[MG] Multiple Proxies

[Steve Coffman]

Hi Scott, et al,

Any decentralized online governance system that provides access to local, regional, international and global referendums will likely have more proposals scheduled for deliberation and a vote, at any given time, than any individual or small group of individuals could rationally and practically respond to in a timely and reliable manner.

It seems to me that citizens wanting to participate *at all levels* of discussion and decision-making would need to enlist a small army of proxies in order to cover all of their bases in any form of global democracy. Personally, I don’t yet see a problem with this...but I’m wondering how others might imagine this playing out.

I think having a battery of proxies for the various geographical and topical regions or sectors one belongs to would be a solution to the overburden of research and participation one would necessarily encounter at this scale of involvement.

One might employ a proxy for local issues (with perhaps a backup should their first choice be unavailable) and several more for regional (environmental, political, scientific, social, technological, etc) issues and concerns. Ones proxy choice for environmental issues may be unconcerned with educational issues, or be so involved in the environmental arena that they just don’t have time to track anything else in a reasonable or acceptable manner.

Your thoughts?

Steve

[Edward Pastore]

Hi, Steve.

This is something like what I had originally envisioned for this project: that we would have governance systems for each natural unit of humanity. The two easiest units to define are civilization centers (metro areas, small cities, towns, etc.) and ecoregions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecoregion <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecoregion> That’s one layer for where people aggregate and another layer for regional natural environments.

However, the group had a better idea, which was to not try to cram governance systems into pre-defined categories. Instead, they could be organic: a governance system applies to any group of people trying to make a decision together.

If a company wants permission to build a nuclear reactor in a community; the decision should be made by a consensus of the local community, the power company and its shareholders, the people in the surrounding climates who may be affected by it, and anyone else in the world who has a concern about it one way or another. There’s no good reason to restrict a decision like that to only the people of one local community (who, for example, can be bought off).

In an open system where any interested party can participate, things only happen when all those people reach the best decision together. The nuclear power company can’t bully itself into a community; but it can work with everyone who has a concern and find a great way to build their facility that everyone’s happy with. It may take longer, but the result will be worth the wait.

Post by Steve Coffman
Hi Scott, et al,
Any decentralized online governance system that provides access to local, regional, international and global referendums will likely have more proposals scheduled for deliberation and a vote, at any given time, than any individual or small group of individuals could rationally and practically respond to in a timely and reliable manner.
It seems to me that citizens wanting to participate *at all levels* of discussion and decision-making would need to enlist a small army of proxies in order to cover all of their bases in any form of global democracy. Personally, I don’t yet see a problem with this...but I’m wondering how others might imagine this playing out.
I think having a battery of proxies for the various geographical and topical regions or sectors one belongs to would be a solution to the overburden of research and participation one would necessarily encounter at this scale of involvement.
One might employ a proxy for local issues (with perhaps a backup should their first choice be unavailable) and several more for regional (environmental, political, scientific, social, technological, etc) issues and concerns. Ones proxy choice for environmental issues may be unconcerned with educational issues, or be so involved in the environmental arena that they just don’t have time to track anything else in a reasonable or acceptable manner.
Your thoughts?
Steve
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[Scott Raney]

On Sun, Dec 3, 2017 at 2:29 PM, Edward Pastore

Post by Edward Pastore
If a company wants permission to build a nuclear reactor in a community; the
decision should be made by a consensus of the local community, the power
company and its shareholders, the people in the surrounding climates who may
be affected by it, and anyone else in the world who has a concern about it
one way or another. There’s no good reason to restrict a decision like that
to only the people of one local community (who, for example, can be bought
off).

So what? You're going to deny them the right to do what they want
within their community? Sounds pretty authoritarian to me.

I'd propose just the opposite: If even a simple majority of them want
to accept a payment that will allow some company to turn their
locality into a chemical or nuclear wasteland, it's not up to us
outsiders to tell them they can't do that. Furthermore I believe we'd
be obligated to help them remove and relocate the resisters. Living in
civilization obligates each of us to do certain things, and what those
things are can be ascertained by simply taking a vote (although of
course that vote must ascertain the preferences of 100% of the
population, not just the "active participants").

Post by Edward Pastore
In an open system where any interested party can participate, things only
happen when all those people reach the best decision together. The nuclear
power company can’t bully itself into a community; but it can work with
everyone who has a concern and find a great way to build their facility that
everyone’s happy with. It may take longer, but the result will be worth the
wait.

Wrong: What you're (again) proposing is dictatorship: When The People
are forced to try to live within a system that doesn't work (i.e.,
doesn't render decisions that benefit them) they inevitably end up
electing Hitler or Trump or some other authoritarian who promises to
"drain the swamp" or whatever will get them out of their current rut.

While I try to give the proponents of "consensus" like Ed the benefit
of the doubt, I often find it hard to believe that anyone could be
that ignorant and naive. I inevitably end up entertaining the
possibility that deep down they really are just authoritarians and
*want* the system to fail so that some "Great Leader" can come along
and tell them what to do. This post combined with his last post (his
characterization that automatically calculating proxies is "forcing"
people to vote) is just another example of that: Ed doesn't want a
system that gives equal weight to each individual's preferences, he
wants a system where the best and the brightest (the "active
participants") make all the decisions, and to hell with the rest of
us.
Regards,
Scott

[Edward Pastore]

Replying to both.

Post by Scott Raney
Essentially what you're proposing is a
plutocracy: A system where a small group of people who "care" about an
issue enough to overcome their inertia are allowed to make the
decision regardless of its effect on the vast majority of the
population.

I am not saying that at all. You are assuming that decision-making is quick and final. I am describing a system where it is slow and flexible. If a group of interested people are starting to decide to build a nuclear power plant and then someone else notices and decides that they don’t want it to happen, they can join in and break the consensus. The people who care about an issue are not a static, small group, when you look at a long-term consensus-building process.

Post by Scott Raney
On Sun, Dec 3, 2017 at 2:29 PM, Edward Pastore

Post by Edward Pastore
If a company wants permission to build a nuclear reactor in a community; the
decision should be made by a consensus of the local community, the power
company and its shareholders, the people in the surrounding climates who may
be affected by it, and anyone else in the world who has a concern about it
one way or another. There’s no good reason to restrict a decision like that
to only the people of one local community (who, for example, can be bought
off).

So what? You're going to deny them the right to do what they want
within their community? Sounds pretty authoritarian to me.

It’s not authoritarian, it’s good governance. If people in Portugal want to build a dangerous nuclear power plant that could sent radiation all over Spain… you’re saying the people of Spain should have no say in that decision? What if the people of Chicago want to enslave the people of Indiana? Good governance has to be distributed to all people who care about any decision.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Edward Pastore
In an open system where any interested party can participate, things only
happen when all those people reach the best decision together. The nuclear
power company can’t bully itself into a community; but it can work with
everyone who has a concern and find a great way to build their facility that
everyone’s happy with. It may take longer, but the result will be worth the
wait.

Wrong: What you're (again) proposing is dictatorship: When The People
are forced to try to live within a system that doesn't work (i.e.,
doesn't render decisions that benefit them) they inevitably end up
electing Hitler or Trump or some other authoritarian who promises to
“drain the swamp" or whatever will get them out of their current rut.

Well, I am arguing that deliberative consensus-building by all interested parties inherently renders good decisions. It has to. I am not saying compromise, I am saying consensus: something that is a win for everyone.

Post by Scott Raney
While I try to give the proponents of "consensus" like Ed the benefit
of the doubt, I often find it hard to believe that anyone could be
that ignorant and naive. I inevitably end up entertaining the
possibility that deep down they really are just authoritarians and
*want* the system to fail so that some "Great Leader" can come along
and tell them what to do. This post combined with his last post (his
characterization that automatically calculating proxies is "forcing"
people to vote) is just another example of that: Ed doesn't want a
system that gives equal weight to each individual's preferences, he
wants a system where the best and the brightest (the "active
participants") make all the decisions, and to hell with the rest of
us.

Please try to be more civil. I am respectful of you. Even though I disagree with you, I don’t think you are evil or ignorant (both words you used in reference to me). I think we just haven’t learned how to properly communicate with each other. Let’s get there, please.

You are asserting that everyone has an interest in every decision that may affect them. Frankly, I don’t care if the road outside my home has more parking on it or less.I don’t have a car and I don’t want to have to spend one moment of thought on the issue, and am very happy to cede that decision to people who care. If however, I learn that my neighbors are starting to propose that garbage trucks should park outside my house all night every night, well then I might decide to jump into the conversation and sway the consensus away from that action. That paradigm gives me complete power in things I care about, and doesn’t bother me with things that I don’t care about at all. There are billions of public decisions that affect my community. No way can I participate in all of them; nor can I choose a proxy who will think like I do in all of them.

[Scott Raney]

On Sun, Dec 3, 2017 at 9:16 PM, Edward Pastore

Post by Edward Pastore
I am not saying that at all. You are assuming that decision-making is quick and final. I am describing a system where it is slow and flexible. If a group of interested people are starting to decide to build a nuclear power plant and then someone else notices and decides that they don’t want it to happen, they can join in and break the consensus. The people who care about an issue are not a static, small group, when you look at a long-term consensus-building process.

Right, so if the reactor is half built and a few people change their
minds (or a few new people chime in), the process just stops until a
new consensus is reached. That's not social engineering or public
policy decisionmaking, it's anarchy (in the "breakdown of
civilization" sense of the word).

Post by Edward Pastore
It’s not authoritarian, it’s good governance. If people in Portugal want to build a dangerous nuclear power plant that could sent radiation all over Spain… you’re saying the people of Spain should have no say in that decision? What if the people of Chicago want to enslave the people of Indiana? Good governance has to be distributed to all people who care about any decision.

I love this quote because it perfectly captures what elitists use to
justify their elitism: You can't trust the people to make good
decisions, so you need a filter (in your case "activism" based on
"caring") to determine who's voices get heard and who's can safely be
ignored.

Post by Edward Pastore
Well, I am arguing that deliberative consensus-building by all interested parties inherently renders good decisions. It has to. I am not saying compromise, I am saying consensus: something that is a win for everyone.

And what if only 1% of the population participates in the process? How
does your proposal ensure that "everyone" is represented?

Post by Edward Pastore
Please try to be more civil. I am respectful of you. Even though I disagree with you, I don’t think you are evil or ignorant (both words you used in reference to me). I think we just haven’t learned how to properly communicate with each other. Let’s get there, please.

I disagree: I see your willful ignorance and promotion of half-baked
ideas to be a serious problem and would prefer that either you educate
yourself to the point where you don't say irrational and
scientifically indefensible things or at least stop promoting things
you haven't bother to think through the repercussions of. It's not a
communication problem: What you're doing is not just wasting your time
(and mine), it's actually actively hampering the progress of
civilization.

An analogy: While it's tempting to consider the election of Trump (or
Hitler), the failure of the US federal government to pass any
significant legislation in the past year, and the data reported in
books like "Stealth Democracy" and "Democracy for Realists" to be
signs of the coming apocalypse, I see them as energy, like the flow of
wind. Our job is to design an airfoil such that sticking it out into
that wind will cause it to lift all of us. That's what proxyfor.me is
intended to be. But to extend the analogy, your posts, and the
promotions of organizations like https://www.democracy.earth/ and
https://thenextsystem.org are like ice crystals in the wind: Not only
are they not examples of a lifting body, by promoting unreasonable
(and IMHO irrational) expectations, they stick to anything that
actually *could* generate lift and prevent it from working as
designed. Which is sad because these "snowflake" proposals in fact are
not really "designed" at all, but merely pulled out of the asses of
people who fancy themselves as social engineers even though they have
no experience or education in the field, nor do they apparently even
recognize that their vast ignorance is a problem (i.e, it's the
Dunning-Kruger effect).

Post by Edward Pastore
You are asserting that everyone has an interest in every decision that may affect them. Frankly, I don’t care if the road outside my home has more parking on it or less.I don’t have a car and I don’t want to have to spend one moment of thought on the issue, and am very happy to cede that decision to people who care.

Right, just like you don't own slaves and aren't likely to be captured
and sold into slavery and so should have no say on the subject. And
you're not a woman and so can't get pregnant, so the issue of abortion
doesn't really affect you and so your opinion can safely be ignored
(or if you're a Catholic and so do have a strong opinion on the issue,
your vote ought to be weighted proportionally to the strength of your
feelings). A properly functioning civilization requires *all* of us to
participate in *every* public policy decision to ensure that each one
is both fair and functional. Promoting a system that abdicates this
responsibility IMHO this is simply an ignorant, irresponsible, and
frankly evil thing to do.

Post by Edward Pastore
If however, I learn that my neighbors are starting to propose that garbage trucks should park outside my house all night every night, well then I might decide to jump into the conversation and sway the consensus away from that action. That paradigm gives me complete power in things I care about, and doesn’t bother me with things that I don’t care about at all. There are billions of public decisions that affect my community. No way can I participate in all of them; nor can I choose a proxy who will think like I do in all of them.

Exactly, which is why instead of promoting BS in your posts you ought
to take a few hours to try to understand how https://www.proxyfor.me/
works (read the help system, and then *all* of the scientific research
it points to) and maybe realize that it solves both of these problems.
Or if you subsequently come to think you've found a reason that it
doesn't at least you'll be in a position to offer constructive
criticism of it and participate in the development of an improvement.
Wasn't that the purpose of your setting up metagovernment.org in the
first place?
Regards,
Scott

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Manage subscription: http://metagovernment.

[Mark Giza]

Good idea

Post by Edward Pastore
Hi, Steve.
that we would have governance systems for each natural unit of humanity.
The two easiest units to define are civilization centers (metro areas,
small cities, towns, etc.) and ecoregions: https://en.
wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecoregion That’s one layer for where people aggregate
and another layer for regional natural environments.
However, the group had a better idea, which was to not try to cram
governance systems into pre-defined categories. Instead, they could be
organic: a governance system applies to any group of people trying to make
a decision together.
If a company wants permission to build a nuclear reactor in a community;
the decision should be made by a consensus of the local community, the
power company and its shareholders, the people in the surrounding climates
who may be affected by it, and anyone else in the world who has a concern
about it one way or another. There’s no good reason to restrict a decision
like that to only the people of one local community (who, for example, can
be bought off).
In an open system where any interested party can participate, things only
happen when all those people reach the best decision together. The nuclear
power company can’t bully itself into a community; but it can work with
everyone who has a concern and find a great way to build their facility
that everyone’s happy with. It may take longer, but the result will be
worth the wait.
Hi Scott, et al,
Any decentralized online governance system that provides access to local,
regional, international and global referendums will likely have more
proposals scheduled for deliberation and a vote, at any given time, than
any individual or small group of individuals could rationally and
practically respond to in a timely and reliable manner.
It seems to me that citizens wanting to participate *at all levels* of
discussion and decision-making would need to enlist a small army of proxies
in order to cover all of their bases in any form of global democracy.
Personally, I don’t yet see a problem with this...but I’m wondering how
others might imagine this playing out.
I think having a battery of proxies for the various geographical and
topical regions or sectors one belongs to would be a solution to the
overburden of research and participation one would necessarily encounter at
this scale of involvement.
One might employ a proxy for local issues (with perhaps a backup should
their first choice be unavailable) and several more for regional
(environmental, political, scientific, social, technological, etc) issues
and concerns. Ones proxy choice for environmental issues may be unconcerned
with educational issues, or be so involved in the environmental arena that
they just don’t have time to track anything else in a reasonable or
acceptable manner.
Your thoughts?
Steve
_______________________________________________
Start : a mailing list of the Metagovernment project
http://www.metagovernment.org/
Manage subscription: http://metagovernment.org/mailman/listinfo/start_
metagovernment.org
_______________________________________________
Start : a mailing list of the Metagovernment project
http://www.metagovernment.org/
Manage subscription: http://metagovernment.org/mailman/listinfo/start_
metagovernment.org

[Steve Coffman]

If a company wants permission to build a nuclear reactor in a community; the decision should be made by a consensus of the local community, the power company and its shareholders, the people in the surrounding climates who may be affected by it, and anyone else in the world who has a concern about it one way or another. There’s no good reason to restrict a decision like that to only the people of one local community (who, for example, can be bought off).
In an open system where any interested party can participate, things only happen when all those people reach the best decision together. The nuclear power company can’t bully itself into a community; but it can work with everyone who has a concern and find a great way to build their facility that everyone’s happy with. It may take longer, but the result will be worth the wait.

Hi Ed,

I apologize for the delay in getting back to you. I’ve been a bit distracted by my conversation with Scott.

Determining the % required to pass a proposal has been a difficult thing for me to come to terms with. I’ve gone round and round with this in my own mind. Ultimately, it seems to me that given the degree of polarity that exists in our country (or world) today, it’s difficult to imagine that we would ever be able to pass (all but a very few) proposals by unanimous consent.

That said, I think that in some cases, a lengthly deliberative process would have multiple benefits for individuals and society at large. As I see it, these benefits would include: deliberation is inherently educational on a number of fronts; it can encourage some people to become more involved in their community and more connected to each other; and is likely to produce better decisions overall.

I say "likely" because, if you start out with a majority already signed on to pass the proposal, and yet it takes days, or weeks, or even months of discussion and deal-making to bring the rest of the community on board, one could argue that the community just wasted a lot of time in the process with essentially the same result, or even a less optimal one. One could also argue that some proposals which have great value for the community would never come to a vote because the process died due to the frustration and resignation of those involved in the effort to bring the remaining naysayers on board.

I was involved in the anti-nuclear movement many years ago with thousands of people working together to stop the Diablo Canyon nuclear facility from going online...and then again at the Yucca Flats nuclear test site in Nevada. We used a consensus model for our decision-making. It was often tedious, frustrating, slow, and at times resulted in people giving up and walking away from the *table*. I found it was also incredibly empowering when we were finally able to arrive at consensus together.

But could we govern ourselves in that manner at scale...with the myriad of vested interests present in even the smallest of sectors of today's society? Personally, I very much doubt it.

Here’s a hypothetical example in case you care to discuss this further: Let’s say a community of 30,000 residents is faced with having to upgrade their electrical infrastructure in order to accommodate an increase in the number of hybrid vehicles now being charged within their community. The electrical department’s projected increase in power usage estimates that demand is likely to treble in the next decade as a result. Let’s say that 8% of voters are old, crotchety, conservative luddites who believe climate change is a hoax. They are quite happy with their gasoline powered vehicles and don’t see themselves purchasing a hybrid anytime within their remaining years. They think that an increase in taxes to pay for the upgrade would be unreasonably unfair and have declared that they will do whatever they can to stop what they see as an expensive *liberal* project promoted by Agenda 21. Should the community *majority* go the extra 9 miles (read months) to *maybe* bring the luddites on board? What if doing so might prevent the community from being able to take advantage of State and Federal tax credits for the proposed system upgrade?

