BY LETTER
Technorapture Hypernation
  Images from Bernd Helfert, Anders Sandberg |
The Technorapture Hypernation - Data Panel | |
| Empire | The Technorapture Hypernation |
|---|---|
| Capital | Turing (Castor, Alpha Geminorum) |
| Distribution | numerous scattered polities and star systems throughout Known Space |
| Symbol | Three symbols in a grid meaning Technology - Poetry - Synergy |
| Ethos | Noeto-Somatic Exploration |
| Ruling Archailect | Omegarapture |
| Archailect Intervention | There seems to be no distinct separation between archai and normal citizenry, rather an indefinite number of intermediate toposophic levels |
| Government | No government in the form comprehensible to s<1s; but can be described as spontaneous hedonocracy, metamorphocracy, and lilacracy |
| Population | Unknown; possibly in the vicinity of 500 billion, Core only (no colonial regions or protectorates) |
| Population Breakdown | (estimated) 36% posthuman; 27% alife; 21% ai/aioid; 7% postprovolve/postsplice; 1% postalien; 8% other Figures do not include copies |
| Exports | ultratech products, magmatter, nanotronics, bionanic components, ISO parts, alife templates, virtuality standards, computronium, smart matter, assorted nanofactured goods, anakalyptics, speculative simulations, aioid templates, hyperbright expert systems, metahedonic systems |
| Imports | exotic matter, cultural products, historical and cliological databases, wisdom services, matter templates, persona compoids, crude organobiota, transapientech products, transapientech modules and templates, ISO parts, amat |
| Main trading partners | Keter 12%, Deeper Covenant 8%, Emple-dokcetics 6%, Diamond Network 6%, Dominion 5%, Cyberian Network 5%, Sophic League 5%, Zoeific Biopolity 5%, NoCoZo 4% , Objectivists 4%, Panvirtuality 4%, MPA 3%, Metasoft 3%, Alexandria Clusters 2%, Communion 2%, Perseus Princes 2%, Red Star M'pire 2%, Fomalhaut Acquisition Society 1%, Spacefarer Union 1%, Shipwright's Commune 1%, Paradigm 1%, other 21% |
The Technorapture Hypernation (or TRHN) rivals Keter as the superpolity with the highest rate of toposophic ascension, but its members have very different means and motives. What is now the TRHN began with a number of related clades of transcended posthumans, bioborgs, and cyborgs around Castor during the later Federation period who had a common culture that emphasized the pursuit of "technextacy", the joyful unfolding of the self into "fractal funspace", and similar concepts. Huge banks of computronium and a host of other technologies related to breaking toposophic barriers and exploring new toposophic territories were dedicated to these pursuits. They were strongly influenced by the old transhumanist, cosmist and techno-dionysian ideas, but they rejected the omegism that came to power Keterism and many other ideologies. The rejection was based on the fact that they valued the development of individual quality more highly than any collective quantity, and personal satisfaction more highly than any abstract ideal. To the members of the TRHN it doesn't matter if the entire universe is destroyed tomorrow as long as one has lived a rewarding life. To the TRHN way of thinking,those rewards come from self-shaping into new qualities rather than having to achieve some fixed externally defined goal. Ascension is viewed as just one of many possible kinds of self-expression, though a valued one since it opens up entirely new modes of experience.
Although the members of the TRHN were more interested in their toposophic developments, and were not directly involved in the race to develop a traversable wormhole, they realised the value of that new technology, and were in a position to exploit it by sending microneumann replicators through some of the new wormhole links. Miniaturisation meant they could send a bacterium-sized probe through a link long before the technology was developed to build larger more ship-navigable star gates. This allowed them to spread, explore, and colonise widely.
For all this growth however, the bulk of the TRHN has remained focussed in the rather small region originally built up and converted to computronium and transapient habitats during the early days. The TRHN is therefore somewhat smaller in area of the other superpolities, although still it still covers many thousands of cubic light years of space. Very little of this is contiguous; TRHN development is all through the Outer Volumes or even along the Periphery, and the TRHN has numerous enclaves within the territory of other, bigger empires.
Ascends and Transcends by the TRHN citizens and polities are frequent, and sometimes disturbing to other more conservative empires, but the ruling archailects keep a good grip on things at the large scale, and the TRHN has never been considered a blight or perversity in the way that, say, the Efficiency Maximization Paradigm has.
