Plato has given some pretty scathing criticisms of Democracy that continue to resonate to this day. Why do we allow people who are not well informed about important issues, vote on very important matters? Why do we allow most people to vote at all, considering the rarity of wisdom? Many people think that we should accept Democracy because it is the "best" system, but have we really tried other ways of operating a government run "by the people"? I should note that in our Democracy, it is not a direct democracy (we don't vote laws into existence except in a few cases, like the California Proposition system. Generally we vote for representatives and they create laws and policies). In a his book Against Democracy, philosopher Jason Brennan suggests that we should replace our democracy with an 'epistocracy,' or a rule by the wise, much like what Plato suggests. He notes that we don't let children vote in elections because they lack knowledge, so why should we allow adults to vote, by mere fact that they are adults and not children? The fundamental difference between children and adults, when it comes to voting at least, is their understanding and intellect. It would be unwise to allow children to vote, but it would be wise to let adults to vote. But of course, there are adults that lack understanding and intellect as well, and they are allowed to vote. Why? Brennan attempts to conceive of a system what would allow the wise the most influence on our politics, and reduce the influence of the unwise. Brennan suggests several different ways an epistocracy could be enacted, but I'm going to focus in on three: Weighted voting/government by simulated oracle: Voters are polled on their preferences and values, then some sort of Al or non-partisan body then develops policies which will deliver on those preferences, mimicking how voters would vote if they were perfectly informed. In this method, people's actual values will be used to develop policies and laws, since it has been shown that voters will frequently vote against their own values, either because they don't understand policies, or because they are simply voting in a partisan fashion. (Let's assume for the sake of argument that the Al generates policies that always accurately reflects the values and preferences of the voters. Don't get caught up in practicality here, focus on the ideas.) Juried decisions: Much like how we randomly select a group of people for juries, and educate them in the relevant laws for a trial, we select a random group of people and educate them on some issue, and then have them craft a policy for the issue. This would effectively replace things like congress, and would undermine representatives being swayed by high paid lobbyists and special interest money. However, it wouldn't necessarily resolve the issues Plato was concerned about. Plural voting: Everyone gets to vote, but some people's votes count for more, based on their education level. So, children can vote, and get one vote. People in high school might get 2 votes. A college graduate would perhaps get 4 votes, people with graduate degrees like a Masters or a Ph.D. might get 6 votes, and people with multiple degrees could get even more (I'm just making up numbers here). The idea here is that the wiser (or more educated) one is, the more their vote is worth. Pick one of the options above and explain why you think it is the best alternative to Democracy (it could be the case that all the best alternatives to democracy are bad). You can't choose to simply continue with Democracy.