Everyone lives within governance and creates their own governance. The referendum on the restart of Nuclear Power Plant No. 3 will be held on August 23. Recently, debates and discussions on both sides have heated up again, but this article allows you to think about the societal governance issues that are 'one layer removed.' (Background: Nuclear Power Plant No. 3 Restart Referendum Voting on 8/23: Five televised debates will be held, with the Legislative Yuan supporting the pro side and the Executive Yuan opposing it.) (Background Supplement: Vitalik: I no longer believe that 'optimized governance' can be realized, economics does not perfectly fit society.) At the crossroads of electricity, Taiwan's nuclear energy controversy is like a giant beast trapped in a maze, with each collision deepening the cracks in society. The Nuclear Power Plant No. 3 and No. 4, two power plants with entirely different fates, are better understood not merely as energy facilities but as Taiwan's operating system 'malfunction warning windows.' This system is Taiwan's national-level giant project governance system; Nuclear Power Plant No. 3 was successfully operated in a relatively simple environment during a period of government authoritarian stability; while Nuclear Power Plant No. 4 represents a catastrophic system collapse triggered by this outdated system trying to handle high-difficulty tasks in an increasingly complex democratic era. The stories of both point to a disturbing truth: the real tragedy of Taiwan's nuclear energy lies not in the existence of technology, but in our successful introduction of nuclear energy's 'hardware' (reactors, engineering technology) while failing to establish a matching 'social software,' including long-term stable policies, social trust, democratic communication mechanisms, and a governance framework responsible for future generations. The current anxiety over electricity demand triggered by the AI revolution refocuses our attention on hardware expansion, yet we may once again overlook the 'social software' that has long since malfunctioned and is in need of reinstallation. The 'hardware' achievements of Nuclear Power Plant No. 3, located in Hengchun in southern Taiwan, are a microcosm of Taiwan's economic miracle era. As a key part of the 1970s 'Twelve Major Construction Plans,' its birth carries the nation's ambition for industrialization. Using the then-advanced pressurized water reactor technology, it took seven years to complete and has been operating stably since 1984, providing indispensable base-load power for southern Taiwan for forty years. The successful construction and reliable operation of Nuclear Power Plant No. 3 are exemplary works in Taiwan's introduction and operation of cutting-edge technology 'hardware.' This success must be interpreted within its specific temporal and spatial context. During the authoritarian period, the decision-making path for major construction was unidirectional and efficient: top-down, planned by technical bureaucrats, driven by state will. Concepts of social communication and civic participation were not necessary codes in the governance system at the time. Therefore, the construction and operation of Nuclear Power Plant No. 3 could be completed in a relatively closed and low-interference environment, focusing on solving engineering and technical challenges. It demonstrated Taiwan's ability to handle complex nuclear energy hardware, but this success also inadvertently masked the neglect of 'social software' in its governance model. This overlooked aspect became a doubly complicated issue thirty years later, when the choice between decommissioning and extending the operation of Nuclear Power Plant No. 3 arose, bringing it back to the forefront of public attention. The tragedy of Nuclear Power Plant No. 4 and 'the assembled vehicle' If the history of Nuclear Power Plant No. 3 is a documentary about technological success, then the story of Nuclear Power Plant No. 4 is an epic tragedy about governance failure. This power plant, which cost nearly NT$300 billion and took decades to build without ever generating a single kilowatt-hour of electricity, serves as Taiwan's most expensive lesson during its democratic transition. Its failure was a systemic conflict between the 'hardware mentality' of the old era and the 'software demands' of the new era. The original sin of Nuclear Power Plant No. 4 began with its broken procurement model. Taipower abandoned the 'turnkey' model that had been in place for the previous three nuclear power plants and instead assumed the role of general management, purchasing designs from General Electric (GE) and then subcontracting hundreds of subsystems to vendors around the world. This decision was akin to buying the design blueprints for an advanced aircraft, only to