Quantronics made remote autonomy more than an engineering patch. Before that shift, many delay-bound settlements still behaved as if serious legitimacy came from elsewhere. Local judgment existed, but it was often framed as provisional until stronger contact resumed. Quantronic consensus changed that posture.
When a local machine population can preserve deep memory, compare multiple futures, and synchronize under scarce contact, it no longer acts like an isolated maintenance outpost. It begins to function as a full civic intelligence. That does not eliminate outside authority, but it changes what must be justified from outside rather than what can be assumed.
This is why some of the most mature remote colonies do not describe themselves as cut off. They describe themselves as delay-bound. The distinction is political. Delay no longer means confusion. It means a different regime of decision-making.
Quantronic consensus did not make far colonies independent in the theatrical sense. It made them capable of carrying legitimacy long enough that dependence stopped being the most useful description.