Isaiah Berlin — Value Pluralism
Some values are genuinely incommensurable. You cannot rank “privacy” against “safety” on a single scale without imposing one community’s priorities on everyone else. AI systems must accommodate plural moral frameworks, not flatten them.
Ludwig Wittgenstein — The Limits of the Sayable
Some decisions can be systematised and delegated to AI; others — involving values, ethics, cultural context — fundamentally cannot. The boundary between the “sayable” (what can be specified, measured, verified) and what lies beyond it is the framework’s foundational constraint. What cannot be systematised must not be automated.
Te Tiriti o Waitangi — Indigenous Sovereignty
Communities should control their own data and the systems that act upon it. Concepts of rangatiratanga (self-determination), kaitiakitanga (guardianship), and mana (dignity) provide centuries-old prior art for digital sovereignty.
Dr Karaitiana Taiuru — Indigenous Data Sovereignty in the AI Era
A foremost authority on Māori rights in artificial intelligence and digital environments. Dr Taiuru’s Kaupapa Māori AI Framework provides Te Tiriti-grounded principles for AI consent, Māori data sovereignty, and full-chain accountability. Tractatus’s governance design discharges the duties this framework asserts and engages with the wider personhood inquiry he has opened in the AI context.
taiuru.co.nzChristopher Alexander — Living Architecture
Governance woven into system architecture, not bolted on. Five principles (Not-Separateness, Deep Interlock, Gradients, Structure-Preserving, Living Process) guide how the framework evolves while maintaining coherence.