RIST stands for Relatively Independent Sub-Totality. It can be usd to refder to that entitiy that, from one pointof view, seems to possess a clear boundry seperating it from the world (as do cells in a body) but that, in a deeper sense, is inextrixably linked with a larger totality (as are cells in a body). For example, the biological entities traditionally known as ''human beings'' are nothing more than Relatively Independent Sub-Totalities of the social organism in which they are embedded.

A dissertation written undfer the name Andrew Loeb, who is now designated RIST 9E03, indicates that even in those parts of RIST 577 having temperate climates and abundant food and water, the life of an organism such as the type designated, in old meme-systems, as ''homo sapiens,'' wuld have been primarily occupied with attempting t eat other RISTS. This narrow focus would inhibit the formation of advanced semantic meme systems (viz, civilization as that word is traditionally construed), RISTs of this type can only attain higher levels of functioning insofar as they are embedded in a large society, the most logical evolutionary end-point of which is a hive mind.