Chapter 26 Some days in the life of a Reasonocrat AishaÕs head was still feeling a bit fuzzy from last nightÕs bachelorette party, as she was staring at her fruit wall trying to decide whether to pick a mango or a papaya for breakfast. The wall grows enough fruit to supply a piece for each of the three household members every day, forever. ItÕs timed so that 3 ripen each day. She glanced at email on her phone. The first subject line read, Congratulations, Aisha, you have just won the United StatesÉ She didnÕt even need to look at what it was she supposedly ÒwonÓ. Obviously, the message was spam. Funny, her filter was usually pretty good at eliminating spam. Odd, also, was that the message bore an icon indicating an encrypted and verified digital signature. Why would a spam message have that? She was about to mark it spam so that she wouldnÕt get any more of those messages, when curiosity got the better of her and she opened it. ÒOh, my God!Ó From: Tony Hamilton (Verified Signature) Subject: Congratulations, Aisha, you have just won the United States Reasonocracy Lottery *Official US Government Business* Dear Ms. Hernandez: Greetings from the Congress of the United States. YouÕve been randomly selected as a candidate for the US Congress. Details at www.becoming_a_reasonocrat.gov Please phone me ASAP. Tony Hamilton Director of Recruiting and New Member Education United States Congress The Capitol, Washington, DC 20001 202 555 1212 Public key: hj3jhk24348787sdf0239485554234585b You may be wondering, Dear 2018 Reader, just what is a Reasonocrat? LetÕs look it up in the dictionary. Reasonocrat, n. A person who represents the general population in deliberations by the government about how to solve problems. So called, because the processes are designed to try to reach consensus by using reason instead of power, inspired by the social processes of science. Antonyms: Bureaucrat, n. A person who implements government policy via fixed routine without exercising intelligent judgment. Aristocrat, n.: A person who gains great power and/or wealth via heredity or conquest, and makes decisions for those beneath them in the power hierarchy. Democrat, n.: A person who believes that voting is the best way for a group to make a decision. The ÒantonymsÓ share this characteristic: they all resist change from the status quo. This despite overwhelming evidence that bureaucratic, aristocratic, and yes, even democratic processes cause unnecessary war, poverty, and unhappiness of the governed. Aisha thought she should visit the web page first. It requested that she login, then said: Congrats Aisha, youÕre one of a select few that are invited to apply for the position of Reasonocrat in the US Government starting next year. The requirements are so few that most people over 18 meet them, and you wouldnÕt have received the invitation if we didnÕt already expect that you met them. Hmm, IÕve got a three year old to raise, weÕve just started planning a new house, and well, now is not a great time for this ÒopportunityÓ. She dialed the phone number: Tony: Hi Aisha, glad you called. Aisha: (After pause.) Ah, I was expecting 5 levels of voice menus. Tony: Yeah, that was the old bureaucracy. Turns out, voice menus wasted everybodyÕs time including the organizations that deployed them. Besides thereÕs only 4 people I give this number to. Managing your application is very high priority. Aisha: What is your job again? Tony: I help people overcome the shock of winning the lottery, so to speak. We still call it a ÒlotteryÓ, but itÕs not like that old game that was used to scam people back when we had Capitalism. Sad to think that people were so desperate then, that they pinned hopes on winning money. Also that they were so uneducated that they fell for it. My fifth-graderÕs Probability class would know better. Aisha: IÕm not sure I want to win. Tony: My job is to help you decide. You can call me any time with a question about anything. OK, I donÕt know everything but as a former Reasonocrat myself, I pretty much know whatÕs in store. Aisha: How much do I get paid? Tony: The same as me and what you make now, nothing. But the digs are pretty comfortable. Your own apartment, thereÕs a swimming pool, theater, and food of pretty much any nationality youÕd want to eat. Aisha: Can I bring my family? Tony: The little one, sure. James? LetÕs see youÕve been living together over a year, right? We should be able to get him in too. In a month Aisha, Trish and James are on a plane to Kansas, chosen for the government because its literally the center of the country and no big cities. Tony greets them at the airport and they drive 45 minutes to the Reasonocracy Center. Though it doesnÕt grant any degrees, everyone calls it ÒThe UniversityÓ. Aisha: Why do you call it that? Tony: YouÕre here for 4 years and most of your time is spent learning. In fact, thatÕs all you do as a freshman. Best professors in the world, small class size, very interactive. Aisha can see the website photos were accurate. She already felt familiar with the physical layout. She and the other applicants are lead to the main auditorium. After an overview presentation, thereÕs time for questions. Aisha: I can see what the place is and can imagine the process, but why would I want to come here? Prof: Well, I canÕt get inside your head but I can tell you that only 1% donÕt make it through the 4 years and nobody at the end wants to leave. Ask Tony why he wanted to continue being involved. YouÕll learn a lot, youÕll make a real difference, and youÕll have more respect than you can use from the whole country. Its nothing like being a lawyer or politician. In a different venue, James was assured that there were a lot of opportunities here for him too, starting with an extensive maker space. Learning, interacting, helping out with the tasks of making a village run smoothly. That village would be raising their daughter too, in about the most cooperative and empathetic way possible. Aisha: Will you still love me if I