The Imperial Charter: Section Thirteen

…continued from parts ten, eleven, and twelve.

SECTION XIII: THE EUPRAXIC COLLEGIUM

(Note: this entire section was added by the Eleventh Amendment, passed in 0000 as a response to the steady increase in the power available to individuals, which (with reference to incidents in the few years immediately preceding it) greatly increased the potential harm that an irrational individual could cause if unchecked and undetected, and with reference also to the code of behavior (based on the Eupraxia) coded into the structure of AI operating systems, the eleventh amendment imposed the requirement of a similar eupraxic code on all sophonts within the Empire, and established a body to define it, implement testing for it, and in other ways to care for the avoidance of pernicious irrationality and the promotion of rational thought.  — ed.)

Article I: Charter of the Eupraxic Collegium

Inasmuch as essential prerequisites to the liberties of the citizen-shareholders of the Empire and the prosperity and good order of our civilization are the rational choices of its citizen-shareholders;

And inasmuch as developments in technology have placed greater and greater energies into the hands of the individual sophont; and further, have enabled new technologies of mental editing, desire control, and personality analysis to be developed and used;

And inasmuch as these developments pose a great threat to the liberties, prosperity and good order aforementioned, when wielded by minds unstable or irrational;

We hereby charter and establish the Eupraxic Collegium, for the purpose of monitoring and assuring the rationality and good mental health of the citizen-shareholders of the Empire.

Article II: Purposes of the Eupraxic Collegium

To fulfill the purposes for which it is chartered, the Eupraxic Collegium shall be granted the following powers:

  • To define, maintain, and update standards of rationality, of stability under stress, and a eupraxic code, which shall henceforth be adhered to by all citizen-shareholders of the Empire;
  • To routinely audit and certify the mind of every citizen-shareholder of the Empire, on a regular basis, as executing within such standards of rationality, and as stable under such levels of stress; and to offer such higher levels of certification on the basis of rationality as shall also be defined;
  • To, when under audit the mind of a citizen-shareholder of the Empire shall be found not to execute within such standards of rationality or stability, take such corrective action as shall be necessary to restore said mind to a rational and stable state;
  • To investigate cases and trends of cacopraxia which do not themselves qualify as pernicious irrationalism, and to take such measures as are permissible within the rights outlined in this Charter to advise and guide against them;
  • To produce, maintain, publish and promulgate an ontology and set of social and economic protocols capable of fulfilling the purposes of sophont interaction and the recording of knowledge, while acting to propagate rational thought free from bias and irrational axiom;
  • To research further advancements in the science of clionomy; and to produce projections, extrapolations, and computations therefrom;
  • And to investigate cases of self-reproducing thought-code; toxic memes; and other infectious information capable of propagating irrationality, and to take such action as is necessary to prevent their free propagation.

Article III: Governance of the Eupraxic Collegium

To achieve the above purposes, The Eupraxic Collegium shall be governed by a council of twelve officers, the Clarifiers of the Collegium, each of whom shall be appointed by the Imperial Couple with the advice and consent of the Senate, and who shall be passed at the highest degree of rationality by the previously existing procedures of the Collegium before their appointment, and who shall be Aspects of the Eldraeic Transcend.

Each Clarifier of the Collegium shall be audited no less often than once in each week to the strictest degree of scrutiny practiced by the Collegium; and should such examination reveal any deviation from the highest degree of rationality, the Clarifier shall be suspended from office until such deviation is corrected.

(The boldface in the article above is another addition by the Twelfth Amendment. — ed.)

Article IV: Rationality of Collegium Officers

Each and every officer of the Eupraxic Collegium shall be audited at such intervals and to such degree of scrutiny as the Clarifiers of the Collegium shall find appropriate for the office to which they have been appointed; and should such examination reveal any deviation below the appointed degree of rationality for that office, the officer shall be suspended from office until such deviation is corrected.

Article V: Responsibility of the Citizen Mentality

Each citizen-shareholder of the Empire is amenable to and accepts the responsibility of permitting the officers of the Eupraxic Collegium, duly appointed to audit the minds of citizen-shareholders, to access their static and dynamic mind-state for the sole purpose of auditing its structure and algorithm to assess the rationality and stability thereof.

Such static mind-states, having been audited, shall be erased forthwith; and an officer of the Eupraxic Collegium, having audited a mind-state, shall redact and erase from their memory all information gained from their study of that mindstate not germane to the assessment of its rationality and stability, specifically including all memory information; and each audited citizen-shareholder of the Empire shall have the right to examine the records confirming that this has been done.

RATIFICATION

Given under our hands and seals this day, 17th of the Fourth Cycle of Selene, 1,828th Year of the Calendar of Rhoës;

ALPHAS I AMANYR, EMPEROR OF CESTIA and the UNION OF EMPIRES

SELEDIË III SELEQUELIOS, EMPRESS OF SELENARIA and the UNION OF EMPIRES

LORAN CAMRÍÄD, THÉARCH of the DEEPING

LIRÍEL LÁRATHYR, QUEEN OF VERANTHYR

VARÍÄN LEIRAVÁL, KING OF LEIRIN for the POLYARCHY of the SILVER CRESCENT

…and we’re done!

6 thoughts on “The Imperial Charter: Section Thirteen

  1. Pingback: The Imperial Charter: Sections Ten, Eleven, and Twelve | The Eldraeverse

  2. This leads me to conclude that (rather ironically in light of their apparent commitment to absolute individual liberty) one of the deviations from baseline that hasn’t been highlighted all that much by comparison with the others is a somewhat lower threshold for trust — since I personally don’t think I’d be comfortable with the idea of consenting to allow someone else to tinker with my head on a regular basis, no matter how demonstrably foolproof the system is or how spotless its reputation up to this point is.

    • Actually – it’s the other variable that’s different. Not a lower threshold for trust, but the fact that the Empire is a very high-trust culture and society (as should be evident from a comparison of the way they do things there, as revealed in various posts here, and a description of the functioning of said cultures, such as the excerpts here. And in particular, it’s a high-trustworthiness society, and one that emphasizes the obligations of liberty right along with the rights.

      I would be uncomfortable with that idea, but that’s because I’m a product of what is, by their standards, a low-trust society. In their NYC-equivalent, people still don’t feel the need to lock their doors. Hell, some people build houses so open-plan they don’t even have doors, and they can rely on folks still respecting the property line. A gentlesoph’s word is his bond, a billion esteyn can safely be committed on a handshake contract, etc.

      Which is rather a stark contrast towards our modern Western civilization that, by and large, considers honor archaic and giving one’s word a punch-line, and where obligation is concerned, has not only invented strategic default, but has made the practice so ubiquitous as to give it a jargon of its own.

      So, essentially, if I was a product of that society instead of this one, I’d be much more able to trust such institutions without moving my own trust threshold at all.

      • An interesting way of putting it — and in light of that, certain other factors I had thought jarring seem to have come together quite nicely.

        And, incidentally, bookmarking that link for further reference, since it’s probably going to be relevant to my own creative endeavors.

  3. Pingback: The Guardians of Our Harmony | The Eldraeverse

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