(Mostly) Water Worlds

Imagine a super Earth that is mostly covered in water. Landmasses are few and scattered. What would be the consequences for the development of an advanced civilization?

Landmass Size

For development of an advanced civilization on a super water world, I think it would have to be a water world where the landmasses are not miniscule. Tiny scattered islands would not give much evolutionary chances, or pressures, for life to leave the ocean (there would be but one ocean on a water world). What benefit would there be? There would not be enough territory for land creatures to have a go at it. There may be creatures that learn to live in the shallows, and there would probably be more shallow areas than areas above the ocean surface; and those creatures may venture at times on the land. Maybe some would evolve to use the land to lay eggs - protection from egg eaters. Some plant life that survive on the surface of the ocean could also end up being OK on the tiny islands - being small land masses, on a very large water world would mean waves, storms, rain, as well as a humid atmosphere (we suspect super Earths would have thick atmospheres, and may be steamy or humid). This atmosphere would potentially offer more protection from ultra violet radiation than our atmosphere, making it easier for surface water plants to survive periods on the land masses.

But for larger land masses - large enough to support evolution of land creatures - that is a different tale. Large land masses allow room for life to evolve permanent settlers, for a complex enough, and large enough, ecosystem to allow for permanent land adaptation. Once life evolves species to permanent adapt to land, they can then spread to smaller, relatively nearby, landmasses.

Landmass Separations

On a super Earth, even large land masses, close to Earth continents in size, would be separated by vast stretches of water - a vastness that would make our oceans seem like large lakes by comparison.

On Earth, landmasses separated for long periods show us divergent evolutionary paths. Each continent on a super Earth water world would have little biological communication with each other, at least for creatures that become fully established as land creatures. Semi-aquatic could eventually find their way to other landmasses, but those that evolve to be on land - each landmass would be a separate evolutionary laboratory.

An Aside

I have to stop for a moment here. While the evidence for evolution is overwhelming, it still has its holes, and thus it needs refining. But I also think that the Grand Designer of the universe has created the marvelous, awe inspiring, supremely elegant and beautiful natural laws that brought the universe to life. It's a sonnet, controlled by some regulations and restrictions, but allowing for so much expression within. For me, evolution is not anti-spiritual, but is evidence of a grand design, a remarkable design, that allows for such an incredible range of life in this universe. Many, many different songs of life, a Universe Symphony. And so, as science uncovers more truths of the universe, we will learn more of this Grand Design, and discover more of the beauty, the genius, the elegance of the Universe. This outlook informs my speculations. See "Introduction" for more on this blog's focus.

Evolutionary Laboratories

While the landmass lifeforms will have evolved from the same one ocean, the greatly separated major landmasses would allow for different evolutionary paths. Convergent evolution, where organisms not closely related (not monophyletic) independently evolve similar traits, would come into play, of course: lifeforms evolving similar adaptations because the occupy similar niches such as climbing trees, hunting at night, and eating burrowing insectoids. They would be on the same planet, within that planet's gravity well, magnetic field, and living through the planet's seasons as it orbits its star. But there will be variations in how each landmass' lifeforms specifically adapt. Natural disasters may affect one landmass while another is barely even touched by it - for instance, a supervolcano exploding on one landmass, but as the planet is a super Earth, and the landmasses greatly separated, the devastating effects of a supervolcano on this super Earth would not have the same global impact as a supervolcano explosion on Earth would. A meteor strike on a super water world would have less of a global impact, for the same size meteor, as that strike would on the Earth. A tsunami from an ocean strike would have much further to go, on a world with higher gravity, dissipating more of the tsunami's energy by the time it strikes a landmass than it would on the Earth. Not that there still would not be global effects from major disasters, it is just that with vast distances between at least some of the landmasses the effects for some areas of the planet would be much reduced. This would allow for very different end results. 

Dinosaurs Kingdoms and Mammal Kingdoms?   

If the Earth was a super water world, where it had, say, the same overall landmasses but with much, much greater distances between some of them due to the vastness of the global ocean, one result is that one continent would still have dinosaurs evolving, while another continent would have the dinosaurs wiped out, and the mammals evolving. Would this result in a sentient warm-blooded dinosaur race (probably feathered) on one continent, and sentient warm-blooded furry mammal race on another continent - intelligent descendants of the dinosaurs ruling one continent while intelligent humans ruling another? If the dinosaurs were not wiped out, could they have continued evolving, surviving the changing Earth to become sentient? Birds are the descendants of dinosaurs. Some birds, like crows, have brains twice the size needed for control of their bodies - they are much smarter than the other birds. Some even make tools (Caledonia crows can take a twig, strip it, and then work it until it has a hook at one end so that it can use it to hook insects burrowed in holes). If the dinosaurs were not wiped out by natural disaster(s) (some think more than one disaster ended their reign), could some have evolved to human level intelligence? 

What a world that would be. One day, an explorer from the dinosaur kingdom coming across the human kingdom, or vice versa.

Exploration

Which leads to my next speculation for this long post. For a world where continents are separated by distances many times what our continents are separated by, what would that mean for exploration? A sentient being is probably a curious one, and with a need to do some exploring, expanding territory. 

But as we see from our past, a large ocean is perilous to traverse. Many of our ancestors still did - we are finding that they traveled more, and farther, than we first thought. But it was perilous, and many resisted. For a continent that had only a few islands nearby and then nothing else, many early ships would leave to either never return or to return with no sightings of land. This would hold true for centuries as their sailing technology would not be enough to cover the incredible distances needed to get to another continent. The pressure to develop this technology would not be great - there is just no evidence for them, no tales of far off countries - just the known boundaries of their continent, the small islands off the coast, and that is it. The known world. The center of the world, and of the universe, as known to them. 

This separation, this loneliness, would allow the separated sentient beings on the separated continents to progress on their own, focusing on their known world, their center of the world. Until one day at least one progresses to the point where they can begin to think of exploring the universe. As knowledge increases, as they being to realize their world is a giant sphere, they may again wonder if some continent lies far, far away, just like we use to wonder if sentient life existed on Mars, or the Moon. Scientific exploration leads to technology that finally enables them to send a probe around the planet, or a long range probe to cross the seas (though a planet orbiting probe is the much more efficient means), and they spot it - another continent. 