assume the role of chief engineer, separately procuring engines, wings, and avionics systems, and then attempting to assemble it on their own. This approach not only overestimated its integration capabilities but also sowed the seeds for subsequent quality control failures and management chaos. When this fragmented 'hardware' assembly process collided with Taiwan's waves of democratization and political party changes, the results were catastrophic. The hasty suspension of construction by the Chen Shui-bian government in 2000 and the subsequent restart caused irreparable internal injuries to the project. For instance, scandals of cost-cutting in the reactor base, Taipower's large-scale unauthorized design changes without the manufacturer's consent, and difficulties in integrating digital instrumentation systems completely eroded public trust. Nuclear Power Plant No. 4 was ridiculed by the media as an 'assembled vehicle,' a metaphor not only pointing to technical assembly but also indicating governance disarray, a lack of a strong and trusted chief designer to integrate different political forces, vendor interests, and diverse public opinions. Ultimately, catalyzed by the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011 and the defeat of the referendum in 2021, this expensive 'assembled vehicle' was permanently sealed, becoming a unique monument in Taiwan's governance history, warning of the painful costs of 'social software' collapse. The unresolved nuclear waste issue, the ultimate black hole of trust Among all debates concerning nuclear energy, the nuclear waste disposal issue is the most unavoidable weapon for the pro-nuclear side and the most powerful argument for the anti-nuclear side. This is not only a technical dilemma but also the most profound manifestation of the dysfunction of Taiwan's governance 'social software,' a black hole that devours all trust. The dilemma of high-level nuclear waste (spent nuclear fuel) is the biggest pain point in Taiwan's nuclear energy development. Currently, all spent fuel rods are temporarily stored in the already saturated fuel pools at various plants. The transition from wet storage to dry storage as a mid-term solution has been delayed for years due to administrative bottlenecks from local governments and the public's 'Not In My Backyard' (NIMBY) effect. As for the final disposal site for nuclear waste, given Taiwan's small territory, dense population, and active geology, even the legal basis for site selection is at a standstill. Although the Ministry of Economic Affairs has proposed a goal of 'opening the final disposal site by 2055,' in the absence of social consensus and trust, this seems more like a distant political promise than an executable plan. Finland's successful experience serves as a mirror reflecting Taiwan's failures. Finland has built the world's first final disposal facility for high-level nuclear waste, Onkalo, and the key to its success lies not in technology, but in establishing a 'social software' framework centered on trust, transparency, civic participation, and local veto power. In contrast, in Taiwan, nuclear waste disposal has long been dominated by the government and Taipower, with a decision-making process shrouded in secrecy and civic participation being merely formal, leading to deep-seated distrust among the public towards the authorities. The failure of this governance model has created a vicious cycle. This cycle is: the inability to solve nuclear waste makes any discussion about nuclear energy seem irresponsible, and this irresponsible image, in turn, deepens the trust deficit. Unless Taiwan can thoroughly reform its nuclear waste governance framework, shifting from technical persuasion to democratic consultation, the future of nuclear energy will remain trapped in this unsolvable deadlock. Is a referendum a political game? In the face of a dysfunctional governance system, the referendum, a democratic tool that should compensate for the failure of representative governance and unify social consensus, has been distorted into a political arena that exacerbates divisions and tears society apart in the context of Taiwan's nuclear energy issues. It has not only failed to repair the malfunctioning 'social software,' but rather installed a plugin that accelerates the collapse of this bug-ridden system. After the threshold for the 2018 (Referendum Law) was lowered, the nuclear energy issue became a new battleground for party mobilization. In the 2018 'Nuclear Energy to Sustain Green Energy' referendum, the pro-nuclear side achieved victory, abolishing the non-nuclear home deadline in the (Electricity Act). In the 2021 'Restarting Nuclear Power Plant No. 4' referendum, the anti-nuclear side successfully countered, completely vetoing Nuclear Power Plant No. 4. And so on...