So, you wanted to know about the Guardians of Our Harmony? They’re the thought police. Well, okay, not like that. That’s what paranoid outworlders would say, but really, they’re more like the thought paramedics. There’s a quotation from their ur-founder which I … Continue reading
selective ontology evocation system: Known in the vulgar as the reality engine, or even as the god-machine1, and widely acknowledged as the crowning achievement of the ontotechnologist’s art, the SOES is the first general-purpose ontotech effector. The SOES came from a development … Continue reading
For those mildly bothered by the ambiguity in the size of the Empire heretofore present, I’m here to relieve you of that ambiguity. It is precisely 243 systems in size, of which 226 can be found in the list below, the … Continue reading
(also, questions from August; and since it’s a slow month, I’m going to throw in some questions from comments, too.) It’s been pretty well established that the eldrae place an immense value on pride and personal achievement, to the point … Continue reading
It occurred to me that the parallels that I drew here make less sense, and inviting comments and thoughts is less useful, inasmuch as to the best of my knowledge I never actually clarified (except in one still-to-be-completed series, by … Continue reading
Life Drinker (Although Not Really): Not in any literal sense, obviously, this being firm SF and thus vitalism very much not in vogue. But consider the case of the experience addict, who eats forcibly taken memories, or those who take … Continue reading
I’ve recently been asked elsewhere, “how far into the future is your setting?” Well, since it’s not connected causally to Earth, even fictional Earths, and technological development in the ‘verse didn’t necessarily take place in the same order or at … Continue reading
So, today I was randomly reminded of In The Grim Darkness Of The Contact Form, and the hypothetical fictional possibilities of a face-off between the Empire and Warhammer 40K’s Imperium of Man, which details I cover there with a note … Continue reading
Elsewhere A term adopted by ontotechnologists to designate the not-space/not-time in which the universe keeps its metadata (a realm whose existence is implied by all three major theories of natural ontology, although with different representations and certain disagreements on the details), … Continue reading
Dyson Sphere: The Empire has two, although neither by that name, the concept *there* having been devised by Cirys Minaxianos. One, a Cirys bubble, is at Esilmúr (Imperial Core); a thin layer of light-sail material surrounds the star, held up … Continue reading
(Because a comment thread back a ways suggested a mention of the big dakka that hopefully no-one will ever have to use might be in order…) CASE DYSPEPTIC FLARE MOST SECRET (ULTRAVIOLET) / EYES ONLY DYSPEPTIC FLARE NEED-TO-KNOW ABSOLUTE HARD … Continue reading
…continued from parts ten, eleven, and twelve. SECTION XIII: THE EUPRAXIC COLLEGIUM (Note: this entire section was added by the Eleventh Amendment, passed in 0000 as a response to the steady increase in the power available to individuals, which (with … Continue reading
The Empire has no true ecumenopolis within its borders. As those who are prone to wryly comment on such things might say: The many do not exist; the few lack the ecumene; and the one lacks the polis. The few, … Continue reading
…continued from part four. Probably worth noting that this section obviously interacts heavily with the following two sections, Six being the Curia and Seven the Senate, so if any questions you may have concern how the various branches interact, you … Continue reading
Continued from part two. SECTION III: SHAREHOLDING AND CITIZENSHIP Article I: On Imperial Shares The Empire, as a corporation sovereign, shall issue a number of shares of citizen stock equivalent to the number of Imperial citizens. Such shares shall be … Continue reading
Bizarre Alien Senses: Well, hell, who doesn’t have some sort of bizarre senses? Especially since it gets very tricky if you count the whole electromagnetic spectrum as one – i.e., “ultravision” and “infravision” are both strict subsets of “vision”. As, … Continue reading
Thinking briefly of things other than today’s challenge, I’d like to draw the attention of interested readers to the My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic fanfic Friendship is Optimal. (Trope page here; story here.) Specifically, with relevance to the Eldraeverse where seed … Continue reading
Akashic Records: The Transcend remembers everything any of its constitutionals know, or ever knew. (And, quite possibly, anything that can be deduced or induced from that.) That may not be all knowledge, but it’s close enough for Deus Est Machina … Continue reading
Something that came up over on G+ – in the course of discussing how many pre-spaceflight eldrae are still around (answer: lots, even if you discount the deep-submergence infomorphs and Transcendent afterlife, and even if some of them spent a … Continue reading
What Measure Is A Non Super: (now merged with Muggle Power) Technically, by the letter of the Universal Accord on Sophont Rights, every sophont from the humble baseline to the most transcendent of the Powers and Potentialities has an identical set … Continue reading