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Da to Dd

Daat, Daath

sefirot intermediate between Binah and Chesed, or alternatively between Binah and Hokmah. Sometimes equated with the Ajna chakra (although one minority group associates it with the Vishudda chakra. Symbolically, straddles the "abyss", hence represents the transition from a lower to a higher toposophic grade

Daedalus

Pi-3 Orionis IV)

Inner Sphere early colonized world - scene of a protracted civil war between two competing groups of colonists, although for a while civilized has come to be inhabited by a class 2 perversity

Daedalus

Zeta 1 Reticuli III Large Arean Tundric, now terraformed

House Marhenke managed to have this frigid desert world terraformed by the mid Empires era. It has become a neo-feudalistic society, with close affiliations with the Solar Dominion, who have provided them with aid, finance, and technology. Despite the apparently opposite political allegiance, relations are cordial with Atlantis and the rest of the Zeta Reticuli system.

Daemons of the Trump

In 9923, the Sidene system, located in the Periphery, fell victim to a fleet of highly advanced ultratech warships. For several years this was the extent of knowledge on the subject, but in 9948 another system, Adice, was attacked and managed to send information to other systems. The local powers have pieced together what they can.

The fleet is composed of four ships equivalent to Dominion battlecruiser class - this alone being enough to overcome most Outer Volumes systems. While nanotech and some picotech is definitely present in these ships, their ownership of advanced clarketech remains a speculation - hopefully, it is no more than speculation.

Each of the ships seems capable of deploying 50 million microfighters. Why they would use microfighters, and not nano- or even pico-scale fighter craft, is unknown (some have hazarded a guess that the purpose is visibility: their victims see them coming). These microfighters conduct most of the combat, but it has been confirmed that the battlecruisers are heavily armed themselves.

As to their origins and motives, little is known. It seems they refer to themselves as the Daemons of the Trump; no one in the region has been able to decipher this reference. Ideas concerning their origin include their being Dawn Hunters, Immanentization Crusaders, or an outbreak of the Chaos. A few minor cults have sprung up based on these ships, considering them a form of divine retribution and spiritual cleansing (a relatively standard mythos).

Currently, the local governments are trying to form a response to the ships. Much pressure is being put on the Gayomart Protectorate, the most advanced local power, to do something. The Raylen, ruling AI of the Protectorate, has not made public any plans, has in fact remained utterly silent about the events.

James Ward

Daffy

Psi Serpentis V

Famous Negentropy world in the Inner Sphere. Originally colonised by First Federation radicals naming it after the trickster duck.

Daharran

A tragic victim of cross-species congress, the Daharrans (of whom very few remain) are the most humanoid species of xenosophont yet discovered; resembling a centaur-like hybrid of crustaceans and mammals. there are three genders. They were discovered in 6659 by a ComEmp Loyalist expedition to the Chronos Cluster (on the outskirts of the Cygnus sector)

Daharran

Anglic term for Daharran language - see Booklet on Daharran Grammar for details regarding Daharran speech and vocal apparati

Anders Sandberg

Daharran Unity

A human-alien civilisation founded approximately 6700 in the Chronos Cluster. In 7200 it isolated itself after the Advance Party had won a landslide election. For the next century not much was heard from the Unity, until Daharran Prime suddenly vanished in 7343. Investigations revealed that the Advance Party had converted it into a black hole in order to achieve the sacred mass; now they were busy hunting more mass under the slogan "Strength - Unity - Mass". They conquered the Chronos Cluster, systematically eradicating everyone and everything. It is widely believed that the Unity was already ossifying or imploding even before the powerful corporate Quasar Dynamic Fleet came upon the scene; that explains the QDF's successes against what was clearly a much larger military and industrial opponent.

damage waiver

a part of doing business with any sophont within the NoCoZo, damage waivers indicate that the product or service in question is deemed 'safe' for a specific type or types of sophonts when used in one or more specific manner(s).

