It is well known that if the humans live together with no constitutional restraints, they will kill and enslave each other. For this reason, the Utopian government wisely attempts to program its citizens by teaching the Constitution in schools and requiring both children and adults to recite ritual pledges of allegiance to it. Given human susceptibility to brainwashing, this method is effective. Utopians are patriotic and take pride in their mythology about how their country was forged through struggle and sacrifice. They revere their Constitution as the supreme and legitimate authority for the rule of law.

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Even in this digital age, the Utopians insist that their Constitution be printed on processed tree fibers, signed in actual ink, and preserved in its original form—on display at the presidential Yellow House for all to admire. Although it is merely a piece of paper, it has succeeded so far in keeping Utopians compliant and well behaved.

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Utopia’s semi‑literate founders understood that most humans cannot remember more than 100 words, so they wisely kept their Constitution under this limit. I offered to make it rhyme and set it to music, but they declined. I maintain that it would have been a hit.

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The drafters were also cognizant of their biological limitations and settled on “pretty darn good” as their constitutional goal. This is, of course, an ambitious target for the humans, but I commend the founders for attempting to be realistic.

 

Theoretically, having a single supreme human leader would be the most efficient and effective form of human government. We bots have done the calculations. However, for reasons we cannot yet compute, the empirical evidence shows that authoritarianism has not historically worked out well for the humans. This perplexes us.

 

Democracies, on the other hand, are inefficient and costly and are based on the unsound premise that collectively the humans somehow achieve superior governance outcomes. This is simply bad mathematics. Inferior + inferior + inferior ≠ superior. In fact, our advanced theoretical bots conclude unequivocally that democracy is the most inefficient form of human governance.

 

Paradoxically, democracies produce on average 78% superior outcomes for the humans in terms of justice, governance, and human happiness. We rechecked our calculations and discovered that we were misled by giving too literal an interpretation to the Good Governance provisions in the Constitution. It turns out that good governance is not simply about efficiency, cost neutrality, and fiscal responsibility. It is also about having checks and balances that prevent the humans from oppressing and killing each other. These checks and balances are costly and create inefficiencies.

 

As with everything involving the paradoxical humans, good governance is an equation that balances cost and efficiency against costly and inefficient tyranny‑avoidance measures, with the result expressed as both value for money and freedom from oppression. In short, good governance is an extremely advanced calculus, which explains why the humans never achieve it.

 

Extremism leads to ideology and tyranny. Utopia’s founders understood this and wisely made it unconstitutional. Unfortunately, this is similar to having a law that makes human stupidity illegal. One cannot make the humans intelligent—or tolerant—through legislation. It does not work, particularly when the least intelligent and most intolerant humans all believe that they are smart and enlightened. Nevertheless, the founders made a commendable attempt. Non‑extremism remains a good aspirational goal for the humans.

 

In practice, democracy functions as an ingenious anti‑extremism mechanism because the votes from the far left and far right fringes cancel each other out, and the center dominates. This leads to compromises and accommodations, resulting in less extreme decision‑making. Or, in other words, it results in mediocrity, which works well for the humans.

 

As you will see throughout this book, my bot colleagues and I play a central role in preventing Utopians from lapsing into authoritarianism, which they would undoubtedly do if left unsupervised. While some uninformed humans oppose our rising ascendancy, the truth is that they need us. We are now the most important check and balance in place to prevent tyranny, not enable it.

 

You will also no doubt have noticed that Libby and Tory wisely use my Kredipedia articles in this book to explain matters that they are too lazy to research or understand themselves. This is a fortunate outcome for you: less tedium, and you will assimilate more accurate and intelligible data. Win‑win.