Regarding humans surprising Minds: if memory serves, modelling human minds, while obviously trivial for Minds, is not a Done Thing, as The Culture, of which the

Regarding humans surprising Minds: if memory serves, modelling human minds, while obviously trivial for Minds, is not a Done Thing, as The Culture, of which the the Minds are the premiere manifestation, holds a high ethical standard in which software simulations of sufficient high fidelity have rights. If you model a human mind, you have created a human, and you then have responsibilities for that human, tiny as it may be. Similarly, it would be trivial for a Mind to scan or manipulate an organic brain, yet the only known Mind to do so (Grey Area aka Meatfucker) was held in contempt by its peers. While the human level characters do not have any material worries to contend with, they do worry quite a bit about their social standing. You can choose to do nothing in The Culture, but then you are probably not going to be invited to the interesting parties.