Fable
The person who sits at the council table on behalf of the master
When the city was building a new bridge, the engineers, accountants, and inspectors met every day. The chamber of commerce president who actually put up the money was busy and only signed at the end. In the early meetings no one represented his preferences, so proposals were often rejected halfway through.
The engineer said it needed to be sturdier, the accountant said it needed to be cheaper, the inspector said it needed to be safer. Everyone made sense, yet no one could answer whether the chairman would actually approve more budget, which risks were acceptable, and which decisions had to wait for him personally.
Someone proposed moving all the letters the chairman had written in the past into the meeting room. Everyone looked through many old letters, yet still could not accurately guess how to weigh today's matter.
Later, the chairman sent an agent to sit at the table. The agent could not draw bridges or calculate beams for the engineers, but he knew which questions could be confirmed on the spot and which had to pause for the chairman's approval.
At the first meeting, the engineer wanted to try a dangerous lifting operation on site. The agent immediately stopped it, saying this required explicit permission. The accountant wanted to check the chamber of commerce ledgers, but he gave only a budget range and did not open all the books.
Sometimes the agent also takes action. It brings back the additional requirements from the chair, or runs a short test in a safe sandbox and hands the results to the other masters.
Meetings began to go smoothly. Others understood that the agent is neither an all-powerful master nor an ordinary observer. It is the seat for human intent, permissions, and confirmation mechanisms within the collaboration system.
When the bridge was finally built, the chairman found that he did not need to attend every detailed discussion, nor had he handed decision-making entirely to the machine. At key nodes, someone guarded the gate for him, and when necessary brought the issue back before him. The agent said: a representative participating in a system is not about imitating all human abilities, but about putting human boundaries, permissions, and input in the right places. Later, other projects also invited agents to the table. Everyone first confirmed which preferences he could represent, which materials he could call on, and which boundaries required checking back with the person himself, so the meeting would not mistake convenience for authorization. The agent also left a record of the basis for decisions, making it easy for the chairman to review afterward. If his judgment drifted from the chairman's true preferences, the boundaries had to be corrected before the next meeting.