| 0 to 9 | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z |

Qua

Quadaa Atonement Center

small O'Neil orbital in the 07-71-01117-IN system near Zamzam, inhabited by a Umma order calling themselves the Friends of the Muwakkil.

The Friends, at this time at the height of their influence in the Shell, sought a return to the personal and systematic Islam they regarded as waning in the Stellar Umma. As part of their program they developed elaborate forms of atonement, arranged retreats and programmed advanced atonement virtuals. The Quadaa Centre was constructed to be far out of the way, a place where the most grievous sins could be properly atoned in near perfect solitude with Allah. The Centre orbits a dim M-class star, a small O'Neill-type habitat divided into a number of compartment environments and co-orbiting modules. It was, and is still, run by the AI Ummul Mu'mineen. E maintains extensive virtual environment, creating complex simulations for the visitors where they can fully explore their past actions, understand their nature and atone for them. There are also non-virtual habitats for other forms of atonement, ranging from mere solitude and prayer to more radical ordeals.

While the Friends declined, the reputation of the Centre grew. The skill and care Ummul Mu'mineen employed in helping its charges to cleanse themselves became well known in the Umma and Sophic League. In 6342 it accepted the first non-Islamic pilgrim, and Ummul expanded the practice to provide for atonement for all beings.

A large number of similar atonement centers have developed, but Quadaa Centre remains the most well-renowned. It does not accept a large number of pilgrims, and the system Ummul employs to decide who gets to atone at the Centre or not remains mysterious. At the Centre Ummul and many atonement designer beings create personalized atonement situations, carefully weaving together events, environments and tests to provide a maximally intense and pure cleansing process. It has been called the oldest and grandest spiritual artwork or craft studio in existence.

quantum

term coined by Old Earth late industrial age scientist Max Planck to describe an individual particle of light.

At the subatomic level, matter and energy occupies discrete packages, or quanta. These govern all particle interactions on and physical qualities, including electric charge, spin, and so. Quantum effects are primary in picotech and femtotech engineering. See also quantum mechanics.

Quantum Channel

Even as early as the late information age, some applications required even higher security than that provided by public key cryptography. In these cases a secret key can be transmitted via a quantum channel. Such a system makes use of quantum complementarity in the measurement of the polarizations of photons. If a measurement is made to determine if the photons are polarized up-down or left-right then all information about polarizations in the exactly intermediate directions is completely lost. A channel capable of producing and detecting individual polarized photons can therefore be made completely secure. In practice the security is not absolute, but repeatedly using summation parity checks on random subsets of the bits sent can reduce the chance of undetected eavesdropping to a vanishingly small level.

The use of quantum channels is limited to distances of several tens of kilometres, reducing their value for communicating over large distances. Signals transmitted using brighter pulses of light (i.e. by sending more photons) can be transmitted over much longer distances, but with a greatly increased chance of undetected eavesdropping.

Ad Astra

quantum computer

Proposed by the grandfather of Nanotechnology Dr. Richard Feynman (basis of the legendary Feynman expert system) at the First Conference of the Physics of Computation in 1981 C.E. A Quantum Computer is radically different from the Turing state machines that preceded the first universal operational machine 'Harvey' in 2017.

The basis for data in a QC is a qubit, which unlike the bit in a Turing machine which encodes either a one or a zero, encodes both possible states at the same time, a quantum superposition of 0 and 1. Thereby not only reducing the time needed for processing complex mathematical equations, such as the factoring of very large numbers, by at least three orders of magnitude; this is done by directly manipulating the probability amplitudes at the gate level.

It also permits the modelling of quantum systems in real time, thereby making it invaluable in the design of nanotech and picotech. All Quantum Computers are required to be built using Landauer reversible logic (unitary transforms).

Ben Higginbottom

quantum cryptography

A system based on quantum- mechanical principles. Eavesdroppers alter the quantum state of the system and so are detected.

Transhuman Terminology

quantum decoherence

A process in which the ambiguous quantum state of a particle, such as the nuclear spin of an electron representing a qubit in a quantum computer, is resolved into an unambiguous state, whether measured or not (conscious observers are not needed).

quantum encryption

form of encryption using streams of quantum entangled particles such as photons. See Quantum entanglement.

quantum entanglement

relationship between two physically separated particles under special circumstances.

Two photons may be "quantum entangled" if produced by the same particle interaction and emerging in opposite directions. The two photons remain quantum entangled with each other even when separated by very large distances (even when light-years apart). In such a circumstance, the two quantum entangled photons, if each forced to make a decision to choose among two equally probable pathways, will make the identical decision and will do so at the same instant in time. Since there is no possible communication link between two quantum entangled photons, classical physics would predict that their decisions would be independent. But two quantum entangled photons make the same decision and do so at the same instant in time. During the early information age, experiments demonstrated that even if there were an unknown communication path between them, there is not enough time for a message to travel from one photon to the other at the speed of light.

Ray Kurzweil

quantum entanglement device, QED

mythological ultratech or clarketech communications device that supposedly employs quantum entanglement for limited "ftl" communicate at interstellar distances. Said to be in the hands of powers and archailects. It is commonly believed or supposed in cheap virchfiction that a few have over the centuries fallen into the hands of nearbaselines, who have however been able to use them to their useful potential. the reality however is that no QED has ever existed; as with FTL it is myth that is believed by the gullible. It has been known ever since the atomic and information ages of Old Earth that actual Quantum entanglement cannot be used to send information.