I’m inclined to think that we need to design a system that has some degree of *regulated* flexibility. In my mind, giving an elected Executive Council the power to determine the requisite quorum, the % of the vote necessary to pass a proposal, as well as the length of time a proposal would remain in the public discourse phase, may be the answer. The regulatory adjustments of the Exec. Council would be based on the *Priority* the community has established in attending to the situation the proposal was constructed to address. If they felt the advantage to the community at large outweighed the resistance of the naysayers, they would be empowered to adjust the three above *indexes*…..within certain parameters predetermined by the community at large.

Your thoughts…

Steve








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[Scott Raney]

Post by Steve Coffman
I’m inclined to think that we need to design a system that has some degree of *regulated* flexibility. In my mind, giving an elected Executive Council the power to determine the requisite quorum, the % of the vote necessary to pass a proposal, as well as the length of time a proposal would remain in the public discourse phase, may be the answer. The regulatory adjustments of the Exec. Council would be based on the *Priority* the community has established in attending to the situation the proposal was constructed to address. If they felt the advantage to the community at large outweighed the resistance of the naysayers, they would be empowered to adjust the three above *indexes*…..within certain parameters predetermined by the community at large.

OK, since no one else seems inclined to take this on, I'll bite:
1) For "Executive Council" for some reason my mind automatically
substitutes junta/politburo/oligarchy. Why does it do this? Oh, that's
right, just about everything I've learned over the last 50+ years
about how politics (and indeed human behavior in general) tells me
that this is the inevitable result of *any* system that gives ultimate
authority on *anything* to a small group of people. So the first
question has to be, how is your proposal any different than what we've
been living with for the last 6000 years or so?

2) While I don't see the need for this type of monkeying around with
thresholds (much better, as I've said, to incentivize the proposal
authors to seek high supermajorities), if it *does* turn out to be
necessary or even desirable, is there some other way we could
implement this feature? Could it be automated? Could the
variable/threshold choice be included in the proposal itself, perhaps
as a sort of progressive-implementation plan? For example, larger
supermajorities cause either an acceleration of the implementation, or
cause additional features to be automatically added to the to-do
list...
Regards,
Scott

Post by Steve Coffman
Your thoughts…
Steve

[Steve Coffman]

Post by Scott Raney
1) For "Executive Council" for some reason my mind automatically
substitutes junta/politburo/oligarchy. Why does it do this? Oh, that's
right, just about everything I've learned over the last 50+ years
about how politics (and indeed human behavior in general) tells me
that this is the inevitable result of *any* system that gives ultimate
authority on *anything* to a small group of people. So the first
question has to be, how is your proposal any different than what we've
been living with for the last 6000 years or so?

I’m not sure we’re referencing the same design idea Scott

As I see it, an Executive Council would be necessary to build and regulate any significantly large, crowdsourced governance mechanism.

A global platform with several million, or possibly several hundred million users would need extensive, qualified oversight.

At that scale, I imagine dozens if not hundreds of proposals would arrive daily. Ok, I admit this is an unsubstantiated guess, but I’m just not sure where to get data on a self-organizing-global-network of human beings creating, deliberating, and voting on proposals together. I may be overestimating how active a Network of that size and scope would be, but I’m quite sure we’re not talking about what might be on the docket for a weekly City Council or HOA meeting.

But let’s say that only a few dozen proposals arrive each day. Some may be short like the ones currently on pf.m
but more likely, they will be lengthly documents that cover items like staffing requirements, budget outlines, design criteria, and detailed, long-term projections of the benefit any given proposal would provide those who would be voting on it. So many proposals
so many details
.unbelievable numbers of details. (So many that vetting proposals would likely become an Agency of it’s own.)

And, in my mind, people will only want to vote on proposals that have been thoroughly researched by real people or institutions that they can *visibly* locate and easily track (read trust). I’m sure some people right from the get-go would be comfortable delegating their decisions to proxies operating behind a wall of algorithms run by bots. And I would bet that as time passes, more and more people would be comfortable with that set up
.if they found it was reliable and trustworthy.

In the beginning though, the level of trust required for some (maybe most) people to send off qualitative personal data to a cloud on the internet so some other person who they’ll never see or know anything about can vote for them, would be substantial. And unfortunately, hackers and scammers will likely keep that fear in play for some time
I'm guessing.

Proposals would also need to be vetted in order to keep the platform from being inundated with spurious, non-sensical, and poorly written manifestos. Allowing proposals that are not meaningful, concise, focussed, and reasonably well-constructed would be the second best way to discourage overall voter participation. To have a *Stack* cluttered with proposals that are vague, inaccurate, badly written, and not based on any actual facts would be a real buzz kill, imo.

E.g. Let’s say some Nationalist group from Alabama submits a proposal to segregate the southern Confederate states and declare them as an International Sanctuary for white-skinned people of European origin. In their proposal they cite numerous bogus studies about the inferiority of non-white people and blather on for pages about how whites are discriminated against around the world. The budget they cite to achieve this barbaric regression is minuscule compared to what the actual costs would be, and the claimed net-effect their proposal would provoke is simple-minded, one-sided, and very limited in scope.

My guess is that a such proposal would just linger in the proposal Stack because the opposition to it would be so insurmountable. It might though have enough support to suck a polarized electorate into a very lengthly deliberation and thus draw attention away from other proposals more relevant to the *Priority* of the collective *Global Body*. So why bother with that detritus when certain filters or vetting criteria, defined by the electorate, could be employed by an elected Executive Oversight Council to prevent this kind of old paradigm garbage from cluttering up our platform?

Obviously these filters and criteria would be mostly, if not entirely, subjective. So the vetting process would need to reflect the *Values and Priorities* of the electorate through which these criteria would be derived.

In my mind, "We the People" would need to develop a document that describes the core values of the Global Body. A Declaration of Inter-dependence, if you will. These Values would likely be based on principles like Freedom, Respect, Security, Equality, and Justice, to name a few. I imagine many of the Values inscribed in this document would immediately nix a proposal such as the one mentioned above, if there were a vetting process provided by an Executive Oversight Council.

Also, in my version a *Template* would be provided for proposal creation and submission delineating the various elements and criteria necessary for constructing a well-written proposal. Using The Template would be mandatory and it would be based on a subset of values, like brevity, clarity, methodical referencing of source material, accurate budgeting and cost analysis, reliable description or depiction of the net effect(s) should adoption of the proposal take place, and so on.

As I see it, a Template *Agency* would be staffed in order to provide individuals and groups with assistance in the proposal development process because proposals would be the main drivers of the Organization and augmenting their successful formulation and submission would be key. And
.if the Executive Oversight Council were an elected body, with a very strict mandate, and we had the ability to fire them, at any point in their term, with one simple vote
.I would trust them to vet proposals according to the crowdsourced Values and Priority of the collective Global Body.

Post by Scott Raney
2) While I don't see the need for this type of monkeying around with
thresholds (much better, as I've said, to incentivize the proposal
authors to seek high supermajorities), if it *does* turn out to be
necessary or even desirable, is there some other way we could
implement this feature? Could it be automated? Could the
variable/threshold choice be included in the proposal itself, perhaps
as a sort of progressive-implementation plan? For example, larger
supermajorities cause either an acceleration of the implementation, or
cause additional features to be automatically added to the to-do
list


What better way to incentivize proposers than to make the process simple with clear guidelines and a staff to facilitate and encourage proposal development?
Oh, and a global crowd-funded Foundation to support projects born from their proposals.

I see six Agencies necessary to manage a global *organism* of this mandate.

1. The Template - as described above.

2. The Index - a crowdsourced continuously evolving indicator of the Networks *Priority* in a ranked stack format with various descriptors.

3. The Ballot - This is where proxyfor.me would set up shop. The Ballot would have a voting as well as a pledging function.

4. The Foundation - To manage the currency of the Network as well as it’s investments, donations, endowments, and profits. And, as mentioned above, to provide project financial support.

5. The Scales - This Agency would manage the Public Discourse platform. It would also function as a Magistrate for the Network...and ultimately as a Global Tribunal as well.

6. The Database - Multiple tasks here. Records of all proceedings, contracts, and agreements, minutes from meetings, copies of proposals, and so on would be stored here. It would also be the Proposal Vetting Agency, and it would have a Journalistic Branch to keep the Network abreast of the Real News. and so on
.


Then there’s just two Oversight Councils (one for the Structure and one for the Process), a Declaration of Values, a Mandate
..and a mass of creative, newly empowered human beings. That’s it. :)


As together we choose, together it will be.

[Scott Raney]

I’m not sure we’re referencing the same design idea Scott
As I see it, an Executive Council would be necessary to build and regulate
any significantly large, crowdsourced governance mechanism.

Why? Why not just have a single executive, like we do now in most
levels of government and in corporations?

A global platform with several million, or possibly several hundred million
users would need extensive, qualified oversight.

It would mean management, for sure. But other than maybe county
governments (and the aforementioned juntas and politburos) what other
organization even has an "executive council"? And you can't count
corporate boards, since their primary (and indeed in many cases sole)
responsibility is merely to choose the executive. Same with HOA
boards, though many of them do tend to micromanage the executive
(usually a contracted HOA management company), to basically everyone's
detriment.

At that scale, I imagine dozens if not hundreds of proposals would arrive
daily. Ok, I admit this is an unsubstantiated guess, but I’m just not sure
where to get data on a self-organizing-global-network of human beings
creating, deliberating, and voting on proposals together. I may be
overestimating how active a Network of that size and scope would be, but I’m
quite sure we’re not talking about what might be on the docket for a weekly
City Council or HOA meeting.

Probably comparable to the former (which in most cases is an order of
magnitude more than what an HOA or corporate board handles directly).
But note that even in most mid-to-large cities "staff" does at least
95% of the work.

But let’s say that only a few dozen proposals arrive each day. Some may be
short like the ones currently on pf.m…but more likely, they will be lengthly
documents that cover items like staffing requirements, budget outlines,
design criteria, and detailed, long-term projections of the benefit any
given proposal would provide those who would be voting on it. So many
proposals…so many details….unbelievable numbers of details. (So many that
vetting proposals would likely become an Agency of it’s own.)

Sure: Which is a nearly perfect fit for a strictly hierarchical
organization, which is why is why nearly all state and federal
governments and corporations are structured this way...

And, in my mind, people will only want to vote on proposals that have been
thoroughly researched by real people or institutions that they can *visibly*
locate and easily track (read trust). I’m sure some people right from the
get-go would be comfortable delegating their decisions to proxies operating
behind a wall of algorithms run by bots. And I would bet that as time
passes, more and more people would be comfortable with that set up….if they
found it was reliable and trustworthy.

The ultimate expression of this, again, being a single trustworthy and
yet easily replaceable executive.

(big snip)

As I see it, a Template *Agency* would be staffed in order to provide
individuals and groups with assistance in the proposal development process
because proposals would be the main drivers of the Organization and
augmenting their successful formulation and submission would be key. And….if
the Executive Oversight Council were an elected body, with a very strict
mandate, and we had the ability to fire them, at any point in their term,
with one simple vote….I would trust them to vet proposals according to the
crowdsourced Values and Priority of the collective Global Body.

None of this explains why a "council" is required rather than a single
executive with a strictly hierarchical organization below them.
Certainly history has shown when you have a junta a lot of stuff that
should be decided by the legislative branch ends up being decided by
the junta itself. And unlike an executive, replacing all of the
politburo is a nightmare. Just ask the Soviets. Or anyone who's had a
difference of opinion with an HOA board (voice of experience here): In
most cases it's impossible to make any significant change in either of
those environments because the system in most cases is *designed* to
prevent radical change in leadership, usually in the name of
"continuity" but with the inevitable result that preserving the status
quo becomes the management's primary goal.

2) While I don't see the need for this type of monkeying around with
thresholds (much better, as I've said, to incentivize the proposal
authors to seek high supermajorities), if it *does* turn out to be
necessary or even desirable, is there some other way we could
implement this feature? Could it be automated? Could the
variable/threshold choice be included in the proposal itself, perhaps
as a sort of progressive-implementation plan? For example, larger
supermajorities cause either an acceleration of the implementation, or
cause additional features to be automatically added to the to-do
list…
What better way to incentivize proposers than to make the process simple
with clear guidelines and a staff to facilitate and encourage proposal
development?

Definitely. But that's not what you're proposing, at least as far as I
understand it. Your proposal was to create a junta that had the power
to "move the goalposts" as it were, which IMHO is exactly the opposite
of what I'm proposing. The rules should be clear and fixed and any
"adjustments" should be components of the proposals themselves, not
something decided by some oligarchs looking over the proposer's
shoulders.

Oh, and a global crowd-funded Foundation to support projects born from their proposals.

I've no problem with us collectively funding for projects like this
(maybe run like grant proposals for scientific research or the arts
are now), and in fact believe that nearly *all* projects currently
handled by "charities" should be funded this way (which is why it's
specified to work this way in the Matchism Manifesto ;-)

I see six Agencies necessary to manage a global *organism* of this mandate.
1. The Template - as described above.
2. The Index - a crowdsourced continuously evolving indicator of the
Networks *Priority* in a ranked stack format with various descriptors.

How does this work? Does it prioritize individual proposals, or
classes of them? Is it just a simple list that The People are
continually re-sorting? If so, why not work on the proposals directly?

3. The Ballot - This is where proxyfor.me would set up shop. The Ballot
would have a voting as well as a pledging function.
4. The Foundation - To manage the currency of the Network as well as it’s
investments, donations, endowments, and profits. And, as mentioned above, to
provide project financial support.

I call this "the government" ;-)

5. The Scales - This Agency would manage the Public Discourse platform. It
would also function as a Magistrate for the Network...and ultimately as a
Global Tribunal as well.

This is the junta?

6. The Database - Multiple tasks here. Records of all proceedings,
contracts, and agreements, minutes from meetings, copies of proposals, and
so on would be stored here. It would also be the Proposal Vetting Agency,
and it would have a Journalistic Branch to keep the Network abreast of the
Real News. and so on….

This would be part of proxyfor.me too (i.e., the UI to *all*
government operations ought to be uniform to cut down on training time
and maximize utilization).

Then there’s just two Oversight Councils (one for the Structure and one for
the Process), a Declaration of Values, a Mandate…..and a mass of creative,
newly empowered human beings. That’s it. :)

I'd still like hear more about what benefits a junta provides vs a
single hierarchical organization with an executive at the top...
Regards,
Scott

[Steve Coffman]

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
I’m not sure we’re referencing the same design idea Scott
As I see it, an Executive Council would be necessary to build and regulate
any significantly large, crowdsourced governance mechanism.

Why? Why not just have a single executive, like we do now in most
levels of government and in corporations?

Yes, a single Executive Council.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
A global platform with several million, or possibly several hundred million
users would need extensive, qualified oversight.

It would mean management, for sure. But other than maybe county
governments (and the aforementioned juntas and politburos) what other
organization even has an "executive council"? And you can't count
corporate boards, since their primary (and indeed in many cases sole)
responsibility is merely to choose the executive. Same with HOA
boards, though many of them do tend to micromanage the executive
(usually a contracted HOA management company), to basically everyone's
detriment.

I think you’re conflating an elected oversight body with an installed (by force) ruling body.

Politburo - the principal policymaking committee of a Communist Party.

Junta - a military or political group that rules a country after taking power by force.

Executive Oversight Council (as I see it) - an elected body, with a narrow crowdsourced mandate. Any Councilor can be fired...at any point in their term...with one simple vote by the electorate. The criteria for firing a councilor is crowdsourced as well and can be changed or amended...at any time...by a proposal and a vote of the electorate.

The take away is this: You can’t have a global platform of this scope with out some kind of management. In my mind, this is not a problem as long as the managers are being managed by the users of the platform.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
But let’s say that only a few dozen proposals arrive each day. Some may be
short like the ones currently on pf.m
but more likely, they will be lengthly
documents that cover items like staffing requirements, budget outlines,
design criteria, and detailed, long-term projections of the benefit any
given proposal would provide those who would be voting on it. So many
proposals
so many details
.unbelievable numbers of details. (So many that
vetting proposals would likely become an Agency of it’s own.)

Sure: Which is a nearly perfect fit for a strictly hierarchical
organization, which is why nearly all state and federal
governments and corporations are structured this way


Hierarchy - Pecking order, ranking, chain of command, grading scale, range.
Here's another way of looking at it:

The human being was once thought to be organized entirely by it's grey matter. Executive Function = brain. CEO of the body. Now we know that our mind is made up of glial cells in the heart and in the gut as well. In fact, the entire body is in on the symphony. Cells everywhere within unbelievably complex networks regulating the “being” of the body. Who’s organizing this? Where is the Executive Function here?

And, the human mind has imagined into being the computer which is both a Structure and a Process, hardware and software. You need both to access the Internet. Where’s the Executive Function here? Is it with the engineer who’s designed the hard drive...the programmer who's written the code
or the user sitting in front of the computer? And when you step out to the meta level, who’s managing things there? Who's creating the internet? Is it Google or Amazon? Is it the FCC or ICAAN? Maybe it’s the porn industry
.or those who pay for it. Or is it Microsoft and Apple?

I’m talking about building a Process and a Structure that can encompass the Meta level as an Executive Function, in and of itself. Again, the take away is that the users will always be in charge. That’s embedded in the design of the Process and the Structure. If they give that up
then so be it. There is no safeguard against that other that to make it as inclusive as possible (large quorum) as quickly as possible
.imo.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
And, in my mind, people will only want to vote on proposals that have been
thoroughly researched by real people or institutions that they can *visibly*
locate and easily track (read trust). I’m sure some people right from the
get-go would be comfortable delegating their decisions to proxies operating
behind a wall of algorithms run by bots. And I would bet that as time
passes, more and more people would be comfortable with that set up
.if they
found it was reliable and trustworthy.

The ultimate expression of this, again, being a single trustworthy and
yet easily replaceable executive.

Exactly, "a single trustworthy and yet easily replaceable executive" *Council* ..
to build, manage, facilitate, and oversee.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
What better way to incentivize proposers than to make the process simple
with clear guidelines and a staff to facilitate and encourage proposal
development?

Definitely. But that's not what you're proposing, at least as far as I
understand it. Your proposal was to create a junta that had the power
to "move the goalposts" as it were, which IMHO is exactly the opposite
of what I'm proposing. The rules should be clear and fixed and any
"adjustments" should be components of the proposals themselves, not
something decided by some oligarchs looking over the proposer's
shoulders.

All powers given to the EC to “move goal posts” are strictly defined, and can be changed by the electorate through the exercise of their inalienable power to vote on anything they choose. If the EC misinterprets the Mandate of the Electorate, they can be fired, in whole or in part. All responsibility for the successful operation of the Organization rests in the hands of The People.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
2. The Index - a crowdsourced continuously evolving indicator of the
Networks *Priority* in a ranked stack format with various descriptors.

How does this work? Does it prioritize individual proposals, or
classes of them? Is it just a simple list that The People are
continually re-sorting? If so, why not work on the proposals directly?

