OK, I think it might be worth looking at the handwavium.
An obvious explanation for what is going on, or is not going on, is that Handwavium has an agenda. "But, surely it does whatever you want?" Some restrictions are:
* no powered weapons (including 'boom is bad')
* limited personal enhancement (not all biomods are walking (flying) around with superpowers)
* understand what you're doing, or else (the basis of a lot of quirks)
* have clear motivations (agree with your subconscious, or, for example, your gender may vary)
* no quirky life support
And I'm sure there are others. A lot of this agenda is summed-up as:
'handwavium is benevolent, but'
and:
'you may not get what what you want, but it'll be survivable'
All this implies handwavium has some quite elegant meta agendas.
The conspiracy theorists and the professional paranoids love handwavium. Why don't Mundane governments use handwavium to build inter-stellar empires (and drab housing estates)?
The simple answer, that makes Fenspace the setting it is, is, 'that's just how it is'. The more complex answer is 'we don't know, but we might be able to make a few guesses'...
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
An obvious explanation for what is going on, or is not going on, is that Handwavium has an agenda. "But, surely it does whatever you want?" Some restrictions are:
* no powered weapons (including 'boom is bad')
* limited personal enhancement (not all biomods are walking (flying) around with superpowers)
* understand what you're doing, or else (the basis of a lot of quirks)
* have clear motivations (agree with your subconscious, or, for example, your gender may vary)
* no quirky life support
And I'm sure there are others. A lot of this agenda is summed-up as:
'handwavium is benevolent, but'
and:
'you may not get what what you want, but it'll be survivable'
All this implies handwavium has some quite elegant meta agendas.
The conspiracy theorists and the professional paranoids love handwavium. Why don't Mundane governments use handwavium to build inter-stellar empires (and drab housing estates)?
The simple answer, that makes Fenspace the setting it is, is, 'that's just how it is'. The more complex answer is 'we don't know, but we might be able to make a few guesses'...
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind