diaspora-cultural-tensions

In this chapter, Blanca visits the Hull, a synthetic spacecraft environment, to reconnect with fellow Carter-Zimmerman polis citizens known as the Osvalds, who embrace the subjective experience of interstellar travel through simulated biological senses. Blanca reflects on the cultural and philosophical tensions within the Diaspora community, particularly regarding the authenticity of experience and the controversial Kozuch Theory of wormholes, which faces skepticism despite its predictive successes. The chapter explores Blanca's personal struggle with the failure to solve the Distance Problem and the broader community's retreat from speculative physics toward a more conservative, experience-anchored worldview.