Hyperion's Hegemony Vs The Culture

[madd0ct0r]

Not in a battle, but on a literary crit side.

The two civilisations share a lot in common, but there are some key differences in how they were written.

The Hegemony has no intelligent aliens. It is described in the 2nd book how humans have wiped out any species that even had the potential to develop later. It is heavily implied this was not malicious, but combinations of ignorance, stupidity and mass tourism.

The Culture is far more into body modification. In this, Dan Simmons gave a similar tendency to the Ousters, reinforcing the contrast with the happy but shallow Hegemony. It could be said that the Ousters portrayed in the 2nd book resemble the forerunners of the Culture.

AI in the books. Culture minds seems to be benevolent and approachable. The CORE personalities are deliberately more unknowable and keep humans around largely as pets. (and as housekeepers and extra RAM - the CORE personalities are also more dependent on humans, interestingly.)

any contentions?

[Marcus Aurelius]

Not in a battle, but on a literary crit side.

The two civilisations share a lot in common, but there are some key differences in how they were written.

I don't think there's too much in common. The Hegemony is not even close to a true post-scarcity Utopia, which the Culture is. The Hegemony has a fairly standard 20th century style representative democracy, the Culture is an anarcho-communist Utopia with direct democracy in local matters and no formal central government. The only common thing is that both are secretly controlled by advanced AIs, but in the case of the Culture the control is even more indirect and it's essentially a "public secret"; everybody knows the Minds are pulling the strings, because the Culture is much too complex to be governed successfully by any body of humans beyond the local level. The biological citizens of the Culture just don't care about that, because they don't have to. The Culture biologicals are immortal if they wish to be (most don't), but the Hegemony humans are very much still mortal.

The Culture may be more into body modification, but that kind of biotech is very old news for the Culture; they have had it for thousands of years. Extensive body modifications come and go like a fashion with most people still preferring the basic humanoid form most of the time. For the Hegemony the basic human form seems to be something of an ideological dogma; they prefer to terraform planets instead of shaping their bodies to match the environment.

I don't think the Ousters are a forerunner of the Culture. In the Hyperionverse the conflict between humans and AIs seems to be irreconcilable in a deterministic fashion following the Teilhardian philosophy it is based upon, although that might not be apparent if you haven't read all the four books.

[Omeganian]

I don't think the Ousters are a forerunner of the Culture. In the Hyperionverse the conflict between humans and AIs seems to be irreconcilable in a deterministic fashion following the Teilhardian philosophy it is based upon, although that might not be apparent if you haven't read all the four books.

Read Orphans of the Helix, there is some reconciliation there (at least between certain factions).