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I've been developing a speculative theoretical framework called RUFT (Relational Universe Framework Theory), investigating whether physical reality can emerge from a more fundamental structure of distinguishable relationships.

The central hypothesis is that space, time, matter, and physical laws may not be fundamental, but instead arise from stable patterns of information-preserving interactions.

1. Distinguishability as a Foundation

Two physical states are operationally distinct only if some possible interaction can distinguish them.

This suggests that physical identity may be fundamentally relational rather than spatial.

2. Emergence of Spacetime

RUFT proposes that stable information transfer and persistent relational records could generate effective causal ordering and locality without assuming an underlying spacetime geometry.

Under this hypothesis, space and time emerge from the organization of relationships rather than existing as fundamental backgrounds.

3. Physical Laws as Stable Structures

The deeper hypothesis is that physical laws may correspond to robust mathematical structures that remain stable under relational dynamics and coarse-graining.

Rather than assuming geometry and causality, RUFT attempts to investigate their emergence from more primitive constraints.

4. The Fundamental Question

If physical reality emerges from distinguishable relationships, what determines which relationships are physically realizable?

Could consistency, composability, and information preservation constrain the possible laws of nature?

The ultimate question is whether the structure of physical reality can be derived rather than assumed.

RUFT remains speculative. The next step is computationally testing whether locality, causal structure, and effective dimensionality emerge from initially non-spatial relational networks.

I'm interested in criticism from researchers familiar with quantum foundations, causal sets, information theory, and emergent spacetime.

Whenever you run into a problem while writing, where do you usually look for inspiration?

Do you turn to real-world history, philosophy, politics, or human psychology? Do you look at how other authors handled similar situations? Or is Reddit your first stop? 😅

Personally, I tend to look at the real world first, especially history and human behaviour. There's so much strange, fascinating, and sometimes downright absurd stuff that actually happened that fiction almost feels tame in comparison.

But I'm curious about how other writers approach this.

When you're stuck on a character, plot, or worldbuilding problem, where does your mind go first?

Be it for a classic mentor and apprentice tradition like knights and squires following noble traditions or wizard and apprentice following more meritocratic ways. Or is it like more like mass compulsory education with talent being singled out for further advancement or is it cuthroat backstabbing conscription with only the strongest being worthy of advancement.

For example in my Infinite Horizon universe, an interstellar sci-fi setting, on the the military side of things there is the "Fleet", the "Armada" and then there is the Lighthouse keepers a more techno-scientific insitution.

First the Lighthouse keepers are critical in maintaining and expanding humanity FTL station. To do that they need the best and brightest, so they have teachers in most schools keeping an eye out for gifted children to recruit into their own advance Lighthouse school, parents and the child can refuse but it is considered a great honor. However getting into Lighthouse school is not the end all be all as kids can dropout or be rejected as the program gets more challenging. Dropping out or failing out of Lighthouse school is not considered shameful or dishonorable (it is a hard and gruelling program) however there is occasional discrimination between the gradutes and dropouts and even between dropouts ("you suck you dropped out 5 years in, I made it to 9 years before being failed out"). Although not a hard tradition sometimes Lighthouse teachers become mentors to the kids they pick out following their progress and careers lending help when needed.

The Fleet is your classic Lawful Good space defense force mirroring our modern western militaries with recruiting only volunteer adults and letting people choose their roles within the fleet after they prove their proficiency and have the appropriate qualifications with a scattering of private contractors amongst them. Unsurprising the Fleet is called the shield of humanity.

The Armada on the other hand was created as the sword of humanity, in secret, in response to the Auriga crisis (tldr oh shit we're not alone, aliens exist, we lost a colony to a dead alien civilzation anything can be out there). The Armada can be described as Chaotic Goodish with them recuiting specific people secretly as needed and an entire planet Laconia (iykyk) as a breeding, training and recuitment grounds for the rest of their personnel.

The mandate of Laconia is to bring out the best(or worst) of humanity to neutralise threats to humanity (in contrast to the Fleet who is tasked to defend humanity). This mandate encompasses genetic enigineering, bioengineering augumentations and most interestingly of all from birth conditioning and brainwashing.

