Monday - October 22, 2007

Lasers, Spaceships, and Nanotubes:  Part 2 (Unfinished Draft)

I've come to terms with the fact that I'm not ever going to get this story finished.  Despite that, I'm going to resume blogging, and this is what is left that was going to partly makeup part 2.  I wrote none of the final piece, the conclusion.

Since only a few civilizations developed lasers, spaceships, and nanotubes independently, these technologies reached others through one of several methods, including generosity, commercial exchange, theft, and forced adoption.  In this part we'll consider how civilizations adopted alien technologies, the consequences of the methods of adoption, and the consequences of adoption.

Since the Gujurpus were the first to explore across space, they naturally had the first encounter with a foreign species, too.  Although the Hotari and Jitnurys are often thought of as the first peoples they encountered, a Gujurpian explorer actually encountered another species first, the Motluks.  The Motluks are often forgotten because they did not spread through the universe, nor did they thrive after meeting the Gujurpus.  Instead, despite the Gujurpus's best efforts to introduce technologies that they believed would improve the Motluks lives, the Motluks generally refused to adopt technologies and preferred to live a primitive life.  Even today only moderate technological progress has been made with the Motluks, who have only recently adopted modern medical techniques.  Why, despite being the first people contacted by a spacefaring civilization, did the Motluks reject the technologies that would have allowed them to participate equally in the politics of the universe?

The answer lies in Motluk culture.  Although still a young species when the Gujurpus encountered them, the Motluks had surprisingly primitive technology.  They had only begun to develop metallurgy, despite easily accessible sources of metal ore, and had no concept of agriculture or husbandry.  The Gujurpus subsisted by grazing on the ample vegetation and built only stone and wood structures, the former for administrative and religious purposes and the latter for housing.  To the Motluks, the Gujurpus were gods, and only when an elderly Gujurpu, Alfred [2] died on the Motluk planet did the Motluks believe otherwise.  Their reaction to that death proved insightful.  The Motluk city where Alfred died went from fearing the Gujurpus as they feared their gods to hating the Gujurpus for bringing heathen knowledge to their planet that would likely incur the gods' wrath.  Despite some brave Motluk subcultures that sought out Gujurpian influence and migrated off-world, the Motluks have remained fearful of outside influence and have only slowly adopted instantaneous communication (used almost exclusively intraplanet), nanotube building materials (only because the planet underwent a geologically unstable period that destroyed most stone structures and forced adoption of nanotubes), and medicine (only because of an accidentally introduced virus that mutated to attack Motluks).

[2]:  The elderly Gujurpu's name is all but unprintable in Human languages, so I've translated the name to the closest equivalent in terms of perception.

Thursday - June 07, 2007

Lasers, Spaceships, and Nanotubes: Part 1

Civilizations obtained lasers, spaceships, and nanotubes by one of two methods; they either invented these technologies independently, or they adopted them from other civilizations.  In this first part, we'll look at how some civilizations developed lasers, spaceships, and nanotubes.  In the second part we'll consider how other civilizations acquired, or failed to acquire, the technologies that allowed some civilizations to dominate others.

The first species to rise to galactic power was my own, the Gujurpus.  Four hundred eighty seven centuries ago [1], early Gujurpus built the first spaceships in the galaxy and explored their planetary neighbors.  First they colonized the satellites of Gujupa, then other planets in their solar system, laying the foundations for an interplanetary civilization.  Over the next 48 centuries the Gujurpus spread to all 11 planets and 789 asteroids in their home system.  By the 22nd century after reaching space, though, the Gujurpus were already feeling crowded, so they began to explore nearby stars which they observed to have planets.  They sent hundreds of spaceships out into the galaxy, some which would reach their destinations after only several centuries, starting the Golden Age of Exploration.

Why was it the Gujurpus, and not the Hotari, Jitnurys, or many other species they encountered, who first developed spaceships and lasers?  Let us consider how the Gujurpus developed spaceships and lasers, and why the order in which they developed proved important.  Surprising to many species, ancient Gujurpus developed lasers millennia before space travel was remotely possible.  This strange history is a consequence of Gujupa's many surface rocks high in stored energy.  By a simple, easily discoverable chemical reaction, these rocks generate enough light to provide the basis of a power system.  It was only a short time before the Gujurpus focused this light through translucent gems to create fine beams of light:  lasers.

While most species fought with physical impact weapons before they developed space flight, the Gujurpus used lasers, and in short time, high-energy weapons.  After the atrocities of the Fourth Dyanad, the Gujurpus people were eager to find a way to permanent peace, which resulted in the political unification of Gujurpa.  So when, just two short centuries later, the Gujurpa developed space flight, they made the jump, not as several warring factions, but as a planet.  And as history has shown, this pre-space-flight unification is essential to rapid success of multi-planetary and multi-system governments.

