidelines say "very obvious" is the level we are looking for.
The creator blatantly misresolves the market - this means everyone agrees that the resolution is wrong based on the criteria. In these instances you can feel free to correct it and warn the creator.
If they "blatantly misresolve" the market. This provision must meet a very high bar! Only if "everyone agrees that the resolution is wrong based on the criteria". But we have 8 users holding No shares and also spiderduckpig in the comment section arguing it should resolve No. It's very far from 'everyone'. And the criteria are very hard to parse.
And I feel like N/Aing a market based off of the title being in the wrong tense isn't something that mods would do in any other market, so why this one?
Actually, that did happen only a month ago. But it was in coordination with a cooperative market creator who considered the suggestions of moderators and decided to change the resolution to N/A.
The key factors here and the things stopping me from just resolving it Yes as a 'blatant misresolution' are:
Eight users hold No shares in this market, compared to seven users holding Yes shares. It appears that it is far from 'everyone' who agrees this market should resolve Yes.
In the comment section, one uninvested user, spiderduckpig, thinks it should be either No or N/A.
A.) what is America, some techbro name for India?
B.) I was in Portuguese court when he presented his proposal, dude doesn't even know the difference between a Arabic mile and a Roman mile
C.) I would have said something, but he was too much of a dick that I'll be happy when he starves 2/3's of the way to India if he doesn't sink before then
D.) Even if he does "discover" the new route to India or whatever it would obviously be later than October 12th
for the intellectual stability of the realm, hoping the pope sends all YES holders to die on the next crusade
@StopPunting Pope Alexander VI was born under the crown of Aragon and has a good relation with Spain, so I find it unlikely that he would punish YES holders for having faith in the success of a mission under the Spanish flag. If anything, I'd wager he'll be willing to confirm the rights of the Spanish crown to whatever exclusive trade route or unknown lands Colombus might find, assuming he succeeds. I don't think we'll be having a crusade any time soon.
One doth recall that in the second volume of the annals of the creed of assassins, that His Holiness hath initially been referred to as "the Spaniard" for this very reason. I pray that no ill fate may befall him in these uncertain times.