Contact

And now the final speculations for this long post What myriad of ways that could play out? A civilization more advanced but for some reason didn't launch an orbiting probe (their culture focused more inward for whatever reasons - political,  theological, or distracted by a more harsh environment and needing to spend more energies there). Or a civilization less advanced. People similar in body form, but still different enough: humanoid but with tails, or humanoid but much smaller. Or more aggressive. Or not humanoid at all. The first contact hidden by the government of the country that sent the probe because of the differences - delaying actual contact. Or used by the government to rally their dissafected people against a perceived enemy?  Or this other land thought of as being heaven, or hell, or .... So very many different ways that first contact could play out.

Alien Visitors - How to Say "Hello, World"?

Alien Etiquette Faux Pas

In ABC's "V," a rich source for those who like to speculate on alien realities, the Visitors arrive in very large space craft. Some critics think that such arrivals could not happen without our noticing. However, we Earthlings already are working on cutting edge stealth technologies that address making objects invisible to various frequencies  so it is not far-fetched to think that an even more advanced alien species would have perfected such technology. (Do these critics not have access to Discover, Scientific American, Science News, Discovery Channel, or the Science Channel?)

For me their arrival presents a different problem involved with first contact. After 9/11, and after watching movies like Independence Day and District 9, surely an advanced race would realize arriving in large ships unannounced to a jittery planet would be a monumental faux pas. Maybe early in the universe, the first space explorers made such faux pas, but it seems logical that they learned that one needs to study another planetary species carefully, learning their culture and language before contact

Lost in Space Translation (and You Thought Learning Klingon was Hard...)

But learning the culture and language of another world is fraught with incredible difficulties. Aliens that perceive the world differently than we do (live in a water world with heavier gravity, no land masses, and circling a binary star for instance), who use a different means of communicating (communicate via light, or electromagnetism, for instance), and have a different physiology and psychology (asexual, cold-blooded, egg-laying, creatures that feed by sucking the fluids out of other creatures) would have very different frames of references than we do.

And since our words have connotations, and we tend to use idioms and tropes (such as metaphors), an alien would need to understand not only our alphabets, syllabaries, and pictographs, but they would have to enter an strange world more foreign to them than our alien (to them) planet: our minds - what makes us tick. 

Think about how difficult that would be. Imagine how difficult it would be for a sentient creature that communicates via light and can see the color blue, a color to which it attaches an emotional sexual connotation, describe that color and convey its connotations to an alien sentient creature that is impassively asexual, blind, and communicates via sound. This goes beyond "lost in translation."

The Internet and World Contact Day

Thus, an alien species, from "neighbors" saying hi to those bent on being our overlords, would likely put long effort into studying us secretly at first: learn our languages and try to decipher and understand our culture, traditions, and psychology. Although, with the advent of the Internet, we've just made the job not only easier, but so much more fruitful - they can gather so much intel from afar by just tapping into our Internet via eavesdropping on our satellites.

Maybe we've hastened the arrival of World Contact Day. Time to learn The Recognized Anthem Of World Contact Day: "Calling Occupants Of Interplanetary Craft."


Image credit: 1. 20th Century Fox     2. A&M Records

The Visitors...

The Visitors arrive...


Yet another alien invasion show. Not that that's a bad thing (the show that is - alien invasion would be a bad thing). I am looking forward to the re-imagining of the 80's series. However, it got me to thinking again about the possible motivations for an alien species to invade the Earth, and the many difficulties involved with invading an already populated planet.

1. Atmosphere: a sentient species will be evolved to their specific environment. Slight changes can prove to be very toxic. An alien invading Earth would need to be able to breathe our particular blend of gasses. That would be a rare alien. Ah, but what about spacesuits or masks? True, those would help, but then why take over a planet that you can not breathe unassisted on? I would think it be easier to terraform a barren, or nearly so, planet than to "terraform" one with an already fully developed ecosystem. Though as mentioned in previous posts, postbiologic / robotic sentience creatures probably can withstand a very wide range of atmospheres.
   
   
2. Nutrition/Dietetics: a sentient species coming to Earth to use us as food would run the risk of finding us to be indigestible or even poisonous. Even if their genetics/physiology are somehow close to ours (that DNA is somehow a normal result of biochemical processes leading to life in the universe), there are many example on Earth where food that is nutritious to one creature, is not nutritious to another (and may even be poisonous). Of course, if the aliens find Earth life to be eatable, it stands to reason that Earth life would, in turn, find the aliens eatable as well, from mammalian predators to invertebrate parasites.
   
   But it is more likely that our physiological makeup will be too different to be of any use dietetic use. The To Serve Man recipe book would not be a top seller for aliens. Although if Earth animals were heavily processed, the aliens possibly could get some food value from them - but a lot of work for little return. Why not find a suitable barren planet, terraform it, and raise food more suitable to their physiology? If the aliens are postbiologic, which many think aliens would probably be (a next natural step in evolution for sentient species), they probably do not need biological food anymore anyway.
   
   
3. Disease/Immunity: I have read conflicting opinions on this matter. One opinion is that humans and disease have evolved side by side - it's a continual arms race as our immune systems evolve to better protect, and diseases evolve to defeat our systems. An alien system would be, well, alien. Diseases have evolved to attack other Earth creatures and are finely tuned to Earth creatures and thus would not be able to attack an alien creature. Others are of the opinion that an alien would be wide open to attack, since their defense systems have never seen Earth diseases and thus have no finely tuned defenses or mechanisms to block or fight them.
   
   In addition to diseases, there are all manner of venomous arachnids, insects, snakes, toads and poisonous plants that an alien would have to contend with. Many would not care if the creature they are in contact with is from the Earth or not. How many of us have put a straw or stick into an ant hill and see the ants swarm and viciously attack the stick? Would the alien bodies be able to tolerate foreign venom or poison?
   
   However, with advanced nanotechnology (or technology advanced beyond it), aliens may very well have postbiologic systems to help them deal with diseases, venomous creatures, and poisonous plants - such matters may be of no real threat or concern to them.
   
   
4. Other environmental factors: we have evolved in a particular gravity well, in a particular magnetic field, with certain ranges of light and other radiation hitting our planet's surface, and a certain range of temperatures. Any invading alien would need to have come from a planet similar to ours if they have any plans for long term domination. Unless, of course, they are postbiotic creatures.
   
