mind computers

A Mind is an mirror-like ellipsoid of several dozen cubic metres, but weighing many thousands of tons, due to the fact that it is made up of hyper-dense matter. It is noted that most of its 'body' only exists in the real world at the outer shell, the inner workings staying constantly within hyperspace.

The high computing power of the Mind is apparently enabled by thought processes (and electronics) being constantly in hyperspace (thus circumventing the light speed limit in computation). Minds do have back-up capabilities functioning with light-speed if the hyperspace capabilities fail - however, this reduces their computational powers by several orders of magnitude (though they remain sentient).

The storage capability of a Planet based Mind is as 1030 bytes (1 million yottabytes). Research at the UC Berkeley School of Information suggests that 5 exabytes of storage space were created in 2002 alone, 92% of it on magnetic media, mostly on hard disks. Hence, a Large Mind has 200 billion times more storage than the total storage created by humans in 2002. When a Mind is disconnected from the hyperspace and relying on light speed conventional electronics, means its normal capacity is likely to be considerably higher.

As independent, thinking beings, each Mind has its own character, and indeed, legally The Empire has a policy of each Mind is an Empire citizen. Some Minds are more aggressive, some more calm; some don't mind mischief, others simply demonstrate intellectual curiosity. But above all they tend to behave rationally and benevolently in their decisions. Every Mind writes its own OS, thus continually improving itself and, as a side benefit, becoming much less vulnerable to outside takeover by electronic means and viruses, as every Mind's processing functions work differently.

As mentioned before, Minds can serve several different purposes, but the Mind ships have one special attribute: the Mind and the ship are perceived as one entity; in some ways the Mind is the ship, certainly from its passengers' point of view. It seems normal practice to address the ship's Mind as "Ship" However, a Mind can transfer its 'mind state' into and out of its ship 'body', and even switch roles entirely

More often than not, the Mind's character defines the ship's purpose. Minds do not end up in roles unsuited to them; an antisocial Mind simply would not volunteer to organise the care of thousands of humans, for example. On occasion groupings of two or three Minds may run a ship. This seems normal practice for larger vehicles.

A Mind's personality becomes defined at least partially before its creation or 'birth'. Warships, as an example, are designed to revel in controlled destruction; seeing a certain glory in achieving a 'worthwhile' death also seems characteristic. The presence of human crews on board warships may discourage such recklessness, since in the normal course of things, a Mind would not risk beings other than itself.

Personality

Minds are constructed entities, which have general parameters fixed by their constructors (other Minds) before 'birth', not unlike biological beings. A wide variety of characteristics can be and are manipulated, such as introversion-extroversion, aggressiveness (for warships) or general disposition.

However, the character of a Mind evolves as well, and Minds often change over the course of centuries, sometimes changing personality entirely. This is often followed by them becoming eccentric or at least somewhat odd. Others drift from the Empire-accepted ethical norms, and may even start influencing their own society in subtle ways, selfishly furthering their own views of how the Empire should act.

Minds have also been known to commit suicide to escape punishment, or because of grief.

Interests
Minds are constructed with a personality typical of the Empires's interests, i.e. full of curiosity, general benevolence (expressed in the 'good works' actions of the Empire, or in the protectiveness regarding sentient beings) and respect for the Empire's customs.

Nonetheless, Minds have their own interests in addition to what their peers expect them to do for the Empire, and may develop fascinations or hobbies like other sentient beings do.

The mental capabilities of Minds are described as to be vast enough to run entire universe-simulations inside their own imaginations, exploring metamathical (a fictional branch of metamathematics) scenarios, an activity addictive enough to cause some Minds to totally withdraw from caring about our own physical reality into "Infinite Fun Space", their own, ironic and understated term for this sort of activity.

Minds (and, as a consequence, Empire starships) usually bear names that do a little more than just identify them. The Minds themselves choose their own names, and thus they usually express something about a particular Mind's attitude, character or aims in their personal life. They range from funny to just plain cryptic. Some examples are:

Sanctioned Parts List – a habitation / factory ship
So Much For Subtlety – a habitation / factory ship
All Through With This Niceness And Negotiation Stuff – a warship
Attitude Adjuster – a warship
Of Course I Still Love You – an ambassador ship
Funny, It Worked Last Time... – an ambassador ship