Really alien aliens

Apophenia said:
With hindsight, others have discounted that 'dinosauroid' concept as being excessively humanoid. A more realistic what-if might involve troodontids evolving into forms with longer armed and shorter necks. That would have eventually allowed for the development of larger-capacity brains in bigger skulls as well as literally encouraging manual dexterity (with resulting benefits to cognitive function).

Russell et al had to make their 'dinosauroid' stand fully erect to make up for its absence of a tail. Of course, bird evolution took a totally different approach to (almost complete) tail-loss. A crouching stance like a bird might scale better if the biped in question was fully terrestrial with more robust bones for muscle attachments. But, an armed bird analogue still wouldn't result in an upright, humanoid life form.
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In the 'BattleTech' novel 'Far Country', human travellers arrive on an unknown planet populated with flightless, intelligent bird aliens . . .
"The Tetatae are native to the Earth-like planet Kaetetôã in an unknown star system. They resemble large flightless birds with arms, standing approximately one and a half meters tall. Male and female Tetatae exist, but seem to have a very similar physical appearance."
From HERE :-

cheers,
Robin.
 
In I think...memory might not be certain on this.....a continuation of the Uplift War.
One alien species is essentially like a giant single cell.
Being inhabitants of gaseous planets if I reccal.
In it's encounter with a human it absorbs them and communicates by a mixture of 3D shapes and chemical signals into the human body.
But it's communication with it's own kind is by literally pieces of itself shot off to be absorbed by others and visa versa.

In the story FTL travel was by one of several methods. The most extreme by a sort of parallel quantum realm. In which entities existed. Included sentient beings.
But talking to them proved unproductive.
 
Apophenia said:
I saw Dale Russell's dinosauroid at the old Natural History Museum in Ottawa back in the '80s. A very cool concept ... but kind of freaky to stand looking eye-to-eye with!
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In reality dinosaurs continued their evolution, you know the all the birds are essentially current dinosaurs evolved by therapods.
An intelligent and tools exploiting dinosaur?
We already have it exactly now on Earth: take the big Amazonian parrots.....
 
I’ve heard the jump from simple cells to complex Eukaryotic cells is a potential answer to the fermi

https://www.reddit.com/r/space/comments/ucbuz3/eukaryogenesis_the_solution_to_the_fermi_paradox
View: https://www.reddit.com/r/space/comments/ucbuz3/eukaryogenesis_the_solution_to_the_fermi_paradox/

For those who don't know what the Fermi paradox is (see here for a great summary video): the galaxy is 10bn years old, and it would only take an alien civilisation 0.002bn years to colonise the whole thing. There are 6bn warm rocky Earth-like planets in the galaxy. For the sake of argument, imagine 0.1% generate intelligent species. Then imagine 0.1% of those species end up spreading out through space and reaching our field of view. That means we'd see evidence of 6,000 civilisations near our solar system - but we see nothing. Why?

The issue with many proposed solutions to the Fermi paradox is that they must apply perfectly to those 6,000 civilisations independently. For example, aliens could prefer to exist in virtual reality than explore the physical universe - but would that consistently happen every time to 6,000 separate civilisations?

Surely the most relevant aspect of the Fermi paradox is time. The galaxy has been producing stars and planets for 10bn years. Earth has existed for 4.54bn of those years. The earliest known life formed on Earth 4bn years ago (Ga). However, there is some evidence to suggest it may have formed as early as 4.5 Ga (source). Life then existed on Earth as single celled archaea/bacteria until 2.1 Ga, when the first eukaryotes developed. After that, key milestones happened relatively quickly – multicellular life appeared 1.6 Ga, earliest animals 0.8 Ga, dinosaurs 0.2 Ga, mammals 0.1 Ga, primates 0.08 Ga, earliest humans 0.008 Ga, behaviourally modern humans 0.00005 Ga, and the first human reached space 0.00000006 Ga.

It's been proposed that the development of the first eukaryotes (eukaryogenesis) was the single most important milestone in the history of life, and it's so remarkable that it could be the only time in the history of the galaxy that it's happened, and therefore the solution to the Fermi paradox. A eukaryote has a cell membrane and a nucleus, and is 1,000 times bigger than an archaea/bacteria. It can produce far more energy, and this energy allows for greater complexity. It probably happened when a bacterium "swallowed" an archaea, but instead of digesting it, the two started a symbiotic relationship where the archaea started producing energy for the bacterium. It may also have involved a giant virus adding its genetic factory mechanism into the mix. In other words, it was extremely unlikely to have happened.

