The Viner Codex

Technology

• a human-oriented technology (rather than people as ‘cogs in the machine’
• science and technology in / as an interaction with underlying culture
• changing relationship with technology as it moves closer to sentience / becomes sentient – ethics of sentient technology
• gendering of technology – e.g. vinery tending to be seen as more ‘feminine’, steam mechanics as more ‘masculine’
• ‘a bit of magic’ – relation between magic, mystery, science, technology

Vinery

• distinct plant-based technology – “gene-splicing with 17thC technology”
• must always be credible as a feasible hard-science, hard-technology
• viner-creations are always one-off and do not reproduce (though specific late-sequence story-points may revolve around this) – analogue is sterile-hybrids in plant-husbandry
• links to sociopolitics as concept of ‘knotwork’ – “everything is interwoven”

Socioeconomics / politics

• respect for the land (sustainability)
• egalitarian – “when Adam delved and Eve span / where then was the gentleman?”
• politics and socioeconomics of a literal ‘commonwealth’
• responsibility-based economics versus possession-based economics – countering paediarchy
• interaction between equality and individuality, between dependence, independence and interdependence
• what is power? – where does it come from? – who has it, does not have it, how, and why?
• what is creativity? where does it come from? – who has it, does not have it, how, and why?
• sex and gender in a (more) egalitarian culture
• relationships, fractally – compare egalitarian to hiarcarchical
• “religion is a personal matter” – no ‘established Church’ or state-religion, no ‘right’ to impose religion or other beliefs onto anyone else
• role of a nominal monarch in an egalitarian culture

Foreign-policy, colonialism and war

• relationships with other countries with different sociopolitical models (colonial, imperial, monarchic, oligarchic, slavery-based etc)
• “war is a breach of the peace” – war and preparation for war as a crime – no distinction between ‘laws of peace’ and ‘laws of war’
• resolve conflict, not increase it!
• it may take courage to fight, but it often takes more courage to not-fight…
• military technologies and tactics are always defensive, not offensive (preparing for offense is a crime)