want to do it? James: IÕm not sure I would if you didnÕt! Two Years Later É Aisha is on the ÒPeace AdvocatesÓ committee. After the civil unrest of 2025, ÒThe PoliceÓ became just the name of a 1980s rock band. The women and men in blue changed their name to ÒPeace AdvocatesÓ to reßect a whole new philosophy on policing. With scarcity solved, jobs are, what would have been called, ÒvolunteerÓ. Even so, prestigious jobs like Peace Advocate are in demand and have stringent requirements. The overall need for police is down thanks to scarcity mitigation. However, some aggressive people, and mentally ill people still commit crimes. We listen in on a Peace Advocates committee meeting. Member 1: IÕve just been sent a final draft of the Oakland Peace Advocates rules of engagement with citizens. TheyÕre proposing these be incorporated into the training program for national Peace Advocate certification. From ÒThe UniversityÓ education, Lesson #3: Before you take a position on an issue, the first step is to identify the relevant criteria for making the decision. Aisha: What does it say about use of lethal force? Member 1: Peace Advocates arenÕt allowed to carry lethal weapons of course, but they do suggest sticky foam and a new chemical that blinds you for about 15 minutes. Member 2: A guy in my old neighborhood got blinded by that stuff a few years back, but he was still able to do a lot of damaging with the machine gun he was holding. Lesson #7 Back up rationale with reality. Member 1: ThatÕs where the sticky foam comes in. Ok its not perfect but a lot better than the old days of shoot first and ask questions later. Lesson #9 An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Aisha: This is just the tech stuff. What about the kinds of events that trigger stopping citizens in the first place? Member 1: Its kinda complicated. ThereÕs lots of ÒindicatorsÓ but at the end of the day, itÕs still a judgement call. Lesson #12: Expand the solution space. Member 3: In England theyÕve got a different set of rules and, according to statistics, its working out pretty well. Why donÕt we just adopt those? Member 2: Do any of these solutions train officers in Psychology? You know, what motivates people, what makes them angry? Lesson #14: Invention is always on the table. Member 1: HmmÉ the Oakland proposal doesnÕt and IÕm pretty sure EnglandÕs process is minimal in that area. But thatÕs an important idea. LetÕs have our recommendation include some psych training. A couple hours laterÉ Lesson #21 Rationale is important but hard to manageÉ Aisha: OK weÕve captured a lot of good rationale in our Justify discussion about Òrules of engagementÓ. What seems apparent to me is that weÕve got a ton of good ideas, but we differ on how effective those ideas are in actual practice. Lesson #15 Recognize ignorance. Member 1: As fond of the Oakland policy as I am, I have to admit that they donÕt have enough data for us to be confident about recommending their proposal for National deployment. Heck, this is going to determine life and death. Lesson #2 Embrace the scientific process Aisha: While lives are being lost, we must not dilly-dally. On the other hand, I donÕt want to make a hasty judgement here. LetÕs play the ÒScientific ExperimentÓ card. WeÕve got one just started in Oakland on their plan. That covers a tough inner city. We need a suburban and a rural setting, and we also need to contrast the Oakland plan with EnglandÕs. Lesson #18 Haste makes waste but time is of the essence. Its a balance. Member 4: England isnÕt America. Member 2: America isnÕt America, but so what? LetÕs catalog the differences and learn as much as we can from the commonalities. Aisha: WeÕre going to need some big data analysis here. LetÕs ask for a couple suburbs and a couple rural areas to implement the Oakland plan, then rope in some statisticians to carefully get the raw data from them and from England. Lesson #2b: Generate and test, experiment and analyze. Member 3: And donÕt forget that weÕll need the machine learning guys to help generalize from the megabytes theyÕll collect. Aisha: OK, weÕll let the Logistics Committee hammer out the details, then revisit this issue in a year to see if weÕre getting a clear direction from the machine learning guys. Remember weÕll take their input with a grain of salt. All the reasoning weÕve captured here today and then some will be needed to help shape the best solution. A few years later, another issue comes up É Friend: The guy next to me has a zillion of those noisy little drones ßying to his house every day. Since youÕre a former Reasonocrat, I though maybe you could put in a word with the powers that be and É Aisha: Hold on. Former Reasonocrats have no revolving door to K Street like the old US Democracy. IÕm just an ordinary citizen now. Friend: So you canÕt make those pesky things illegal? Aisha: I canÕt but we can give it a shot. LetÕs talk to our townÕs Environment Committee. Two days later É Env Committee member: WeÕve had a noise complaint about the constant drones ßying to your house. Neighbor: Yeah, it bothers me, too. But hereÕs the thing. IÕve invented a new kind of magnet that helps doctors locate tumors and now every hospital wants one. Env Committee member: Hmm, I know this aerodynamics guy. Later É Aerodynamics Guy: Turns out if you put bumps on propellers, ˆ la whale ßippers, it can increase aerodynamic efficiency and decrease noise. I know this drone guyÉ Drone Guy: OK. I can 3D print some new propellers for the drone IÕm working on. IÕll upload them to thingiverse.com. Also, IÕll enter the rationale for their design into the Environment CommitteeÕs citizen feedback site, so that the government will know that they have a possible solution when someone else complains about drone noise. Neighbor: Since I want to be a good neighbor, IÕll suggest to the hospitals that they start using the new, quieter drones. Speaking of quiet, itÕll quiet down my neighbor who originally complained, to know that thereÕs a solution on the way.