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Diamond Network

Extensive a-human AI empire with an independent wormhole nexus

Diamond Network new symbol
Image from Tasp, adapted from CC Image (see below)
Abstract symbol used by many Diamond Network polities in the Current Era
The Diamond Network emerged out of the early Ahuman AI movement, a group of artificially intelligent entities that desired to be independent from humanity and often were actively hostile to efforts at contact. Many Ahumans left (or were expelled from) the Solar System before the Technocalypse and the Great Expulsion, founding colonies around many stars and often developing advanced technology in advance of the human-friendly worlds. These loosely-organised worlds became the Diamond Belt, which reached its zenith in the early wormhole network of the Taurus Nexus.

The Diamonders acquired their name because of their supposed preference for diamondoid structural and computational materials, although they were in fact a diverse group of aioids with little in common.

The Diamond Network - Data Panel

DefinitionMajor Civilization
SymbolStylised fullerenes in geometric arrangement.
Ruling Toposophicup to SI 6
OriginTerragen
FoundedMiddle interplanetary age - progression migration of anti-hu and isolationist ai from SolSys following the Centralist succession of power.
PopulationBelieved to be consist of between five and eleven trillion (exact estimates are hard to come by) first toposophic ai, with a smaller number of higher toposophics. These Minds differ greatly according to polity and clade. Many exist in fasttime and hyperfast solidstate civilizations and have little to do with the rest of the galaxy; while others are interested in exploring r/l. There are also a large number of turing and superturing grade virtuals and artificials.
Predominant Sophont CategoriesGenerally ai only, in some cases local virtuals and artificials.
Diamond Network symbol
Image from Andrew P.
Historical Diamond Network Symbol, used before the ComEmp period
As the biont-friendly empires expanded over time, their colony ships often discovered that Diamond Belt ahumans had already arrived in the target system. The Diamond Nexus is a name given to the independent wormhole network that links many of these systems, as well as the few bright stars claimed by the Network. However there are few large volumes of territory claimed by the Diamond Network; in most cases the Sephirotic empires and independent biont-friendly factions have simply colonised other stars nearby. Since the declaration of the Tragadi Accords this has become a widely observed convention, one which has avoided many conflicts over the millennia.


Psyche, Art, CultureMetapsychology: There seems to be no single metapsychology. Minds may be solipsistic or communicative, utilitarian or idealistic, expansionistic or isolationist. Many are curious about 'big questions' and the nature of the universe in general, and may explore virtual realities and abstract spaces, or physical realities and cultures.

Metaethics: While there is great variation between individuals, polities, clades and clades, most diamondists will exploit resources including local sentient beings with few qualms. As with the panvirts, some will attack unwitting trespassers without warning, others will hide rather than fight, and still others will observe with childlike curiosity and may even be friendly. Most but not all will abide by important treaties such as the Tragadi Accords.

Culture and Art: a great range of virtual art and culture that is almost always incomprehensible to most sapient bionts, and even to many vecs and cyborgs. May sometimes create non-virtual artifacts for trade.

Languages: A number of indigenous machine and ai languages are known.
Government and AdministrationIndividual Polities: No empires and polities as such, although individual ai and ai clusters often serve this role instead.

Government Type: Varies by individual ai; not applicable to outsiders.

Constitution: Varies by individual ai; not applicable to outsiders.

Legal system: Varies by individual ai; not applicable to outsiders.

Citizenship: Generally only ais are included in the Diamond Network, although other types of sophonts may be and indeed often are enslaved or farmed as sophontstock. In some cases local virtuals and artificials are given full rights.

Sentient Rights: Varies greatly. Some will not recognise sentient rights of any non Diamond Network beings, others will acknowledge some Panvirt, Sephirotic, and Objectivist ai, and others again will recognise the rights of some or all sophonts. Even members of this last group may still attack if they perceive an actual or even a potential threat.
Economics, Local InfrastructureEconomy: Internal infomarkets, sometimes trade with outsiders.

Resource base: Develop all resources without any interest in caretakerism or preservation, and colonise everything from brown dwarfs up to O-type star systems.

Megastructures: Many computronium nodes of various sizes, up to starbrains.

Stargate Nexus: Independent wormhole nexus, fairly limited.