The galaxy could be full of planets hosting archaea/bacteria, but Earth could be the first one where eukaryogenesis miraculously happened and is the "great filter" which we have successfully passed to become the very first intelligent form of life in the galaxy - there are 3 major reasons for why:

  1. The appearance of the eukaryote took much more time than the appearance of life itself: It took 0.04-0.5bn years for archaea/bacteria to appear on Earth, but it took a whopping 1.9-2.4bn years for that early life to become eukaryotic. In other words, it took far less time for life to spontaneously develop from a lifeless Earth than it took for that life to generate a eukaryote, which is crazy when you think about it
  2. The appearance of the eukaryote took more time than every other evolutionary step combined: The 1.9-2.4bn years that eukaryogenesis took is 42-53% of the entire history of life. It's 19-24% of the age of the galaxy itself
  3. It only happened once: Once eukaryotes developed, multicellular organisms developed independently, over 40 seperate times. However, eukaryogenesis only happened once. Every cell in every eukaryote, including you and me, is descended from that first eukaryote. All those trillions of interactions between bacteria, archaea and giant viruses, and in only one situation did they produce a eukaryote.
This paper analyses the timing of evolutionary transitions and concludes that, "the expected evolutionary transition times likely exceed the lifetime of Earth, perhaps by many orders of magnitude". In other words, it's exceptionally lucky for intelligent life to have emerged as quickly as it did, even though it took 4.5bn years (of the galaxy's 10bn year timespan). It also mentions that our sun's increasing luminosity will render the Earth uninhabitable in 0.8-1.3bn years, so we're pretty much just in time!

Earth has been the perfect cradle for life (source) - it's had Jupiter nearby to suck up dangerous meteors, a perfectly sized moon to enable tides, tectonic plates which encourage rich minerals to bubble up to the crust, and it's got a rotating metal core which produces a magnetic field to protect from cosmic rays. And yet it's still taken life all this time to produce an intelligent civilisation.

I've been researching the Fermi paradox for a while and eukaryogenesis is such a compelling topic, it's now in my view the single reason why we see no evidence of aliens. Thanks for reading.
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The one and only true remaining question is: Who would all those dirty stinking apes vote for???
 
New Approach called the geological solution to the Fermi paradox
A Study by Robert J. Stern and Taras V. Gerya
Point on the importance of planetary tectonic for biological evolution
mean since Earth has planetary tectonic and Life, while Mars And Venus no planetary tectonic and no Life [or not found yet]

Imply that Life can only originate on World with active planetary tectonic
[This also imply theory that earth like Planet need a Moon for keep planetary tectonic active - or be Moon of Gas giant (Pandora) ]
There conclusion is grim, since of 8 planets in Solarsystem, only Earth has Intelligent Life.
So life can be rare in Univers...

more on theory
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sTbkHDXEA0&t=731s


Source
www.nature.com

The importance of continents, oceans and plate tectonics for the evolution of complex life: implications for finding extraterrestrial civilizations - Scientific Reports

Within the uncertainties of involved astronomical and biological parameters, the Drake Equation typically predicts that there should be many exoplanets in our galaxy hosting active, communicative civilizations (ACCs). These optimistic calculations are however not supported by evidence, which is...
www.nature.com www.nature.com
 
There's more considerations, at least in terms of what we would rapidly recognize as life. There may be some really freaking weird stuff out there, like silicon-based life forms that need to be at 500degC to function, or really exotic things that can live in star or whatever. But it'd take us forever to even look for those things.

But roughly earth-like life?

Planets within the liquid-water range of the star, or if they're outside of that are they close enough to their Gas Giant that they still manage to have liquid water (like Europa)?

They need active plate tectonics (probably), they definitely need a moon to cause tides, they need a liquid core and a planetary magnetic field, then we can look for free oxygen in the air.
 
The complete helplessness of human infants at birth and the length of time required for them to look after themselves seems the most likely reason for our evolution of "unique" human skills like using clothes and fire to keep ourselves alive and developing crops to feed on.

Other animals dont have this problem. I suppose it is possible that insects or reptiles might be similarly vulnerable on other planets. But I cannot see why.