The problem is or rather the policy is that it is better maintain a diversity of upbringings lest there is key weakness in a monolithic program and there is strength and adaptability in variety. Add to that the uncertainity on what kind of upbringing/training works, Laconia is effectively an unethical exprimental psychologist wet dream.

So in the different corners of Laconia there individual kids being raised by ultra loving parents that they want to protect, to kids being raised by unloving parents that they desparately yearn approval of, to groups of kids raised to be in cutthroat competition with each other or groups of kids being abused so much they have to work together and rely on each other to overcome the adversity and so on so forth all arcoss the planet. These kids are not only being trained to be military personnel for the Armada but also be to scientists, engineers, spies and politcal leaders that infiltrate into common society.

Some of my stories have been about these characters with these backgrounds coming together and interacting with each other with all sorts of shenanigans and drama. For example

-The unloved daughter, trained and engineered to be a harden supersoldier discovering her loved sister, an aspiring influencer, who grew off Laconia >!the plot twist is the Laconia program is not restricted to the planet and them meeting up was part of the expriment!<

-A Brotherhood of abused boys rescued/escaped from Laconia on path of vengenance for the small colony who welcome them in and hid and shielded them against conscription. >!meanwhile unknown to them (being in a backwater sector) a civil war is being waged between anti alien and pro alien factions of the Fleet!<

-A classic buddy cop duo of a low self esteem Lighthouse dropout and a gung ho Fleet officer running around trying to solve problems and making messy mistakes(and learning from them). >!meanwhile they are being used as proxies by the Lighthouse keepers (via the dropouts Lighthouse mentor and guidance by a secret AI cult) to shutdown and disrupt scientific and technical research that the Lighthouse prefers to keep a monoploy on!<

I always believed that magic could affect every day life for the common people, if it was established enough. I could expect industrious individuals to capitalize on this and create an industry where they can produce such items for the populace. Naturally, there are common objects and more refined ones for those with deeper pockets.

Here are a few from my world of Athil Vestra:
* Water jug - taps into the chaos plane, specifically the realm of water to fill on a simple tap against it.
* Cleansing cloth - used to wipe oneself clean; a little flick an is no longer soiled.
* Warming towel - always warm and soft to the touch.
* Warming bowl - used to heat up food - specifically soup.
* Frost box - low temperatures from cool to freezing to help food last longer.
* Cooling shade - a parasol that not only blocks the sun, but also emits waves of cool air.

Beyond this there are more advanced magical items, objects, and craft to enhance the qualities of life.
Road resurfaces are one. Utilizing the effects of Move Earth, they can fix broken or sinking roadways and return them to a state of flat and smooth once again. Simple, yet incredible for ease of travel through a city.
Magic is a tool - use it wisely.

Tell me, does your world have such things?

I've been wondering about how a modern/futuristic world can revert to melee weapons. Other fictional worlds have come up with their own solutions (personal shield in Dune, the Force for Jedi in Star Wars, everyone being hopped up on bulletproof steroids in 40k), but one avenue I've wanted to explore is: Can a world run out of bullets?

Suppose a world where direct energy small arms just aren't feasible. Maybe the energy efficiency is too low to justify the cost of making a laser gun, or people just never figured out how to miniaturise a plasma generator. There are plenty of good reasons to deprive a world of direct energy weapons. So the world uses gunpowder firearms, like today.

Bullets require a propellant and a projectile. Usually the projectile is made out of metal. If you want a world to stop using bullets, you could say that it ran out of metal. But then you'd harm a lot of other industries important for the world to remain modern or futuristic. So "no more metal for bullets" is out.

What if the world ran out of propellant, then? From what I understand, propellants are made out of chemicals such as nitrates and sulphates. Perhaps you could say that people mined too much and now the world is stripped of such chemicals to use as propellants. Yet, many of these chemicals can also be synthesized.

How would a world run out of bullets?

Connecting a setting to the real world is almost ubiquitous in science fiction, even something as fantasy-adjacent as Star Wars takes place "a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away" relative to Earth. This is not as common with fantasy though, and I'm curious if anyone here has made a world that's the exception.

