Actually, laws can be really effective even if they are only enforced intermittently.

I'm not sure how true this is.

If you consider low-stakes crimes, typically to get to a steady state of effectiveness you need at least some sort of bootstrapped period of ubiquitous enforcement. If that's impossible then I'm not sure you ever get to effectiveness.

If we're talking high-stakes, death-penalty-lottery-if-you-break-the-rules type stuff, then I think actually detection rate (i.e. consistent enforcement) is the biggest predictor of reduced rates, not severity of punishment.

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happytoexplain 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Sure, but even giving 100% of the benefit of the doubt you're raising, it still doesn't follow that it is purely "performative" to formally establish a rule just because it may soon become impossible to identify rule-breakers without whistle-blowers or intel.

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0x3f an hour ago | parent [-]

Well what purpose does the rule serve if it can't be enforced, if not signalling/norming?

	▲	happytoexplain an hour ago \| parent [-]
		Your premise is fallacious - at best, it is partially enforceable (like I said: whistle-blowers, intel), which gives it teeth (not necessarily much, but more than zero, which makes it useful to some non-zero extent). Even at worst, it expresses intent, which has meaning to humans. We are humans. I can't force you to do anything, but I can ask you to. Don't disparage what it means to be humans talking to each other - it's one of the few things we have left on Earth.