   
5. Water: many alien invasion scenarios have aliens coming for our water. Yet we are discovering that water is rather common in the cosmos. There is water on the moon, Venus, Mars, many of the moons of our gas giants, in comets and meteors. Why mess with a populated planet when water is probably much closer to home?
   
   
6. Overpopulation: some alien scenarios have aliens invading because their home planet is overpopulated. I guess their entire solar system would have to be too, for them to move out into the stars to expand. If they were postbiologic and still felt the need to increase their population, they could easily colonize barren systems first or large space stations (Dyson spheres?).
   
   
7. Salvation I: several scenarios have dying aliens coming to Earth in order to do medical experiments to either create some vaccine or gene therapy that can restore the alien's health, or to create alien-human hybrids so that the aliens can continue to live on, albeit in a rather different form. Besides the difficulties of two species evolving on two planets being compatible enough to be of any use to the other medically, again it would seem logical that an interstellar space faring race would be able to evolve into postbiological forms and thus not need to invade another planet to save their species. Though Studying other biologies can help uncover any universal biology laws and principles and thus help a species understand itself better.
   
   But let us say, for the sake of argument, that they cannot or are unwilling to go the postbiologic route and need to leave their star system (going nova?) and colonize another system (ours) and thus need to create hybrids to survive in our very alien environment (this scenario also assumes they cannot or do not have time to terraform another unpopulated world). A hybrid would feel and be different than the aliens - it would be a new species, experiencing the universe differently, and thus evolving away from the invading alien's culture and identity. How is that helping anything? They might as well just impart their knowledge to another race and consider the torch passed and not bother with the whole hybrid thing.
   
   
8. Salvation II: ala The Day the Earth Stood Still, aliens may invade to save us from ourselves, baring any alien version of a Prime Directive, or to prevent us from being a danger to our space neighbors (not all of our space neighbors may be advanced enough to be safe from dangerous space faring races).
   
   
9. Salvation III: alien missionaries come to convert us.

I am sure there is more that I have not thought of.

Alien Missions

Overall, it seems that for the most part postbiologic creatures would have very little drive to invade another planet. At least for physical reasons. But they may have psychological or theological reasons. For instance they find the postbiologic evolutionary step incredibly repugnant or blasphemous. They may fear for their safety or for the safety of other less develop extraterrestrial species and decide to keep us restrained or contained until we, in their minds, have matured enough. Maybe they have long forgotten their own early sentience past and look upon our aggression with psychological or theological horror. They may look upon us as heathens and feel the need to forcibly spread their theology upon us. Now those are scary thoughts indeed.

Image credit: ABC

Insectoids?

Them! © 1954 Warner Bros. Pictures.

While I am a fan of B science fiction films ("open your mind to the possibility that they are not bad movies, just misunderstood" - Mr. Lobo, Cinema Insomnia), those with giant insects tend to be science fantasy at best. Insects are not designed to be big. All this talk about how an ant can lift 10 times its weight is fine as long as the ant remains tiny. But enlarge it to the size in the movie Them, and they wouldn't be able to walk.

Many of the reasons why insects are small were discussed in my February 13 post: Life on large planets (Are Earth sized planets not the best size for life? II). I mainly discussed the surface to volume ratio problem that insects have - as surface area doubles, volume triples. Smaller creatures have a greater surface area to volume ratio, which means that small creatures have greater water and heat loss compared to large creatures (This is why children can dehydrate and become hypothermic much easier than adults). This is why insects have exoskeletons - the outer shell helps insulate and "waterproof" them. But this shell also slows down their growth - all growth has to occur within the shell before the shell is shed and, as quickly as possible, replaced

However, there is another reason for their small size which I didn't cover in the post mentioned above: their respiratory mechanism. Without going into great detail, because of their exoskeleton, and their need for all their organs to help restrict water loss, their respiratory system is separate from their circulatory system - all air that enters their respiratory system must be able to diffuse to every cell in the body; thus insects have a network of air tubes. They also tend to have air sacs which can contain an extra supply of air so that in dry environments they can close their spiracles (openings in their exoskeleton through which air passes) to help reduce water loss. Such a respiratory system works well for small creatures, but not for large ones - it would be difficult for air to diffuse to every cell in a large creature, unless it was riddled with air tubes, and even then, it would be difficult to ventilate the tubes so that air would flow through them.

Ah, but insects were large - no, huge! - in prehistoric eras. One large monster bug, which lived around 286 to 360 million years ago, was the giant dragonfly (Meganeura monyi) which had a 27 inch wingspan! As reported in this month's Science Illustrated magazine, "Scientists think an oxygen-rich atmosphere helped boost their size" (p. 29). What probably helped too is that the Earth was particularly hot and humid at that time - heat loss and water loss being less of a problem.

© Surface Vision 2007

Thus, for a sentient alien race to be insectile, like the insectoid Xindi from Star Trek: Enterprise, or the large insects threatening the Earth in Starship Troopers, it looks like they need to evolve on a small (low gravity) planet that has a hot, humid, and very oxygen rich atmosphere.

And maybe it wouldn't hurt if the planet was largely a water planet as insects are evolved from crustaceans and being in water helps with buoyancy (thus can grow larger) and no need to worry about water loss (though may need to worry about salt content - creatures adapted to fresh water tend not to survive in salt water and vice versa). The large, dry, rocky bug home world in Starship Troopers just isn't a hospitable planet for large sentient insectile creatures.

© Animation Factory

Of course, insectile creatures on other planets are not destined to be exactly like Earth insects or crustacea. Universal biology will allow for a great range of diversity - insectile creatures on other planets may have some similarities to Earth insects, but they will have differences, especially if they were able to evolve to high level (i.e., technological using) sentience.

Yet more can be said on this subject, but 'tis way past my bedtime.

Reference:

"How did insects evolve?" Ask Us. Science Illustrated. Sept/Oct. 2008: 29. Print.

Myer, Dr. John R. "Insect Physiology: Respiratory System." General Entomology - ENT 425. North Carolina State University. 1 Nov. 2006. Web. 16 Aug. 2008. <http://www.cals.ncsu.edu/course/ent425/tutorial/respire.html>.

Abductions

© DigitalBlasphemy.com

The History Channel last night (23 July 2008) had a program titled "New UFO Revelations: The Gray's Agenda." One speculation was that the aliens where here to produce alien-human hybrids.

