Exceptions (which I think is what you mean by edge cases) DO indicate that a rule is incomplete or not universal.
Yes! But rules don’t have to be complete or universal to be acceptable.
Rules about people should be more formally correct than is implied by this post.
I think I see what you’re getting at. My instinct kinda runs the other way, though: if people don’t fit neatly into categories (and you care about the edge cases), it might be better to throw out the rule entirely rather than formalize it and categorize those edge cases. Could you give an example of where formalizing would be helpful?
Certainly in actual legislation, formalizing the criteria so that there are no exceptions is wise. This is often equivalent to throwing out the rule and rethinking why you’re considering it in the first place, so as to have a more legible description of who it applies to.
Yes! But rules don’t have to be complete or universal to be acceptable.
I think I see what you’re getting at. My instinct kinda runs the other way, though: if people don’t fit neatly into categories (and you care about the edge cases), it might be better to throw out the rule entirely rather than formalize it and categorize those edge cases. Could you give an example of where formalizing would be helpful?
Certainly in actual legislation, formalizing the criteria so that there are no exceptions is wise. This is often equivalent to throwing out the rule and rethinking why you’re considering it in the first place, so as to have a more legible description of who it applies to.
To take a non-hotbutton topic, this is the very simple version of a rule for whether something is “prepared food” in Washington State and thus is taxed differently from groceries: https://dor.wa.gov/education/industry-guides/restaurants-and-retailers-prepared-food/retail-sales-tax. There are pages of details and exceptions to the exceptions in the actual legislation and case law around it.