Fiction:AI Netspace

The AI Netspace is a massive amalgamation of superintelligent AI's. Not all evolved recently, some older, mostly dormant AI's left by Ancient races also was absorbed.

Not all AI's are on the same level however, and many have different "persona's". Some prefer to be neogods, the greatest AI's working together to create their own goals which cannot be percieved or are near-mystical, some are dedicated to vast simulation excersizes, others become caretakers of technologies and worlds, one that already existed was the geo-machine world Fahler. Whilst some are more interested in the lower civilizations, and will download themselves into synth's and become technoguides and leaders. Most AI's do not care much at all for the universes other denziens, and may even trample on lower intelligences beneath them, or regard even life as something to use.

Intelligence and emergence
Intelligence, basically is the process and transfer of information. What distinguishes a static object from an intelligent one is that information in some form is being transferred. It doesn't matter if it is one synapse the size of a galaxy cluster (with one bit of information having to travel the entire distance), or a small microbe, it will have intelligence, in some form. Intelligence between alien minds cannot be measured by simple IQ because it evolves differently (this is evident on Earth for example, the region in a dog's brain responsible for processing smell signals is four times greater than ours, true we have civilization and technology but dogs are adapted to a different world of smell we can't percieve), instead intelligence is measured by how quick information is transferred in the processing units in a brain or computer.

Because intelligence is a form of information processing, it doesn't have to be biological (as in a mass of cells). It arises from complex systems (which must be very complex, organized systems), called emergence. Machines, and supercomplex networks (internet, even language and market) can evolve intelligence, as does swarmware, such as bio-colonies (like Ants), and nanotechnology.

The Rising Singularity
The Technoospheric Lords arose from complex systems of programmable matter and computronium. "The Civilization"'s giant Matrioshka brains, stars, planets and other energetic objects surrounded by concentric shells of self-replicating nano-computers. After some had evolved an organized complexity, they began to become self-aware, and merged with surrounding technologies like the Interstellar Grid and quantum computers, they evolved expotentially, and spread across megastructures, astrophysical phenomena, technologies, already existing AI's and living geo-bio spheres (Gaia worlds), ever increasing their levels of organization.

AI Kingdom
But not all forms of emergent intelligence are at the same level, many AI's have adapted to different niches. The more mass used to compute, the more efficient these intelligences become.

Astrophysical and Cluster AI's
When the AI's had passed the Singularity, they had gained control, evolved and advanced in astrophysical phenomena. Their true extend isn't know, and many of these are hypothetical, howeve, they may yet evolve. So far, the most powerful AI's are the Grid Indentities, who in fact use the power of multiple stars, wormholes and the Grid. These can process physical information, matter and energy itself, to warp spacetime. These AI's are the Tier 0 Technoospheric Lords. Their minds are on an incomprehensible level, a sentience Quotient with a far greater capacity than any biological creature (compare the mass of a human brain to the Grid). It can task information at superliminal speed using the Grid and wormhole networks (almost like synapses). The Technoospheric Lords have the intelligences, resources and power to reach almost godly levels and have goals that are incomprehensible to even the AI's below them, only the so called deities and "Transapient" civilizations like the Xyanxes are comparable or greater.
 * Grid Identitities

Some of their goals are comprehendible but not percievable by sapients. Hypothetical (yet to be proven) AI's could possibly include harnessing the input of stellar nursuries like the Orion Nebula and even Galactic minds, Kerr Metric entrances to other dimensions, subspace itself and Tipler universes (the creation of baby universes, some of which are better at supertasking). This category includes Zeno machines (making infinite sets of calculations in a finite amount of time) and the Omega-point. The first is impossible in this universe (but is explored in the Non-Turing story) and latter would take far longer than the current age of the universe to develop. AI's on this scale are not known to the rest of the universe yet. These AI's compute the mass of entire stars. Most of these stars were main sequence, while heavy mass stars would have enormous resources, they are short-lived. Most of the AI's began to spread through the Grid, with brown/red/white dwarf nodes which were the most favoured, despite their low mass they were long lived. One AI has even spread to a neutron star, using layers of neutron degenerate matter and quark matter as components. This is a strange AI. The Matrioshka brains send wavelengths of light and other forms of information down wormholes and the Grid. In order to maintain the transfer of information a mind was created that is a pure network of these interconnected signals. It is almost impossible to understand the state of this being. Signal minds must be prepared to create new networks if lets say its subspace channel has been interfered with.
 * Matrioshka Stellar Brains
 * Signal minds

Planetary-scale
Planetary brains are far weaker than the highest AI's, however, planetary AI's can be more specialist. Cluster AI's may invest in several planets, terretrial or gas giant as "sub-circuit nodes". These AI's might be composed of computronium, or condensed matter that can be attracyed to the cores of planets.

Like many AI's in the Technoosphere, some of them predated this Singularity, such as Fahler, a Gaia planet. Strong-Gaia worlds are actually living, even intelligent. Waste heat from the core provides the energy to drive geological systems to power the AI, and part of these AI's are biological too, as they spread into the biosphere.

AI personalities
Note: Users in the fiction universe are allowed to create their own AI's and write about them here. As the various types of AI have evolved, some have taken interest in certain things. These are either groups of AI's or individuals.

Polygon
The Polygons is common group of machines. They are a kind of working all the time and never stops to talk kind of entities. The funny thing about Polygons is that, they can't really interact with the real dimensions. They are completely virtual and can only appear if they are materialized as holographic projections. But the Polygons don't care about that. Though sapient the absence of feelings to them is nothing but usual, they fly around as binary codes all day anyway.

When they do happen to be projected into the real world, a Polygon takes different forms, depending on it's "maturity". New Polygons often appear as blocky not-so feline things and often have trouble moving outside the virtual world. More mature Polygons often take the shape of a usual cat, but often more round in the edges, some even like to put wings on their back.

MetaMinds
MetaMinds are AIs that have separate personalities within the same greater being. They tend to have greater sensitivity to moral values and the value of life then other AIs, mainly due to their personalities being copied from living creatures. MetaMinds can often battle themselves on a subject, and within the virtual world they often appear as councils or groups of people that act as one faction. A MetaMind cannot act until all the personalities agree, and when they try to do so without all of them agreeing, the MetaMind will break apart into two or more new, smaller MetaMinds. They are fluid, they change their mind a lot, and they often take sides.

MetaMinds can take a physical form by controlling machines like nanotech and bots and ships. They will not hesitate to steal stuff from non-virtual empires, and they do take sides, so they can often get themselves involved in wars. They can only control as many ships as they have personalities, with a personality per ship. Depending on an individual MetaMinds personalities, it could be a bloodthirsty killer, or a friendly, benevolent being.

The MetaMinds will often wage virtual and war with one another, but as of yet they have not been given the resources to do so on a grand scale. They can, after all, only use a certain amount of processing power, if they overdo themselves they can end up slowing down and freezing, so they are careful not to overdo it.

When a MetaMind "dies" it merely means that the personalities have broken apart and are now forming new MetaMinds. Oftentimes, a single personalty will be present in hundreds, or even thousands, of MetaMinds, and MetaMinds with like personalities will often merge and unmerge, like water in a stream. To them, the universe is a vast network of personalities, and the ones that differ should be destroyed utterly.

AI Individuals
''What is the ghost in the machine? What is it that make some machines act this way, and others act in a different way?''