Now why would aliens traverse interstellar distances to produce a hybrid with us? For fun and profit? Boredom? Because they can? On a dare?

One possible reason mentioned by some is maybe they need us to save their own species - they can no longer reproduce for some reason. Let's ponder on that for a moment.

The aliens would need DNA, and DNA that was similar enough to human DNA to make a hybrid possible. And they would need to overcome the problem that most Earth mammal hybrids have - infertility (think mule). That would be counter-productive. And if they were able to overcome the problem (making the alien-human "mule" consistently fertile) then why couldn't they overcome the problem of their own infertility to begin with?

How would a hybrid save their species? The hybrid would be a new species. So why bother at all? If it is perpetuate their culture, I'm sure there would be people on Earth who would volunteer to travel to their planet to live. Ah, but those volunteers would bring their own culture embedded with them. The aliens would need some one who is essentially a blank slate - a new born. However, every species has sets of instincts, and maybe pure human instincts would not mesh well with the alien planet and culture. Thus, the need for a hybrid.

Also, the chance that the alien planet would be a close enough match to Earth for an Earth baby to thrive in are low, especially for the small Grays (the ones that are said to be between 3 to 4 foot tall). The Earth baby would find itself in a societal environment long designed for small creatures. The gravity of the planet may be much greater (a possible reason why the small Grays are small to begin with), too great for a normal human to thrive (or even survive) in for any length of time. Thus, another need for a hybrid.

But if the aliens have the technology to traverse the stars and the knowledge, technique, and technology to create hybrids, that they would have trouble solving their own infertility seems odd. Or at the very least injecting a few select specific human genes into their own genome which would only require sampling some genetic material (a mouth swab would do).

There is, however, another reason for an alien-human hybrid, if such things exist, that I think needs to be considered. Lengthy exploration of a planet that is even moderately hostile environmentally would be difficult for the aliens. If the Earth's atmospheric pressure and gravity is very low compared to theirs, has more radiation reaching the surface, the Sun's spectral class different, the temperature much cooler/warmer it could be difficult for an alien to stay long on the Earth's surface without artificial/supplementary medical/biological aids to help them. Plus, there is the concern about viruses and bacteria - some think that an alien wouldn't be susceptible to our bugs since our bugs are adapted to try to get through our immune systems and thus an alien's immune system would have no trouble recognizing Earth bugs as foreign bodies and attack. Nice assumption, but their immune system evolved on their planet and may miss an Earth bug (maybe see it as inert). Anyway, a hybrid, one brought up in the alien's culture, with alien instincts as well as human protective instincts (like our instinctive fear of a snake's hiss), might make the best alien scientists to explore and research Earth. They would have additional protection against Earth's "bugs," some native instinctive reaction to give them further protection, and can better survive and interact in Earth's environmental conditions.

© Animation Factory

By the way, for those who are wondering what a Gray (or Grey) is, it is one of several species of aliens reported by people. According to Jerome Clark in his 1998 book The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial, Grays are most commonly reported in the U.S. (75% of all alien sightings) with Europe and England reporting Grys 20% and 12% of the time, respectively.

Population Bottlenecks

This is something I will return to after some more research, but I find it very intriguing how population bottlenecks have affected the human race. A population bottleneck occurs when either a significant percentage of a population or species is reduced by 50% or moreor when a small group gets isolated from the main population (called the "founder effect"). This results in increased gene frequencies (genetic drift), as well as resulting in increased inbreeding. This has profound effects on the future of the species affected by the bottleneck.

These bottlenecks usually occur due to some large disaster, whether cosmic, natural, or man-made such as meteor impacts, super volcano eruptions, climate change, disease, or war, just to name a few.

So when thinking about alien realities, we need to keep in mind that unexpected evolutionary pathways can occur because of bottlenecks. Think of this hypothetical situation: a small group of a sentient species is exiled or chased away by a larger, stronger group (of the same species). Left alone, Darwinian forces here would predict that eventually the stronger group's genes would win out over the weaker group. But if a disaster comes along that wipes out the stronger group but, by the luck of the draw, the small, weaker group manages to survive - guess who will repopulate the species?

On Earth we have isolated groups where color-blindness is much higher than the average human population, or where six-fingers is the norm, or people who walk on all fours. If a major disaster were to happen and by fluke stroke of luck one of these isolated groups survived, the future of the human race would be greatly changed (where, for instance, those with five fingers would be the odd ones). Of course, some of these attributes are recessive, and eventually the dominant genes would reassert themselves as the norm.

Life on large planets (Are Earth sized planets not the best size for life? II)

© David A. Aguilar (Harvard-Smithsonian CfA)

What would a larger planet mean for the evolution of its life forms? One of the first considerations would be the effect of the heavier gravitational field have. And that effect? Size. No matter what skeletal structure is used, weight (gravity) affects how big a creature can become.

Let's examine insects first. One reason insects are so small (OK, if you have a fear or phobia for a particular insect, it doesn't look all that small!) is that their exoskeleton structure is not effective for supporting great weight (crayfish also have exoskeletal structure, but they live in water, which helps support added weight).

So then why do insects have exoskeletons? It may have something to do with surface to volume ratios. As surface area doubles, volume triples. Smaller creatures have a greater surface area to volume ratio, but as creatures increase in size, the ratio quickly decreases. What this means for small creatures is that they have greater water loss, as well as heat loss. This is why children can dehydrate and become hypothermic much easier than adults (of course this works in "reverse" as well: larger, heavier people overheat easier than thinner people).

An insect's exoskeletal structure helps insulate and "waterproof"it; this is how it overcomes the surface to volume ratio problem. However the exoskeleton helps reinforce upper size limitations on insects - to grow in size, an insect must molt or shed its exoskeleton in order to secrete a new one. Since the insect needs the exoskeleton for structure, and any growth must occur within it - thus it can not be very large when it sheds the exoskeleton. Of course, if the insect undergoes metamorphosis - the transformation of a larvae into a mature adult - major changes can occur.

Even for vertebrate creatures, there are limits to what biology can support in terms of the musculature needed to hold up great body weight. There is also a need to be able to rid the body of heat, since the surface to volume ratio decreases dramatically as creatures attain very large sizes - it is difficult to radiate out inner heat rapidly. This is why various dinosaurs grew large plates on their backs: they essentially operated as radiator fins. Of course, creatures living in water can more easily obtain larger sizes since the water aids in supporting the weight (buoyancy).