I'm mostly a sci-fi worldbuilder myself, but I have a mostly-fantasy setting (with many sci-fi elements) for a tabletop RPG I'm working on and that one does have a connection to the real world. It takes place 240,000 years in the future around a distant star located within the Milky Way Galaxy. The various human-like fantasy races are almost all distant descendants of humanity, who have evolved a bit since the modern day. Society has collapsed and been rebuilt without yet reaching the heights that allowed humanity to cross the stars, Earth is nothing more than a disputed myth in the eyes of most people. Even the magic system is explained in a way that accounts for why modern humanity doesn't know about it.

There was another world I build for a D&D campaign, where the flat fantasy world full of magic was a simulation that was constructed in our universe which was deep into the throes of heat death. The simulation was a refuge for humanity's last remnants in a dying universe, and it had existed for so long that its denizens had forgotten what they were. This was a reality that the player characters eventually discovered and had to grapple with.

Maybe I'm just too sci-fi brained, but I have trouble suspending my disbelief about the idea that a human (or something approximating a human) can ever exist truly causally disconnected from Earth. And my worldbuilding reflects this.

I'm curious how common this is. Does your fantasy world have a defined place in space and time relative to modern Earth?

Hello Reddit!

I’m looking for a writing partner, or possibly a small group of writers, to help me develop a rather extensive fictional universe I’ve been working on for a very long time.

The setting is a modern-day world that blends science fiction, fantasy, horror, superheroes, kaiju, the supernatural, and a healthy amount of satire and occasional parody. Rather than being one enormous story with a single cast, I’ve been treating it as a collection of smaller projects that can stand on their own while still existing within the same universe.

I’ve actually been developing this for as long as I can remember, and would like to actually be able to do something with it in the near future.

Most of the material currently exists as notes, character information, setting details, story ideas, and lore in one enormous Word document that has grown to nearly 300 pages and around 100,000 words.

I actually like the fact that it’s organized this way. Instead of trying to develop the entire universe simultaneously, I can focus on one character, setting, faction, or story at a time and gradually build outward.

For example: Blue Ties — working title

This is the supernatural/horror side of the setting, following a character known as The Revenant, a man with some rather unusual and dark secrets of his own.

His stories can range from relatively grounded investigations involving criminals and serial killers to encounters with supernatural creatures, cryptids, monsters, cults, folklore, urban legends, and other strange phenomena.

The idea is to explore the darker and more mysterious corners of the world through his perspective, while still leaving room for the occasional bizarre or humorous situation.

I Kaiju -

This side of the universe focuses on giant monsters, kaiju, and human beings who have been forced to live in a world where things dozens and even hundreds feet tall actually exist.

One of the main characters is Mara Jensen, a genetically engineered giant super-soldier who has spent much of her life dealing with kaiju at very close range.

Another is Sven Friedheim, a descendant of the giant-killers found in medieval folklore. His story approaches the same part of the world from a very different perspective, focusing more on what it actually means for an ordinary human being to try to survive and make a difference in a world infested by giants.

Highrider -

This is the more action heavy and guns blazing side of the universe that focuses on a blend between vehicular warfare and military drama.

The main character is Caid Aarons, aka Highrider, a scorned and battered police officer who takes matters into his own hands when the justice system fails him.

His story becomes entangled with a bloodthirsty militia attempting to seize control of the country, while various otherworldly events unfold around him.

And those are only a few corners of the setting. There are superheroes, science-fiction elements, fantasy characters, strange civilizations, monsters, organizations, historical events, and plenty of other things that I haven’t even gotten into here.

The important thing is that none of this is meant to be one giant story that everyone has to work on at once.

I’d like different stories to feel like their own things while occasionally allowing them to overlap. A character from one story might eventually encounter someone from another, or some event might have consequences elsewhere in the setting, but I don’t want every character to constantly be meeting each other just for the sake of making everything connected.

