'Brave New World' on steroids?
Yes, but-
The key point I took was 'you cannot force someone to become Uninvolved, it's a choice'. Except when you are Hjivin, you mold and stitch and cut so long on souls until you can create something that resembles a traditional Uninvolved. And then automate the process.
Even Christian hell is better.
Also yes.
We based the Hjivin largely on certain of Robin Hanson's ideas. He wrote an
entire book about it, though I'll warn you up front, Hanson seems to think what they did may be a
good idea. I don't mean to say he's an evil lunatic—he appears to have convinced himself this is a good outcome. So, maybe just lunatic. Bear that in mind before you buy the book. XD
That being said, authorial intent was to make the Hjivin worse. They're as terrible as possible, to as great a degree as is possible, while still being the kind of monsters that seem... not likely, but given the size of the galaxy,
plausible. A path that someone would step down. A path that's rational; where most steps on the path were taken because they benefited the person taking it, and where many could even be said to benefit those it were done
to, from the twisted perspective of someone already halfway down that road. The 20th century Hjivin would be horrified by what came later, and their civilization at the time included plenty of people who warned that this might happen, but... those weren't the people
in charge.
That's the most terrible part of their design, as far as I'm concerned. They're someone we might become. An outcome I am happy to warn people away from, but one I feel not enough people pay attention to. Though I think their ending is unlikely, that's more because our incentives and physical constraints are slightly different; not because we, as people, are all that different.
I don't know their full backstory, though if I were to guess, it would go somewhat like the following...
= = =
The Hjivin started out much like ourselves. Prior to their 20th century, there
were no significant differences. So that's where we'll start.
Most of you already have an inkling of what I will say. They went through their version of the gilded age—they had robber barons, labor movements, slaves and slave rebellions, and let's not forget governments trying to keep all this in check. Trying, as much as anything, just to maintain their own power. They were, perhaps, a little more socially inclined than us; which is to say, they were more inclined to follow the herd, less inclined to rock the boat or do things that benefited
them, specifically. Not outside the gamut of humanity, though; just biased a little.
When technology became a significant factor, it got used. Instead of a culture that rejected drugs in favour of a religious adherence to pristine humanity (Hjivin-ity), governments and corporations made sure to take advantage of them. There, too... well, the jobs were terrible anyway, and people had to do them anyway, you understand. Giving workers something to take the edge off seemed
fine, right? And in a sense, it really was; the problem is the second-order effects, as it always has been.
But in any case, they were less inclined to worry about those. A smaller chance of rebellions or strikes? Great! It's win-win. And if the same drugs tended to kill people at about the end of their useful work life ... well, we're talking about the lower working class anyway. Not, um, 'real' people. Besides, they could always resign if they wanted to.
(Fill in a hundred more atrocities.)
When genetics allowed them to do it, they segregated people by genetic purity. Not races... though there was some of that... but mutational load, mostly. It wasn't done by force, and didn't have to be; it was simply an offer provided, to anyone looking for a partner, that let them check if a child they had with said partner was likely to have any form of disease, or other limitation. Perfectly... reasonable. You can do the same right now.
The result, on a society already close to being caste-based, I guess you can imagine. But to spell it out: The castes hardened. Marrying outside your own became not just frowned upon, but
foolish. Stupid and irrational. In some places, it was made illegal; the children, you understand.
Of course did this ensure there'd be no cross-pollination between castes at all, thoughts or otherwise. It became quite easy to see the others as.. 'other'.
(And another twenty, equivalent second-order effects applied.)
And then, the First came into their hands... and the Second, Third... all the way to the Eighth, I dare believe.
The society I've described isn't stable. Obviously. Places like it have existed for real, still do to some degree; they never last, in part because they can't compete with outsiders and in part because if you put a steel-toed boot on 90% of your population, there will
eventually be enough pressure built up for some series of coincidences to bring it down. Where the Hjivin differ from ourself is three-fold.
- They were more cooperative to begin with, less likely to rebel; it was also less likely for nations to go to war. I've mentioned that.
- Their ruling classes were, being more cooperative, also less likely to backstab
each other. It would take a longer series of coincidences to bring down their society at all.
- And then they gained access to the Second.
The dominoes fell from there, and a lot has been guessed. The caste system hardened into true differences in species. The under-castes, which was nearly everyone, were given the
desire to follow their rulers—though not to gain any pleasure from it; that turns out to be a different subsystem entirely.[1]
They weren't able to alter mental functionality directly, because souls are complicated; but they were able to edit their genetics, using trial and error to remove the capacity for rational thought from those who didn't need it, the capacity for muscular strength from the technicians running their computers... again, with little reason to make anyone feel happy about it. The population was already under control. This was a matter of mop-up.
And, of course... the rulers could apply this to each other, removing aspects such as empathy for their lessers. Of course, the way they were being raised, that basically already didn't exist. But from that moment on, no children would ever risk falling into confusion about it, or risk finding un-approved playmates.
(And... you guessed it... insert a thousand more minor changes.)
It was a fine art, by the time they met the Shiplords. The Hjivin engineers and scientists were
all Feynman or Einstein-level geniuses, rational to the bone; their soldiers fearless; their leaders cold, calculating beings who would never blink at sacrifice, but who would never do so unnecessarily, either. It was the
obvious path, the inevitable end-state that surely
every species must come to, and hence the Shiplords' claims could not possibly be accurate.
And then, towards the end of the war....
The Hjivin, unlike any species since the Consolat, cracked the secret of the soul. They theorised how Uninvolved work, and how their own minds worked, well enough to make practical use of the knowledge. A skill their leaders immediately put towards the creation of an artificial, massive,
hungry entity—an "uninvolved" that would never cease growing, never fade or die, and which would not even be their own demise. A cybernetic shell for themselves, if I can use that term. An artificial mind where
they would be in charge, and
everyone else in the Hjivin empire would still exist, as living parts of the abomination.[2]
Those part of their living minds that the rulers found useful, anyway. No scientist-caste has any need for thoughts besides those of science, I suppose.
1: Quite a surprise when I learned it, and I wish I could find a reference right now. But at any rate, whatever subsystem in your brain makes you
enjoy things is completely disjoint from whatever makes you
want to do them. That's why you can procrastinate on things you enjoy... and why you sometimes want to keep doing things which you don't. They're usually aligned, but not always; it's a bug. Try to keep that in mind.
2: This might sound a bit like the Conjoiners. I assume the next paragraph disabused you of that notion.