An apelike biped with symmetrical arms and legs and no fur to keep it warm coupled with a large brain seems to me the most likely animal with helpless young that need a society to raise.

Elephant babies are nowhere near as helpless as their human equivalents.
 
Scott Kenny said:
They need active plate tectonics (probably), they definitely need a moon to cause tides, they need a liquid core and a planetary magnetic field, then we can look for free oxygen in the air.
Click to expand...
Oxygen might not be an indication of life at all.

www.theguardian.com

‘Dark oxygen’ in depths of Pacific Ocean could force rethink about origins of life

Electrically charged metallic lumps found to produce oxygen in total darkness in process aking to how plants use photosynthesis
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
 

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Michel Van said:
New Approach called the geological solution to the Fermi paradox
A Study by Robert J. Stern and Taras V. Gerya
Point on the importance of planetary tectonic for biological evolution
mean since Earth has planetary tectonic and Life, while Mars And Venus no planetary tectonic and no Life [or not found yet]

Imply that Life can only originate on World with active planetary tectonic
[This also imply theory that earth like Planet need a Moon for keep planetary tectonic active - or be Moon of Gas giant (Pandora) ]
There conclusion is grim, since of 8 planets in Solarsystem, only Earth has Intelligent Life.
So life can be rare in Univers...

more on theory
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sTbkHDXEA0&t=731s


Source
www.nature.com

The importance of continents, oceans and plate tectonics for the evolution of complex life: implications for finding extraterrestrial civilizations - Scientific Reports

Within the uncertainties of involved astronomical and biological parameters, the Drake Equation typically predicts that there should be many exoplanets in our galaxy hosting active, communicative civilizations (ACCs). These optimistic calculations are however not supported by evidence, which is...
www.nature.com www.nature.com
Click to expand...

Professor Brian Cox's take on the Fermi Paradox . . .

"Until recently my guess has been that the answer to the Fermi Paradox might be found in biology - complex biological systems are rare.
I’m increasingly of the view that the reason for The Great Silence is that civilisations are inevitably crushed by the weight of nobheads shortly after inventing the internet."

https://twitter.com/x/status/1803357229208215883
View: https://x.com/ProfBrianCox/status/1803357229208215883


cheers,
Robin.
 
Humans be the product of rock pool apes on some forgotten coast.

Floating upright in salt water, freeing the hands to grope for shellfish. Yet a nearby stream of fresh water kept us from having to adapt to drinking salt water.

This is why you are so hairless compared to other apes.
This is why you sweat, cry, defecate, and urinate salt. Like no land mammal.
Why you have a layer of subcutaneous fat.

And this is why the female cycle has more in common with the tidal range. Dictated by luna orbit.

The sea taught us to stand upright and then we walked into the savanna. Upright you caught the warmth of the rising sun. But in midday when the sun was overhead you presented the least area to heat up.

And walking is efficient, basically falling forward and catching it. Humans can walk other animals to death.
 
zen said:
Humans be the product of rock pool apes on some forgotten coast.
Click to expand...
What Zen means is the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis
That our early ancestor life in pond or coast and adapted to aquatic life style.
This Hypothesis is also connected as "pseudo scientific evidence" to Mermaid mythos.

More here:

Aquatic ape hypothesis - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
 
Michel Van said:
What Zen means is the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis
That our early ancestor life in pond or coast and adapted to aquatic life style.
Click to expand...
Yes it's the best explanation of these features of humans.

However pseudoscience is of no relevance. I don't know why you'd even mention that?
 
zen said:
However pseudoscience is of no relevance. I don't know why you'd even mention that?
Click to expand...
my last line is bit misunderstandig , the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis, is misused today as pseudoscience explanation for Mermaid.
 
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Michel Van said:
8 planets in Solarsystem, only Earth has Intelligent Life
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This is not a consequence of tectonics alone.
There are also notable differences to be considered in radiation, temperature, chemistry, pressure or gravity that had an influence on which molecular structures and biochemical reactions are possible
 
I'm not saying it was really alien aliens, but...

88ab6d25b45394c68d6dab3571837615.jpg
 
robunos said:
Professor Brian Cox's take on the Fermi Paradox . . .

