polemos:8th_age:lore_notes [Earth Sphere]

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====== 8th Age Lore Notes/Suggestions ======
!!!SPOILERS BELOW!!!

Listed below are a few suggestions to take into consideration when writing lore for this age. Polemos is a vast world and there are always exceptions to the rule, so you do not have to follow these to the letter; rather these suggestions are focused on the "spirit" or "themes" that you should follow.

===== Themes =====

==== Trouble in Paradise ====
The majority of humanity (outside the unions) live in a technological wonderland. Famine, major diseases, natural disasters, and all but the most serious of injuries can be addressed by technology. Yet starvation, epidemics, poverty, war, and all the usual woes to humanity are still rampant. The severity differs by area of course, but people's flaws, and the evils that follows them can not be fixed by simply building better tools.

==== Body and Soul ====
Like most (if not all) cyberpunk settings, questions around the nature of self when whole-body replacement is possible (inevitable?). Thematically, 8th age tries to stick to the following (narrative) maxims:
  * Each person has a body and a spirit (mind, soul, whatever). Materialism is an incomplete view of humanity.
  * The separation of the natural body and spirit is not a Good Thing. It may be the best option given a failing body, and it doesn't make one a Bad Guy to become a construct, but over time and taken to their natural conclusions, a mind devoid of a natural body is missing something. Even if it's just lost perspective this will, at some point, lead to bad outcomes. A mind without a body is not closer to enlightenment and Truth. In short - 8th age stories work best with an anti-gnostic underpinning.
  * Spirits/minds cannot be fully digitized. One can scan a brain, but these digital representations are only simulations (see below). For fully cyberized individuals, organic brains are replaced by artificial brains that use artificial neurons but otherwise mimic organic organs precisely. This brain replacement process is not done all at once, but by 'printing' and integrating artificial neurons one-by-one so the overall neural net is gradually replaced. In other words, while the 'software' can be transferred to new 'hardware,' the format cannot change.
  * True AI does not exist. AIs exist in the 8th Age, and are incredibly capable at limited functions, but their minds are not self aware and are not capable of general learning. No AI will ever develop sentience through happenstance (see: Chinese Room Theory).
  * Simulated minds are not sentient. Similar to the inability to build a general learning AI, simply copying one's brain patterns into a simulation and running them does not produce true AI. This is because, no matter how perfect the scan, the simulated mind cannot replicate the physical phenomenon that occur in a human mind completely. Rather, it will be simulated only as much as physics is understood at the time. No simulation can go down to simulating the Unmoved Mover, and so will always produce a non-sentient mind that degrades over time, usually very quickly. Depending on the depth of simulation, though, a convincing forgery might be created, however temporary and incomplete.
  * Despite the maxims above, people want to believe in Gnosticism. People want to believe in true AI, digitized and simulated minds, and all manner of science fiction, often because they believe it would allow them to achieve immortality. These delusions can be mostly harmless, but can also lead to disastrous mistakes.

Note that people in the 8th Age, depending on their worldview, very often will disagree with these maxims, and that taken to extremes this rejection causes all manner of problems in the world.

==== The Magic of Technology ====
Advanced technology seems secular in the 8th age, but is literally magical. K-H generators draw from the magic power of nature (see: Natural magic power in the 4th Age), Chaos power is technological use of Chaos energy (see: Chaos power in the 4th Age), Divine Machines are really demons posing as digital minds or True AI. Normal people aren't aware and likely would not believe this if they found out. This wide-spread use of magic has not caused cataclysms like previous ages because it's use is relatively low-powered and un-ambitious, but things like K-H pollution (esp: the Meikyou disaster) are signs that the abuse of natural law for technological gains is pernicious.

==== The Free Technology Problem ====
Should people be free to use advanced technology? Can people be trusted with that power? As the power a single individual can muster increases over time, does the control and oversight the group has also need to increase? This question serves as the foundation for the three major ideologies involved in the Long War:
  * [[polemos:8th_age:philosophies:constructionism|Constructionism]] - Individuals cannot be trusted to use technology on their own, but they can be taught by experts. A strong leader/state is needed to have the power to channel the use of technology in the correct direction. If people are properly controlled by experts, and led by a strong state, then nothing is impossible through the use of technology.
  * [[polemos:8th_age:philosophies:freoismos|Freoismos]] - Technology is a tool, and so will be used for good or ill based on the person. Fear of technology is really fear of what the human heart is capable of. People must be free to use technology for good and free from abusive control by technology. The best way to achieve this is to treat people as individuals with rights and responsibilities, and to have checks and balances in government to prevent anyone from having too much control.
  * [[polemos:8th_age:philosophies:unionism|Unionism]] - A person can use technology properly, but people cannot. Beyond the herd mentality problem, unequal intelligence will lead to the smart reaping the benefits of technology more than the rest. A strong communal, populist state (called a Union) is required to enforce protections against the disasters of unrestricted mass technology (crime, social instability, ecological damage, social inequality, etc).

===== Long War Timeline =====
A broad timeline of the Long War with an eye to narrative beats:

  * AE 238 - Outbreak of war between USC and FPA, the latter collapses as the Agathos civil war begins. Unions declare war against USC to keep balance of power.
  * AE 238-242 - Agathos Civil war, First USC-Union war. Ends in defeat of USC in Agathos. Agathos civil war ends with creation of UFPF. Focus changes to Unionist front.
  * AE 242-244 - Stalemate on Unionist front. LIDA forms and supports unionists.
  * 244-245 - Stalemate ends, LIDA opens 2nd front by invading Celic/Centras. Ends with LIDA overtaking Sector Zero and toppling USC. Tense peace (first intermission) is established between LIDA and unionists. USC territory reorganized into southern Centrian Union Alliance (CUA) and northern Republic of Centria, Celic Republic, and other liberated republics that join the Centras Free Allied States (CFAS).
  * AE 245-256 - Unionist/LIDA bickering over peacetime affairs, with a series of 3-way proxy wars in Undas between Unionists, LIDA, and USC remnants.
  * AE 256 - Disaster at Phaethon causes mass devastation of southern Centras. Unions (always skeptics of the project) declare war on LIDA.
  * AE 256-262 - First Unionist war. LIDA dominates Unions with MARCS ships but is unable to capitulate due to lack of ground invasion. Ends with negotiated peace bringing first unionist war to an end.
  * AE 262-264 - second intermission
  * AE 264-270 - Neo-constructionist warlord from Undas returns to Centria and topples weak republic to found the Future Human Society (FHS). FHS wages war against unionists, ending the CUA. LIDA embraces isolationism and remains neutral. Ends with Unionist defeat.
  * FIXME ...
  * AE 319 - A lasting peace is established. The Long War ends