Vernor Vinges' Zones

You could study your whole life, and not know. How long must a fish study to understand human motivation? It’s not a good analogy, but it’s the only safe one; we are like dumb animals to the Powers of the Transcend. Think of all the different things people do to animals—ingenious, sadistic, charitable, genocidal—each has a million elaborations in the Transcend. The Zones are a natural protection; without them, human-equivalent intelligence would probably not exist.” She waved at the...

 The "Powers" in Vernor Vinges' Universe

Marketing calls our current visitor ‘Old One.’” He smiled. “That’s something of a joke, but true even so. We’ve known it for eleven years.” No one really knew how long Transcendent beings lived, but it was a rare Power that stayed communicative for more than five or ten years. They lost interest, or grew into something different—or really did die. There were a million explanations, thousands that were allegedly from the Powers firsthand. Ravna guessed that the true explanation...