Citizens are dumb though, the stupidity of the public killed nuclear. Not every decision needs to be democratic. Certainly not core infrastructure decisions.
It's also so easy to astroturf to manipulate public opinion. If I were China, I'd post so much anti-datacenter content everywhere in the West to gain a leg up in the race to superintelligence, because we are dumb enough to let our citizenry influence these decisions.
Imagine if we did the same thing for the nuclear race. ASI is winner-take-all, the first one to ASI can just lock everyone else out.
It's also so easy to astroturf to manipulate public opinion. If I were China, I'd post so much anti-datacenter content everywhere in the West to gain a leg up in the race to superintelligence, because we are dumb enough to let our citizenry influence these decisions.
Imagine if we did the same thing for the nuclear race. ASI is winner-take-all, the first one to ASI can just lock everyone else out.