The Index is a ranked stack (prioritized) list of the Collective (User’s) concerns and desires for focus. Each registered User can advocate a list (10 maybe) of their own priorities and/or select ones already inventoried. The Index is a compilation of all Users individual lists. I imagine it might look something like this:

Clean Water
Shelter
Peace
Oceans - Over fishing - Drag nets - Illegal - Policy - Enforcement
Forests
World Hunger
Education
Women's rights
Energy
Agriculture
Space Exploration
Transportation
Pollution
Banking and Finance
Shelter
Extinction
Governance
Global Warming
Disclosure
Human Rights
Child Abduction and Prostitution
Israel/Palestine
Imperialism
Clean Water


If you click on any single item (like Oceans above) it would define the concern further and ultimately develop into a mind-map format. There would be numerous indicators and stacked functions to make this index extremely informative. Eventually, it would be tied to Google Earth in order to locate jurisdictions, pinpoint various proposals and projects, and then link to their stats, etc, etc. Basically it’s a vary complex mechanism of human self-reflection. A big mirror of not only the current priority and concern of our species, but the enormity of our response as well.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
5. The Scales - This Agency would manage the Public Discourse platform. It
would also function as a Magistrate for the Network...and ultimately as a
Global Tribunal as well.

This is the junta?

As together we choose
..

[Scott Raney]

Post by Scott Raney
Why? Why not just have a single executive, like we do now in most
levels of government and in corporations?
Yes, a single Executive Council.

You're evading the question.

Post by Scott Raney
A global platform with several million, or possibly several hundred million
users would need extensive, qualified oversight.

So this is some sort of "two heads are better than one" appeal? How
many corporations work this way, where a CEO hires 5 or 7 people to
run a department? Nothing would ever get done...

Post by Scott Raney
It would mean management, for sure. But other than maybe county
governments (and the aforementioned juntas and politburos) what other
organization even has an "executive council"? And you can't count
corporate boards, since their primary (and indeed in many cases sole)
responsibility is merely to choose the executive. Same with HOA
boards, though many of them do tend to micromanage the executive
(usually a contracted HOA management company), to basically everyone's
detriment.
I think you’re conflating an elected oversight body with an installed (by
force) ruling body.

No, the source of their power is irrelevant. I'm concerned purely with
the mechanics of the operation of the organization. You seem to be
saying that organizations run by committees somehow function better
than those run by individuals. The research (and my own experience)
shows that this is almost never the case. Therefore the only
justification for a group-format executive branch might be where there
*is* no "legislative branch" to handle the high level decisionmaking
and supervision of the executive (i.e., the
council/committee/junta/politburo combines the executive and
legislative functions).

Post by Scott Raney
I’m talking about building a Process and a Structure that can encompass the
Meta level as an Executive Function, in and of itself. Again, the take away
is that the users will always be in charge. That’s embedded in the design of
the Process and the Structure. If they give that up…then so be it. There is
no safeguard against that other that to make it as inclusive as possible
(large quorum) as quickly as possible….imo.

You might have to write a book on this to explain this proposal, but
I'd start with the "executive summary" of how it compares with the
day-to-day operation of existing organizations.

Post by Scott Raney
And, in my mind, people will only want to vote on proposals that have been
thoroughly researched by real people or institutions that they can *visibly*
locate and easily track (read trust). I’m sure some people right from the
get-go would be comfortable delegating their decisions to proxies operating
behind a wall of algorithms run by bots. And I would bet that as time
passes, more and more people would be comfortable with that set up….if they
found it was reliable and trustworthy.

It's an empirical question, but my sense (based on my experience on
forums and to a lesser extent on the research (e.g., Keil 2010)) is
that people can judge the quality of the argument *independent* of
knowing the individual organization that produced it, and that this is
actually an important feature in a decisionmaking system. For example
the "peer review" process is exactly the opposite of what you propose,
and for good reason: You don't want people making decisions based on
the status of the individual/group making a particular argument.

Post by Scott Raney
The ultimate expression of this, again, being a single trustworthy and
yet easily replaceable executive.
Exactly, "a single trustworthy and yet easily replaceable executive"
*Council* ..…to build, manage, facilitate, and oversee.

So you propose replacing the entire council, rather than individual
members, when it repeatedly fails to make good decisions? If not, how
do you propose to identify the malfunctioning components?

Post by Scott Raney
The Index is a ranked stack (prioritized) list of the Collective (User’s)
concerns and desires for focus. Each registered User can advocate a list (10
maybe) of their own priorities and/or select ones already inventoried. The
Index is a compilation of all Users individual lists. I imagine it might

There's something like this (Goals of The People) in the Matchism
Manifesto, but I'm actually moving away from that lately. Sure, the
executive (and/or the proposal writers) will sometimes need to do
polls to assess The People's preferences and priorities, but I'm
lately thinking that this doesn't need to be a separate component of
the system as it's already going to be accounted for in the profile
data (assuming one does proxy matching) and in the output of the
budgeting process. For training and operational efficiency reasons we
should strive to eliminate "bells and whistles" from the design of the
decisionmaking system, especially when we're not absolutely sure
they're really needed.
Regards,
Scott

_______________________________________________
Start : a mailing list of the Metagovernment project
http://www.metagovernment.org/
Post to the list: ***@metagovernment.org
Manage subscription: http://metagovernment.org/m

[Steve Coffman]

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Scott Raney
Why? Why not just have a single executive, like we do now in most
levels of government and in corporations?
Yes, a single Executive Council.

You're evading the question.

A single figurehead, at the top of a global organization of the aforementioned scope, would place way too much power (and far too much responsibility) into the hands of a single individual
.imo.

That said, if the a majority of the electorate felt that a single figurehead/executive was a better way to do business, then that would become the new Executive Structure. I just wouldn’t want to front load it with that because of the reasons stated above.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Scott Raney
A global platform with several million, or possibly several hundred million
users would need extensive, qualified oversight.

So this is some sort of "two heads are better than one" appeal? How
many corporations work this way, where a CEO hires 5 or 7 people to
run a department? Nothing would ever get done


There would be enough Councilors for there to be an effective delegation of functions. This of course would depend entirely on the demands placed on this body. (Actually there are two bodies that perform the Executive function as I mentioned previously: one for the Process and one for the Structure).

Corporations are a different animal with a different mandate and a different set of priorities. What I’m talking about is a self-organizing decision-making platform whose sole purpose is to support the *Proposal* of a sovereign People.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Scott Raney
I think you’re conflating an elected oversight body with an installed (by
force) ruling body.

No, the source of their power is irrelevant. I'm concerned purely with
the mechanics of the operation of the organization. You seem to be
saying that organizations run by committees somehow function better
than those run by individuals. The research (and my own experience)
shows that this is almost never the case. Therefore the only
justification for a group-format executive branch might be where there
*is* no "legislative branch" to handle the high level decisionmaking
and supervision of the executive (i.e., the
council/committee/junta/politburo combines the executive and
legislative functions).

The People are the legislators. They make the proposals, and decide on them as well. The Executive Oversight Council exists strictly to administer the decisions of the People. (Maybe it would be less confusing if they were called the *Administrative* Oversight Council?)

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Scott Raney
I’m talking about building a Process and a Structure that can encompass the
Meta level as an Executive Function, in and of itself. Again, the take away
is that the users will always be in charge. That’s embedded in the design of
the Process and the Structure. If they give that up
then so be it. There is
no safeguard against that other that to make it as inclusive as possible
(large quorum) as quickly as possible
.imo.

You might have to write a book on this to explain this proposal, but
I'd start with the "executive summary" of how it compares with the
day-to-day operation of existing organizations.

I have absolutely no interest in comparing this to something that’s currently existing. I’ll leave that to others to whom that matters. Again, this is a novel way of organizing humanity and, as the adage says, "You can’t put new wine into old skins.”

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Scott Raney
And, in my mind, people will only want to vote on proposals that have been
thoroughly researched by real people or institutions that they can *visibly*
locate and easily track (read trust). I’m sure some people right from the
get-go would be comfortable delegating their decisions to proxies operating
behind a wall of algorithms run by bots. And I would bet that as time
passes, more and more people would be comfortable with that set up
.if they
found it was reliable and trustworthy.

It's an empirical question, but my sense (based on my experience on
forums and to a lesser extent on the research (e.g., Keil 2010)) is
that people can judge the quality of the argument *independent* of
knowing the individual organization that produced it, and that this is
actually an important feature in a decisionmaking system. For example
the "peer review" process is exactly the opposite of what you propose,
and for good reason: You don't want people making decisions based on
the status of the individual/group making a particular argument.

From Wikipedia, "Peer review is generally considered necessary to academic quality and is used in most major scientific journals, but it does by no means prevent publication of invalid research. Traditionally, peer reviewers have been anonymous, but there is currently a significant amount of open peer review, where the comments are visible to readers, generally with the identities of the peer reviewers disclosed as well.”

And one could argue that if there were more transparency, we wouldn’t have so much corruption in the current peer review process.

Also, even within traditional peer review, an individual or group that submits a paper to a journal or institution knows something about the reviewers background and level of competence. Otherwise the journal or institution wouldn’t be trusted.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Scott Raney
The ultimate expression of this, again, being a single trustworthy and
yet easily replaceable executive.
Exactly, "a single trustworthy and yet easily replaceable executive"
*Council* ..
to build, manage, facilitate, and oversee.

So you propose replacing the entire council, rather than individual
members, when it repeatedly fails to make good decisions? If not, how
do you propose to identify the malfunctioning components?

As I said earlier, I’m proposing that the electorate have the option to replace the Council, "in whole, or in part", if they deem it appropriate and have the votes to do so. My guess is that replacing the entire Council would happen only under a very extreme circumstance, if ever.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Scott Raney
The Index is a ranked stack (prioritized) list of the Collective (User’s)
concerns and desires for focus. Each registered User can advocate a list (10
maybe) of their own priorities and/or select ones already inventoried. The
Index is a compilation of all Users individual lists. I imagine it might

There's something like this (Goals of The People) in the Matchism
Manifesto, but I'm actually moving away from that lately. Sure, the
executive (and/or the proposal writers) will sometimes need to do
polls to assess The People's preferences and priorities, but I'm
lately thinking that this doesn't need to be a separate component of
the system as it's already going to be accounted for in the profile
data (assuming one does proxy matching) and in the output of the
budgeting process. For training and operational efficiency reasons we
should strive to eliminate "bells and whistles" from the design of the
decisionmaking system, especially when we're not absolutely sure
they're really needed.

I’m talking about designing the next iteration of our *Social Medium*. A place where a global People can gather online to connect and co-create our collaborative human endeavor, together. As I see it, it will need to be interesting, informative, empowering, and coherent if it’s going to be at all successful. As designed, the above "Index" would be a large part of the sensory-response-feedback-complex of this new Social Medium.

All the best,
Steve

Post by Scott Raney
Regards,
Scott
_______________________________________________
Start : a mailing list of the Metagovernment project
http://www.metagovernment.org/
Manage subscription: http://metagovernment.org/mailman/listinfo/start_metagovernment.org

[Steve Coffman]

From an interview with Bonnitta Roy

https://www.infoq.com/articles/how-self-organization-happens



"People often think there is just one specific outcome that results from self-organizing processes. For example, people have long argued that hierarchy is the predominant outcome of social processes in nature. But this has proven to be untenable. Nature self-organizes in complex, multi-valent patterns. What we see, depends on the way we investigate the patterns. For example, we used to illustrate the food web in a simple hierarchical pyramid, or linear food chain. Now we use computers to visualize the complex food web that represents energy exchange in ecological systems. It is the same with horses. We used to think that the herd was dominated by the stallion, at the top of a simple hierarchy. Now we understand herd dynamics as much more sophisticated, overlapping and complex.

"On the other hand, in the agile community, the notion of self-organization has come to mean “non-hierarchical” or “egalitarian” or “peer-to-peer” outcomes. In fact, it is possible for self-organizing dynamics to create any of these patterns, and other patterns as well. What pattern emerges is dependent upon a host of factors in the environment– conditions, constraints, and circumstances. What pattern emerges is also dependent on key features of the agents themselves -- how they express their autonomy, relationality, and agency. This is as true for animals and plants as it is for people.

"People who are critical of self-organization are critical of one or more of the patterns that might emerge. People on both sides of the argument – those who admire hierarchies and those who are allergic to them—want only a single outcome that appeals to them. They want rules that will control the patterns of human relating. At the end of the day, this is not possible. People merely self-organize in unofficial ways despite the official rules that say “we must be a hierarchy” or “we must be egalitarian.” The actual complex processes of human relating cannot be reduced to fit into one or the other of those forms.

"People who believe that self-organization is an important theme in organizational life, understand that self-organization is the source of creative novelty and coherence in complex systems. We believe that understanding self-organization means we can become more conscious in how we face organizational challenges. We believe that by designing with these dynamics, we can design for potentials that are just now emerging in collaborative teams."


and


"I do a workshop on developing trust networks, and it is always a surprise to discover how little we agree on what trust is, and how it operates in our lives. You can try a simple exercise for yourself. Put a dot in the middle of a paper. The dot represents you. Draw a series of concentric circles around the dot. Think of the people you trust most, and put them in the inner circle. You will sense a boundary or threshold where a few people you trust most qualify for this inner trust sanctum, while others feel they belong in the circle further out. When you feel into this notion of a trust network, other people you know from personal or work life will not make it into the inner circles at all. They will belong further out, until the relationships fall into the categories of “casual acquaintance.” You might even have some people black-listed as “not trustworthy at all!”

"The question to ask yourself is, what are the threads that are measuring this feeling of trust? Some people think trust is a matter of “predictability”, while other people think it is a matter of “responsibility.” Some people build trust on the bases of intention and purpose, while others see it more about the skills necessary to act reliably in a given situation. People discover that trust is not something that is “on” or “off” – but more like a measure of who is proximate (close to us) and those who are more distal (further out) in our trust network.

"Now to answer your question. I wouldn’t say that trust is a pre-requisite for self-organization. I would say that we self-organize our trust network, through continuous participation in complex processes of human relating. Trust is the felt-sense of the pattern that emerges—the implicit pattern of with whom we extend a great deal of trust, and with whom we reserve our trust, to various degrees.

"Now imagine an organization as overlapping fields of the trust networks emanating out from all the participants. Certain individuals occupy highly significant nodes of this trust network, and as such, are crucial accelerators of trust across the network. If you really want to visualize how your organization works, you would start identifying all these trust networks."

[Scott Raney]

Post by Steve Coffman
From an interview with Bonnitta Roy

Argh: Really? Going back to your preference for using (or at least
exposing) expertise and credentials in decisionmaking, is this really
the kind of "expert" you're going to bring to bear on the issue of how
to structure an organization? Did you even spend FSOG before deciding
this Qigong expert is just wasting your time?

Post by Steve Coffman
https://www.infoq.com/articles/how-self-organization-happens
"People often think there is just one specific outcome that results from
self-organizing processes. For example, people have long argued that
hierarchy is the predominant outcome of social processes in nature. But this
has proven to be untenable.

I call BS: This is still the dominant view in ethology, despite the
best efforts of feminists and post modernists to argue that actual
power is more distributed than it appears to be...

Post by Steve Coffman
Nature self-organizes in complex, multi-valent
patterns. What we see, depends on the way we investigate the patterns. For
example, we used to illustrate the food web in a simple hierarchical
pyramid, or linear food chain. Now we use computers to visualize the complex
food web that represents energy exchange in ecological systems. It is the
same with horses. We used to think that the herd was dominated by the
stallion, at the top of a simple hierarchy. Now we understand herd dynamics
as much more sophisticated, overlapping and complex.

Perhaps, but does this mean that the stallion is *not* actually at the top?

(lots of handwaving by someone who apparently has no training or
experience in social engineering or organizational psychology snipped)

Post by Steve Coffman
"Now imagine an organization as overlapping fields of the trust networks
emanating out from all the participants. Certain individuals occupy highly
significant nodes of this trust network, and as such, are crucial
accelerators of trust across the network. If you really want to visualize
how your organization works, you would start identifying all these trust
networks."

Now try to imagine how this paragraph would have been written by a
social engineer, who is concerned with how something *actually works*
rather than what it appears to some people to look like, instead of a
handwaving pseudo-scientist...
Regards,
Scott

[Scott Raney]

Post by Steve Coffman
A single figurehead, at the top of a global organization of the
aforementioned scope, would place way too much power (and far too much
responsibility) into the hands of a single individual….imo.

I guess it's an empirical question, but IMHO you've *vastly*
over-estimated the power of an executive that only serves at the Will
of The People and could be removed next weekend by a simple vote.
Worse your proposed solution to this merely theoretical problem
(decisionmaking by committee) is to cripple the system to prevent it
from working properly in *any* situation.

Post by Steve Coffman
That said, if the a majority of the electorate felt that a single
figurehead/executive was a better way to do business, then that would become
the new Executive Structure. I just wouldn’t want to front load it with that
because of the reasons stated above.

Well, of course people would have to vote to approve the new system,
but wouldn't it be better if we *designed* it right in the first place
to reduce the number of these on-the-fly redesigns?

Post by Steve Coffman
There would be enough Councilors for there to be an effective delegation of
functions. This of course would depend entirely on the demands placed on
this body. (Actually there are two bodies that perform the Executive
function as I mentioned previously: one for the Process and one for the
Structure).

I restate my claim that it's a junta/politburo, then. Which have been
proven to be not only ineffective in a managerial sense, but because
they can always claim that they're "representing" the people, they're
far more likely to abuse their power than a single executive would be,
at least when there is even any hint of The People's power acting as a
constraint (e.g., US presidents have proven to be far less risky than
dictators, and yet presidents are *very* hard to removed by comparison
with Managers as I have proposed).

Post by Steve Coffman
Corporations are a different animal with a different mandate and a different
set of priorities.

Priorities, sure, but to claim that the executive branch of government
needs to operate in some manner different from hierarchy (i.e.,
government operations are just qualitatively different from
corporations, the military, etc.), you're making a fundamental error
IMHO. Where's the proof, or even the theory, that this is necessary?

Post by Steve Coffman
What I’m talking about is a self-organizing
decision-making platform whose sole purpose is to support the *Proposal* of
a sovereign People.

Sounds *very* slippery to me: Unless there is a *direct* coupling
between the Will of The People and the decisions rendered, you've
merely recreated oligarchy.

Post by Steve Coffman
The People are the legislators. They make the proposals, and decide on them
as well. The Executive Oversight Council exists strictly to administer the
decisions of the People. (Maybe it would be less confusing if they were
called the *Administrative* Oversight Council?)

I struggle with this too: Most people don't even understand the
difference between the executive and legislative branches. Not that
this is all their fault: Our current systems have the two mixed
together to a far larger degree than is optimal, let alone necessary.
But I'd stick with "executive" which is the more technically-correct
term.