M.Alan Kazlev with note by Anders Sandberg

Quantum field theory

quantum mechanics

A theory, first developed during late industrial and atomic age Old Earth, that describes the interactions of subatomic particles, combining several basic discoveries, such as the observation that energy is absorbed or radiated in discrete quantities (quanta) and the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle stating that it is not possible to know both the exact position and momentum of a particle (e.g. an photon or , electron) at the same time. Quantum mechanics is a very solid theory in many ways; it is on the same order of fundamentalness as thermodynamics. Some of its applications like quantum field theory became quite messy even during the information age, a lot of the original associated concepts such as the "Copenhagen Interpretation" were rendered irrelevant by the so-called Physics Whizz Babies of the early interplanetary period. Quantum mechanics has since been resolved through direct observation and manipulation at the picotech and femtotech levels. An understanding of the workings of quantum interactions remains an essential prerequisite of any minute-scale ultra tech.

quantumscale

Generic term for the size scale at which the nature and behaviour of matter and energy is determined by quantum effects are determined by quantum effects. Basically refers to the picoscale/femtoscale and smaller

M.Alan Kazlev

quark

The fundamental particles of hadronic matter such as protons, neutrons and mesons. There exist six 'flavors' of quarks: up, down, strange, charm, top and bottom. They are confined to hadrons by the strong force

Quark

Continent on Corona, one of the largest surviving baseline enclaves in the inner sphere outside the Terran Federation.

The continent was originally settled by idealistic baseline merchants, venture capitalists, and utopians disillusioned with the Sol System power plays, sentient rights abuses, and even occasional internecine warfare during the later Federation period. Quark quickly became a fairly respectable and prosperous colony, and remained so for some time, until the influx of tweak and cyborg settlers who came with the big trade boom of the next few centuries.

Some of the baselines never really got over the resentment and sense of inferiority at being relegated to the place of "poor dumb cousins", and a fair minority of the population migrated outwards whenever they could afford it. The ones who stayed behind eventually adapted, and established themselves as artisans (bayish arts and craft seems to hold a certain appeal for some superiors, perhaps they are fascinated by the sheer rough crudity and troglodyte simplicity of it all), cheap labourers, novelty tour guides, waiters, greeters (popular in some of the bigger rl stores, they bow to every customer who comes through the door) and other service industries not requiring much intelligence, etc. But to this day the baseline enclave remains the poorest and most disadvantaged on Corona, and whilst Quark culture is not endangered (thanks to the ancient and strongly entrenched ghettoism), the population has been slowly but steadily declining over the past millennium, through a combination of outbreeding and outgening, migration and falling birthrate.

M.Alan Kazlev

quark engineering

Sculpting quarks to create completely new kinds of subatomic particles, quarkonium structures, and so on. One of the many useful applications of femtotech

quarkonium

Quark matter, dense matter composed of a mass of quarks rather than quarks separated into hadrons. Occurs naturally inside dense neutron stars or as strange matter. Since the density and strong interactions lend themselves well to quantum computation quarkonium is a powerful (if expensive and heavy) computronium matrix used by hyperturing entities.

Anders Sandberg

Quasa'an Dynasty

Until the Battle of the Fringe, the Quasa'an Dynasty ruled with absolute power over the hu-dominated world of Mandra QuinSi for centuries, during the period of 3579-4415.

Renowned for ruthlessness and cruelty, the Quasa'an Dynasty was perhaps best characterized by its tyrannical ruler, Terrorlord Ernst Savro, of Clade Blofeld, who raised terror to an artform, and who thrived on the pain, suffering, and death of his unfortunate victims.

The Terrorlords came to power in a gruesome coup that now lives in Mandra Quin'Si legend as the Coup of Nine Devils. Thus began the reign of the Quasa'an Dynasty.

Terrorlord Savro, who came to power during the Pedisto Gambit hiatus, immediately set about systematically and methodically eliminating his former allies, effectively consolidating his iron grip on power and imposing his will upon the population of Mandra Quin'Si in 4164.

In his work titled, "Braxis Dominus: The Path to Power," Mandra historian Therios Findal detailed the origins of the Coup of Nine Devils, providing one of the finer insights into both the coup, itself, as well as the figures who made it possible.

Other suggested studies for the interested scholar are "Stainless Mercy: A Thesis on the Neutrality of Murder," a collaborative effort authored by the faculty of Hor'tunzz University on the splice world Ghonus, "Terroralysis" authored by the renown Jarthorruh brothers of Stanus IX, and the newer, but lesser known work titled, "Phobocracy: The Coming of the Nine," whose author, Dr. Stilvarian Merachus, is better known for his contemporary fiction series, "Along Came a Splicer."

Charles Mosteller

Quasar Dynamic Fleet, QDF

Officially a semi-autonomous subsidiary of the Quasar Dynamic Group; after the bankruptcy and dissolution of the QDG in the second half of the 9300s, the fleet has become a somewhat nomadic civilization whose only aim seems to be the complete and utter destruction of the Daharran Advance

quasispecies

A fuzzy distributions of genotypes characterizing a population of quickly mutating organisms, alifes, or molecules.

Manfred Eigen in Transhuman Terminology

Quaternary Period

On Old Earth, the second period of the Cenozoic Era, beginning1.8 million years ago.

The Quaternary period consists of the Pleistocene, Holocene, and Gaiacene epochs.

Stephen Inniss

| Qa to Qt | Qua | Qub to Qz |

| 0 to 9 | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z |

Unless otherwise specified,
this work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

feedback