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Multiplanet Reserves |
Many middle level empires and independent solar systems can best be explained as being multiplanet reserves.
The old SolSystem was run by a group of competing hyperturings, who eventually incorporated as the Solar Organisation; The Terran Federation (still ruled by old First Federation AI administrators) and the Disarchy are the same, while the individual participant solar systems in the Free Zones within the NonCoercive umbrella are similar; you have a thriving, commercially organised solar system or empire mostly populated by nearbaselines and transapients, living in various ways that utilise a relatively small proportion of the energy and resources of their local stars.
Also in the systems (or in others nearby) might be high toposophic entities using resources that are inaccessible to the human societies, but tolerate and encourage the societies to develop at their own pace- they don't control these societies overtly, but maintain them as an open societum which is free to interact economically and intellectually with the rest of the 'free' galaxy. Eccentric polities like the Reydovan Empire could well be one of these, as could most of the societies in the Crucis Corridor and the Serpens Reach.
Think of it as a galaxy-wide caretaker zone, for Kardaschev 1 type societies and below, run by a smaller number of k2 entities. I think these supervising entities might share a common philosophy, that of libertarian freedom, which encourages them to allow their charges 'free' rein, and the opportunity to strive against one another in a competitive environment. The emergent phenomenon called the Invisible Hand of the Market influences most, if not all of the free zone entities. While some believe that a higher toposophic being exists who embodies these forces, others see only a consensus philosophy which the higher toposophics in these zones adopt voluntarily and which emerges as a sum much greater than the individual parts.
This model of open caretakership allows the societies to come into conflict and even open warfare; like wildlife on a game reserve, except the participants are whole societies on a galactic scale. Rather than the restricted and jealously protected systems of the caretaker gods themselves, these societies are ostensibly `free'; they are protected however from the predations of high toposophic perversions, additionally, hegemonising empires such as the Solar Dominion and the Negentropists are actively discouraged from involvement in these 'free' zones.
With a competitive model the advancement of individuals and societies could progress until they are ready to become higher toposophics themselves, the end result being diversity and the elimination of less successful strategies.
One should not forget that the real motives and strategies of the higher level powers would be hidden and perhaps different to those perceived by those at lower levels of the society; this of course is almost always the case.
