#xeelee

This universe is incredibly prone to developing life and intelligence. It seems everything that exists -- quantum foam, dark matter, neutron star matter, star plasma, turbulent liquid -- will eventually sprout a whole civilization. This means the universe is full of radically different life form that have completely incompatible requirements for existence, and no ways to communicate meaningfully, or common background except for expansionism driven by natural selection; so First Contact is almost invariably enslavement or genocide.

The presence of relatively benign Precursors, namely the Xeelee, who can do near-magical feats of spacetime engineering and constantly leave powerful artifacts behind. They are even relatively nice, helping humanity escape extinction when the latter have launched a completely pointless war against them. However, these artifacts can be used and even replicated by lower-technology species, though without providing any information useful for other purposes. This means that, as soon as a species gets into space and finds such artifacts, they immediately give up scientific advancement -- what's the point? -- and start fighting over the Xeelee leftovers, since the first who gets its tentacles on starbreakers or nightfighters can rule all its neighbors.

Hence, "The Universe beyond the Solar System seemed to be a place full of petty, uncreative races endlessly competing for Xeelee scraps." (Ring, ch. 10).

but the Jjaro in Pathways Into Darkness and Marathon are kinda closer to Stephen Baxter’s Xeelee, where it’s not even clear whether they have corporeal bodies at all.

Oh really?

So, like, do some dedicate their whole lives toward studying them? Are there advocacy groups? Conservation efforts? Do some write poetry about them? Do they keep them as pets, name them, feed them, and mourn them when they die? Do they build whole museums for them? Do they keep them in zoos and try to take care of them?

How exactly “like humans” are these things?