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Charactervots (and related concepts)
Sophonts > Modosophonts > Aioids and Sophtware
Sophonts > Modosophonts > Vec
Sophonts > Modosophonts > Virtuals
Sophonts > Modosophonts > Vec
Sophonts > Modosophonts > Virtuals
Simulated Personalities of various kinds and sophistication levels | |
 Image from Steve Bowers and Bing Image Creator | |
| Charactervots portraying famous historical or fictional personalities are popular companions on long space journeys, both real and simulated | |
However the technology required to create a truly non-sophont vot with general intelligence and realistic personality was not developed until the Federation Era and the Declaration of Eris. But before the advent of vots and charactervots a number of different mind-types were developed, in particular Simms and Evocations.
Simms: Simms were first developed in the Interplanetary Age, and were relatively crude emulations of real people, historical characters, or fictional and fantasy characters. They were intended to be non-sophont, artificial personalities used for entertainment and as companionship devices, often virtual in nature, but sometimes existing in physical form as bots. Unfortunately, as simms became more sophisticated, sometimes they became sentient, sapient or even sophont by accident; toposophic research was in its infancy, so crossing the line between a simulated person and a real one was difficult to avoid in practice. Because these simms were expected to perform in predetermined ways, this constituted a form of slavery, so simms that crossed the line into personhood became Slaved AIs, a type of ethically and morally repugnant entity that became redundant with the development of true vots. In the Current Era simms are almost extinct as a category, although they sometimes occur in isolated cultures and on the Periphery.
Evocations are a kind of simulated personality that use detailed information to make a very accurate simulation of a real person without any uploading process; they might use public access data, life-logs or even data recorded by the person's own direct neural interface (if permission is given). The basic characteristic of an evocation is that they do not include data taken directly from the person's central nervous system, therefore they are not a true upload, and are only an approximation. An evocation can be sophont or otherwise. Evocations were developed in the Interplanetary Age before the development of true uploading, but as technology improved and more data became available directly from the subject's neural connectome, evocation data was often used to supplement the relatively crude data obtained from the first attempts at destructive uploading.
By the Federation Era the processes of non-destructive and gradual uploading became much more reliable, and evocations became rare. However, even in the Current Era some modosophonts prefer to be represented by an evocation after their death, if for instance they have religious or philosophical misgivings about the concept of true uploading.
Characterbots: As detailed above, a Charactervot is a specialised form of vot which simulates the responses of a true sophont being very accurately, without actually being sophont. Such simulated personalities are commonplace inside certain types of virchuniverse, often as background characters or antagonists which can be injured or killed without causing any true suffering. Simulated personalities of this kind can also be installed inside various kinds of physical robot, creating a wide range of characterbot; like charactervots, these devices are not capable of true suffering so can be utilised for a range of activities that a true sophont would not be expected to perform. In the Current Era characterbots have many roles such as companion entities, servants, erotobots, and police and military bots capable of intelligent action but unable to feel true pain or real suffering.
A small fraction of characterbots are upgraded to full sophonce and become charactervecs, but since these are regarded as citizens they have full sophont rights, and are free to discard any artificial elements of their personality if they wish.
Other Virch Inhabitants and Artificial Personality Types
Most charactervots are found in fictional or fantasy virches, with a smaller number in projections of the past or future; other virtual sophonts often perform roles inside these imaginary worlds, and these come in many types. Virtual sophonts make up the most numerous type of modosophont in the Terragen Sphere, not only in the Sephirotic Empires but in the other metaempires as well. Most virtual sophonts in the Sephirotic Empires were born or created within a virtual environment of one kind or another; these native born virtuals are often known as digital sophonts or digis, and only a small fraction of these will ever leave virtual reality. However a significant fraction of the virtual population are uploads, that is to say, persons who were originally physical beings in the so-called real world but have since been converted into infomorphs.Vusers: Visitors to a fictional virch come in two main classes; virtual sophonts, who can usually translate with relative ease into their new roles, and real-life sophonts who utilise technological interfaces to insert themselves into the environment - these are known as virtual reality users (vusers). In order to interact with the virtual environment, such a visitor will generally create an avatar of some kind, unless they wish to remain a disembodied presence.
Avatars can be used by many different types of modosophont, including bionts, vecs and aioids, and these avatars are expected to resemble and imitate the sort of characters which would be routinely found inside such a scenario. Avatars which act 'out of character' or break the rules of the virch will generally be warned about their misbehaviour and eventually evicted for continued transgressions.
More rarely, an avatar may be created by a visiting transapient or archailect, and these often act as guides, advisors or even as critics of the scenario.
Actors: Some visitors may volunteer to become active participants in the narrative of the virch; these volunteers are known as actors, and are given very strictly defined roles to play. Often an actor will receive a continuous stream of suggestions or instructions from the creators or controllers of the virch, and may be encouraged to extemporise on occasion. Quite often the majority of actors are representatives or subroutines of the creator(s) of the virch, and inside a virch which has been created by a transapient or archai, these actor-entities can be extremely numerous (sometimes even outnumbering the charactervots).
Figments: A further category of entity may sometimes exist inside a virch, although they are generally difficult to distinguish. Most transapients and archailects are capable of creating fully sophont subroutines which can adopt a role inside a virch and continue to play this role for an indefinite period, but which are not aware that they are artificial personality constructs. These are known as figments, since they are 'figments of the imagination' of the transingular entity concerned. Archailectologists suspect that most transapients create such sophont subroutines on a routine basis, although most such entities do not last very long. When their role is complete these figments will be reabsorbed into the databanks of the creating entity, although some choose to become free citizens of the Sephirotic Empires instead. An increasing number of figments in the Current Era have been created by modosophont-level technology, although these entities are generally less sophisticated than the godtech version.
Scions: Another application of the charactervot concept is the creation of partial copies or scions which can be used as messengers, information gatherers and representatives when the original sophont is otherwise engaged. Most scions are charactervots or characterbots based on the personality of the original, but since they have general intelligence they can act as proxies in a wide range of situations. Because these scions are only partial copies they are not generally given the same privileges and responsibilities as their original; even the (much rarer) class of scion that is fully sophont generally is not regarded as fully equivalent to the original, because they do not have access to all the original's memories and other attributes.
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Development Notes
Text by Steve Bowers
Ideas from Ryan B (Rynn), Andrew P, echammond, Todd Drashner
Initially published on 14 May 2009.
Ideas from Ryan B (Rynn), Andrew P, echammond, Todd Drashner
Initially published on 14 May 2009.
Additional Information
Rewritten in 2024 by Steve Bowers to list various artificial personality concepts.
