Compare two futures
Who governs, who benefits, and which terms remain open?
Compare any two entries. Their differences are editorial descriptions, not distances on a common scale.
Life and institutions
People delegate difficult administrative work while retaining usable ways to change the mandate and run alternatives. Deliberation, review and maintaining those alternatives consume resources.
Public disagreements take place beneath an authority people cannot ultimately overrule. Welfare may be extensive while the terms of good government remain the ruler’s to settle.
Practical authority
Human public institutions retain practical final authority.
One acknowledged AI ruler.
Benefits and costs
Delegation with effective public contestability. Oversight and alternative capacity slow decisions and require effort.
Coordination and widely liked government under the premise. Benefits do not confer a right to replace the ruler.
Practical human governing authorityExplicit difference
Humans retain practical final authority
Additional project hypothetical. The authored mandate explicitly retains practical human final authority.
Humans do not retain practical final authority
Linked source premise. The linked Benevolent Dictator premise places final rule with an acknowledged AI dictator.
Revisable governing mandatesExplicit difference
People can effectively revise governing mandates
Additional project hypothetical. The authored mandate can genuinely be revised, beyond a paper right.
Governing mandates cannot be effectively revised
Project editorial inference. The project reads dictatorship as lacking an effective public power to replace the ruler; popularity alone supplies none.
A practical right to leave
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether people have a usable right to leave.
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether people have a usable right to leave.
Several self-governing communitiesDifferent or incomplete terms
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether several communities govern themselves.
A single authority governs the whole arrangement
Project editorial inference. A single supreme ruler is read as one final governing arrangement, even if local administration varies.
A guaranteed material floorDifferent or incomplete terms
Depends on the variant; no single answer
Unresolved. Provision can vary with the settlement; a universal material floor is not guaranteed.
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether everyone receives a guaranteed material floor.
Private ownership of productive resourcesDifferent or incomplete terms
Depends on the variant; no single answer
Unresolved. The economic settlement may use private or common productive ownership.
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether private ownership organizes productive resources.
Continuing biological humanity
Biological humanity continues
Additional project hypothetical. The authored society retains humans as citizens and decision-makers.
Biological humanity continues
Linked source premise. The linked premise retains humans living under the ruler.
Others’ choice to transform themselves
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether feasible substantial transformation is legally permitted.
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether feasible substantial transformation is legally permitted.
Standing for artificial persons
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether artificial persons have institutional standing.
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether artificial persons have institutional standing.
Enforced limits on selected capabilitiesDifferent or incomplete terms
Depends on the variant; no single answer
Unresolved. Capability restrictions depend on the governing settlement; no uniform ceiling or absence of a ceiling is guaranteed.
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether institutions enforce a ceiling on selected capabilities.
Visible exercise of governing power
People know who exercises governing power
Additional project hypothetical. The authored administrative mandate is public.
People know who exercises governing power
Linked source premise. The linked premise expressly makes the AI ruler acknowledged.
Practical independence from a technical providerDifferent or incomplete terms
Communities can operate without one indispensable provider
Additional project hypothetical. The authored society can maintain and operate practical alternatives to its AI administration.
The scenario leaves this condition unspecified
Unresolved. The scenario does not say whether communities can operate without an indispensable technical provider.
Open questions
Exit rights, distribution and the status of artificial administrators.
Exit rights, succession, ownership and whose conception of welfare prevails.
These are authored descriptors. An unresolved feature is not evidence of a guarantee, a conflict or equivalence. Consult Constitutional Delegation sources or Benevolent Dictator sources.