In addition, a large terrestrial planet may also affect the development of avian creatures. I think, though, this question is more difficult to answer. A heavier gravitational field would be harder to work against, requiring more muscles, more energy. The lighter the creature, the less weight it has to try to get airborne. Since we've seen how volume triples when area doubles, we can quickly see that if you double the size of an avian creature, it will triple in mass. However, birds have evolved ways around this. Having larger wingspans help develop more lift, but also having air spaces in their bones helps reduce their mass. This however weakens their bones to a degree, and since muscles need to be connected to the skeleton (kinesiology - mechanics, physics, of biological movement), weaker bones mean a lower limit to muscle strength. A lower limit to muscle strength means a lower limit to the weight that can be lifted into flight.

However, a thicker atmosphere might make up for some of that heavier gravitational pull by making it easier to acquire lift. Also, creatures that glide more than they actually fly, may be able to attain larger size since what they need is a large wingspan to float on the air or to catch updrafts with. Such creatures may tend to climb up large trees or cliffs and leap off to glide, reducing the need to power themselves into flight. Once launched, it would require less energy to stay aloft. They may have large thin membranes for wings since such structures would be very lightweight. It may even be feasible that some could develop bladders where they produce and store helium like the swim bladders in a fish, which are gas or air filled bladders which controls the fish's buoyancy (and for some even helps them hear) .

So a sentient alien from a very large planet may tend to be small in size, especially if they come from a warm planet with heavy gravity. I would doubt they would be insectile creatures, as insectile creatures on a very heavy planet (especially a warm and/or dry one) would have a harder time with large sizes than those on Earth. Not to say such sentient alien creatures as the insectile Xendi creatures from Star Trek: Enterprise are impossible, just that they are highly unlikely (maybe a very humid Earth sized planet could somehow produce one). Thus, I think heavy planets would tend to favor vertebrates of some sort, whether terrestrial or aquatic.

© Animationfactory

Hmm, maybe one reason why many UFO accounts have aliens as being small, just a few feet in height, is that they come from terrestrial planets that are several times larger than the Earth, and thus with much greater gravity.

Alien Technology - 1. Biology/Physiology - Part IV

"Biodome" © DigitalBlasphemy.com

Much of technology is driven by cultural needs, by physical needs (survival needs such as food, water, and protection from the elements) and, at least for humans, technology is also driven by the need for entertainment, and for exploration.

All of these are directly, or indirectly, connected to the biology and physiology of the alien race. Some additional examples include an alien species where mating is a difficult process, even more difficult than it can be here on Earth at times; for such a species there may be quite the pressure to concentrate energies on creating tools (technology) to help with the process. On a planet that is largely a desert, for a species that while physiologically efficient in the use of water, there will still likely be great pressures for developing tools (technology) to find and protect water as well as to get the most out of agriculture. Or for a species that is wholly herbivorous, technology to protect themselves from predators.

There are many other possibilities, which I will try to explore in the future, but this is more than enough to get us started, eh?

So, when contemplating on different kinds of aliens, and the technologies they may have, we need to keep in mind all the different biologies that could exist - do not ignore any biological need as an influence on the type and direction of technological development an alien species may undertake.

Alien Technology - 1. Biology/Physiology - Part III

"Enclosure" © DigitalBlasphemy.com

I was speaking with a mathematics instructor and retired Methodist minister today about logic. He brought up an interesting speculation: for many of hundreds, even thousands, of years ancient Greek logic has held sway. It is an either/or binary type of logic. But with modern advances in the study of DNA (logic with four variables) and computer science and quantum physics (fuzzy logic), binary logic is found to be too restrictive. It does not describe reality - most things are not black and white, off or on. Most things are diverse with a continuum, or range, of values. He wondered what our world would be like now if instead of binary type of logic, the ancient Greeks instead embraced more complicated logic. How would that affect technology?

Why did the Greeks use binary logic to begin with? Most things on the surface seem to be in binaries: hot and cold, night and day, left and right, dry and wet. We have two arms, two legs, two eyes, two ears, and two nostrils in our nose. We have male and female genders. However, that overlooks the other options: warm, twilight, middle. Maybe this binary thinking came from a moral sense - things are either bad or good - no in between. For some, the in between is worst (the Bible picks up on this - that it is better to be hot or cold than to be lukewarm, morally¹). It is also a simpler way to deal with things and such logic worked well enough for them. It even worked well enough for computers at first. Our scientific and technological advances are what helped pushed for the increased use of fuzzy logic. I think some of today's problems, as my mathematical minister friend was alluding to, is caused by this clash of classic binary thinking and modern "multi" thinking.

So, for alien sentient beings, some may develop non-binary thinking early on. Let us take, for example, theoretical alien beings on a planet in a trinary star system; there are solar system configurations that would allow for more than just Day - Night: two stars orbiting close to each other with a third orbiting further out, like a planet, with the planets orbiting in between. Now give the planet a large moon and with such an arrangement, there could be:

1. • A Main Day (with the main star seen either by itself, with the partner star directly behind or in directly in front of it, or with its partner star beside it),
     
   
   
   • with a Minor Day as its night (the third orbiting star only seen, the other stars "behind" the planet - normally the day side for planets around a solitary star),
     
   
   
   • with the Minor Day sometimes bolstered by the moon reflecting the main stars light, increasing the brightness of the night (though with possible occasional momentary eclipses);
     


2. • or a Main Day (with the main star seen either by itself, with the partner star directly behind or in directly in front of it, or with its partner star beside it),
     
   
   
   • with a Minor Day as its night (the third orbiting star only seen, the other stars "behind" the planet - normally the day side for planets around a solitary star),
     
   
   
   • with the moon sometimes on the Main Day side giving, depending upon the size of the moon and its orbital tilt, either momentary partial or full eclipses, or just hanging dimly in the Main Day sky and thus not adding any light to the Minor Day side;
     


3. • or a True Main Day when all three stars are grouped visually together in the sky,
   
   
   • with either a True Night where no star nor moon is seen in the sky opposite of the Special Main Day side,
     
   
   
   • or a Partial Night where none of the three stars are seen, but the moon is visible, reflecting back with its brightest intensity (since it is reflecting all three stars).
     

