User blog comment:GrandMethuselah67/Character Sheet: Malcolm River/@comment-4867780-20161014010956/@comment-26322734-20161014190438

"Malcolm's Quantum Magic is much more impressive than Bradley's Data Warping at any rate, and come from a source that appears much higher, so a replicating scenario seems more likely to play in his favor rather than the reverse."

Origin and source don't really matter in my 'verse, just the innate power of the abilities themselves. Malcolm's powers may come from his own piece of the meta-structure, but that doesn't really mean anything other than he has cool powers. Bradley can and would simply replicate Malcolm's powers and give them to himself, which, along with the plethora of other abilities Bradley has gained indirectly (through the ontopathogenesis of Terra Ultima's astral shadow), would give Malcolm a disadvantage.

"Doesn't this Quantum Magic make science as we know it radically obsolete ? Is there anything scientific prowess can achieve that QM cannot surpass many times over ?"

No. But I think you might have misunderstood what I said. Malcolm's powers can't go further than, say, the scale of a country (which is the amount of people he'd bought to the new universe of his creation), and anything higher would have to be done via the butterfly effect or chain reaction. Malcom's quantum magic also cannot be learned, it requires some quasi-mystic connection with the universe as a whole, so it isn't like he's able to give people the ability to use it and thus create a post-scarcity society where everyone is a super. What this means, all in all, is that what Malcolm can achieve with his powers ultimately doesn't matter, because it can't be scaled up in any overly meaningful way.

What he can and does do is use his powers to allow him to create advanced technology (such as the warp drive on the T.C.H's page), which he then sells in the market. But at the point that the Technocratic Coalition of Humankind is, every corporation is selling advanced technologies of all kinds, so it doesn't give him any significant market advantage, which is the way he wants it.

"LOL ! The neutrality is mitigated here, which does reflect on the sheets ^ ^"

While I do agree with Malcolm's side more (within reason -- Malcolm's objectivist rejection of altruism doesn't rub me the right way), nanny state is an actual political term that accurately describes Hargrave's Empire. I like playing with and experimenting with political ideologies in my writing, it's what I do.

"Freedom and independence are great things, but if happiness itself is missing, then they are little more than glorified consolation prizes ("I'm not happy but at least I'm free/independent"). Unless being free/independent is the soure of one's own happiness of course, but in pratice they are rarely ever enough, more like stepping stones to get there."

You can believe that, and I can't really disprove you there, but I disagree. The loss of freedom isn't worth being happy. In such a world where you're happy at the cost of your freedom, on the scale of a massive socialist government that treats the people as a collective (which Hargrave's government does), you lose all sense of individuality and motivation to achieve your goals, since you're in a state of equality of outcome. No matter what you do, you're always going to get the same as everyone else (granted, in this case, what everyone else gets is pretty good).

And this isn't to say people in the Technocratic Coalition of Humankind aren't happy. A lot are happy because they live in a society where they can achieve what they want generally unhindered, as long as such a goal doesn't involve hurting others, and many do. Though some fall through the filter and end up in appalling conditions, but due to the state that the market is in, they're able to do well for themselves due to how dirt cheap essentials are (automation being the prime culprit for this).

So it isn't as if it's impossible to be happy with Malcolm, it's just that you have to work for it. Hargrave's civilization has guaranteed happiness, so long as you're willing to sacrifice freedom, which is fine if you're into that, but not everyone is.