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A literal democracy would have everyone being able to vote on any law at any level, which is clearly impractical It used to be impractical due to obvious infra

A literal democracy would have everyone being able to vote on any law at any level, which is clearly impractical It used to be impractical due to obvious infrastructure reasons. But with the internet, is it still? And I'm not sure that there always needs to be an "ignorant majority". If people are closely involved with any aspect of lawmaking, they'll feel more responsible for being educated about political issues. Most "politically ignorant" people I know are that because they feel voting is hardly worth the time, because it only contributes indirectly and abstractly to decision processes (and politicians say one thing and do another...). I think an important responsibility of a democracy is to educate people in critical thinking and make sure they are not "ignorant".

hermannj314 15y ago
It sounds like Congress needs an ignorance quorum before passing any law: "Congress shall pass no law, unless 51% of the electorate can pass a quiz on the content of said law. Also, individual legislators must abstain from voting until they receive passing marks."
toyg 15y ago
It used to be impractical due to obvious infrastructure reasons. But with the internet, is it still? The history of electronic voting is not particularly encouraging for the various "democracy in technology" theories. Besides, even if you sorted out the infrastructure requirements (see security etc), you'd still be left with the day-to-day drudgery of real politics: reading thousands of pages of bills, proposals, analysis, point, counter-point, etc etc etc, is boring and a time-sink. Which is why a professional "political class" has emerged in most countries, and why part-time politicians are invariably rich from the start (i.e. they have a lot of spare time). To fix that, we'll need good AIs to summarize and simulate. I'd actually prefer to have that over a fully-networked, always-on poll booth.
- wladimir 15y ago
  reading thousands of pages of bills, proposals, analysis, point, counter-point, etc etc etc, is boring and a time-sink A crowd-sourcing approach could certainly work here. People will go through boring work if they think it is worthwhile. Having free time is by no means restricted to the rich anymore. Github for politics? (people could do something useful online instead of playing BlaVille, for a change...) we'll need good AIs to summarize and simulate I don't believe that such AIs will be feasible any time soon. Also, it would raise even more security issues. Who controls the AI?

hermannj314 15y ago

It sounds like Congress needs an ignorance quorum before passing any law: "Congress shall pass no law, unless 51% of the electorate can pass a quiz on the content of said law. Also, individual legislators must abstain from voting until they receive passing marks."

toyg 15y ago

It used to be impractical due to obvious infrastructure reasons. But with the internet, is it still? The history of electronic voting is not particularly encouraging for the various "democracy in technology" theories. Besides, even if you sorted out the infrastructure requirements (see security etc), you'd still be left with the day-to-day drudgery of real politics: reading thousands of pages of bills, proposals, analysis, point, counter-point, etc etc etc, is boring and a time-sink. Which is why a professional "political class" has emerged in most countries, and why part-time politicians are invariably rich from the start (i.e. they have a lot of spare time). To fix that, we'll need good AIs to summarize and simulate. I'd actually prefer to have that over a fully-networked, always-on poll booth.

wladimir 15y ago
reading thousands of pages of bills, proposals, analysis, point, counter-point, etc etc etc, is boring and a time-sink A crowd-sourcing approach could certainly work here. People will go through boring work if they think it is worthwhile. Having free time is by no means restricted to the rich anymore. Github for politics? (people could do something useful online instead of playing BlaVille, for a change...) we'll need good AIs to summarize and simulate I don't believe that such AIs will be feasible any time soon. Also, it would raise even more security issues. Who controls the AI?