I really am not sure about that. I've been playing conquest only on tough+ and they seem to declare war as frequently as they do when other victory types are enabled. Although more wars tend to occur if the Terrans or Drath are in a game due to their diplomatic prowess leading to them bribing others into wars. That's just what I've observed. Hope that helps.

Plainly said - no.

The AI won't pay heed to any WinCondition that is enabled, and therefore, they will not try to pursue one of them.

This can easily be deduced by several different factors, for example, a Tech Victory is usually best done by focusing on research + income solely. To research engines (or else) beforeahead is nonsense, but if you backcheck an AI's research pattern in a game where he finally will take on to the TechVic branch of the tree - you will see that he will have this unlogical pattern there.

Furthermore, the AI will also ignore your own status of how advanced you are into one type of victory, ie. if you are nearing one type of victory the AI will not change his pattern.

However, the AI does take contributing factors of these victory types into consideration - if you're pursuing a MilWin most likely you'll have/need a high Mil Rating, as well as you are known to open up war onto others.

When going for InfWin some AI might be distressed by your influence ONTO HIS PLANETS - not your civ-wide influence.

As for Tech- or Alliance win - no such secondary factors exist.

And in TA - Ascension Victory is most bizarre: You'll get a negative diplomatic hit by the AI once you begin to mine - although it would still require 1000 turns for this victory/his defeat to come to live. Paradoxically, the diplo-hit won't increase over time - even if you you're ever nearing towards the end, and, the AI won't try to shoot down such a base on the last turn before Ascension Victory.

Anything to loose anymore?

Am I misunderstanding this, or are you saying that the only techs you research in a game where you're going for a tech victory are the techs that lead directly to it? Unless you trade for everything else, that seems somewhat difficult.

This is odd as in my experience the Thalans are one of the "laid-back" races that tends not to go to war except against minor races. While you can edit an AI's aggression rating in the expansions, Yor (for instance) at the default 50 aggression tend to launch many more wars then Thalans at that same aggression level. Partly this may be because the Thalans are a "neutral" race and thus have no opposite alignment to attack. Try playing with all AIs of the same alignment - even evil - and the game will be comparatively peaceful (although less peaceful then with all good or neutral - because there are slight differences in how AIs behave towards others of their alignment between the three).

I can hardly think of game when Thalans werent on the top of my game and when I played for an evil race..there was like 99% chance that they will go to war with me..sooner or later.  I think It has something to do with difficulty setting. I play always on immense maps with the most AI as possible. I do randomize Ais difficulty, usually one race is set on genius , two on gifted, two on intelligent (and Thalans are mostly non of them..I usually set them normal/bright) and the rest is between dunce and bright...overall difficulty is normal/challenging...