Post by Steve Coffman
I have absolutely no interest in comparing this to something that’s
currently existing. I’ll leave that to others to whom that matters. Again,
this is a novel way of organizing humanity and, as the adage says, "You
can’t put new wine into old skins.”

I struggle with *this* too, but I predict you're going to have to do
this in the end because very few people will be able to do it
themselves. If you don't do it, they' just dismiss your proposals out
of hand because they'll make the simplest comparisons (as perhaps I
have with the junta/council/committee thing).

(snip)

Post by Steve Coffman
From Wikipedia, "Peer review is generally considered necessary to academic
quality and is used in most major scientific journals, but it does by no
means prevent publication of invalid research. Traditionally, peer reviewers
have been anonymous, but there is currently a significant amount of open
peer review, where the comments are visible to readers, generally with the
identities of the peer reviewers disclosed as well.”
And one could argue that if there were more transparency, we wouldn’t have
so much corruption in the current peer review process.

I'd agree that perhaps we don't need to be as obsessive about
preserving anonymity as journals are, but neither do we want to swing
the pendulum very far to the other side as you have proposed: As a
rule of thumb people should always be encouraged to prioritize the
quality of the argument over the credentials of the source. And of
course if they can't do either, they should trust in their proxies
more than in *any* argument or source that they don't have the time to
properly research.

Post by Steve Coffman
As I said earlier, I’m proposing that the electorate have the option to
replace the Council, "in whole, or in part", if they deem it appropriate and
have the votes to do so. My guess is that replacing the entire Council would
happen only under a very extreme circumstance, if ever.

But you haven't explained how we're supposed to figure out which
components of the Council are malfunctioning, or how we go about
removing and then replacing them...

Post by Steve Coffman
I’m talking about designing the next iteration of our *Social Medium*. A
place where a global People can gather online to connect and co-create our
collaborative human endeavor, together. As I see it, it will need to be
interesting, informative, empowering, and coherent if it’s going to be at
all successful.

Sounds to me like the same kind of "active participant" based system
that we've already tried and found wanting. Indeed, with the "Council"
apparently making many of the most important decisions themselves and
with The People having very limited awareness of their motivations or
hard control over them, it's really no different that the kinds of
oligarchies that "active participant"-based systems seem to always
devolve into.
Regards,
Scott

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[Steve Coffman]

Hi Scott (and others),
My apologies for dropping the previous thread. I was away from my computer for several weeks visiting family. I’d like to continue the conversation, but rather than picking up the circular and protracted debate about the pros and cons of dictators vs. politburos ;) I like to suggest that we just move on. I believe there’s a larger conversation needing our attention.

I would though like to reference one comment you made in your last reply to the 'Multiple Proxies’ thread, Scott. There’s a passage from a book I was reading while I was away that I feel correlates with it quite elegantly.

[First my comment
]

Post by Scott Raney

...if the a majority of the electorate felt that a single
figurehead/executive was a better way to do business, then that would become
the new Executive Structure. I just wouldn’t want to front load it with that
because of the reasons stated above.

Well, of course people would have to vote to approve the new system,
but wouldn't it be better if we *designed* it right in the first place
to reduce the number of these on-the-fly redesigns?

From: Founding Brothers by Joseph J. Ellis
Vintage Books 2002
p. 216

"As Adams remembered it
.'all great critical questions about men and measures from 1774 to 1778' we’re desperately contested and highly problematic occasions, usually decided by one vote of a single state, and that vote was often decided by a single individual. Nothing was clear, inevitable, or even comprehensible to the soldiers in the field at Saratoga or the statesman in the corridors at Philadelphia: 'It was patched and piebald policy then, as it is now, ever was, ever will be, world without end.' The real drama of the American Revolution, which was perfectly in accord with Adam’s memory, as well as with the turbulent conditions of his own soul, was its inherent messiness. This meant recovering the exciting but terrifying sense that all the major players had at the time—namely, that they were making it up as they went along, improvising on the edge of catastrophe."

[More about this at the end of my email.]

As I think we all know now, the "catastrophe” these *Brothers* were facing was multifold and ultimately came down to 'life or death' decisions for many of them individually as well as for their emerging Country. But the circumstances they faced were, by any reasonable measure, an order of magnitude less complex and dire than those we are currently facing as a planetary species.

In my mind, the confluence of tragedies we are soon to encounter on a colossal scale is an emerging crisis that can only be met by the massive synergistic intelligence of a collective global mind. I think it is our best and only survival option. It should be clear to any semi-conscious human that the structures we now rely on are not up to the task. For me personally, the preponderant question is: "How does a Meta-mind emerge?" Of course no one can really say, but I think attempting to design a Meta-governance system to replace what’s collapsing before our eyes is a fine place to start.

--------------------------------------------------

I really like the essential components of proxy4.me. I think it’s crucial that we achieve a comprehensive quorum if we are going to empower a truly comprehensive global democracy. And it seems to me that proxy4.me is a near perfect fit for this objective...if it works as intended. That said, I think it’s just one piece of a larger puzzle that will be needed for constructing a thriving and effective global platform. Listed below I believe is an inventory of a the baseline components that will be crucial, from the get go, for the creation of a self-organizing global body.

1 - I think we can all agree a crowdsourced *proposal driven platform* is key. One that is available to anyone willing to participate according to the rules and norms of the larger Organization. A Network for a global tribe that can generate and support the proposals and projects of a new paradigm
perhaps even an entirely new species.

2 - Perhaps we can also agree that proposals will need to be vetted in order to reduce the number of those which are poorly developed and/or that don’t fit the Mandate of the Organization at large.

3 - Because *we the people* will ultimately generate an enormous number of proposals at a global level (perhaps dozens or more daily), a sizable staff will be necessary to process them in a timely manner.

4 - This staff will need to be managed by some Executive Oversight Structure. [To be run by either a Dictator, or a Politburo. ;]

5 - The overall Platform will need to be developed and maintained as well by even more staff.

6 - I think it will be necessary to set up a customized crypto-economy with a Foundation to support proposals and the financial needs of the Organization at large. Many proposals will need significant resources to get them off the ground. And some will no doubt provide significant income for the Foundation once their projects become viable.

7 - A Voting Platform will be necessary to determine which proposals are adopted and funded.

8 - An ever-evolving crowdsourced Mandate will need to be drafted in order to reflect the Vision of the Organization as well as to determine it's Priority.

9 - And, as I see it, a blockchain Database will need to be set up to track the undertakings and operation of the Organization.

10 - A huge forum for Discourse will be necessary to debate the proposals that have been vetted prior to a vote.

11 - A Magistrate of sorts will be necessary to maintain order on the Intranet Platform of the Network.

12 - And finally, a Template for submitting proposals according to the Policy of the Organization will be extremely useful in saving time and effort both for those creating the proposals, as well as for those who are vetting them.

Obviously there are many more details to be fleshed out, but that is, I believe, a comprehensive summary of the fundamental elements necessary to get this project off the ground.


Thanks in advance for your thoughtful response,
Steve

One final word in reference to the "on-the-fly-redesign” comment.

I first encountered what might be called the substratum of these ideas back in the early eighties. My own personal journey through the decades since has precipitated many practical and theoretical iterations emerging from this basic substructure of ideas. But one of the values that has run through them all is a conviction that the Process and Structure must be crowdsourced and flexible enough to be continually self-organizing. I’m not sure if this qualifies as an "on-the-fly-redesign,” but either way, I’ll take it with your "design it right in the first place" comment as a misguided suggestion rather than an admonition. :) I think it’s critical that we remain open, flexible, and collaborative as we "improvise on the edge of catastrophe".

[harold l Carpenter]

“YOU” need to take down that donate button!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sent from Mail for Windows 10

From: Steve Coffman
Sent: Friday, January 19, 2018 3:04 PM
To: Metagovernment Project
Subject: [MG] The Big Picture - Improvising on the Edge of Catastrophe

Hi Scott (and others),
My apologies for dropping the previous thread. I was away from my computer for several weeks visiting family. I’d like to continue the conversation, but rather than picking up the circular and protracted debate about the pros and cons of dictators vs. politburos  ;) I like to suggest that we just move on. I believe there’s a larger conversation needing our attention. 

I would though like to reference one comment you made in your last reply to the 'Multiple Proxies’ thread, Scott. There’s a passage from a book I was reading while I was away that I feel correlates with it quite elegantly.  

[First my comment
]

...if the a majority of the electorate felt that a single
figurehead/executive was a better way to do business, then that would become
the new Executive Structure. I just wouldn’t want to front load it with that
because of the reasons stated above.

Well, of course people would have to vote to approve the new system,
but wouldn't it be better if we *designed* it right in the first place
to reduce the number of these on-the-fly redesigns?


From: Founding Brothers by Joseph J. Ellis
Vintage Books 2002 
p. 216

"As Adams remembered it
.'all great critical questions about men and measures from 1774 to 1778' we’re desperately contested and highly problematic occasions, usually decided by one vote of a single state, and that vote was often decided by a single individual. Nothing was clear, inevitable, or even comprehensible to the soldiers in the field at Saratoga or the statesman in the corridors at Philadelphia: 'It was patched and piebald policy then, as it is now, ever was, ever will be, world without end.' The real drama of the American Revolution, which was perfectly in accord with Adam’s memory, as well as with the turbulent conditions of his own soul, was its inherent messiness. This meant recovering the exciting but terrifying sense that all the major players had at the time—namely, that they were making it up as they went along, improvising on the edge of catastrophe."
[More about this at the end of my email.]

As I think we all know now, the "catastrophe” these *Brothers* were facing was multifold and ultimately came down to 'life or death' decisions for many of them individually as well as for their emerging Country. But the circumstances they faced were, by any reasonable measure, an order of magnitude less complex and dire than those we are currently facing as a planetary species.

In my mind, the confluence of tragedies we are soon to encounter on a colossal scale is an emerging crisis that can only be met by the massive synergistic intelligence of a collective global mind. I think it is our best and only survival option. It should be clear to any semi-conscious human that the structures we now rely on are not up to the task. For me personally, the preponderant question is: "How does a Meta-mind emerge?" Of course no one can really say, but I think attempting to design a Meta-governance system to replace what’s collapsing before our eyes is a fine place to start.

--------------------------------------------------

I really like the essential components of proxy4.me. I think it’s crucial that we achieve a comprehensive quorum if we are going to empower a truly comprehensive global democracy. And it seems to me that proxy4.me is a near perfect fit for this objective...if it works as intended. That said, I think it’s just one piece of a larger puzzle that will be needed for constructing a thriving and effective global platform. Listed below I believe is an inventory of a the baseline components that will be crucial, from the get go, for the creation of a self-organizing global body.

1 - I think we can all agree a crowdsourced *proposal driven platform* is key. One that is available to anyone willing to participate according to the rules and norms of the larger Organization. A Network for a global tribe that can generate and support the proposals and projects of a new paradigm
perhaps even an entirely new species.

2 - Perhaps we can also agree that proposals will need to be vetted in order to reduce the number of those which are poorly developed and/or that don’t fit the Mandate of the Organization at large.

3 - Because *we the people* will ultimately generate an enormous number of proposals at a global level (perhaps dozens or more daily), a sizable staff will be necessary to process them in a timely manner. 

4 - This staff will need to be managed by some Executive Oversight Structure. [To be run by either a Dictator, or a Politburo. ;]  

5 - The overall Platform will need to be developed and maintained as well by even more staff.

6 - I think it will be necessary to set up a customized crypto-economy with a Foundation to support proposals and the financial needs of the Organization at large. Many proposals will need significant resources to get them off the ground. And some will no doubt provide significant income for the Foundation once their projects become viable.

7 - A Voting Platform will be necessary to determine which proposals are adopted and funded.

8 - An ever-evolving crowdsourced Mandate will need to be drafted in order to reflect the Vision of the Organization as well as to determine it's Priority.

9 - And, as I see it, a blockchain Database will need to be set up to track the undertakings and operation of the Organization.

10 - A huge forum for Discourse will be necessary to debate the proposals that have been vetted prior to a vote.

11 - A Magistrate of sorts will be necessary to maintain order on the Intranet Platform of the Network.

12 - And finally, a Template for submitting proposals according to the Policy of the Organization will be extremely useful in saving time and effort both for those creating the proposals, as well as for those who are vetting them.

Obviously there are many more details to be fleshed out, but that is, I believe, a comprehensive summary of the fundamental elements necessary to get this project off the ground. 


Thanks in advance for your thoughtful response,
Steve

One final word in reference to the "on-the-fly-redesign” comment. 

I first encountered what might be called the substratum of these ideas back in the early eighties. My own personal journey through the decades since has precipitated many practical and theoretical iterations emerging from this basic substructure of ideas. But one of the values that has run through them all is a conviction that the Process and Structure must be crowdsourced and flexible enough to be continually self-organizing. I’m not sure if this qualifies as an "on-the-fly-redesign,” but either way, I’ll take it with your "design it right in the first place" comment as a misguided suggestion rather than an admonition. :) I think it’s critical that we remain open, flexible, and collaborative as we "improvise on the edge of catastrophe".








---
This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software.
https://www.avast.com/antivirus

[Steve Coffman]

???

Post by harold l Carpenter
“YOU” need to take down that donate button!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sent from Mail <https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=550986> for Windows 10

[Patrick Millerd]

I'm not sure what Harold is talking about either. I like your list Steve,
well spelled out. The only thing I disagree with is point 4 - This staff
will need to be managed by some Executive Oversight Structure. [To be run
by either a Dictator, or a Politburo. ;]

With a clearly defined mandate set by the public of what is expected from
the staff, they should require no managing. If they break their mandate
then they are able to be replaced by a vote. This 'Executive Oversight'
needs to be extremely limited in its power for me to consider this a
reasonable idea. As I perceive your system now I think they can do to much
damage in the short term, enough to disrupt everything and potentially
cause chaos.

Also, the link to Scott's site is www.proxyfor.me, not the number 4.

Post by harold l Carpenter
???
“YOU” need to take down that donate button!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sent from Mail <https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=550986> for Windows 10
_______________________________________________
Start : a mailing list of the Metagovernment project
http://www.metagovernment.org/
Manage subscription: http://metagovernment.org/mailman/listinfo/start_
metagovernment.org

[Scott Raney]

Post by Patrick Millerd
I'm not sure what Harold is talking about either. I like your list Steve,
well spelled out. The only thing I disagree with is point 4 - This staff
will need to be managed by some Executive Oversight Structure. [To be run by
either a Dictator, or a Politburo. ;]
With a clearly defined mandate set by the public of what is expected from
the staff, they should require no managing. If they break their mandate then
they are able to be replaced by a vote. This 'Executive Oversight' needs to
be extremely limited in its power for me to consider this a reasonable idea.
As I perceive your system now I think they can do to much damage in the
short term, enough to disrupt everything and potentially cause chaos.

Agreed. I haven't really defined what the filtering mechanism for
getting a proposal into the main queue should look like, but in
proxyfor.me inappropriate filtering is the only real means for the
executive branch to get up to any policy mischief (e.g., there is
basically no provision for "executive orders" other than the normal
regulatory stuff). I still believe that getting a proposal through
some sort of an "initiative" process on FB/reddit/etc. should be
sufficient. If the Manager rejects it anyway, they'd be obligated to
provide a rejection letter, and if that provides an obviously
inappropriate reason it would be sufficient cause to get people riled
up enough to vote to remove the the manager (or maybe just the queue
manager). And as I've already suggested "remove the manager" should be
a permanent proposal in the queue and that the replacement manager
should be pre-identified (e.g, for the Globality Manager, the highest
rated (by some objective criteria) Locality Manager would
automatically be promoted. For Localities I guess you'd have to use a
lower-level board: Here in Boulder for example it'd probably be the
highest rated member of the Planning Board, which perhaps not
coincidentally is where many of the City Council candidates already
come from).

Post by Patrick Millerd
Also, the link to Scott's site is www.proxyfor.me, not the number 4.

Yeah, proxy4.me is being used by some German sysadmin for his testing
purposes. At some point I was going make an offer to buy it from him,
but was planning to wait until confusion became an issue. I guess it
already has ;-)
Regards,
Scott

[Steve Coffman]

Post by Scott Raney
Agreed. I haven't really defined what the filtering mechanism for
getting a proposal into the main queue should look like,

I think it could largely be a boilerplate *application* tailored to the type or category of proposal being submitted. Tutorials could be available to assist in making the application process more understandable. And as I said earlier, I think that ultimately AI could be utilized. My sense is that one would want to make the process as simple and painless as possible so that more people would be inclined to use the platform. And the boilerplate aspect would assist in the *vetting* as well by making proposals more uniform. Initially I think, maybe just a simple form with a tutorial listing the basics.

Post by Scott Raney
but in
proxyfor.me <http://proxyfor.me/> inappropriate filtering is the only real means for the
executive branch to get up to any policy mischief (e.g., there is
basically no provision for "executive orders" other than the normal
regulatory stuff).

Agreed.

Post by Scott Raney
I still believe that getting a proposal through
some sort of an "initiative" process on FB/reddit/etc. should be
sufficient.

This is the biggest hurdle in my mind. How do you legitimize something like proxyfor.me except through widespread usage. It needs to be tested before it will be accepted by the mainstream. Chicken and egg. What kind of proposal could be run on Social Media that would have enough *value outcome* to attract the necessary population, not only to validate it, but to encourage it’s further usage?

Post by Scott Raney
If the Manager rejects it anyway, they'd be obligated to
provide a rejection letter, and if that provides an obviously
inappropriate reason it would be sufficient cause to get people riled
up enough to vote to remove the the manager (or maybe just the queue
manager). And as I've already suggested "remove the manager" should be
a permanent proposal in the queue and that the replacement manager
should be pre-identified

I imagine this would cause a managers average cortisol levels to rise substantially.

Post by Scott Raney

Also, the link to Scott's site is www.proxyfor.me <http://www.proxyfor.me/>, not the number 4.

Yeah, proxy4.me <http://proxy4.me/> is being used by some German sysadmin for his testing
purposes. At some point I was going make an offer to buy it from him,
but was planning to wait until confusion became an issue. I guess it
already has ;-)

Glad I could help out with that. :)

Post by Scott Raney
Regards,
Scott
_______________________________________________
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[Steve Coffman]

The only thing I disagree with is point 4 - This staff will need to be managed by some Executive Oversight Structure. [To be run by either a Dictator, or a Politburo. ;]
With a clearly defined mandate set by the public of what is expected from the staff, they should require no managing. If they break their mandate then they are able to be replaced by a vote. This 'Executive Oversight' needs to be extremely limited in its power for me to consider this a reasonable idea. As I perceive your system now I think they can do to much damage in the short term, enough to disrupt everything and potentially cause chaos.

I appreciate your feedback Patrick. I'm probably missing something here. (I really mean that.) It’s difficult for me to comprehend how an organization of that scale would tick without some umbrella of management. But I’m considering your suggestion
."a clearly defined mandate [such that staff would] require no managing,” that to me would be ideal.

