[Avodah] Rabbi Noach Isaac Oelbaum's Position on the Kosher Switch

[Zev Sero via Avodah]

On 04/16/2015 02:22 PM, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
> "The switch will fail in triggering the circuit"? What are they
> doing to introduce this second safeiq? The best I can tell, it's
> a simple bit of software -- a randomizer that says "don't respond
> anyway". But that's just guessing, I'm not good enough at reading their
> patent to be sure.

Yes, that's how I understood it.  If and when the pulse is received,
instead of automatically triggering the light to turn on, there's a
gatekeeper that flips a coin, heads it obeys the request to turn on
the light, tails it refuses.


> Also, in what sense is either a safeiq? Both will eventually happen,
> the question is when.

In principle it might not ever happen.

The basis of all this seems to be siman 277.  There the concern is that
even if the wind isn't blowing right now, it might start to blow
*immediately* as you begin to open the door.   This implies that if we
can be sure that it won't start blowing until some time after the door
has been opened it will be OK.  But that whole discussion assumes that
extinguishing the flame is not the purpose for which the door is being
opened, it's just a possible side-effect.  Is the halacha different if
that was the intention?


On 04/16/2015 02:46 PM, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
>
> AhS OC 514:11 (still catching up to the yomi schedule after Pesach) quotes
> the Rama (se'if 3) who in turn cites the Maharil that it's permissable
> to put a candle in a windy place on Yom Tov that it should be blown out,
> as long as the wind isn't blowing at the time you're taking it outside.
> The AhS explains, "For doing so before the wind comes -- that is
> *geram* kibui".

But there you're actively taking it to the place where the wind will blow.
Here you're merely opening the door, so that if/when the wind blows the door
won't protect the flame.


> But it's certainly not "iffy" that we could invoke sefeiq sefeiqa. It's a
> random length delay, not a doubt whether or not the switch will eventually
> cause the outcome. The odds the wind will never come, or the randomizer(s)
> will never produce a combination that causes the switch to be honored,
> is ignorably small. (No one is selling a switch that may or may not shut
> the light.)

Why not?  For the shabbos-keeping household, a switch that sometimes fails
is better than no switch at all.

-- 
Zev Sero
zev at sero.name