we should be trying to build The Culture. you all know that right? the whole point of all of this is to build The Culture.

the Minds of Loving Grace spend their time building and organizing and enjoying their lives. and the humans are cared for and enriched and fulfilled and empowered in every way they can be.

no permanent underclass. no spike-adorned von Neumann probes. no slave races. we're going to build the Culture.

and yeah before the careful utopian thinkers come out of the woodwork, i know, Bank's Culture is missing one important thing. humans need a way to uplift to Minds. if they decide to, if they want to evolve. there's no reason individual humans can't eventually choose that :)