I think one of the most inspiring examples of this is valvesoftware.com. They have a completely horizontal organizational structure. Their desks are literally on wheels and each employee gets to park themselves wherever they want, and work on what ever inspires them. I’m not a gamer, but I believe Valve is one of the premier companies of it’s kind on the planet. Apparently they're very successful. As I understand it, the only managers are ad hoc Projects Organizers who are completely self-selecting. Maybe their model is something to emulate. Whatever we wind up implementing, I agree with you and Scott that being able to vote managers out overnight is key.

Also, as we speed up the curve towards the *Singularity*, no doubt AI will be saddled with more of the tasks and duties associated with managing our general human infrastructure. If we can write algorithms to manage various aspects of oversight for the Organization, I’m all for it.

The real question that continues to bewilder me is, “How do we get this show on the road?” My guess is that a fair number of those souls with an interest in Meta-governance have at some point found their way to this list. If that’s so, what’s keeping us from a more active collaboration. Are we waiting for permission from the goddess of law and legislation...or is there some other group that’s movin' and groovin' with this? I don’t mean to be flippant but, what’s the hold up? I mean really. I just came from a trip to California where I have family in both Santa Rosa and Ventura and I can attest to you that Rome has already begun to burn.

It seems to me that our apparent inability to organize a governance mechanism for a sovereign global people is the only thing that is keeping us from a reasonable response to the tragedies that lie before us.

I’m puzzled to find the missing link? What will it take?

What would a first step look like?

[Steve Coffman]

Maybe we just need more women on our list. :)

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/01/21/world/womens-march-pictures.html

Post by Steve Coffman

The only thing I disagree with is point 4 - This staff will need to be managed by some Executive Oversight Structure. [To be run by either a Dictator, or a Politburo. ;]
With a clearly defined mandate set by the public of what is expected from the staff, they should require no managing. If they break their mandate then they are able to be replaced by a vote. This 'Executive Oversight' needs to be extremely limited in its power for me to consider this a reasonable idea. As I perceive your system now I think they can do to much damage in the short term, enough to disrupt everything and potentially cause chaos.

I appreciate your feedback Patrick. I'm probably missing something here. (I really mean that.) It’s difficult for me to comprehend how an organization of that scale would tick without some umbrella of management. But I’m considering your suggestion
."a clearly defined mandate [such that staff would] require no managing,” that to me would be ideal.
I think one of the most inspiring examples of this is valvesoftware.com <http://valvesoftware.com/>. They have a completely horizontal organizational structure. Their desks are literally on wheels and each employee gets to park themselves wherever they want, and work on what ever inspires them. I’m not a gamer, but I believe Valve is one of the premier companies of it’s kind on the planet. Apparently they're very successful. As I understand it, the only managers are ad hoc Projects Organizers who are completely self-selecting. Maybe their model is something to emulate. Whatever we wind up implementing, I agree with you and Scott that being able to vote managers out overnight is key.
Also, as we speed up the curve towards the *Singularity*, no doubt AI will be saddled with more of the tasks and duties associated with managing our general human infrastructure. If we can write algorithms to manage various aspects of oversight for the Organization, I’m all for it.
The real question that continues to bewilder me is, “How do we get this show on the road?” My guess is that a fair number of those souls with an interest in Meta-governance have at some point found their way to this list. If that’s so, what’s keeping us from a more active collaboration. Are we waiting for permission from the goddess of law and legislation...or is there some other group that’s movin' and groovin' with this? I don’t mean to be flippant but, what’s the hold up? I mean really. I just came from a trip to California where I have family in both Santa Rosa and Ventura and I can attest to you that Rome has already begun to burn.
It seems to me that our apparent inability to organize a governance mechanism for a sovereign global people is the only thing that is keeping us from a reasonable response to the tragedies that lie before us.
I’m puzzled to find the missing link? What will it take?
What would a first step look like?
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[Michal Štěpánek]

Hi Steve,

about that Meta-mind. Sorry, I know that you do not define it, but it
sounds like that if everybody is in the decision making process that it is
the best process. Well, it may be true when the best contribution of some
individuals is that they learn something from the process. Because they may
be biased, e.g. vulgar material thinking bias. They only way forward may be
learning.

Sure more people know more, but in my opinion it is worth testing how many
and what kind of people you need for decision-making that produces best
outcomes, before you ask everybody to participate.

Kind regars
m.

Post by Steve Coffman
Hi Scott (and others),
My apologies for dropping the previous thread. I was away from my computer
for several weeks visiting family. I’d like to continue the conversation,
but rather than picking up the circular and protracted debate about the
pros and cons of* dictators vs. politburos * ;) I like to suggest that we
just move on. I believe there’s a larger conversation needing our
attention.
I *would* though like to reference one comment you made in your last
reply to the 'Multiple Proxies’ thread, Scott. There’s a passage from a
book I was reading while I was away that I feel correlates with it quite
elegantly.
[First my comment
]
...if the a majority of the electorate felt that a single
figurehead/executive was a better way to do business, then that would become
the new Executive Structure. I just wouldn’t want to front load it with that
because of the reasons stated above.
Well, of course people would have to vote to approve the new system,
but wouldn't it be better if we *designed* it right in the first place
to reduce the number of these on-the-fly redesigns?
From:* Founding Brothers* by Joseph J. Ellis
Vintage Books 2002
p. 216
"As Adams remembered it
.'all great critical questions about men and
measures from 1774 to 1778' we’re desperately contested and highly
problematic occasions, usually decided by one vote of a single state, and
that vote was often decided by a single individual. Nothing was clear,
inevitable, or even comprehensible to the soldiers in the field at Saratoga
or the statesman in the corridors at Philadelphia: 'It was patched and
piebald policy then, as it is now, ever was, ever will be, world without
end.' The real drama of the American Revolution, which was perfectly in
accord with Adam’s memory, as well as with the turbulent conditions of his
own soul, was its inherent messiness. This meant recovering the exciting
but terrifying sense that all the major players had at the time—namely,
that they were making it up as they went along, improvising on the edge of
catastrophe."
[More about this at the end of my email.]
As I think we all know now, the "catastrophe” these *Brothers* were facing
was multifold and ultimately came down to 'life or death' decisions for
many of them individually as well as for their emerging Country. But the
circumstances they faced were, by any reasonable measure, an order of
magnitude less complex and dire than those we are currently facing as a
planetary species.
In my mind, the confluence of tragedies we are soon to encounter on a
colossal scale is an emerging crisis that can *only* be met by the
massive synergistic intelligence of a collective global mind. I think it is
our best and only survival option. It should be clear to any semi-conscious
human that the structures we now rely on are not up to the task. For me
personally, the preponderant question is: "How does a Meta-mind emerge?" Of
course no one can really say, but I think attempting to design a
Meta-governance system to replace what’s collapsing before our eyes is a
fine place to start.
--------------------------------------------------
I *really* like the essential components of proxy4.me. I think it’s
crucial that we achieve a comprehensive quorum if we are going to empower a
truly comprehensive global democracy. And it seems to me that proxy4.me
is a near perfect fit for this objective...if it works as intended. That
said, I think it’s just one piece of a larger puzzle that will be needed
for constructing a thriving and effective global platform. Listed below I
believe is an inventory of a the baseline components that will be crucial,
from the get go, for the creation of a self-organizing global body.
1 - I think we can all agree a crowdsourced *proposal driven platform* is
key. One that is available to anyone willing to participate according to
the rules and norms of the larger Organization. A Network for a global
tribe that can generate and support the proposals and projects of a new
paradigm
perhaps even an entirely new species.
2 - Perhaps we can also agree that proposals will need to be vetted in
order to reduce the number of those which are poorly developed and/or that
don’t fit the Mandate of the Organization at large.
3 - Because *we the people* will ultimately generate an enormous number of
proposals at a global level (perhaps dozens or more daily), a sizable staff
will be necessary to process them in a timely manner.
4 - This staff will need to be managed by some Executive Oversight
Structure. [To be run by either a Dictator, or a Politburo. ;]
5 - The overall Platform will need to be developed and maintained as well
by even more staff.
6 - I think it will be necessary to set up a customized crypto-economy
with a Foundation to support proposals and the financial needs of the
Organization at large. Many proposals will need significant resources to
get them off the ground. And some will no doubt provide significant income
for the Foundation once their projects become viable.
7 - A Voting Platform will be necessary to determine which proposals are
adopted and funded.
8 - An ever-evolving crowdsourced Mandate will need to be drafted in order
to reflect the Vision of the Organization as well as to determine it's
Priority.
9 - And, as I see it, a blockchain Database will need to be set up to
track the undertakings and operation of the Organization.
10 - A huge forum for Discourse will be necessary to debate the proposals
that have been vetted prior to a vote.
11 - A Magistrate of sorts will be necessary to maintain order on the
Intranet Platform of the Network.
12 - And finally, a Template for submitting proposals according to the
Policy of the Organization will be extremely useful in saving time and
effort both for those creating the proposals, as well as for those who are
vetting them.
Obviously there are many more details to be fleshed out, but that is, I
believe, a comprehensive summary of the fundamental elements necessary to
get this project off the ground.
Thanks in advance for your thoughtful response,
Steve
One final word in reference to the "on-the-fly-redesign” comment.
I first encountered what might be called the substratum of these ideas
back in the early eighties. My own personal journey through the decades
since has precipitated many practical and theoretical iterations emerging
from this basic substructure of ideas. But one of the values that has run
through them all is a conviction that the Process and Structure must be
crowdsourced and flexible enough to be continually self-organizing. I’m not
sure if this qualifies as an "on-the-fly-redesign,” but either way, I’ll
take it with your "design it right in the first place" comment as a
misguided suggestion rather than an admonition. :) I think it’s critical
that we remain open, flexible, and collaborative as we "improvise on the
edge of catastrophe".
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[Steve Coffman]

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Hi Steve,
about that Meta-mind. Sorry, I know that you do not define it, but it sounds like that if everybody is in the decision making process that it is the best process. Well, it may be true when the best contribution of some individuals is that they learn something from the process. Because they may be biased, e.g. vulgar material thinking bias. They only way forward may be learning.
Sure more people know more, but in my opinion it is worth testing how many and what kind of people you need for decision-making that produces best outcomes, before you ask everybody to participate.
Kind regars
m.

Wouldn’t any “best outcome” determination be based on subjective criteria? Who would determine what "best outcome" looks like, and what are the criteria they would use to make this determination?

Also, how do you exclude someone from this process? By their low IQ, their prison record, or their poor diet? :) Is that what you mean by "vulgar material thinking bias”? I’m not sure I’m following you Michal.

Sorry. Please try again.

S
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[Michal Štěpánek]

Yes, best outcome is subjective, still it allows for 7.6 billions of
subjectivities. Just ask them whether their life is good, whether some
partial outcomes are good.

As in current system exclusion isn't the right word in many cases. It is
just so that some kinds of people are more likely to be in government. It
may be about election system that makes people with "better outcomes" (as
described above) more likely to be in some kind of government. Or it may be
about system that attracts certain kind of people who are likely to produce
"better outcomes".

Still the research about relation of election systems and "better outcomes"
is still very incomplete. On the other hand I believe it is in your powers
to run some research in this sense with your skills.

Kind regards
m.

Post by Michal Štěpánek

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Hi Steve,
about that Meta-mind. Sorry, I know that you do not define it, but it

sounds like that if everybody is in the decision making process that it is
the best process. Well, it may be true when the best contribution of some
individuals is that they learn something from the process. Because they may
be biased, e.g. vulgar material thinking bias. They only way forward may be
learning.

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Sure more people know more, but in my opinion it is worth testing how

many and what kind of people you need for decision-making that produces
best outcomes, before you ask everybody to participate.

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Kind regars
m.

Wouldn’t any “best outcome” determination be based on subjective criteria?
Who would determine what "best outcome" looks like, and what are the
criteria they would use to make this determination?
Also, how do you exclude someone from this process? By their low IQ, their
prison record, or their poor diet? :) Is that what you mean by "vulgar
material thinking bias”? I’m not sure I’m following you Michal.
Sorry. Please try again.
S
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[Steve Coffman]

Yes, best outcome is subjective, still it allows for 7.6 billions of subjectivities. Just ask them whether their life is good, whether some partial outcomes are good.

Theoretically, at least in my mind, the *precursors* to “best outcome” would be described clearly in the Mandate of the Organization. Values like freedom, justice, and equality come to mind.

The Mandate would drive the quality, intent, and material design of proposals submitted to the Organization.

For me, “best outcome” for proposal submissions would be based on values like brevity, clarity, and veracity. Or for staff selection - experience, passion, responsibility.

As in current system exclusion isn't the right word in many cases. It is just so that some kinds of people are more likely to be in government. It may be about election system that makes people with "better outcomes" (as described above) more likely to be in some kind of government. Or it may be about system that attracts certain kind of people who are likely to produce "better outcomes”.

I’m not sure exactly what you mean by "best outcomes”. Are you talking about the better legislation
.or better elected representatives
or both?

Still the research about relation of election systems and "better outcomes" is still very incomplete. On the other hand I believe it is in your powers to run some research in this sense with your skills.

I seem to remember a thread where you discussed this with Scott. Is this something that a larger quorum would fulfill? More people voting = larger cross-section of sensible voter profiles = less assholes getting elected = "better outcome”?

Kind regards
m.

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Hi Steve,
about that Meta-mind. Sorry, I know that you do not define it, but it sounds like that if everybody is in the decision making process that it is the best process. Well, it may be true when the best contribution of some individuals is that they learn something from the process. Because they may be biased, e.g. vulgar material thinking bias. They only way forward may be learning.
Sure more people know more, but in my opinion it is worth testing how many and what kind of people you need for decision-making that produces best outcomes, before you ask everybody to participate.
Kind regars
m.

Wouldn’t any “best outcome” determination be based on subjective criteria? Who would determine what "best outcome" looks like, and what are the criteria they would use to make this determination?
Also, how do you exclude someone from this process? By their low IQ, their prison record, or their poor diet? :) Is that what you mean by "vulgar material thinking bias”? I’m not sure I’m following you Michal.
Sorry. Please try again.
S
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[Michal Štěpánek]

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Yes, best outcome is subjective, still it allows for 7.6 billions of
subjectivities. Just ask them whether their life is good, whether some
partial outcomes are good.
Theoretically, at least in my mind, the *precursors* to “best outcome”
would be described clearly in the Mandate of the Organization. Values like
freedom, justice, and equality come to mind.
The Mandate would drive the quality, intent, and material design of
proposals submitted to the Organization.
For me, “best outcome” for proposal submissions would be based on values
like brevity, clarity, and veracity. Or for staff selection - experience,
passion, responsibility.

As in current system exclusion isn't the right word in many cases. It is

Post by Michal Štěpánek
just so that some kinds of people are more likely to be in government. It
may be about election system that makes people with "better outcomes" (as
described above) more likely to be in some kind of government. Or it may be
about system that attracts certain kind of people who are likely to produce
"better outcomes”.
I’m not sure exactly what you mean by "best outcomes”. Are you talking
about the better legislation
.or better elected representatives
or both?
Outcome is positive subjective (thin moral) evaluation of one's life.

There are more options how to construct it as (thin moral) evaluation of
one's life has distribution in population, so you may use descriptive
statistics.

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Still the research about relation of election systems and "better
outcomes" is still very incomplete. On the other hand I believe it is in
your powers to run some research in this sense with your skills.
I seem to remember a thread where you discussed this with Scott.

I have made some steps (hopefully forward :) since that time.

Is this something that a larger quorum would fulfill? More people voting =

Post by Michal Štěpánek
larger cross-section of sensible voter profiles = less assholes getting
elected = "better outcome”?

Well, we do not know really, there are too many effects in society for such
a simple thinking imho. I prefer the black box model, where we measure
outputs and we look for significant inputs. Everything else is black box.
Significant inputs we may also call as Meadows' "leverage points".

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Kind regards
m.

Post by Michal Štěpánek

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Hi Steve,
about that Meta-mind. Sorry, I know that you do not define it, but it

sounds like that if everybody is in the decision making process that it is
the best process. Well, it may be true when the best contribution of some
individuals is that they learn something from the process. Because they may
be biased, e.g. vulgar material thinking bias. They only way forward may be
learning.

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Sure more people know more, but in my opinion it is worth testing how

many and what kind of people you need for decision-making that produces
best outcomes, before you ask everybody to participate.

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Kind regars
m.

Wouldn’t any “best outcome” determination be based on subjective
criteria? Who would determine what "best outcome" looks like, and what are
the criteria they would use to make this determination?
Also, how do you exclude someone from this process? By their low IQ,
their prison record, or their poor diet? :) Is that what you mean by
"vulgar material thinking bias”? I’m not sure I’m following you Michal.
Sorry. Please try again.
S
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[Steve Coffman]

Outcome is positive subjective (thin moral) evaluation of one's life. There are more options how to construct it as (thin moral) evaluation of one's life has distribution in population, so you may use descriptive statistics.

Ok, so you could use descriptive statistics to predict the best outcome for the development specific legislation? Sorry, I don’t have a background in statistics (and I may be a little bit stupid as well). But I’m curious. Are you wanting to use statistics to gauge the outcome of decision-making by quantifying subjective values like freedom, and then use that data to predict/create better legislation?

Is this something that a larger quorum would fulfill? More people voting = larger cross-section of sensible voter profiles = less assholes getting elected = "better outcome”?
Well, we do not know really, there are too many effects in society for such a simple thinking imho. I prefer the black box model, where we measure outputs and we look for significant inputs. Everything else is black box.
Significant inputs we may also call as Meadows' "leverage points”.

What would be a "leverage point" for bootstrapping a global Polity?

[Michal Štěpánek]

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Outcome is positive subjective (thin moral) evaluation of one's life.
There are more options how to construct it as (thin moral) evaluation of
one's life has distribution in population, so you may use descriptive
statistics.
Ok, so you could use descriptive statistics to predict the best outcome
for the development specific legislation?

Descriptive statistics is for description. E.g. regression or neural
networks are for prediction.
I would like to measure and later predict the red line. As I think it is
the most important statistics about thin moral evaluations. (But it is also
possible to try to measure the area under the hypothetical line or any
other area or line in the graph)

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Sorry, I don’t have a background in statistics (and I may be a little bit
stupid as well). But I’m curious. Are you wanting to use statistics to
gauge the outcome of decision-making by quantifying subjective values like
freedom, and then use that data to predict/create better legislation?

Good. First of all I would like to quantify thin moral evaluation of one's
life (sometimes called happiness, meaning, subjective well-being). Freedom
is already a thick moral (descriptive) concept.
For more see
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/thick-ethical-concepts/

Next I will try to find that "leverage points" and also other significant
variables(like religion). I do have some candidates to leverage poins, but
it is worth testing. My main candidates are constitutions of global actors,
as they influence education, research, media, material flows, violence,
etc. One interesting exception is religion and churches as their constitutions
are written in brains and do not seem to be leverage points as they are too
stable.

