How to detect if you are in orbit?

[Bowler1]

Shorter stumps would be another solution in high gravity using bigger thicker bones with bigger muscles. Maybe even a skeleton scaffold structure for added support.

[Vertigo]

Yup, and I actually think that is more likely than extra limbs. So still similar if a little squashed looking

[Parson]

Originally Posted by Vertigo

I actually go against the general thoughts of many on this point. I think the thought processes, motivations and attitudes of aliens are unlikely to be all that different to our own. The evolutionary pressures on species are always going to be very similar; survival and procreation. Now that can be very different whether you are looking at a herbivore or carnivore but if you look at most herbivores on Earth their fundamental behaviour is actually very similar, the same goes for carnivores. Yes in both cases some are solitary and some social and that creates differences and there are of course many other differences. But they are really not that big when you get right down to it. We can relate to and understand the behaviour of pretty much all the creatures on our planet.

I actually agree with you on the base needs. I think they would be comprehensible. That's why I was speaking of higher moral questions -- Like should we save this race. For either a base carnivore/omnivore or herbivore the question could have a sensible answer in either direction.

I would also go further and argue that intelligence is unlikely to develop in non social creatures and also less likely in herbivores. All the smartest animals on our planet tend to be social; higher intelligence required to communicate, and carnivore; hunting animals requires more intelligence than fleeing ones.

But again that is a whole other topic for discussion. However the bottom line is I personally think that if we ever do encounter intelligent aliens we might find they are surprisingly like us. Right down to physiology. Big brains must be kept cool, so dump that fur and get a better cooling system like our sweating. Outside of insects evolution has never produced any land animals with more than four limbs (I suspect extra limbs would be too complex to control conciously). An intelligent species (at least technological ones) need manipulators so it would logically become bipedal to free up two of those limbs. I could go on The more I think about the requirements of an intelligent, technological creature the more logic points at a configuration similar to our own.

This is logical, but I can't help the niggling suspicion that our limited experience makes what we think "obvious" likely less than that.

[Vertigo]

Well of course we'll never know until we do, or if we do, make contact. But yes I would agree broadly that moral values would probably be quite different depending on evolutionary origins, particularly herbivore or carnivore. Of course, as omnivores, we sit somewhere in the middle.

Actually, I also have a tendency to think that omnivores are the more likely origins of intelligence. By their nature omnivores are inclinded to a more varied diet which implies a mind less focussed on one particular way of acquiring food. This suggests to me a mind more open to new possibilities combined with an opportunistic approach to finding food. That combines with the need to communicate in a social group.

Hehe, sorry one of my pet subjects. I love trying to figure out what evolutionary pressures are most likely to produce intelligence. Or maybe more accurately what evolutionary niches where intelligence, and in particular abstract thought, would be useful from a survival perspective and therefore prove to be a successful mutation.

[Metryq]

Originally Posted by Dozmonic

Plato's cave for genetically engineered humans :-)

Not quite—the point of Plato's cave is that one does not perceive the real world, but only shadows or projections of it. In Vertigo's story, the young humans have been taught all the proper physics, yet told a lie about their actual situation. One of Plato's cave-dwellers would not even recognize a real, 3D object for what it was.

And I'm with Parson on the "obviousness" of evolutionary design. Nature is not an engineer seeking the greatest efficiency. All it needs are solutions that work. Considering the diversity of forms on this one planet, I wouldn't make any bets on how weird something from another star system might be. That is, there might be factors rendering all life within one star system somewhat similar. However, I would not be surprised if evolution produced many similar solutions elsewhere. (I just don't hold with the idea that there is one, best way. Look at all the engineering buffoonery in the human design, but that didn't stop us from becoming the top predator on the planet.)

Psychological differences are even harder to guess. Consider the differences between human civilizations—and I'm not talking about minor differences like language. South American civilizations had an entirely different perception of time than the European explorers who ran over them. There are many eastern philosophies that see everything in nature as cyclic, while most westerners view the universe as linear.

I like the idea of different factions within the alien community. All too many sci-fi productions stamp all their aliens out of the same mold—they all look the same, they think the same, etc.

[Bowler1]

One of the fun bit about SciFi is creating aliens. So far my top two, a Killer Bird species and a Dog/Kangaroo cross. I have others but not as well developed yet. I nearly always have the aliens with different factions and the humans in the middle trying to figure out the local politics. Of course aliens would have different views and may even come to blows over these views, we do all the time. I do place human motivations on my aliens, simply because it is what I understand hence I can write up these motivations and weave my plot.

[Vertigo]

Metryq, I can see both arguments for similiar and dissimilar aliens but I personally swing in favour of similiar rather than dissimilar. I actually think when you look closely at life on Earth, whilst there is huge diversity on the surface, underneath that diversity there are really only a handful of fundementally different 'types' of life. Like Insect, mammal, reptile etc. Sure there are lots of different types, sizes and shapes of mammal but inside they all work in pretty much the same way. However that said, we do only have the one sample planet to extrapolate from so I'm certainly not denying other possibilities. Though the absence of life anywhere else in the solar system is a rather telling point on life's likes and dislikes. Yes we might yet find some but I don't think it will be what we would call higher order life.

I like to think I keep an open mind but, based on the current evidence (and after all that is all we can do in science), I suspect similarities are more likely than dissimilarities.

Of course as Metryq says that are differences in thinking between different social groups of humans. But really those differences are still on very much on the surface. When it comes right down to fundamental motivators like love, hate, hunger, lust etc. I think you'll find we're all pretty similar.

[Bowler1]

Motivators like love, hate, hunger, lust etc. I think you’ll find are all closely linked to survival of the species. Metryg is correct in pointing out that aliens may have views so different to our that we may never understand each other but it would make plot and storyline difficult. So I’m taking the easy route for now as I have enough to get on with just polishing up my writing style.

When it comes to life out there, I think life will be reasonably common. My view is intelligent life will be rare and again I will use earth as the best example. We have popped up recently and we are an intelligent fluke of evolution that could have occurred earlier - a clever dinosaur type! But there have been millions of years and even a number of extinctions where life restarted without an intelligent species taking over. What does this tell me, a big brain is rare and there must be a good reason for this in evolution. So lucky for me this theory of mine will leave life giving planets available for human expansion which is nice. It will also give me aliens to play with. Levels of technology are a different question and this is where the SciFi comes in. Our spaceships will be the Wright brothers and the aliens will be whizzing around in the Euro Fighter. Some aliens will be happy to see us and some won’t and that could be different views from the same species. So its quick draw on the ray guns and blast my way out of trouble.

[Vertigo]

Pretty comparable viewpoint there Bowler. And besides, never mind what I actually expect, it's fun coming up with weird and wonderful aliens. Just take Neal Asher's Spatterjay flora and fauna - imaginative doesn't really cover it. But he has worked out valid evolutionary backgrounds for all of them.

[Bowler1]

I have read that one it was out there like all the other stories he comes up with. I think I'll stick with my easy aliens for now and work on my writing. Everything was, in my mind at least, going so well until I joined Chrons. Now I know I have a bit of work to do! The good news is that I have discovered my imagination needs little improving on I just have to channel that beast.

[Metryq]

Orbit detector with no windows: a Sagnac interferometer.

Michelson-Morley Experiment AAAS/NPA Conference Presentation Holy Einstein, Batman!

[Vertigo]

Interesting stuff Metryq, though possibly a little too complex for my immediate purposes.

[Metryq]

Oh, come on! You mean none of the kids have a laser pointer for teasing the ship's cat? You could call the story "Fringe Science."

[Vertigo]

Heh he!