This would give the primitive sentient beings an "in your face" non-binary example. Maybe for such beings, the number three would hold such a long and deep importance across all their theologies and cultures throughout their history that thinking in binary would seem unnatural. Maybe this is the type of system the Ramans came from (see Arthur C. Clarke's brilliant Rendezvous with Rama series)!

So, could some sentient species develop fuzzy logic quicker than we did? And how would that affect their early technologies?

We won't necessarily find the answers to these kinds of questions in this blog, but I hope we can have fun speculating on them. And in a rather large universe (and with parallel universes possible), maybe, just maybe, some or more of what we speculate could somewhere be true.

If nothing else, it may help us to see our own world in a new way, to appreciate it on some deeper level (as well as help an occasional fiction writer!).

Notes:

1. Revelations 3:16: "So because you are not one thing or the other, I will have no more to do with you" (Bible in Basic English) or "So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth" (KJV).

Alien Technology - 1. Biology/Physiology - Part II

"Enclosure" © DigitalBlasphemy.com

An article I recently read about "stereo noses" of certain insects got me to thinking about how some technological advances/abilities may be rather common because of a common need for communication in space and the universal nature of space: while different beings may communicate on their planet in a number of very different ways - by light, sound, touch, or smell for instance - because of the near vacuum of space, communication is somewhat limited. One cannot communicate by touch, sound, or smell through the vacuum of space; however, one can communicate by light, or rather by the electromagnetic spectrum (radio waves, x-rays, light, and so forth). So no matter how a species communicates amongst its members on their home planet, they are rather restricted to how they can communicate in space.

Thus, many feel we may fairly confidently look to the electromagnetic spectrum as the most likely means for communicating with most alien species, it may not be the best way to search for indications of intelligent life on other worlds. Most assume that intelligent life will, at some point eventually, if they survive long enough, develop technology that will include some forms of electromagnetic communication / transmission of information which would either "leak" out into space and/or would purposefully used for space communications. These signals would eventually be detectable by sensitive radio telescopes (by those who believe that such intelligent life would use mostly the radio band) or by optical telescopes (for those believe some advance civilizations would use lasers to communicate, at least for communication in outer space).

However, not all species may use the electromagnetic spectrum to communicate with each other on their home planet, and thus not leak out any evidence of their presence or of their advanced civilization into space and, eventually, if we are fortunate enough, be detected here on Earth by our telescopes.

Take, for an extreme example to make my point, a water world where the intelligent species has developed wholly as an underwater organism. Smell, light, and radio waves are not the most effective or efficient means of communication in water, due to the properties of water. But sound is a different matter - sound is a very effective means, which is why whales and dolphins, among others, are able to communicate over long distances (sometimes thousands of miles) via sound alone. Using electricity would be difficult, and so development in that area could be very slow.

As mentioned in a previous post, such a species may also be slow to leave the planet - a creature that needs to be immersed in water has a much heavier load to launch into space than a creature that needs to be immersed in air. Water is dense and very heavy, launching from under water and breaking free from the planet's gravity (especially if the gravity is even heavier than Earth's), carrying enough water to fully immerse one or more creatures, not to mention the mechanisms to not only oxygenate the water and remove waste air (and other wastes) which would be more complicated than those to care for a terrestrial creature, all would add up to a much much more difficult endeavor than it is to launch from the surface, in air, with air breathing terrestrial passengers.

However, it could be argued that such a species would tend, then, to rely wholly on robotic space probes (after they tackle the problem of creating such probes with electricity in a underwater environment from scratch - though one could suppose a heavy reliance on pneumatics, which while adding weight to the craft, would add far less than a water immersed passenger). In which case, they would need a means for communicating with the probes, and thus reveal themselves to other planets.

Although, let us pick, for a another extreme example, an intelligent species that deaf or nearly deaf with rudimentary vision and which communicates mainly by smell and touch. Such a species would not feel the need to develop TV or radio, though they may develop something akin to the teletype where they can, by touch, feel what is being transmitted. Such a device could easily be updated where the information is transmitted through the air via radio waves, which get converted by a braille type mechanism or even a pulsating mechanism which while producing sound as a by-product, it is the variations in the vibrations that can be felt by sensitive appendages which is how the message is deciphered. Thus, such a species would use a means of communicating over distances that would leak out into outer space and which could be eventually detected by radio telescopes on, or orbiting around the Earth.

Finally, someone once mentioned, in a discussion about the Drake Equation, that some species may be paranoid about broadcasting, even inadvertently, their presence to the universe and may restrict/shield and otherwise block signals from leaving their planet - there may be more advanced civilizations out there that we can not detect by our SETI or OSETI telescopes.

Such beings may be paranoid because their physiology causes them to be especially xenophobic, or because of their theology makes them so, or because their ruler is. Or it may be because of a negative experience they had with another alien species. Or it just may be they logically thought about it and saw how violent their own people can be toward each other over differences and how more technologically advanced civilizations tend to easily conquer less advanced civilizations and figure they should play it safe (there are those here on Earth that present this very argument against our having SETI programs which purposefully try to make contact with other worlds).

We've had many examples on Earth of cultures closing their borders to avoid contact from other countries because of the paranoia of the leaders - mostly to limit the influence of "subversive" ideas from other cultures that may cause the people to reject the leader, or the paranoia of a people in reaction to a negative experience with outsiders. And so it could also happen with at least some other alien worlds.

References:

"Optical SETI - OSETI." Life in the Universe. 8 August 2001. 13 January 2008. <http://www.lifeinuniverse.org/noflash/OpticalSETI-07-01-03.html>

Rockefeller University. "Two 'Noses' Are Necessary For Flies To Navigate Well." ScienceDaily. 29 December 2007. 13 January 2008. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/12/071226230117.htm>

Alien Technology - 1. Biology/Physiology

"Enclosure" © DigitalBlasphemy.com

One important area of research for engineers is the area of human factors science or design -understanding and applying the properties of human capability to the design of technology (a somewhat oversimplified definition). The capabilities of the human being has to be taken into account. Some are obvious factors (when you are not speculating about non-human species) are such things as: humans are bipedal, have five fingers, and their knees bend inward not outward like some birds, to name but a few. There are many human factors that influence technology including, but by no means limited to, from how something is physically designed, to safety mechanisms that need to be installed, to what kind of assistance the human operator needs to operate the technology.