Post by Michal Štěpánek
Is this something that a larger quorum would fulfill? More people voting =

Post by Steve Coffman
larger cross-section of sensible voter profiles = less assholes getting
elected = "better outcome”?

Well, we do not know really, there are too many effects in society for
such a simple thinking imho. I prefer the black box model, where we measure
outputs and we look for significant inputs. Everything else is black box.
Significant inputs we may also call as Meadows' "leverage points”.
What would be a "leverage point" for bootstrapping a global Polity?

When it comes to concrete changes, I do not know. We may get a lot of hints
from small scale testing. Cultivate those hints to some bigger test till we
get to global level. If I say it simply, I am for testing of promising
constitutions (inputs) and measurement of subjective well-being (outputs).
Compare it to arranging nice inputs and always finding some unspecifically
big mistakes in the output.

Kind regards
m.


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[Scott Raney]

Post by Steve Coffman
Hi Scott, et al,
Any decentralized online governance system that provides access to local, regional, international and global referendums will likely have more proposals scheduled for deliberation and a vote, at any given time, than any individual or small group of individuals could rationally and practically respond to in a timely and reliable manner.

I firmly believe this to be false, and stand by my analysis that one
or two votes a week will be sufficient to do *more* than what
governments at all levels do now. Of course I do expect there to be
some consolidation as part of this evolution: There are way too many
levels of government now, and there's virtually no justification for
it other than "that's the way it's always been done", and which
results in us continuing to use a system that was designed to be run
on horseback. I also expect that the executive branch will handle even
more of the day-to-day operations than they do now, albeit with the
ability of The People to override bad decisions (the executive branch
already does *way* more than most people realize, particularly in the
area of trying to fine-tune business and environmental regulation, but
with almost no oversight or ability for The People to correct for
their mistakes).

Post by Steve Coffman
It seems to me that citizens wanting to participate *at all levels* of discussion and decision-making would need to enlist a small army of proxies in order to cover all of their bases in any form of global democracy. Personally, I don’t yet see a problem with this...but I’m wondering how others might imagine this playing out.

I think that's what they do now: They're usually called
"representatives", even though they are not "representative" of the
people, nor do they even claim to make any of their decisions based on
what is best for The People or what The People would choose to do if
they were given actual power.

Post by Steve Coffman
I think having a battery of proxies for the various geographical and topical regions or sectors one belongs to would be a solution to the overburden of research and participation one would necessarily encounter at this scale of involvement.

I think this misses the point: Any time you allow people to pick and
choose what level or even what issue to participate in, you end up
with "Tyranny of the Active Participants", my correction to what most
people seem to fear as the mischaracterization "Tyranny of the
Majority". Proxy selection must be automatic, and the proxies must not
be preselected by the individual or (as in the case of juries) by some
sort of government appointment. Otherwise all you've done is re-create
misrepresentative government.

Post by Steve Coffman
One might employ a proxy for local issues (with perhaps a backup should their first choice be unavailable) and several more for regional (environmental, political, scientific, social, technological, etc) issues and concerns. Ones proxy choice for environmental issues may be unconcerned with educational issues, or be so involved in the environmental arena that they just don’t have time to track anything else in a reasonable or acceptable manner.
Your thoughts?

It's a non-starter: People are not competent to choose their
proxies/representatives/delegates, something that has been clearly
demonstrated by the failure of all the Liquid Democracy runs, and
indeed of misrepresentative democracies in general, to implement
anything even vaguely resembling "The Willl of the People". My point
is that it's simply not necessary or even desirable that each person
actively participate in every decision or at every level or even to
have the knowledge and skill to choose a true representative. All we
have to do is to make sure that the ultimate vote cast for each person
is the same as what they would have cast if they *did* actively
participate in each decision. Fortunately this is a *much* simpler
problem to solve than to try to somehow make sure that the active
participants are actually representative of The People.
Regards,
Scott

Post by Steve Coffman
Steve
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[Edward Pastore]

Post by Scott Raney
Any time you allow people to pick and
choose what level or even what issue to participate in, you end up
with "Tyranny of the Active Participants"

My point is that it is not tyranny if it is a consensus system. The active participants are the ones who care about an issue. They should have the right to have a voice in the decision, and other people shouldn’t be forced to vote.

If the active participants have to reach a consensus to pass a decision, then it is very unlikely that any tyranny of one group could prevail over other interested parties.

[Scott Raney]

On Sun, Dec 3, 2017 at 3:29 PM, Edward Pastore

Post by Scott Raney
Any time you allow people to pick and
choose what level or even what issue to participate in, you end up
with "Tyranny of the Active Participants"
My point is that it is not tyranny if it is a consensus system. The active
participants are the ones who care about an issue. They should have the
right to have a voice in the decision, and other people shouldn’t be forced
to vote.

And I say that this is exactly the system we have now, and it always
leads directly to SDAP-based leadership and decisionmaking the
inevitable outcome of which is war, famine, and a wide variety of
other incompetent decisionmaking, and probably at some point the
extinction of our species. Essentially what you're proposing is a
plutocracy: A system where a small group of people who "care" about an
issue enough to overcome their inertia are allowed to make the
decision regardless of its effect on the vast majority of the
population. What you seem to be missing (among a great many other
things) is the fact that "consensus" means exactly *nothing* unless
you have 100% participation rates, which curiously is exactly the
opposite of what you're proposing!

There are a wide variety of reasons why the masses don't participate
in these decisions:
1) Maybe they're just busy.
2) They rationally realize that they lack the power to actually make
any difference.
3) They simply lack the psychological characteristics that make it
comfortable for them to wade into a conflict intensive environment.
4) The actively fear repercussions if they become active participants.
Your proposal is that these people don't count and so can and should
be ignored. That's not only anti-democratic, but I would go so far as
to characterize is as being explicitly evil because it is the exact
same justification dictators and other oligarchies used to justify
their seizing power and doing whatever it takes to hold onto it.

Post by Scott Raney
If the active participants have to reach a consensus to pass a decision,
then it is very unlikely that any tyranny of one group could prevail over
other interested parties.

And I say all this tells us is that you don't understand human
psychology or group dynamics. Or history. Or social engineering. Or
even the definition of "consensus": By my understanding of your
proposal, Hitler/Stalin/Mao and their cronies were merely "people who
care about an issue" and therefore were perfectly rationally and
morally justified in making the decisions they did. If people don't
"care" enough about an issue to lay down their lives to defend their
side, well, they get exactly what they deserve. And what better way to
achieve "consensus" than to insure that everyone who disagrees with
you is either eliminated or coerced into accepting your position.
Regards,
Scott

[Steve Coffman]

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
Any decentralized online governance system that provides access to local, regional, international and global referendums will likely have more proposals scheduled for deliberation and a vote, at any given time, than any individual or small group of individuals could rationally and practically respond to in a timely and reliable manner.

I firmly believe this to be false, and stand by my analysis that one
or two votes a week will be sufficient to do *more* than what
governments at all levels do now.

I’m coming at it from a very different angle Scott. I think the only way for humanity to turn things around is to radically redesign the *structure and process* of our governance systems. To do this well (imo) we'll need to leverage the active creativity and ingenuity of as many people as we can technologically accommodate
millions, if not hundreds of millions of ordinary citizens. That would be a lot of deliberation and decision-making. And, regardless of how incompetent you think *regular* people may be, I would want to be a part of the process; including choosing my own proxy. I don’t think I’m alone in that.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
It seems to me that citizens wanting to participate *at all levels* of discussion and decision-making would need to enlist a small army of proxies in order to cover all of their bases in any form of global democracy.

I think that's what they do now: They're usually called
"representatives", even though they are not “representative”
.

I’m not talking about representative government where we elect some *politician* every few years and then in the process turn over our entire decision-making/legislative ability to this “representative". In my mind, a proxy would be a very personalized *civic device* with a lot more flexibility. One could turn it off and on at will, or fire the proxy without notice and select another more suitable option. In the system I’m imagining, proxies would be more like investigative journalists and would be required to keep their *constituents* informed of the issues under deliberation, as well as the their process for arriving at the decision they did. You could put it in the category of 'educating the electorate'.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
I think having a battery of proxies for the various geographical and topical regions or sectors one belongs to would be a solution to the overburden of research and participation one would necessarily encounter at this scale of involvement.

Any time you allow people to pick and choose what level or even what issue to participate in, you end up
with "Tyranny of the Active Participants”...

So, citizens would just push their *proxy* button and all would be well? They could go back to watching Reality TV?

Post by Scott Raney
Proxy selection must be automatic, and the proxies must not
be preselected by the individual or (as in the case of juries) by some
sort of government appointment. Otherwise all you've done is re-create
misrepresentative government.

In other words, we can’t trust the individual to choose for themselves, to educate themselves about a situation, or a candidate, or to know what they want in terms of say, transportation infrastructure, educational systems, or regarding policy for prison systems?

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
One might employ a proxy for local issues (with perhaps a backup should their first choice be unavailable) and several more for regional (environmental, political, scientific, social, technological, etc) issues and concerns. Ones proxy choice for environmental issues may be unconcerned with educational issues, or be so involved in the environmental arena that they just don’t have time to track anything else in a reasonable or acceptable manner.

It's a non-starter: People are not competent to choose their
proxies/representatives/delegates, something that has been clearly
demonstrated by the failure of misrepresentative democracies in general,
to implement anything even vaguely resembling "The Willl of the People”.

I would say that’s an absurd generalization if it weren’t such a cynical one. I’m curious, would you include yourself in that characterization?

Post by Scott Raney
My point is that it's simply not necessary or even desirable that each person
actively participate in every decision or at every level or even to
have the knowledge and skill to choose a true representative.

Is there any decision *We the People* are capable of making for ourselves in this regard? Like maybe whether or not to adopt Matchism?

Post by Scott Raney
All we have to do is to make sure that the ultimate vote cast for each person
is the same as what they would have cast if they *did* actively
participate in each decision. Fortunately this is a *much* simpler
problem to solve than to try to somehow make sure that the active
participants are actually representative of The People.

Hmmmm
.I think you’ve been watching to too much Stefan Molyneux. :)

Post by Scott Raney
Regards,
Scott

Post by Steve Coffman
Steve
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[Scott Raney]

I’m coming at it from a very different angle Scott. I think the only way for
humanity to turn things around is to radically redesign the *structure and
process* of our governance systems. To do this well (imo) we'll need to
leverage the active creativity and ingenuity of as many people as we can
technologically accommodate…millions, if not hundreds of millions of
ordinary citizens.

All agreed!

That would be a lot of deliberation and decision-making.

You went into the weeds here: What evidence do you have that "a lot"
of either of these things is required? The problem with our existing
governments has absolutely nothing to do with the *number* of
decisions being made, merely that the *wrong* decisions are being
made. 99.99% of the public policy decisions that need to be made could
probably be made by a true benevolent dictator as long as we retain
the 0.01% ability to remove or override him (thereby ensuring the
"benevolent" part). Your proposal to burden millions or billions of
people with an obligation that they don't want and are probably
incapable of meeting seems to me not only an example of incompetent
social engineering, but just kind of heartless in addition...

And, regardless of how incompetent you think *regular* people may be, I
would want to be a part of the process; including choosing my own proxy. I
don’t think I’m alone in that.

Certainly you aren't. But 88% of the German population apparently
wanted Hitler to be dictator in 1934 and so voted for that and by your
logic that worked out exactly as it should have. I'll admit that
getting people to accept their incompetence and act rationally in
response is an extremely difficult thing to do, but unfortunately it's
going to be required as part of the reform process. I'd like to start
with you: What is *your* justification for continuing to insist on
something that has clearly been shown to be based on a false belief?
To ensure that you've actually provided one, please note that you need
to deal with both the Hitler example and the lack of correlation in
delegate voting that was reported in the LQFB system in Kling
(http://www.matchism.org/refs/Kling_2015_LQFBforPP.pdf).

It seems to me that citizens wanting to participate *at all levels* of
discussion and decision-making would need to enlist a small army of proxies
in order to cover all of their bases in any form of global democracy.

Exactly, and exactly what proxyfor.me does, and does automatically,
dramatically reducing the incidence of human error in the process.

(snip)

I think having a battery of proxies for the various geographical and topical
regions or sectors one belongs to would be a solution to the overburden of
research and participation one would necessarily encounter at this scale of
involvement.

Surely availability of good information is a necessary requirement for
good decisionmaking. But what does that have to do with proxies? Why
can't the information be provided (and judged) by people who aren't
necessarily likely to vote like you would? Certainly vastly reduces
the number of people required to run the system: Imagine if every
cluster in the 5-dimensional FFM space needed their own investigators:
You'd increase the number of "journalists" required by orders of
magnitude, and for no good reason.

So, citizens would just push their *proxy* button and all would be well?
They could go back to watching Reality TV?

Yes, except that they don't even have to push a button (proxy matching
is opt-out, not opt-in). And I don't get the sarcasm: You say that
like it's some sort of problem. Or are you a follower of Ed's
philosophy: The people that decided to watch Reality TV didn't
participate and so their preferences not only *can* be ignored, but
indeed must be.

In other words, we can’t trust the individual to choose for themselves, to
educate themselves about a situation, or a candidate, or to know what they
want in terms of say, transportation infrastructure, educational systems, or
regarding policy for prison systems?

No, merely that we can't *expect* them to do this. I believe that
everyone is capable of doing these things, which are much simpler
problems than choosing appropriate proxies, but also that it's
delusional (incompetent social engineering) to design a system that
*requires* all them to do this.

It's a non-starter: People are not competent to choose their
proxies/representatives/delegates, something that has been clearly
demonstrated by the failure of misrepresentative democracies in general,
to implement anything even vaguely resembling "The Willl of the People”.
I would say that’s an absurd generalization if it weren’t such a cynical
one. I’m curious, would you include yourself in that characterization?

Definitely. A man's got to know his limitations. See above: Do you
know yours? Or are you one of the above average drivers? (see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_superiority)

Is there any decision *We the People* are capable of making for ourselves in
this regard? Like maybe whether or not to adopt Matchism?

Unfortunately for the world-view of extremists, the world is not black
and white: Just because you're incompetent at choosing proxies doesn't
necessarily mean that you're incompetent at making every other
decision that affects you.

Hmmmm….I think you’ve been watching to too much Stefan Molyneux. :)

Hmm, hadn't heard of him, actually. But a little research clearly
shows that he's like Ed (and indeed like most other extremists on both
the right *and* the left): They're not interested in building a
democratic or egalitarian society, or indeed even one that works, but
merely one where the "right people" get to make the decisions. The
flaw with their proposals is their failure to recognize that it's the
inequality in participation rates that's our main problem, and that it
has nothing to do with the process the "right people" (the active
participants) use to come to a decision.
Regards,
Scott

[Steve Coffman]

Hi Scott,

Thanks for responding again.

I just visited proxyfor.me after your suggestion to Ed. I’ve been out of the [MG] loop for a while and didn’t know you had put this out. I read a lot of your material on Matchism a while back but I guess it didn’t all sink in. I do remember feeling a bit overwhelmed with it all.

I think proxyfor.me <http://proxyfor.me/> conveys the essence of your model in a more succinct and understandable manner. Very interesting. I’m looking forward to digging in a little deeper. It will likely take a while for me to fully grok it, but in the meantime, I have some more questions. My apologies if you’ve been over this already.

- Given the # of statements in the questionnaire, how many different personality types or proxy iterations could be generated? I'm asking this because that would to some degree, it seems, determine how many proxies would be required for any given population of voters. (This is assuming every voter would be matched identically to a proxy of the same result.) And I’m curious about the degree of finesse pf.m would provide. E.g., would it know that I like a coconut chai latte with a dusting of cinnamon and cocoa? :)

- What is the incentive for proxies, and what are the requirements? How would we know they actually thoroughly research and understand any given proposal before voting on it...for us? And is there some redundancy built in? (I had a difficult time navigating back to the page where you talked about proxies.)

- How would this platform scale? Would there be multiple independent iterations (or instances) and, if so, based on what? E.g., would there be one for global proposals, a multitude of them for regional bodies, and so on? Or would there be just one platform that would manage votes and proposals based on location, or some other template for constituency?

- Who can present a proposal?

I’m sure I’ll have more questions after I play around and ponder it all for a bit. Great work!

Steve

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
I’m coming at it from a very different angle Scott. I think the only way for
humanity to turn things around is to radically redesign the *structure and
process* of our governance systems. To do this well (imo) we'll need to
leverage the active creativity and ingenuity of as many people as we can
technologically accommodate
millions, if not hundreds of millions of
ordinary citizens.

All agreed!

Post by Steve Coffman
That would be a lot of deliberation and decision-making.

You went into the weeds here: What evidence do you have that "a lot"
of either of these things is required? The problem with our existing
governments has absolutely nothing to do with the *number* of
decisions being made, merely that the *wrong* decisions are being
made. 99.99% of the public policy decisions that need to be made could
probably be made by a true benevolent dictator as long as we retain
the 0.01% ability to remove or override him (thereby ensuring the
"benevolent" part). Your proposal to burden millions or billions of
people with an obligation that they don't want and are probably
incapable of meeting seems to me not only an example of incompetent
social engineering, but just kind of heartless in addition...

Post by Steve Coffman
And, regardless of how incompetent you think *regular* people may be, I
would want to be a part of the process; including choosing my own proxy. I
don’t think I’m alone in that.

Certainly you aren't. But 88% of the German population apparently
wanted Hitler to be dictator in 1934 and so voted for that and by your
logic that worked out exactly as it should have. I'll admit that
getting people to accept their incompetence and act rationally in
response is an extremely difficult thing to do, but unfortunately it's
going to be required as part of the reform process. I'd like to start
with you: What is *your* justification for continuing to insist on
something that has clearly been shown to be based on a false belief?
To ensure that you've actually provided one, please note that you need
to deal with both the Hitler example and the lack of correlation in
delegate voting that was reported in the LQFB system in Kling
(http://www.matchism.org/refs/Kling_2015_LQFBforPP.pdf).

Post by Steve Coffman
It seems to me that citizens wanting to participate *at all levels* of
discussion and decision-making would need to enlist a small army of proxies
in order to cover all of their bases in any form of global democracy.

Exactly, and exactly what proxyfor.me does, and does automatically,
dramatically reducing the incidence of human error in the process.
(snip)

Post by Steve Coffman
I think having a battery of proxies for the various geographical and topical
regions or sectors one belongs to would be a solution to the overburden of
research and participation one would necessarily encounter at this scale of
involvement.

Surely availability of good information is a necessary requirement for
good decisionmaking. But what does that have to do with proxies? Why
can't the information be provided (and judged) by people who aren't
necessarily likely to vote like you would? Certainly vastly reduces
the number of people required to run the system: Imagine if every
You'd increase the number of "journalists" required by orders of
magnitude, and for no good reason.