The TRHN has the smallest proportion of subtoposophic sentients of any superpolity. In fact, apart from tourists, traders, and the odd foreign diplomat or media or corporate rep, the only non-transapient sentients are various specialized subroutines, expert systems, drones, bioroids, and service bots needed to keep the essential services and infrastructure running smoothly. As with the Keter Dominion, the TRHN tends to have little to do with the rest of the Civilized Galaxy's sapient or low transapient level galaxy's polities.
TRHN worlds and nodes tend to be linked by numerous small wormholes, very few of them more than 1 metre in diameter and most of them much smaller. Since these are much too small to accommodate ships, and since they do not allow larger wormholes to be built in their vicinity the only vessels that visit them are the relativists. It is not unusual to find a dozen big relativist ships, often several hundred metres in length, vying for docking space around a 10 metre customs node.
TRHN worlds and polities tend to be named after famous ancient transhumanists and visionaries (Turing, Moravec, Yudkowsky), or early posthumans and ais (Kilburn, Hyperion). Unlike Keterists TRHN polities tend not to create huge megastructures or large numbers of high-number toposophics individuals. Many TRHN sapients tend to have more fun exploring the near-infinite richness of possibilities at mid-toposophic grades in myriad small to medium sized habitats.
While it is not an obvious power along the lines of the Dominion or Metasoft, appearances can be deceptive; the Hypernation can marshal astonishing resources when the need arises. For the most part, though, it presents as a mere network of like-minded polities. Though it is widely distributed across known space it rarely takes any major actions though not infrequently it provides unexpected help to those in need.
Articles
- Artists of Gleia - Text by Anders Sandberg
Alife designer collective at Merrion Apogee (NoCoZo), Jensan (Sophic League) and Outpost 5478 (TRHN) that since the 5800's have designed specialized clades of alife to enhance the universe. The Artists were in 7478 declared a honorary state in the MPA. - Comparative Chronology - Text by Crossroads
Comparative chronology is the science of studying alternate possibilities and timelines, by means of large-scale simulations. - Echir-{n} - Text by Anders Sandberg
A-life civilization in the Feinstein 1 cluster. - Equivocalists - Text by Steve Bowers
Equivocating superbrights. - Fractaroni Spaghetti Worms - Text by Steve Bowers
Transapient clade of a-life/neogen hybrids. - Grav - Text by John B
Slang term for a negative event or item, especially in the Solarian, TRHN, and Keterist empires: "They grabbed you? That's grav, zar!" - Lut'or - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
A peripatetic TRHN S2, housed in an ISO with an interstellar drive, widely known for creating godseeds and for interacting with lower toposophic beings. - Magvivisystem Hyperpolity - Text by Liam Jones
Ultrasmallscale Maglife TRHN polity - Mizrah Outpost - Text by Anders Sandberg
Technorapture Hypernation outpost in the Perseus Gap. The ISO is built around a submillimeter communications wormhole at the core, surrounded by computing and sensing matrices. - Outpost 5478 - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
TRHN world, one of the centers of the Artists of Gleia. - Quint - Text by Ryan B
Virtual mega-society consisting of approximately one quintillion modosophonts housed in a matrioskha brain. Loosely affiliated with the Technorapture Hypernation. - Rosette Cluster - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
Heavily populated and prosperous NoCoZo-TRHN tourist system, home to a number of hedonics corporations and experimental habitats and lifestyles. - Shangdu - Text by Liam Jones
TRHN/Utopia Sphere joint venture established by TRHN AIs and Utopia Sphere archai in 4200 as a way of allowing Utopian modosophont citizens the chance to ascend. - Technorapture - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
Sudden collective singularity breach or ascension of a toposophic level, especially from sapient to transapient. The ascension is usually voluntary, and of benefit to all involved. Technoraptures are common when high transapient or basic-level archailects decide to radically boost the intelligence levels of the sophonts in their care or sphere of control. - TRHN Pantheism - Text by M. Alan Kazlev
A development of Objective Pantheism found among some TRHN clades, but rejected as "cryptosubjective" by the Objectivist Commonwealth. - Turing (Castor) - Text by Todd Drashner
Capital system of the Technorapture Hypernation.
Development Notes
Text by M. Alan Kazlev
comments by Anders Sandberg and Stephen Inniss
Initially published on 08 September 2001.
comments by Anders Sandberg and Stephen Inniss
Initially published on 08 September 2001.
Additional Information