"Until recently my guess has been that the answer to the Fermi Paradox might be found in biology - complex biological systems are rare.
I’m increasingly of the view that the reason for The Great Silence is that civilisations are inevitably crushed by the weight of nobheads shortly after inventing the internet."

https://twitter.com/x/status/1803357229208215883
View: https://x.com/ProfBrianCox/status/1803357229208215883


cheers,
Robin.
Click to expand...

robunos said:
Professor Brian Cox's take on the Fermi Paradox . . .

"Until recently my guess has been that the answer to the Fermi Paradox might be found in biology - complex biological systems are rare.
I’m increasingly of the view that the reason for The Great Silence is that civilisations are inevitably crushed by the weight of nobheads shortly after inventing the internet."

https://twitter.com/x/status/1803357229208215883
View: https://x.com/ProfBrianCox/status/1803357229208215883


cheers,
Robin.
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The Great Silence only exists in the stupid theory that aliens use the radio to communicate.

If it is not possible to exceed the speed of light, then it makes no sense to speculate whether there are other civilizations in the galaxy.

If it is possible to exceed the speed of light, then there is no point in trying to communicate with them by radio.

If our theoretical physicists are not able to overcome Einstein's complex, AI had better do it.
 

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Justo Miranda said:
The Great Silence only exists in the stupid theory that aliens use the radio to communicate.

If it is not possible to exceed the speed of light, then it makes no sense to speculate whether there are other civilizations in the galaxy.

If it is possible to exceed the speed of light, then there is no point in trying to communicate with them by radio.

If our theoretical physicists are not able to overcome Einstein's complex, AI had better do it.
Click to expand...
Einstein himself was pretty found of direct lazer signals
 
Michel Van said:
my last line is bit misunderstandig , the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis, is misused today as pseudoscience explanation for Mermaid.
Click to expand...
If the aquatic monkey hypothesis were true, we could spend as much time underwater as seals, dolphins or whales. But our respiratory system evolved to run long distances upright (behind gazelles... or in front of the Smilodon)
 
Michel Van said:
What Zen means is the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis
That our early ancestor life in pond or coast and adapted to aquatic life style.
This Hypothesis is also connected as "pseudo scientific evidence" to Mermaid mythos.

More here:

Aquatic ape hypothesis - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
Click to expand...
The mermaid is not a myth, I drink coffee every day at her house.:)
 
zen said:
I quite liked the compound entities based on dog like units that when gathered into a pack attain consciousness from A Fire Upon the Deep.
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Gestalt organisms are immortal, their individual members at death are replaced by others and the collective memory remains.

The phenomenon has been observed in social insects.

There is also a fascinating political theory according to which the Roman Senate survived the Caesars, the barbarians and Islam to become the Vatican Curia in the West and the Politburo in the East... the myth of Hydra.
 
A couple of thoughts...
1) Our corner of galaxy arm is not average due to location within 'Local Bubble', a significantly thinned 'cavity' blown by a group of big, young stars that ran through their fuel and blew to supernovas. Sol-system's galactic orbit came into this region about five million years ago, documented by characteristic isotopes deposited in ancient polar ice.
FWIW, I've seen older and younger estimates, YMMV.
Given the fire-front of 'Local Bubble' was enough to squash gas-clouds and spawn fresh star formation, it could seem a 'tsunami' that would make 'Carrington event' look like a spilled drink
Enough grief to make any 'Priors' pack and leave ahead of 'storm' ?? Think 'Floridians' decamping for hurricane season...

A copy of my wry fictionalised take, 'Of Filters and Fire Walls..' .may be found at. #15 of...
www.physicsforums.com

The Short Story Thread: Post Yours Here

I see a lot of posts here in the writing and world-building forum that ask for help in creating a story, but I rarely see any actual stories! Perhaps you've never shown your writing to anyone else or maybe you've never gotten to the part of writing where you actually do some writing (it's quite...
www.physicsforums.com www.physicsforums.com

2) You know that thing about 'Chaos Theory', where the 'map' may exhibit 'Attractors' ? The Crab / Beetle' body-shape seems one such 'Attractor', with multi-legged beasties from a variety of divergent lineages converging on that plan. And, yes, if there is a Deity, which I strongly doubt, They have a remarkable fondness for beetles...

