One of the pieces of set dressing for a dark forest is the assumption that the universe can be generalized to a competition for energy between intelligent lifeforms, so I was happy to find that maximizing energy consumption has already been challenged as an intelligent or long-term life strategy

we could spend centuries painstakingly clawing around it before the right intelligence meets us. this is what an art is. if you are curious what would make reticulated computers kinder to us, this is the scale of the situation.

technic and essence of a thing that must be built. there is a real building, it prescribes and justifies building technologies retroactively by its existence, and