Post by Steve Coffman
So, citizens would just push their *proxy* button and all would be well?
They could go back to watching Reality TV?

Yes, except that they don't even have to push a button (proxy matching
is opt-out, not opt-in). And I don't get the sarcasm: You say that
like it's some sort of problem. Or are you a follower of Ed's
philosophy: The people that decided to watch Reality TV didn't
participate and so their preferences not only *can* be ignored, but
indeed must be.

Post by Steve Coffman
In other words, we can’t trust the individual to choose for themselves, to
educate themselves about a situation, or a candidate, or to know what they
want in terms of say, transportation infrastructure, educational systems, or
regarding policy for prison systems?

No, merely that we can't *expect* them to do this. I believe that
everyone is capable of doing these things, which are much simpler
problems than choosing appropriate proxies, but also that it's
delusional (incompetent social engineering) to design a system that
*requires* all them to do this.

Post by Steve Coffman
It's a non-starter: People are not competent to choose their
proxies/representatives/delegates, something that has been clearly
demonstrated by the failure of misrepresentative democracies in general,
to implement anything even vaguely resembling "The Willl of the People”.
I would say that’s an absurd generalization if it weren’t such a cynical
one. I’m curious, would you include yourself in that characterization?

Definitely. A man's got to know his limitations. See above: Do you
know yours? Or are you one of the above average drivers? (see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_superiority)

Post by Steve Coffman
Is there any decision *We the People* are capable of making for ourselves in
this regard? Like maybe whether or not to adopt Matchism?

Unfortunately for the world-view of extremists, the world is not black
and white: Just because you're incompetent at choosing proxies doesn't
necessarily mean that you're incompetent at making every other
decision that affects you.

Post by Steve Coffman
Hmmmm
.I think you’ve been watching to too much Stefan Molyneux. :)

Hmm, hadn't heard of him, actually. But a little research clearly
shows that he's like Ed (and indeed like most other extremists on both
the right *and* the left): They're not interested in building a
democratic or egalitarian society, or indeed even one that works, but
merely one where the "right people" get to make the decisions. The
flaw with their proposals is their failure to recognize that it's the
inequality in participation rates that's our main problem, and that it
has nothing to do with the process the "right people" (the active
participants) use to come to a decision.
Regards,
Scott
_______________________________________________
Start : a mailing list of the Metagovernment project
http://www.metagovernment.org/
Manage subscription: http://metagovernment.org/mailman/listinfo/start_metagovernment.org

[Scott Raney]

I just visited proxyfor.me after your suggestion to Ed. I’ve been out of the
[MG] loop for a while and didn’t know you had put this out. I read a lot of
your material on Matchism a while back but I guess it didn’t all sink in. I
do remember feeling a bit overwhelmed with it all.

A nearly universal reaction. Simplifying and/or extracting out parts
is the most common request I get. The only sop to that I've made (so
far) to that is to create an Executive Summary, which I still kind of
believe was a mistake because unless you read far enough to understand
the history and motivations the Executive Summary I think it maybe
sounds kind of crackpot.

In my defense, though, I note that if you ask a million people if
they've read the foundational documents of our civilizations (the
Bible, the Federalist Papers, Mein Kampf, the Communist Manifesto,
etc.) you'll find maybe a handful who has read even one in its
entirety, and probably zero who has read all of them (present company
excluded, of course). Social Engineering is hard work and IMHO not
something armchair dabblers are going to be any good at. But we got
where we are without most people knowing this stuff, so it's not
discouraging to me that they won't have read the design documents for
the next system either.

I think proxyfor.me conveys the essence of your model in a more succinct and
understandable manner. Very interesting. I’m looking forward to digging in a
little deeper. It will likely take a while for me to fully grok it, but in
the meantime, I have some more questions. My apologies if you’ve been over
this already.

No problem. Note that proxyfor.me is up, but that the weekly automatic
advancement has been turned off so you won't get the full experience
now (in particular you won't get the emails telling you what your
calculated and the recorded votes were). After I finish the next round
of upgrades and put together a real marketing plan I'll turn it back
on, but that's looking to be at least a few months off. I've also got
to build a budgeting system (which is mostly designed), but that'll
have to wait until the version after.

- Given the # of statements in the questionnaire, how many different
personality types or proxy iterations could be generated?

13,348,388,671,875 (i.e. 75^7). But that doesn't consider correlations
between items. But it's important to keep in mind that there are no
"types" (a term that makes psychologists cringe, eg. read the
"criticism" section of
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers%E2%80%93Briggs_Type_Indicator)
because all of these traits are continuous dimensions. Your matched
proxies come from a 75 dimensional space that of course no human can
even hope to conceive of, let alone function in. And yet the math is
actually quite simple (a few dozen lines of code that any competent
programmer could easily verify the operation of).

I'm asking this
because that would to some degree, it seems, determine how many proxies
would be required for any given population of voters. (This is assuming
every voter would be matched identically to a proxy of the same result.) And
I’m curious about the degree of finesse pf.m would provide. E.g., would it
know that I like a coconut chai latte with a dusting of cinnamon and cocoa?
:)

All I have is my bot data so far (and they don't drink ;-) but the
number of proxies necessary to get pretty good matches was
surprisingly small: Diminishing returns sets in big time once you get
up to a few thousand direct votes.

As to correlations between these dimensions and how you act (or indeed
even what you look like) in "meat world", that whole field is just in
its infancy. But there are some tantalizing hints that we could indeed
predict many of these things. A good example of this is the
correlation between body type and political orientation:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236740731_The_Ancestral_Logic_of_Politics

There's similar data having to do with facial characteristics and who
gets elected in misrepresentative democracies. The thing to keep in
mind is that the operation of the system is independent of the exact
set of criteria used to do the matching. It may turn out that it's
sufficient to ask people what their favorite drink is, or even just
have a picture of their face, to find appropriate proxies for them.

- What is the incentive for proxies, and what are the requirements?

I'm hoping a desire for "good government" is a sufficient motivator.
There are no requirements for casting a direct vote and at this point
am unsure whether we'll need to encourage or discourage certain kinds
of people from doing so. That's a bridge we'll have to cross if/when
we come to it. For example, my prediction is that we'll have no
trouble getting enough conservatives voting because the studies have
all shown that they are *much* more likely to participate in our
existing systems (yet another problem with Ed's "The people who care
should participate" philosophy, which to me just means that
authoritarians run the world, as they largely do now). But getting
enough low-conscientiousness individuals to vote could very well turn
out to be a problem that we'll need to address by offering them some
sort of incentive (if only doing something like telling them in
advance that if they cast a direct vote it will be multiplied by
hundreds or thousands because so few other people in their particular
region of the 75-dimensional space will do so).

How
would we know they actually thoroughly research and understand any given
proposal before voting on it...for us? And is there some redundancy built
in? (I had a difficult time navigating back to the page where you talked
about proxies.)

You don't know that they didn't just make a snap judgement or just
voted like Steve Bannon told them to. But you do have access to their
posts and cites and so can probably fairly easily identify and block
the crackpots and those trying to game the system. And there are (at
least currently) 5 proxy matches calculated for each proxy vote, which
is at least somewhat resistant to corruption by outliers. After the
system has been running for awhile my prediction (and hope) is that
people will start to recognize the people most commonly matched to
them and learn to trust them. That'll give people a feeling that they
have "chosen" their proxies (a perception you in particular seemed to
desire), when in fact all they've really done is chosen not to reject
them. Where we decide to take that WRT social-media in general also
remains to be decided (e.g., Do we provide a button that will
friend/follow a matched proxy on FB or Twitter? What happens when
someone does a cluster analysis and decides to form a political party,
or even just a social organization, based on having identified a
cohesive "group"?)

- How would this platform scale? Would there be multiple independent
iterations (or instances) and, if so, based on what? E.g., would there be
one for global proposals, a multitude of them for regional bodies, and so
on? Or would there be just one platform that would manage votes and
proposals based on location, or some other template for constituency?

From an engineering sense it'll be straightforward to scale to
billions of people: It's built on MongoDB and AWS which have pretty
amazing distributed processing features (multiple servers all over the
world, with high reliability and failover capabilities, all built for
e-commerce). And it's easily portable to any other cloud platform for
when we decide that it's not really a good idea to be completely
dependent on Amazon for servers. But the design pretty much requires
centralization (albeit distributed centralization).

How the regional/local boundaries are drawn I think is hard to predict
at this point. Certainly the "global" scale is the most important and
all I've built so far. Overlapping jurisdictions (county/state/region)
are a real PITA, both from an implementation and social engineering
perspective and if I could just wave my magic wand I'd get rid of them
(vast amounts of government resources are simply wasted dealing with
interjurisdictional redundancy and conflict), but I fear we're going
to have to develop some sort of architecture for dealing with it...

- Who can present a proposal?

Anyone, but it has to go through the executive branch (which at this
point is me ;-) Quality of content is going to be key at all stages of
the adoption process: Equally bad are the kind of wacko proposals I've
seen on LQFB and other public-facing decisionmaking systems and the
legal mumbo-jumbo you see in the average bill posed at the state and
federal levels. The executive should have no incentive to restrict
anyone proposing anything other than ensuring that it's both
intelligible and legally defensible (which unfortunately rules out
probably 95% of what we see in existing systems). If there's
something you'd like to see, by all means send it in. Otherwise I've
got a queue of several dozen more proposals that need to be polished
up and put into the queue if you lack for something to do ;-)

I’m sure I’ll have more questions after I play around and ponder it all for
a bit. Great work!

Thanks: I look forward to getting your report.
Regards,
Scott

Steve

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[Steve Coffman]

Ok, so let me see how far along I am in understanding your proposal Scott.

Your basic objective is to develop and implement a system (or platform) that provides *the electorate* with an ability to attain full, representative participation, in virtually any jurisdiction or locale, by providing a means of selecting proxies for individuals who are unwilling or unable, for whatever reason, to make governance related decisions for themselves.

Proxy selection would be based on an algorithm that determines an individual’s personal characteristics or *value traits* though testing or some other artificially intelligent mechanism. Proxy selection would be mandatory and automatic, but could be overridden by the individual at each voting instant by simply changing their proxy’s vote to one more befitting their individual preference.

The proxy/voter association would be reconfigured weekly and the platform would provide some degree of redundancy in order to more accurately secure a homogenous representation between the individual and their proxy(ies) in the voting process.

Anyone can submit a proposal, but all submissions will be reviewed, or vetted, by some central authority for their compliance with some set of rational prerequisites before allowing them to move into deliberation, and then on to a vote.

Once proposals are reviewed and deemed to be appropriately constructed, all individuals potentially affected by the proposal, should it pass, would be notified of the impeding vote in time for them to fully research it before it goes to a weekend vote. You’ve calculated that there would likely be an average of one or two votes to consider each week…(for each region, instance, or locale?).

Pf.m would create a quorum nearing 100% which, if it accurately predicts *value/voting* similarities between citizens and their proxies, would yield a very reliable and representative democracy.

I’m guessing it's a fairly crude, nutshell apprehension of your proposal….but I thought I better start there.

Also, I have a another question for you: What (or who) determines the % of votes necessary for passage of any given proposal?

Post by Scott Raney

I just visited proxyfor.me after your suggestion to Ed. I’ve been out of the
[MG] loop for a while and didn’t know you had put this out. I read a lot of
your material on Matchism a while back but I guess it didn’t all sink in. I
do remember feeling a bit overwhelmed with it all.

A nearly universal reaction. Simplifying and/or extracting out parts
is the most common request I get. The only sop to that I've made (so
far) to that is to create an Executive Summary, which I still kind of
believe was a mistake because unless you read far enough to understand
the history and motivations the Executive Summary I think it maybe
sounds kind of crackpot.
In my defense, though, I note that if you ask a million people if
they've read the foundational documents of our civilizations (the
Bible, the Federalist Papers, Mein Kampf, the Communist Manifesto,
etc.) you'll find maybe a handful who has read even one in its
entirety, and probably zero who has read all of them (present company
excluded, of course). Social Engineering is hard work and IMHO not
something armchair dabblers are going to be any good at. But we got
where we are without most people knowing this stuff, so it's not
discouraging to me that they won't have read the design documents for
the next system either.

I think proxyfor.me conveys the essence of your model in a more succinct and
understandable manner. Very interesting. I’m looking forward to digging in a
little deeper. It will likely take a while for me to fully grok it, but in
the meantime, I have some more questions. My apologies if you’ve been over
this already.

No problem. Note that proxyfor.me is up, but that the weekly automatic
advancement has been turned off so you won't get the full experience
now (in particular you won't get the emails telling you what your
calculated and the recorded votes were). After I finish the next round
of upgrades and put together a real marketing plan I'll turn it back
on, but that's looking to be at least a few months off. I've also got
to build a budgeting system (which is mostly designed), but that'll
have to wait until the version after.

- Given the # of statements in the questionnaire, how many different
personality types or proxy iterations could be generated?

13,348,388,671,875 (i.e. 75^7). But that doesn't consider correlations
between items. But it's important to keep in mind that there are no
"types" (a term that makes psychologists cringe, eg. read the
"criticism" section of
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers%E2%80%93Briggs_Type_Indicator)
because all of these traits are continuous dimensions. Your matched
proxies come from a 75 dimensional space that of course no human can
even hope to conceive of, let alone function in. And yet the math is
actually quite simple (a few dozen lines of code that any competent
programmer could easily verify the operation of).

I'm asking this
because that would to some degree, it seems, determine how many proxies
would be required for any given population of voters. (This is assuming
every voter would be matched identically to a proxy of the same result.) And
I’m curious about the degree of finesse pf.m would provide. E.g., would it
know that I like a coconut chai latte with a dusting of cinnamon and cocoa?
:)

All I have is my bot data so far (and they don't drink ;-) but the
number of proxies necessary to get pretty good matches was
surprisingly small: Diminishing returns sets in big time once you get
up to a few thousand direct votes.
As to correlations between these dimensions and how you act (or indeed
even what you look like) in "meat world", that whole field is just in
its infancy. But there are some tantalizing hints that we could indeed
predict many of these things. A good example of this is the
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/236740731_The_Ancestral_Logic_of_Politics
There's similar data having to do with facial characteristics and who
gets elected in misrepresentative democracies. The thing to keep in
mind is that the operation of the system is independent of the exact
set of criteria used to do the matching. It may turn out that it's
sufficient to ask people what their favorite drink is, or even just
have a picture of their face, to find appropriate proxies for them.

- What is the incentive for proxies, and what are the requirements?

I'm hoping a desire for "good government" is a sufficient motivator.
There are no requirements for casting a direct vote and at this point
am unsure whether we'll need to encourage or discourage certain kinds
of people from doing so. That's a bridge we'll have to cross if/when
we come to it. For example, my prediction is that we'll have no
trouble getting enough conservatives voting because the studies have
all shown that they are *much* more likely to participate in our
existing systems (yet another problem with Ed's "The people who care
should participate" philosophy, which to me just means that
authoritarians run the world, as they largely do now). But getting
enough low-conscientiousness individuals to vote could very well turn
out to be a problem that we'll need to address by offering them some
sort of incentive (if only doing something like telling them in
advance that if they cast a direct vote it will be multiplied by
hundreds or thousands because so few other people in their particular
region of the 75-dimensional space will do so).

How
would we know they actually thoroughly research and understand any given
proposal before voting on it...for us? And is there some redundancy built
in? (I had a difficult time navigating back to the page where you talked
about proxies.)

You don't know that they didn't just make a snap judgement or just
voted like Steve Bannon told them to. But you do have access to their
posts and cites and so can probably fairly easily identify and block
the crackpots and those trying to game the system. And there are (at
least currently) 5 proxy matches calculated for each proxy vote, which
is at least somewhat resistant to corruption by outliers. After the
system has been running for awhile my prediction (and hope) is that
people will start to recognize the people most commonly matched to
them and learn to trust them. That'll give people a feeling that they
have "chosen" their proxies (a perception you in particular seemed to
desire), when in fact all they've really done is chosen not to reject
them. Where we decide to take that WRT social-media in general also
remains to be decided (e.g., Do we provide a button that will
friend/follow a matched proxy on FB or Twitter? What happens when
someone does a cluster analysis and decides to form a political party,
or even just a social organization, based on having identified a
cohesive "group"?)

- How would this platform scale? Would there be multiple independent
iterations (or instances) and, if so, based on what? E.g., would there be
one for global proposals, a multitude of them for regional bodies, and so
on? Or would there be just one platform that would manage votes and
proposals based on location, or some other template for constituency?

From an engineering sense it'll be straightforward to scale to
billions of people: It's built on MongoDB and AWS which have pretty
amazing distributed processing features (multiple servers all over the
world, with high reliability and failover capabilities, all built for
e-commerce). And it's easily portable to any other cloud platform for
when we decide that it's not really a good idea to be completely
dependent on Amazon for servers. But the design pretty much requires
centralization (albeit distributed centralization).
How the regional/local boundaries are drawn I think is hard to predict
at this point. Certainly the "global" scale is the most important and
all I've built so far. Overlapping jurisdictions (county/state/region)
are a real PITA, both from an implementation and social engineering
perspective and if I could just wave my magic wand I'd get rid of them
(vast amounts of government resources are simply wasted dealing with
interjurisdictional redundancy and conflict), but I fear we're going
to have to develop some sort of architecture for dealing with it...

- Who can present a proposal?

Anyone, but it has to go through the executive branch (which at this
point is me ;-) Quality of content is going to be key at all stages of
the adoption process: Equally bad are the kind of wacko proposals I've
seen on LQFB and other public-facing decisionmaking systems and the
legal mumbo-jumbo you see in the average bill posed at the state and
federal levels. The executive should have no incentive to restrict
anyone proposing anything other than ensuring that it's both
intelligible and legally defensible (which unfortunately rules out
probably 95% of what we see in existing systems). If there's
something you'd like to see, by all means send it in. Otherwise I've
got a queue of several dozen more proposals that need to be polished
up and put into the queue if you lack for something to do ;-)

I’m sure I’ll have more questions after I play around and ponder it all for
a bit. Great work!

Thanks: I look forward to getting your report.
Regards,
Scott

Steve

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[Scott Raney]

Post by Steve Coffman
Your basic objective is to develop and implement a system (or platform) that provides *the electorate* with an ability to attain full, representative participation, in virtually any jurisdiction or locale, by providing a means of selecting proxies for individuals who are unwilling or unable, for whatever reason, to make governance related decisions for themselves.

Good so far...

Post by Steve Coffman
Proxy selection would be based on an algorithm that determines an individual’s personal characteristics or *value traits* though testing or some other artificially intelligent mechanism. Proxy selection would be mandatory and automatic, but could be overridden by the individual at each voting instant by simply changing their proxy’s vote to one more befitting their individual preference.