3) Perhaps the 'Aquatic Ape' conundrum hay be solved by invoking the Toba mega-eruption ~~70k BP ?
Humanity was lucky, as seasonal winds took much toxic ash away from Africa, But, that continent still got hammered. Consider how Crete was poisoned via ash fluorosis from the lesser Thera / Santorini eruption ??
Around the African and other coasts, washed clean by waves, tides and currents, the gleaning would have been much safer than inland...
 
Hood said:
Oxygen might not be an indication of life at all.

www.theguardian.com

‘Dark oxygen’ in depths of Pacific Ocean could force rethink about origins of life

Electrically charged metallic lumps found to produce oxygen in total darkness in process aking to how plants use photosynthesis
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
Click to expand...
A little more detail:
Grey Havoc said:
maritime-executive.com

Mineral-Rich Nodules Produce "Dark" Oxygen in the Abyss

Researchers funded by a polymetallic nodule mining company appear to have discovered an entirely new source of oxygen production in the abyssal plain...
maritime-executive.com maritime-executive.com
Click to expand...
 
Justo Miranda said:
Gestalt organisms are immortal, their individual members at death are replaced by others and the collective memory remains.
Click to expand...
In the book this is....not quite the case. Since the descrete individual consciousness is the product of a pack of dog-like creatures. Which individually do not have high enough intelligence. Each pack is a human-like conscious individual.
As that pack adds or looses an member so the personality and skills change. Break the pack up and you effectively kill that person.

Quite a clever idea I thought.
 
Justo Miranda said:
If the aquatic monkey hypothesis were true, we could spend as much time underwater as seals, dolphins or whales. But our respiratory system evolved to run long distances upright (behind gazelles... or in front of the Smilodon)
Click to expand...

How many other apes can safely give birth in water, where instinctively the baby holds it's breath until it surfaces?

How many other apes shed salt out in such quantities as Humans?

How many other apes have the layer of subcutaneous fat?
Or the femals having 'monthly' cycles (appropriate term).

The Aquatic Ape is something very far back in human history. The Savanna is more recent relatively speaking.

The problem with the theory, is that the evidence of such is very unlikely to survive. Being on the coast and subject to erosion.
 
zen said:
How many other apes can safely give birth in water, where instinctively the baby holds it's breath until it surfaces?

How many other apes shed salt out in such quantities as Humans?

How many other apes have the layer of subcutaneous fat?
Or the femals having 'monthly' cycles (appropriate term).

The Aquatic Ape is something very far back in human history. The Savanna is more recent relatively speaking.

The problem with the theory, is that the evidence of such is very unlikely to survive. Being on the coast and subject to erosion.
Click to expand...


Humans have spent a lot of time feeding on the sea, thick layers of sediment made up of millions of mollusc shells have been found in archaeological sites that could only have been caught by diving in shallow waters. Possibly evolution prevented those who swam better from starving to death and their descendants inherited the characteristics you cite in your examples. I remember reading something about the orientation of the hair on the back that seems suitable for minimizing hydrodynamic drag. In any case, we never depended exclusively on the sea, possibly because of the changes in the seasons of the year, surely these hominids alternated their food sources with hunting, berries, carrion and cannibalism. No one is perfect.
 
Aubi said:
"The elders tell of a young ball much like you. He bounced three meters in the air, then he bounced 1.8 meters in the air, then he bounced four meters in the air.
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Thus the Spirit/Opportunity air-
bags contraptions--were really scientist's own version of of Pinhead's Lament Configuration/Puzzle Box.
 
I always thought that the more "exciting" versions like HR Giger`s ALIEN and so on, were probably not realistic as if you are a species which is just mind bent on eating anything you see, and being totally immutable and unable to enter into any form of negotiation of discussion, eventually if/when you become space faring, whoever the galactic grandads of the cosmos are will just take one look at you and do whatever the galactic equivalent of splatting you with a newspaper is (I appreciate that the ALIEN is shown to be a sort of parasite not a creator of technology itself, I`m just trying to say that I think the "pure ultraviolence" model of existing will get to a point of not working if you ever try going anywhere). That of course depends on how populated you imagine the place to be in general.

Hive mind things always seemed quite plausible, as you don't need a huge or complex physical body to do very extraordinary things. I`m pretty sure Bees are in unison smarter than several actual people I`ve met, and I have private suspicions that the way they communicate and so on (if you include things like genetic memory) is a lot more involved than just the waggling dances they`re known to do.
 

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