What does this mean for aliens? What it means is that what works for a human may not be the best solution or the solution chosen by an alien. An avian sentient species would need greatly different technology for sitting and control mechanisms (I wonder if a sentient creature that is used to flying, would look to fly beyond the atmosphere sooner than a terrestrial or especially an aquatic sentient species?). A creature that looks more like an octopus than a human would need different seating and control mechanisms as well. Having more fingers, lacking any fingers, having a tail, having more than two eyes, hearing different frequencies, not being able to hear at all, and any number of other physiological differences will affect what the technology will look like, how the species would communicate, and thus affect how we (humans) can find and communicate with an alien race.

And it is possible that there could be some intelligent species that cannot use technology (at least as we commonly define or have commonly come to think of as technology) or which may not have a pressing need for it, or are much slower in developing it because of their physiological limitations. Say, for an extreme example, there are long lived creatures with very slow metabolisms that communicate through touch or biochemical means and who carve out structures within boulders or large masses of rock by secreting acid - such creatures could eventually develop a complex society that discovers complex mathematics, and which ponders the deep questions of "being" and "existence" and the meaning of life; but certain technological development could be very slow - at least the type of technological development that includes physically exploring space and the ability to communicate beyond their planet.

References:

Human Factors and Ergonomics Society. 12 January 2008. <http://www.hfes.org/>

Human Systems Integration Division at NASA Ames. 19 December 2007. 12 January 2008. <http://humansystems.arc.nasa.gov/>

Alien Technology - Preliminary Thoughts

"The Core" (c) DigitalBlasphemy.com

In speculating upon alien realities, one inevitable topic is what would alien technology be like?

OK, so how can we speculate, predict? One aspect is easy - the laws of physics, including the nature of space-time, are universal (or, at the very least regional). We can make some predictions based on predictions we can make for our own technology (for instance, the development of materials that can hide objects from light and sound).

But after that, much of alien technology will be influenced by the alien's 1) biology/physiology, 2) sociology/culture, 3) theology, 4) physical environment (planetary as well as the space environment), and 5) any outside influence (from another alien culture).

And as we will see later, all of the above are somewhat interconnected - each influencing the other to some degree.

Life on Water Worlds

"Artica" © DigitalBlasphemy.com

No, not the movie of the same name.

Some planets may very well be true water worlds - totally covered in water. Though some, like Gliese 581 C (a "super-earth" 50% larger than the Earth 20.5 light-years away) may have dense water - maybe a thin layer of liquid water on top of compressed water. What sort of life would arise there? Think about it - no dry land, or extremely rare dry land that is easily flooded by storms or tides. Life transitioning to land would not happen, at least not large roaming life which needs territory to grow and thrive on (digression: could high level stationary sentient life ever evolve, I wonder?).

On Earth, life developed limbs and walked out of the seas - large tracts of land allowed for evolution to proceed in that direction. On a planet covered with one giant ocean, that direction would be blocked, unless the poles were cold enough to keep up the continued production of ice floes - then there could be an evolutionary path for living on ice floes part or full-time. Otherwise, any evolutionary development of limbs would go in the direction of underwater ambulation. But how useful is underwater ambulation? As useful as fins on land? And so, over millenia, higher sentient life would evolve totally adapted to the oceans. I don't think they would have just fins - hard to build and use tools without some means of griping and manipulating the physical environment.

That is not to say intelligent life needs a means to physically manipulate the environment, but that the ability to manipulate the environment does allow for greater evolution and progress of the brain, or at least to make it much easier for it to happen.

Maybe on some water world planet, a species of sentient life has evolved that can not manipulate the environment, but they have survived for millenia and so have slowly evolved to be able to do high order abstract thinking - their art, culture, science, and theology would all be based on communication - their only tool left to them; they would manipulate the mental environment. Art would be, for those that communicate via sound, vocal music and oral literature. Science would be based largely on observation and mental experiments (of the kind that Einstein made famous, but that the Greeks did to an extent as well) since they could do little experimenting (some, probably, but not much). They would not less likely to physically explore space, as they would not be able to leave their planet (water is extremely heavy, especially compared to air, lifting a craft full of water out into space would be extremely difficult -albeit not impossible - to do. In addition, making space suits for exploration, especially that of dry surfaces, would be extremely problematic as well). Would they be more likely to become telepathic then? To astrally project themselves? Or is that too "newagey?"

For a large planet with several times greater gravity, a thick ocean may have "normal" water at the top, but definitely, for a thick ocean, water that would become denser quickly the deeper one went - water become plastic, or even solid. We have a slight inkling of that here on Earth - mountain climbers know the air gets thinner as they climb, it is a danger if ignored. For our water world aliens, something similar may be in play.

Depending upon their evolutionary track, if they evolved as deep sea creatures, rising up to the surface may be dangerous - especially if they can not work with tools to create devices to help them breath or deal with the pressure change. Even sea creatures on Earth have ranges - some that live closer to the surface can dive rather deep, but they don't live in the depths. Other deep living creatures tend to stay in the depths, only coming near or to the surface when they are sick or dying (like giant squid) - near the surface is not a friendly environment for them to linger in.

Another thought - would, after millenia, creatures evolve to be like our flying fish? Would the air be conquered there as it has long been here as well by flying creatures? They would have to be creatures that feel at home surrounded by oceans, who do not need land to survive. Probably most likely flying fish like creatures, though maybe one some planets, the flying fish make the evolutionary steps toward fish that fly more than they are fish, and develop lungs and end up spending their lives either floating on the surface (when resting, for instance) and flying.

There are some sea birds on Earth that can live far out at sea, and may spend much of their life out at sea. Such birds tend to glide or soar more than the powered flight. This is because they can take advantage of the wind deflected by waves, and or by ground effect which reduces drag.

Because of convergent evolution (where unrelated species tend to develop similar characteristics due to their sharing similar environments, and due to the fact that the same physical laws apply to all species in the same environment) we can make educated guesses that creatures on other planets will tend to try to be efficient in adapting to their environments just like Earth life. If deflected wind and the ground effect is still in effect on this alien water world, then flying creatures there will glide more than they would use powered flight since the latter uses more energy.