I’m trying to make the idea of a crossover feel natural rather than forced. For example, if a killer car possessed by the soul of its last driver appears in a Blue Ties story, something like that could potentially show up in a Highrider story because it fits the world and the kind of things that happen in it. I want those connections to feel like they were always possible, rather than characters crossing over simply because I wanted to make a crossover.

What I’m looking for -

I’m still relatively new to writing. This has mostly been a hobby that I’ve worked on whenever I’ve had the time, and although I have a lot of ideas and worldbuilding material, I’m still learning how to actually turn those ideas into finished stories.

That’s where I’d like some help. I’m looking for people who enjoy writing and worldbuilding and would be interested in:

* bouncing ideas back and forth

* developing characters

* brainstorming stories

* pointing out problems or inconsistencies

* offering constructive criticism

* helping turn rough ideas into actual stories

* developing their own ideas within the setting

* and potentially collaborating on stories themselves

I’m not looking for someone to simply take my giant document and write it for me. I’d much rather find people who enjoy the creative process and want to build things together.

I’m very open to people who are interested in only one particular aspect of the universe.

You wouldn’t necessarily need to learn 100,000 words of lore before being able to contribute. If someone was primarily interested in the horror side, for example, we could focus on Blue Ties.

Someone else might be much more interested in the kaiju side, superheroes, science fiction, fantasy, or something else entirely.

Obviously I’m also not expecting anyone to just commit to this as like a second job or spend hours every week working on it, we all have our work schedules and personal lives that take priority. Even if you’re just interested in occasionally bouncing ideas around, helping develop a character, or critiquing a story when you have the time or feel up to it, I’d be interested in talking.

I’m still figuring out exactly what I’m doing, so I’m not expecting anyone interested to be immediately interested in this, but I would very much appreciate any help thrown my way.

I’m mostly hoping to find other creative people who enjoy throwing ideas around and seeing where they go.

Honestly, I'm not even sure if this is the right place to post this, but if this sounds interesting to you, I’d be happy to talk and show you more of what I’ve been working on.

I have been dreaming up a magic system in which "belief" can be accumulated in objects, practitioners, and concepts.

One example would be a lucky pair of socks, in which, over time, after someone has attributed these socks with luck, they will accumulate, and this luck will become real.

Another example would be religion, where enough cumulative "belief" would manifest a diety/dieties, lending believers strength.

What I need to know is whether this would cause cultures and practices to be static or whether the spread of these conflicting yet real beliefs would create an interesting story?

My world has Belters and where you find Belters you find asteroid mining. The problem is asteroids are mostly just balls of dust held together by their own weak gravity. There's nothing to anchor to, you can't carve bits off, trying to move it will cause it to disintegrate, the high grade ore is evenly mixed with worthless rock, you would probably sink if you tried standing on it.

So here's the bag and drag method:

Once a rock with a sufficient percentage of high grade has been found a balloon is put around the asteroid. to prevent dust from escaping or the entire thing breaking up, called spilling out in miner's slang. The mining is done by drones called moles which dig/swim through the asteroid siphoning up the dirt and mixing it with a fluid which is pumped back to the mothership. There the fluid is centrifuged, high grade is stored and tailings are bagged for disposal, the fluid is pumped back down to the moles.

High grade is carried back to the refinery, probably by towing it in bags hence the name. If the refinery is close by the bags could just be shoved towards it. Tailings are also bagged but are left at the worksite with navigation bouys to warn anyone nearby of the navigation hazard. After processing the refined ore is sent to market on an unmanned barge.

This method is mainly used for valuable resources like rare earths and phosphorous that justify the cost of shipping everything rather than just letting it float. Reaction mass is cheap but fusion fuel, crew salaries and operating costs of a mining torchship aren't. Low value resources like carbon, water, iron and nitrogen that are only profitable in bulk, or when a large amount of construction material is needed, would probably use a simpler method. In that case you might as well just bag and drag the entire rock, doesn't matter if it breaks up inside the bag since it'll be broken down anyway.

I'm still left with the question of how the mole bots will actually dig through the dust. I'm thinking some combination of very small thrusters and methods similar to how earthworms push their way through the soil.