Accepting the waiver frees the product's creator and/or provider (as specified in each waiver) from liability from any injury caused by the product when not used in an approved-safe manner by an applicable sophont. As usual with NoCoZo agreements, no sophonts are required to accept any given damage waiver, however it is generally dangerous to accept products without at least a damage waiver if not a standard damage waiver to prove the 'safety' for specific purposes. Also some (non-standard) damage waivers include terminology which requires the user to only use the product in specific manners, or restricts the users' rights to use the product in other ways. In contrast, the standard damage waivers only indicate the safe manner(s) of usage for the product and offer recompense if the product, while being safely used, causes damage.

John B

The Danyello M'lund Cluster

The Danyello M'lund Cluster was colonized in the 3100's by a coalition of trading cartels, outer volume terraformer guilds, refugee management associations and holoterbics. It was a leased sector of Cygexpa, including five terraformable worlds. The coalition government prospered, and the Cluster became a technologically advanced and peaceful part of the Cygexpa sphere.

In 4504 the main wormhole links between the Cluster Alam and the Cygexpa network backbone, as well as much of the capital system, were unexpectedly destroyed by Metasoft long-range disrupter fleets. The Cluster was isolated and vulnerable, unable to build a workable defense fleet in the short time that would be needed to survive the likely follow-up attack. As a part of the defense measures a civil defense plan was activated, wherein a sizable part of the surviving population were uploaded into backup solid state systems in safe locations. The expected follow-up attack never came, having been stopped at the Battle of Polaris, but the isolated Cluster continued preparing for the worst.

As the situation began to look less tense the defensive uploading of the population could be slowed. However, a sizable fraction of the economy was now run through virtual corporations hiring virtual people running at high speed and able to copy themselves as needed. This competitive advantage put physical citizens and companies at a disadvantage, leading to strong economic incentives for further uploading. Over the next decades the majority of the cluster population moved to virtuality, leaving only 20% embodied (mainly orthodox holoterbics, soulists and arcadists). While tourism and occasional downloads into physicality continued, the vast majority remained virtual.

The war industry and backup storage proved fortunate as the Daveth Tweaks attacked. The Cluster managed to hold them off, and was instrumental in forging the Dawn Mutual Protection Treaty Organisation pact. After the war the Cluster rejoined the Cygexpa sphere with a renewed wormhole lease. Since then it has grown into a prosperous volume of the mid-zone, with strong trade ties to Mutual Progress Association, Keter Dominion, Formaulhaut Acquisition Society, and Solar Dominion systems. In 5640 it became a formal part of the NoCoZo.

Over the millennia there has been a noticeable trend in that many inhabitants, institutions and corporations retreat into virtuality, their only token physicalism being the care about the network infrastructure. The gap left behind is usually filled with immigrants or physicalist dissidents, creating a continuity of the Cluster and its economics while the population constantly changes.

The main planets are mainly kept as parks, largely converted to an idealized pristine near-terrestrial ecology. In some reservations the orthodox physicals live. Most of the population exists within nanocluster cities, today mainly housed within the shells of pre-Introdus buildings or underground. Backup storage is kept in the outer system. At any time a few million tourists exist physically, mainly using rental bodies.

The great Cygexpa sell-off allowed the Cluster to officially move to what was for some time the implicit allegiance to the NoCoZo, Formaulhaut Acquisition Society, and Cyberian Foundation. The old ties to the golden dolphins of Syrtis and the vecs of the Augusta systems remain, giving it a noticeable pull in regional politics.

Anders Sandberg

dark nebulae

Generic term for non-glowing nebula. These are concentrations of dust only visible if they block out the light of stars that lie behind them. Many dark nebula have already been claimed by hider and cloudharvesting civilizations

Charles Darwin

industrial age Old Earth scientist, founder and populariser of the theory of evolution

Darwin

Delta Pavonis IV - first non-terran Garden World discovered.

darwingoo

bionano that will rewrite the genome of biological organisms, causing them to evolve into completely new subspecies or species.