Would these fully pelagic sea bird like creatures be the ones to most likely to become tool makers? They would have, possibly, develop feet (webbed most likely), which could have an opposable digit to help them grip prey (like modern Earth birds) and which could eventually evolve to manipulate tools (as a previous blog entry has noted, some birds, crows most notably, are known to create and use tools, and may be as smart, or even smarter, than a chimpanzee).

Or would the creatures be more like flying fish, or half-bird/half-fish - able to live under water (maybe to nest and breed) as well as live on the water surface and fly over it (to more easily hunt for food - flying through air is faster than flying through water - less dense, less drag).

Though one drawback (to sentient beings) is that on a water planet it would be hard to work with metals - to melt, smelt, and other wise work with metal to create structures and devices that would allow them to eventually explore the stars. Mining ore would be more problematic as well. Water is heavier than air, more dense - it takes more energy to move through it, and probably more difficult to shore up tunnels (not only would they have the weight of the stone above, but the pressure of the water on top bearing down). Light has a harder time penetrating water than it does gaseous atmospheres (sound, however, could travel great distances under water). Working with electricity would be harder. Building telescopes to view the heavens would be harder (though maybe on a planet with rare land, a species that could tolerate the air for short periods could build telescopes on such land - or the avian species, which would have a higher ability to tolerate the air).

On a larger planet, covered with water, how would that affect territorial issues? Would such creatures tend to be more nomadic - especially if they never develop the ability to farm, there is no need to settle down and build cities. Are cities necessary for advancement? Do cities help speed up advancement of civilization, and if they do help (which it does seem like they did for humans), are they the only way? Could nomadic species find their own way to help quickly spur on advancements in civilization? Without natural barriers like mountains, oceans, ice fields, deserts, and large rivers are to humans, would their be less isolation between groups and thus a more "we are one" sort of sentiment develop? Or would groups still develop, some adapting to more colder regions, for instance? (but would this still, in the end, create fewer insulated, insular groups than is the case on Earth?) Would this create a species that would be less xenophobic?

What theology would exist for such creatures? For those on planets with rare land - would the inhospitable land be their version of hell? Or for deep dwelling sentient species, which can not bear being near the lower pressure regions in the upper regions of the sea, would the upper, more lighted, and more dynamic regions be more like hell and heaven more like the darker, heavier, and calmer pressured regions? Would they think all planets are ocean, and that heaven would be a calm ocean? They probably would have some tectonic activity - underwater volcanoes - as well as deep, dark trenches that could play roles in primitive theologies. And for the water bird sentient species, how would their primitive ancestors first think of the world, theologically (I suppose they would love the O.T. verses that describe God as a mother hen).

Two digressions:

1. Would a water world be less susceptible to extinction level events from meteor impacts (no dust to throw up into the air to create a long lasting year round winter that kills off the plant life, no cracking open part of the crust and letting out lava, etc)?

2. There is an article in DVICE.com about the Focus 21 France, a hovercraft prototype that would use the ground effect to achieve helicopter speeds. It would have to fly close to the water to take advantage of the ground effect (a height equal to twice the wingspan or less). I thought that maybe that is how water world sentient species would fly, at least for their earlier flights. Sort of like sub-orbital or low earth orbits for us.

References:

"Astronomers Find First Earth-like Planet in Habitable Zone." ESO. 25 April 2007. 9 December 2007. <http://www.eso.org/public/outreach/press-rel/pr-2007/pr-22-07.html>

White, Charlie. "Focus 21 France uses ground effect to zip above the waves" DVICE.com. 3 December 2007. 9 December 2007. <http://dvice.com/archives/2007/12/focus_21_france.php>

The Lost Regeneration

Most members of the animal kingdom can regenerate lost body parts at some (or all) of their life cycle. Mammals aren't one of those animals. Yet, scientists say the pathway (called the Wnt pathway) still exists, untapped, in mammalians.

Before we start speculating on alien sentient beings being able to routinely sprout new appendages (or like Jeebs, the hapless alien in MIB I and II, a new head), the question that first needs to be pondered is why have mammalians lost, or suppressed, this ability. On the surface, it seems like it would be evolutionary advantageous to retain this ability. Yet apparently it was also advantageous to lose it. Even among creatures that can regenerate, many of them can not do so when adults. This seems to indicate that there must be some problems with regeneration, especially with advanced life forms.

It is obvious we do not fully understand all the parameters regarding regeneration. However, the fact remains the Wnt pathway still exists, latently, but exists in at least some higher mammals. Thus, maybe it is not far-fetched to think there could be sentient aliens with at least some regenerative abilities. In addition, since Earth scientists are looking to restart this latent ability (and have had some success with adult frogs and chicken embryos), it is a distinct possibility that other alien sentient beings could work on restarting any latent regeneration they may have, and may be successful, either as medical procedure, or as a full time reacquired ability.

However, the more advanced the creature, the more there are limitations to the regeneration - that only makes sense. Simple structures are easier to rebuild, with less chance for mistakes. Not so for complex structures. Simple structures require less energy to rebuild than complex structures. Simple structures can rebuild faster. And finally, simple creatures tend to less centralized, the less centralized they are, the easier they can live without a part of themselves. Complex creatures tend to have rather centralized controls. Which brings us to an important point: there are structures that just can't be regenerated - such as a heart, or brain. How can a mammalian body naturally survive a missing heart even if it has the ability to regenerate? The body cannot survive long enough without a heart to give time enough for another heart to regenerate. Same with a brain - if the entire brain is dead or missing, the body cannot continue functioning long enough to allow for regeneration to complete (and even if a creature could regenerate a new head, ala Jeebs in MIB, how could it retain all its knowledge and memories?).

So, how would this affect culture, if we could routinely regenerate missing ears, noses, arms, or legs? For one, it would prolong life - for instance, amputations due to illness would be a temporary set back as the body regrows a healthy new appendage. Maybe more people would be greater risk takers, since the risk of death or permanent dismemberment or disfigurement is lowered (cosmetic surgery? Just remove the offending area, and let a new area grow back). But it also may make war or violence even more common place, since soldiers could be more easily resent back into battle (wars of attrition would take much longer). Of course repeated violence, repeated being torn apart and regrowing must have an affect on the brain, especially on the mental "adaptation" to such a "life." This would also affect culture.

The tougher question is how would it affect theology? What kind of theology would an alien race that had strong natural regenerative powers have?

Reference:

Casselman, Anne. "How to Grow a New Limb." Discover. October 2007. 17.