Gotta say as a Psychiatric Nurse, the ability to reprogram the human brain to like things, to hate things, to fix trauma and addiction... I think society would be insanely different, and that the Zhodani are utopianists but also autocrats, a sort of tyrannical, conservative United Federation of Planets to the liberal Galactic Empire that is the Imperium.
Like if we take the 3I as a good Galactic Empire, the 3I has bases, fleets, ships everywhere on an expanding outer rim, but turn a blind indifference to its member worlds and let them fester in crime or tyranny provided they follow the rules they set out for space activities.
The Zhos meanwhile are sort of a reverse prime directive Federation, a mental Borg if you will: your ideas will adapt to service the consulate, you will be safe and secure, your career set and enjoyable through psionics, your mind and body both healthy and happy throughout your lifespan: we will care for you, especially if you don’t know you need care.
Yet like the UFP, the upper echelons have forgotten the ideals. Zho Nobles are as capricious as they come, immune to the mental conditioning considered crucial for proles and intendants. They pursue their own ends, bicker, and fight internally, like the Starfleet Admirals often so corrupt, brash, or incompetent.
This is a self fulfilling prophecy. Flawed people raise the good as icons, seeing in them what they cannot create in themselves. Perfect people raise the flawed on accident, for when you do not know evil you cannot see it festering beneath.