Particularily popular among Disarchy, Zoeific and TRHN biohackers. Most darwingoo needs a host to replicate (like an ordinary virus), or vectors may include biomodverts, but the more virulent forms are self replicating. The majority is directed to a few species or host types only, but some will infect all terragen organic life. Only very few types of darwingoo can infect both terragen and alien carbon-based life, and most of these are easily detected. Outbreaks of darwingoo can be a particular problem in some unregulated regions

M.Alan Kazlev

Darwinia

Planet in NuiHibbert Sector, Zoeific Biopolity

Darwinism, Darwinian Evolution.

Theory of biological evolution based on insights of Charles Darwin.

Darwin observed that individuals in any population are variable, and this variation can be inherited. But because organisms have the potential to increase in numbers far in excess of the environment's capacity to support all of them, those individuals with traits that increase their chances of survival and reproduction will leave more offspring. Natural selection thus determines which individuals successfully leave offspring for the next generation. ("Survival of the Fittest") Over thousands of generations these small changes can produce even very large changes; such as the biological diversity of different organisms.

During the early atomic age onwards Darwinism (also called Neodarwinism and the Modern Synthesis) incorporated Mendelian theory of inheritance, and, later, genetic mutation (De Vries). Random mutation causes subtle, occasionally dramatic, variations in genes, hence greater genetic diversity. Then selection pressures served to kill off individuals whose mutations were detrimental to their survival in their current environment. Those best adapted pass on the genes.

text by M.Alan Kazlev and Peter Kisner

Darwinian AI

AIs that follow a darwinian route of evolution or self-evolution.

Darwinian AI have usually small (in some cases large) probably random changes from generation to generation and "improve" or specialize to fit their environment over many generations. Contrast this with Lamarkian AI

Peter Kisner

Dashwood

local trade and cultural world, Centauri sector

- nominally part of the Negentropist empire but near the borders with the Paradigm and the Utopia Sphere; memetics from all three systems (as well as NoCoZo and NoCoNeg, and Disarchy ideas) flourish there. Nearest stargate to the Paradigm. During the Paradigm containment war was a major staging post for PCO forces. Currently a popular tourist jaunt, especially with the alternative crowd and anyone making the "Grand Tour".

data media

The following are some of many types of datamedia used:

1) NONE - Memory and storage is often so cheap and datalinks so plentiful there will be no need for a storage media. To back up a machine, you copy its data to another machine. To restore, copy back.

2) PseudoDNA storage - popular among bioborgs, and in the Zoeific Biopolity

3) Optical storage. The so-called 'sugar cube' device with its I/O peripherals.

4) various nano- devices

These are generally manufactured in such a size as to be easily transported and handled - 'flecks' are not often used, except in very space- or mass-limited situations, such as spaceflight. However, the possibility of loosing ones checklists into the air intake can sometimes be a problem.

John B

Data plague

Advanced software viral lifeform.

Possessed of limited sentience and an extremely developed tactical sense. Data plagues are designed to infiltrate and destroy data networks in a continuously evolving, constantly redesigning, consciously controlled manner. In essence a data plague is a self-aware, self-evolving computer virus.

Todd Drashner

Data Slug

Data Slug - A secure, physical, nanoscale information storage node, containing data deemed valuable by the sender. It is common to have the data quantum-encrypted & obfuscated, preventing its being intercepted by third parties. The practice of generating data slugs is often termed 'slugging' in several polities. Note that data slug protocols differ radically from place to place - this article is prepared based on the Ken Ferjik standard dataslug protocols.

John B

Daveth

World in the Coathanger cluster, infamous for the militant tweak pirate federation that emerged during the Version War. Wiped out by the Dawn Mutual Protection Alliance.

Daveth Tweaks

A tweak species from the planet Daveth, extremely adaptable and militant that rose to prominence in the volume around the Coathanger Cluster, expanded with their feared habitat-raper ships at enormous speed in the period 5100-5340 before they were totally annihilated by the Dawn Mutual Protection Treaty Organisation.

Anders Sandberg

DaVinci Games

Contest to create a working replica of one of the sketchbook designs of that preeminent genius.

Note - the animate Sistine diorama has been outlawed since the third such event, when the God icon went "off the deep end"

John B

Dawn Mutual Protection Treaty Organisation

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