I repeat what I’ve said in one of the telegram groups:
I don’t see the point in reaching a political consensus rn, with the effort that this takes. We already have great probabilities of a fork. The idea of the principles and the constitution is a good one, I even agree on several of the points, but I really don’t see the sense of it at this moment.
Complaining about a HIP being rushed when you rushed a HIP after an attempted coup and unilaterally taking it back is not very believable.
We waited 48 hours. You waited less than a day, only 16 hours, for something using a big word like “Constitution” in its title. Facts.
So do you agree could be great to have this criteria for a constitution appoval?
yes it would be great, its included in the proposal that constitutional amendments require a 3/4 threshold.
What? This proposal didn’t even have 24 hours to debate, no feedback was even considered
Feedback from phase-1 was included to modify the approval threshold for non-constitutional HIPs to 2/3 as a pragmatic compromise. The whole goal is to ensure a wide consensus of voters is needed to pass HIPs.
Thanks, I’d like to focus the discussion in this thread on the proposal itself. The goal of the articles of the Proof of Humanity Constitution are a minimal set of principles which we have informally operated under, but formalizing the culture that we created.
The articles of the Proof of Humanity Constitution are,
1. Principle of Sybil Resistance
2. Principle of Non-Discrimination
3. Principle of 1p1v
4. Principle of Wide Pluralistic Consensus
Many democracies operate with informal civic culture and republican virtue. For example the democratic system in the USA was stressed particularly from 2016 to 2020 when many of the traditions of a democratic culture were violated, but many realized that at the end of the day constitutional protections are the only recourse when democratic norms and culture are violated.
Thus far we have operated with an informal civic culture, and informal principles of sybil resistance. The constitution seeks to formalized our principles and civic culture which includes 1p1v voting rights.
A fork without reform is not progress. It repeats a broken model. I strongly believe any version of Proof of Humanity that depends on democratic virtues necessitates constitutional protections. Democracy must be protected from voting itself into a dictatorship.
I ask everyone to seriously ponder why we arrived here, at a bifurcation in a polarized community?
Okay! I will try to give feedback hoping that we can reach consensus in the community. Most of all, because I think that “we arrived here” because there aren’t guiding principles.
about (2) → I’m totally agree. But… we are far behind as protocol. A human that cannot speak cannot submit a valid registration right now. The hip-55 itself says that if a parent helps his child to register controlling his/her keys, it will be a sybil. Another example is someone with a disability. So any proposal looking for that inclusion and non-discrimination will be against principle 1. I just bring this point to ensure that we are not getting a deadlock, but I really don’t know how to fix it.
about (3) → I really think that 1p1v is something powerful. But with that statement we are probably making a really rigid principle. There are ongoing discussions and research on how to evolve democracy. That includes quadratic delegation, quadratic voting, delegation decay, and so on… I don’t know, maybe is better to talk about “democratic ways for voting”.
about (2) → Maybe we should clarify article 2. For example, although a religious extremist group which prohibits the use of modern technology (the Amish), I don’t think this warrants the word ‘discrimination’ by Proof of Humanity even though the religion of these people prohibits them from using Proof of Humanity. Moreover, yes currently users needs to speak in the reverse turing test. We can change rules to accommodate disability (user vouching must make a video with the human speaking on their behalf, higher vouch requirements).
I suppose this highlights the conflict of maximally permissive versions of Proof of Humanity which are not sybil resistant and which allow anyone to participate, and maximally sybil resistant lists. The rights of constitutions often conflict and courts need to resolve disputes.
Reminds me of a book by Jamal Greene, a constitutional scholar who argues rights interpreted too narrowly come at the expense of justice.
‘Rights at the Expense of Justice
The book, Greene’s first, criticizes courts for narrowly framed, all-or-nothing determinations he believes award rights at the expense of justice’
Moreover this reminds me of Credible Neutrality As A Guiding Principle
Not just neutrality: efficacy also matters
A common fallacy of the more extreme versions of the ideologies that I alluded to at the beginning of this post is a kind of neutrality maximalism: if it can’t be done completely neutrally, it should not be done at all! The fallacy here is that this viewpoint achieves narrow-sense neutrality at the cost of broad-sense neutrality.
For example in the US constitution, the right to ‘bare arms’ or guns is an enshrined right. Free speech is also a right. The US govt also has the right to regulate international and interstate commerce. This right has been used to prevent the distribution of 3D printed guns. But this conflicts with freedom of speech (distributing 3D files) and the right to ‘bare arms’.
Perhaps more guidelines for jurors are required for constitutional interpretation when the articles of constitution are not simultaneously satisfied. In particular, as listed in the preamble, the primary purpose of the constitution of POH is sybil resistance. That is guidance for jurors.
about (3) → yeah there is interesting debate on-going about voting systems which are not 1p1v. Some are thoroughly studied and experimented, others are neither studied nor tested on a large scale which worries me about trying to replace the current governance system with an experimental system. 1p1v is definitely a fundamental voting system which could cause a schism in this community.
With respect to conflicting rights, there are a number of methods adopted to address them. What follows is just my personal opinion. Of course, there are plenty of variables at play. For example, prioritisation of rights may depend on the source of said rights (i.e. constitutional rights vs. statutory rights vs international treaty-based rights vs. common law rights, etc).
For the purpose of simplicity, we may focus here only where rights exist within the same source (e.g. constitutional rights).
Firstly, of course, we need to see if there’s any specific interpretation of the clauses within the fact situation that allows us to retain each right without needing to resort to a trade-off. If such an interpretation is possible, then it should be adopted, even if it is not the “intuitive” or “common sense” interpretation.
If a harmonized interpretation is not possible, then it depends on the intended constitutional scheme: Is there an intended hierarchy of rights? If yes, then the right that is intended to be higher up the ladder dictates the extent of other rights lower down the ladder.
If there is no hierarchy of rights, then the extent of each right is in constant flux depending on the context and circumstances at play, and to deduce the correct conclusion, we need some kind of reference point to gauge when to limit one right in favour of another.
This reference point may well be a consequentialist one: what is in the best interests of the system governed by the constitution (in this case, PoH)? Whatever interpretation of conflicting rights secures those interests best should be adopted. Of course, there must be some general agreement on what the interests of the community are, too. Some may say maximizing the number of successful submissions is important, others might say that getting the “right” submissions is more important.
Alternatively, the reference point may well be a fundamental principle or value enshrined in the constitution itself; a kind of “summum bonum”. Traditionally, the job of a preamble is sometimes seen to express this value.
Of course, it goes without saying that any interpretation of the fundamental value should be an approach that protects all of the rights provided in the constitution as much as possible. If this is not possible, then one probably needs to adopt a thought experiment: Consider that both of the rights are completely and irreparably in conflict with one another in the specific fact situation before you. Which right’s absence do you reckon will destroy the purpose enshrined by the fundamental value (i.e. preamble) more? That’s the right that should take priority in the given fact situation before you.
It goes without saying that just because one right has been accorded priority as the result of a thought experiment, this doesn’t mean that the conflicting right can be ignored entirely; it must only be clawed back to the extent that the conflict doesn’t exist anymore. This may be referred to as the principle of proportionality.
Of course, I would recommend that this thought experiment should ideally be adopted for every single conflict that arises. The appropriate response in one fact situation may not be the appropriate one in another, even if the same two rights are in conflict and even if there are some similarities in the issues at play.
If doing the above requires a rethink of what you want the fundamental value to be, as prescribed by the preamble, then that may well be a sound investment of your time and effort.