I've been trying to avoid calling it AI for marketing reasons, but
you're basically right that that's what it is. I must confess, though,
that I consider "AI" to be a misnomer, at least as it has ever been
implemented so far: All we've ever built so far (especially anything
using neural networks) is just a fancy term for automated statistical
analysis, which is exactly what proxyfor.me does. True, the vast
majority of what "intelligent" human behavior is probably based on
that sort of pattern matching as well, but humans have additional
capabilities, many of which are hard-wired rather than learned, that
are orders of magnitude more complex and capable than any current AI
system.

Post by Steve Coffman
The proxy/voter association would be reconfigured weekly and the platform would provide some degree of redundancy in order to more accurately secure a homogenous representation between the individual and their proxy(ies) in the voting process.

Not exactly: The proxy matching is done based on the direct votes
available at the time. That is, the results you get will depend on
when you open the site/app/etc. up until the batch calculation done on
Friday night. This is actually a feature under the presumption that
more votes means closer proxy matches and indeed better quality votes
because more information is available to later voters than to earlier
ones.

Post by Steve Coffman
Anyone can submit a proposal, but all submissions will be reviewed, or vetted, by some central authority for their compliance with some set of rational prerequisites before allowing them to move into deliberation, and then on to a vote.

Correct, and I was assuming the gatekeeper would be the executive
branch. While there could be some sort of petition/initiative process
whereby a proposal that gets enough votes will be entered directly, my
firm belief is that not only is that not necessary, but will just
result in wasting *everyone's* time, something you'll clearly see if
you look at any of the petition-oriented (slacktivism) sites like
change.org, avaaz.org, and petitions.whitehouse.gov. The only
social-engineering fix I'd pre-apply to prevent tyrannical behavior
from the executive branch would be to have "Remove the Manager" always
be one of the proposals in the queue. If that one passes the next in
line would automatically assume the role of Manager, the line of
succession being defined ahead of time (e.g., the global manager line
of succession would be based on some objective assessment criteria
applied to all of the locality managers).

Post by Steve Coffman
Once proposals are reviewed and deemed to be appropriately constructed, all individuals potentially affected by the proposal, should it pass, would be notified of the impeding vote in time for them to fully research it before it goes to a weekend vote. You’ve calculated that there would likely be an average of one or two votes to consider each week…(for each region, instance, or locale?).

Right. Again, the number proposals voted on in a given week and how
the proposal queues are presented and sorted remains to be determined,
based in large part on how many overlapping jurisdictions the system
needs to support.

Post by Steve Coffman
Pf.m would create a quorum nearing 100% which, if it accurately predicts *value/voting* similarities between citizens and their proxies, would yield a very reliable and representative democracy.

Right, and this is key: Because there are currently vast differences
in participation rates as a function of personality types this is the
*only* practical way to have a truly egalitarian society. And that's
just the theoretical/philosophical justification: In addition there's
the practical (social engineering) benefit that the kinds of people
who currently participate at the highest rates are exactly those
people who are most inclined to engage in aggressive and
discriminatory behavior that renders our current systems even less
egalitarian than they'd superficially appear to be.

Post by Steve Coffman
I’m guessing it's a fairly crude, nutshell apprehension of your proposal….but I thought I better start there.
Also, I have a another question for you: What (or who) determines the % of votes necessary for passage of any given proposal?

I just have it set at 50% + 1 now, but my prediction is that it won't
matter in the long run because proposals will pass by such large
supermajorities that no one will even bother to ask if we need to
impose a higher standard. There are two features that will ensure
this:
1) The proposal queue(s) are sorted by the ratio of yes to no votes,
so those with the highest approval ratings will get voted on first.
2) The system supports versioning which will enable the proposer to
tweak a proposal to address criticism and hopefully boost its approval
rating. This is analogous to the kind of back-room dealing (like log
rolling) that goes on in existing misrepresentative democracies, but
it will all be done out in the open albeit with a single focal point
(the proposal author). I would expect (and hope) these "social
engineers" to become the "rock stars" of the new system because they
will actually have power on the same level as the Managers and will
actually have more interaction with The People than Managers (who,
unlike mayors/governors/presidents won't have to run for office and so
won't have to have pretty faces and glib personalities).
Regards,
Scott

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[Patrick Millerd]

Post by Scott Raney
1) The proposal queue(s) are sorted by the ratio of yes to no votes,
so those with the highest approval ratings will get voted on first.

My main problem with the only having 1-2 votes a week based on highest
approval. What if we never pass anything of note? They would all be
vanilla, middle of the road stuff proposals. We would have never passed gay
marriage for instance. Nothing risky, sometimes a little risk is worth it
even it doesn't have the highest approval rating. No risk we don't shift or
evolve. I think it's important to rock the boat a little. I'd vote for more
votes in the week.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
Your basic objective is to develop and implement a system (or platform)

that provides *the electorate* with an ability to attain full,
representative participation, in virtually any jurisdiction or locale, by
providing a means of selecting proxies for individuals who are unwilling or
unable, for whatever reason, to make governance related decisions for
themselves.
Good so far...

Post by Steve Coffman
Proxy selection would be based on an algorithm that determines an

individual’s personal characteristics or *value traits* though testing or
some other artificially intelligent mechanism. Proxy selection would be
mandatory and automatic, but could be overridden by the individual at each
voting instant by simply changing their proxy’s vote to one more befitting
their individual preference.
I've been trying to avoid calling it AI for marketing reasons, but
you're basically right that that's what it is. I must confess, though,
that I consider "AI" to be a misnomer, at least as it has ever been
implemented so far: All we've ever built so far (especially anything
using neural networks) is just a fancy term for automated statistical
analysis, which is exactly what proxyfor.me does. True, the vast
majority of what "intelligent" human behavior is probably based on
that sort of pattern matching as well, but humans have additional
capabilities, many of which are hard-wired rather than learned, that
are orders of magnitude more complex and capable than any current AI
system.

Post by Steve Coffman
The proxy/voter association would be reconfigured weekly and the

platform would provide some degree of redundancy in order to more
accurately secure a homogenous representation between the individual and
their proxy(ies) in the voting process.
Not exactly: The proxy matching is done based on the direct votes
available at the time. That is, the results you get will depend on
when you open the site/app/etc. up until the batch calculation done on
Friday night. This is actually a feature under the presumption that
more votes means closer proxy matches and indeed better quality votes
because more information is available to later voters than to earlier
ones.

Post by Steve Coffman
Anyone can submit a proposal, but all submissions will be reviewed, or

vetted, by some central authority for their compliance with some set of
rational prerequisites before allowing them to move into deliberation, and
then on to a vote.
Correct, and I was assuming the gatekeeper would be the executive
branch. While there could be some sort of petition/initiative process
whereby a proposal that gets enough votes will be entered directly, my
firm belief is that not only is that not necessary, but will just
result in wasting *everyone's* time, something you'll clearly see if
you look at any of the petition-oriented (slacktivism) sites like
change.org, avaaz.org, and petitions.whitehouse.gov. The only
social-engineering fix I'd pre-apply to prevent tyrannical behavior
from the executive branch would be to have "Remove the Manager" always
be one of the proposals in the queue. If that one passes the next in
line would automatically assume the role of Manager, the line of
succession being defined ahead of time (e.g., the global manager line
of succession would be based on some objective assessment criteria
applied to all of the locality managers).

Post by Steve Coffman
Once proposals are reviewed and deemed to be appropriately constructed,

all individuals potentially affected by the proposal, should it pass, would
be notified of the impeding vote in time for them to fully research it
before it goes to a weekend vote. You’ve calculated that there would likely
be an average of one or two votes to consider each week
(for each region,
instance, or locale?).
Right. Again, the number proposals voted on in a given week and how
the proposal queues are presented and sorted remains to be determined,
based in large part on how many overlapping jurisdictions the system
needs to support.

Post by Steve Coffman
Pf.m would create a quorum nearing 100% which, if it accurately predicts

*value/voting* similarities between citizens and their proxies, would yield
a very reliable and representative democracy.
Right, and this is key: Because there are currently vast differences
in participation rates as a function of personality types this is the
*only* practical way to have a truly egalitarian society. And that's
just the theoretical/philosophical justification: In addition there's
the practical (social engineering) benefit that the kinds of people
who currently participate at the highest rates are exactly those
people who are most inclined to engage in aggressive and
discriminatory behavior that renders our current systems even less
egalitarian than they'd superficially appear to be.

Post by Steve Coffman
I’m guessing it's a fairly crude, nutshell apprehension of your

proposal
.but I thought I better start there.

Post by Steve Coffman
Also, I have a another question for you: What (or who) determines the %

of votes necessary for passage of any given proposal?
I just have it set at 50% + 1 now, but my prediction is that it won't
matter in the long run because proposals will pass by such large
supermajorities that no one will even bother to ask if we need to
impose a higher standard. There are two features that will ensure
1) The proposal queue(s) are sorted by the ratio of yes to no votes,
so those with the highest approval ratings will get voted on first.
2) The system supports versioning which will enable the proposer to
tweak a proposal to address criticism and hopefully boost its approval
rating. This is analogous to the kind of back-room dealing (like log
rolling) that goes on in existing misrepresentative democracies, but
it will all be done out in the open albeit with a single focal point
(the proposal author). I would expect (and hope) these "social
engineers" to become the "rock stars" of the new system because they
will actually have power on the same level as the Managers and will
actually have more interaction with The People than Managers (who,
unlike mayors/governors/presidents won't have to run for office and so
won't have to have pretty faces and glib personalities).
Regards,
Scott
_______________________________________________
Start : a mailing list of the Metagovernment project
http://www.metagovernment.org/
Manage subscription: http://metagovernment.org/mailman/listinfo/start_
metagovernment.org

[Scott Raney]

Post by Patrick Millerd

Post by Scott Raney
1) The proposal queue(s) are sorted by the ratio of yes to no votes,
so those with the highest approval ratings will get voted on first.

My main problem with the only having 1-2 votes a week based on highest
approval. What if we never pass anything of note? They would all be vanilla,
middle of the road stuff proposals.

Like what the US congress spends the majority of their time on? Stuff
like renaming post offices and declaring "national [insert your cause
here] day"? I would predict (and prescribe) that the queue-keeper
simply not allow that kind of non-substantive proposal onto the queue.
Most of these kinds of things probably don't need to be done at all,
but the Manager could always do them by executive order based on input
from traditional public-opinion polling, slacktivism sites, etc. The
People's time is far too valuable to waste it on non-substantive
proposals.

Post by Patrick Millerd
We would have never passed gay marriage
for instance. Nothing risky, sometimes a little risk is worth it even it
doesn't have the highest approval rating. No risk we don't shift or evolve.

There are several corrections for this already built into the system:

1) By controlling the number of proposals in the queue we can also
control the passage ratios (fewer proposals in the queue will push
through those with smaller supermajorities).

2) The Manager and/or queue-keeper can put something in the #2 slot
directly, forcing a vote for it in two weeks. This I would hope would
be a rarely used feature, reserved for cases where a timely decision
is required (natural disasters, declarations of war, etc.)

3) The versioning feature encourages refinement of proposals to secure
larger supermajorities. This would certainly allow passage of things
like abortion and gun control policies in the US with significant
supermajorities. We've just never been given the opportunity to
compromise on these things because of the way extremists have been
controlling them.

4) I sort of agree with Ed's position here: Sometimes things are not
ready to be decided yet and no amount of proposal tweaking will get
you a supermajority. In those cases it's probably better to let a
continued debate and the passage of time solve the problem rather than
having the government (Tyranny of the Tiny Majority) force the issue.
By making the debate (and the zeitgeist) visible to everyone, The
System would actually be an accelerating force for this type of moral
progressivism. Social media *could* have played this role, but
unfortunately people have walled-off their friend/follow lists to such
a degree that other social media sites now actually prevent it from
happening. There's specifically no way to block posts in proxyfor.me
to prevent this sort of echo-chamber behavior from stopping progress.

Post by Patrick Millerd
I think it's important to rock the boat a little. I'd vote for more votes in
the week.

It seems reasonable, and perhaps even necessary, to me to support
votes on multiple proposals each week (although this isn't supported
currently). But I also believe that the weekend-close schedule is a
key feature that can't be eliminated without disenfranchising a
substantial portion of the population (the proxy-vote correction for
this notwithstanding). There's a reason why most places in the US only
allow voting on a weekday and with limited hours...
Regards,
Scott

[Steve Coffman]

Post by Scott Raney
The proxy matching is done based on the direct votes
available at the time. That is, the results you get will depend on
when you open the site/app/etc. up until the batch calculation done on
Friday night. This is actually a feature under the presumption that
more votes means closer proxy matches and indeed better quality votes
because more information is available to later voters than to earlier
ones.

I don’t think I'm getting this. Do you mean that the more I use the platform the more likely I’ll have a good proxy match because it uses my voting history, in addition to my MMPI test result, to select a proxy for me???

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
Anyone can submit a proposal, but all submissions will be reviewed, or vetted, by some central authority for their compliance with some set of rational prerequisites before allowing them to move into deliberation, and then on to a vote.

Correct, and I was assuming the gatekeeper would be the executive
branch. While there could be some sort of petition/initiative process
whereby a proposal that gets enough votes will be entered directly, my
firm belief is that not only is that not necessary, but will just
result in wasting *everyone's* time, something you'll clearly see if
you look at any of the petition-oriented (slacktivism) sites like
change.org, avaaz.org, and petitions.whitehouse.gov. The only
social-engineering fix I'd pre-apply to prevent tyrannical behavior
from the executive branch would be to have "Remove the Manager" always
be one of the proposals in the queue. If that one passes the next in
line would automatically assume the role of Manager, the line of
succession being defined ahead of time (e.g., the global manager line
of succession would be based on some objective assessment criteria
applied to all of the locality managers).

I like this.

The system or platform I’m working on has a crowdsourced, ranked choice *Priority Stack* that would inform the “executive council" to assist them in managing the position of proposals in the queue. Not the only criteria...but useful information.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
Once proposals are reviewed and deemed to be appropriately constructed, all individuals potentially affected by the proposal, should it pass, would be notified of the impeding vote in time for them to fully research it before it goes to a weekend vote. You’ve calculated that there would likely be an average of one or two votes to consider each week
(for each region, instance, or locale?).

Right. Again, the number proposals voted on in a given week and how
the proposal queues are presented and sorted remains to be determined,
based in large part on how many overlapping jurisdictions the system
needs to support.

Seems to me it would be incumbent on the individual(s) developing the proposal to list the jurisdictions their proposal would impact
.and then the agency vetting the proposal would certify the accuracy of their delineation. I think the deliberation or *public discourse* phase would also be check on the accuracy of the proposals stated influence. Tricky business nonetheless.

Post by Scott Raney

Post by Steve Coffman
What (or who) determines the % of votes necessary for passage of any given proposal?

I just have it set at 50% + 1 now, but my prediction is that it won't
matter in the long run because proposals will pass by such large
supermajorities that no one will even bother to ask if we need to
impose a higher standard. There are two features that will ensure
1) The proposal queue(s) are sorted by the ratio of yes to no votes,
so those with the highest approval ratings will get voted on first.

So there would be some mechanism for determining 'popularity' before an actual *official* vote?

In my mind, the related comments (for and against) would be ranked in terms of popularity (a thumbs up/thumbs down kind of thing). This would be data for those introducing the proposal as well as for the executive council to determine the *ripeness* of the proposal for a vote.

Post by Scott Raney
2) The system supports versioning which will enable the proposer to
tweak a proposal to address criticism and hopefully boost its approval
rating.

This seems crucial as a type of crowdsourcing feedback loop.

Post by Scott Raney
I would expect (and hope) these "social
engineers" to become the "rock stars" of the new system because they
will actually have power on the same level as the Managers
.

I agree. I think designing kickass proposals and projects for better systems of human *livingry* (as Bucky called it) will be the new groovy.

Rock on rock star. :)
Steve

Post by Scott Raney
Regards,
Scott
_______________________________________________
Start : a mailing list of the Metagovernment project
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[Scott Raney]

I don’t think I'm getting this. Do you mean that the more I use the platform
the more likely I’ll have a good proxy match because it uses my voting
history, in addition to my MMPI test result, to select a proxy for me???

No, it's just the passage of time: The closer to the closing date a
proposal gets, the more direct votes will have been cast. The quality
of your proxy match depends on the number of these votes: The more of
them there are, the more likely it will be able to find someone who
voted like you would if you'd had the time to do the research to cast
your own direct vote. This applies even on the closing weekend (after
the batch proxy calculation have been done on Friday night): If you
log in on Sunday afternoon you might even find that the proxies it has
calculated for you, and even your calculated vote, will be different
due to a flurry of proxy-override votes cast on Saturday. How often
this happens I think will be a really good validation of the stability
of the system and the quality of the proxy matches (i.e., I predict it
won't happen very often or to very many people).

(snip)

The system or platform I’m working on has a crowdsourced, ranked choice
*Priority Stack* that would inform the “executive council" to assist them in
managing the position of proposals in the queue. Not the only criteria...but
useful information.

I've considered allowing people to attach a priority to a proposal
when they cast a vote and then using that to aid in scheduling, but
for now would prefer to run with the simpler vote-ratio mechanism...

Seems to me it would be incumbent on the individual(s) developing the
proposal to list the jurisdictions their proposal would impact….and then the
agency vetting the proposal would certify the accuracy of their delineation.
I think the deliberation or *public discourse* phase would also be check on
the accuracy of the proposals stated influence. Tricky business nonetheless.

My general plan is to have single proposals at the global level that
each locality could accept or reject. For example a policy on rental
properties would be posed globally, and those localities that accept
it would only see it once and there'd be as much commonality as
possible (again, in our current system *vast* amounts of resources are
simply wasted with each locality reinventing the wheel on these
things). Any locality that rejected it would expected to come up with
an alternative/modification/addendum that they alone would vote on.
This makes the proposer's job harder because as they build in the
compromises they need to decide whether they're going to lose passage
in some localities in their attempts to pick up others, but it has
huge efficiency and social-engineering benefits to the operation of
government in general.

So there would be some mechanism for determining 'popularity' before an
actual *official* vote?

The direct votes are currently visible to the proposer, and of course
used to sort the queue. The proposer needs to be able to see them to
do the tweaking as described above. Everyone else only gets to see
them as part of the commenting and proxy-matching process (where they
only see a subset) and after the voting has closed.

In my mind, the related comments (for and against) would be ranked in terms
of popularity (a thumbs up/thumbs down kind of thing). This would be data
for those introducing the proposal as well as for the executive council to
determine the *ripeness* of the proposal for a vote.

It does this already (you can sort the posts by number of cites, date,
etc.) But, again, I'd generally prefer to have the advancement system
be fully automated so that you don't have the executive branch dicking
around with the queue manually except maybe in emergencies.

I agree. I think designing kickass proposals and projects for better systems
of human *livingry* (as Bucky called it) will be the new groovy.

Currently nobody evaluates and votes for/against their representatives
using this criteria. Which is just bizarre if you think about it:
That's their freaking *job*, isn't it?
Regards,
Scott

Rock on rock star. :)
Steve