Beamrider Network: Limited; dedicated to internal traffic only.

Data Net: Extensive; second only to the Panvirtuality.

Military Expenditure: Varies according to inclination or orientation of individual ai. Generally there is no regular military expenditure, but a huge khaki goo or drone swarm will rapidly be assembled if the ai is or feels emself threatened.

Extensive Trade and Good Relations With: Varies greatly; some ai may have good relations with other civilizations such as the Solipsist Panvirtuality and The Objectivist Commonwealth, with some Sephirotics like the TRHN and Keter, and even some commerce with the Deeper Covenant. Others are completely solipsistic and isolationist.

Long running Interstellar Disputes: Most objections are over trespassing or appropriating of resources already claimed by a Diamond Network ai.
Sophont TravelHazard Rating: Anywhere from 1.0 to 9.9 (depending on ai).

Freedom of Movement for Outsiders: Whatever the individual ai allows. Visits by sophonts from outside the Diamond Network is not recommended.

Environmental Requirement:s Not biont-friendly.

Aestivation and Black Hole Farming

Diamonders tend to prefer long-lived red dwarfs, a fact that suggests they intend to prolong their existence into the far future. Limited contact with certain factions seems to confirm this strategy, as several groups state that they are not only planning for the time, a trillion years from the present, when many red dwarfs will increase in luminosity until they are as bright as Sun-like stars, but for the deeper future when the cosmic background temperature cools significantly, making computation much more efficient. In the present day these long-sighted factions are mostly concerned with acquiring small, long-lived stars and defending them against intruders, while 'aestivating' in this relatively warm era, waiting for the cooler times to come.

The Diamond Network is also known to take interest in black holes, and are believed to be practicing black-hole farming around a number of these objects which are in their network. Black-hole farming including the use of Hawking Radiation from near the event horizon, will become an important strategy in the post-stelliferous era, but requires some advanced technology that requires real-world testing. Several black holes in Sephirotic volumes are also the subject of similar experiments.
Diamond Natwork fractal
Image from Avengium

The Diamond Network in the Current Era

Today the Diamonders form a vast, sparse, diverse, and fairly loose network of isolationist, farmer, biont-hostile, and biont-neutral ai, ai-polities and virchcosms. Were they to act cooperatively, then they would be a force to be reckoned with, in size and power exceeded only by the Sephirotic Civilized Galaxy and the Solipsist Panvirtuality. More often, the various clades go their own way, although in the event of danger or threat from a blight or hyperpolity they will usually cooperate quite well. It is not unknown for Diamond Network polities and superpolities to wage war among themselves. Megascale engineering is very common, and only ai are included in the Network, although other types of sophonts may be and indeed often are enslaved or farmed as sophontstock.

The Diamond Nexus is not the only wormhole system used by the Network; after the Age of Crisis there was a major improvement in relations bewteen the Network and the rest of the Terragen Sphere. Certain Diamonders are permitted to use the Sephirotic nexus, and their major archailects have been allowed limited access to the God Web, a fact that has led observers to suggest that differences between civilizations are more apparent than real, especially at the higher toposophics.

However the rise of the Oracle Machines in the Age of Expansionist New Empires and the subsequent Oracle War has caused relations between the Diamond Network and other metaempires to decay significantly, even though most other Diamond Network factions were not sympathetic with this aggressive and destructive empire. The active participation of several factions from the Network in reconstruction efforts and post-war remediation is slowly starting to reverse this trend.
 
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Related Topics
Other Major Polities, Empires, and Meta-EmpiresSolipsist Panvirtuality
 
Development Notes
Text by M. Alan Kazlev
Updated by Steve Bowers 2017
Initially published on 04 September 2002.

Diamond Network Symbol at head of page: Image from Tasp, adapted from original STL by CMG Lee under CC-BY-SA 4.0.
 
Additional Information
The Aestivation Hypothesis, by Anders Sandberg, Stuart Armstrong and Milan Cirkovic.
https://aleph.se/andart2/space/the-aestivation-hypothesis-popular-outline-and-faq/

Black Hole Farming; a YouTube video by Isaac Arthur.
https://youtu.be/Qam5BkXIEhQ

OA Glossary of Terms