Throughout the known universe the story of the Gujurpus has been repeated (cf. the histories of the Manbars, the Hollindots, and the Woralbas), with one interesting exception.  The Autiumyannias stand out for many reasons.  They developed space flight long before lasers or nanotechnology.  They are carbon-based and breathe oxygen.  They came into space without political unification.  Yet they rose to dominate their neighboring systems.  The story how is the exception that proves the rule.

Like the Gujurpus, the Autiumyannias are an ancient species, with a history in space beginning five hundred thirty eight centuries ago.  They were arguably the first species to develop space flight, although constant fighting caused them to remain on their home planet until approximately four hundred fifty centuries ago, when the destruction they had done to their environment forced them to migrate to other planets in their system.  These were the unlikely beginnings of a galactic empire.

Autiumyannian unification came only by military domination.  One faction fought their way across the system, planet to planet, conquering all 8 habitable planets.  The Autiumyannians then entered a dark age as the ruling faction destroyed all historical records and encouraged a culture of presentism.  By three hundred ninety eight centuries ago, though, quiet political revolution brought them back to normative government.  Autiumyannian scientists rediscovered their history, and the people began looking to the future.  Seeing that one day their population would exceed what their home system could support, they set out to spread through the universe.

Despite the recent peace among themselves, the Autiumyannias remained war-like and slaughtered several dozen species as they expanded to their neighbors, leaving extant only those species that could be usefully enslaved.  Only upon encountering the powerful empire of the Woralbas did their reign of destruction end, ultimately resulting in subjugation of the Autiumyannias.

How did the Autiumyannias rise to power despite constant war and frequent setbacks?  Simply put, isolation.  The nearest space faring species to challenge them were the Warolbas, and they were separated by the Void of Garrlagh.  With much more promising territory, the Warolbas never bothered to visit the Autiumyannias or their neighbors, meting them only when the Autiumyannias traveled through the Void in hopes of continuing their expansion.  Thus we see Autiumyannian achievements depended largely on the luck of isolation and being the oldest life in their stellar island.

By all accounts, then, it seems the Hotari should have developed into a galactic power.  They remained isolated for many hundreds of centuries, being older even than the Autiumyannias, yet never developed spaceships.  They only learned of spaceships when a Gujurpian explorer arrived.  Yet they were politically unified and had developed nanotechnology beyond anything the Gujurpus knew.  But the Hotari didn't develop spaceships because they didn't want to leave home.  They only took to space when their population exceeded what their planet could sustain.

Based on this review of history, three common themes emerge among the dominant civilizations:  early development of space faring technology, sufficient political stability to support expansion, and lack of other similarly advanced species.  Only when all three appear together is it possible for a civilization to rise to early dominance.  However, not all the multi-system governments of the known universe are the continuation of these early civilizations.  In the next part, we look at how other civilizations adapted to, or failed to adapt to, lasers, spaceships, and nanotubes.

[1]:  Since Humans are generally unfamiliar with standard galactic time-keeping units, I've translated them to Earth-centric ones when necessary.  The author literally said "1546 gigaseconds ago".

Thursday - April 19, 2007

Lasers, Germs, and Nanotubes:  Introduction

Preface

Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs, and Steel describes how some civilizations came to dominate the modern world while others did not.  My goal in the next few blog posts is to present a similar, theoretical argument about the how some civilizations might come to dominate the galaxy while others might not, although written in the past tense as if it had already happened.  Consider this a thought experiment about a future where space travel is realized, but the Singularity is not.  Or, if you like, speculative nonfiction.

Prologue

While visiting Earth, one of the most remote and, until recently, least modern planets in the galaxy, I met a man named John while walking along the coast of southern North America.  A Human, he could have easily overtaken me, but he slowed and we walked together for several thousand seconds.  He asked me what I was doing on Earth, and I explained I was conducting biological research on Earth's coastal bivalves, a rare animal form known to have appeared natively on only three worlds.  He pried a little and I told him about animal diversity and why some body plans appear only rarely, while others are nearly universal.  He said that reminded him of his own species predicament, how Humans had a rare body chemistry that made it difficult for them to endure space travel and the environments of other worlds.  But, he made sure to note, despite this humans had a very similar level of intelligence to other intelligent species in the galaxy, which led him to ask the question that inspired this work:  why did the Gunkins create so much technology and bring it to Earth, while Humans created relatively no technology of our own?

I had no ready answer for him, and his question has continued to gnaw at me over the past few centuries since I last visited Earth, long after John died and my research there was done.  I've spent much of that time, on and off, considering the issue and I believe I have found an answer, but before I can get to it, I must first consider some of the answers I disproved, because they are commonly given as solutions to this puzzle.

The most common argument is that some species are smarter than others.  While it is no doubt true that some species are smarter than others, history shows that average species intelligence was not a significant factor in determining which civilizations came to dominate the galaxy.  For example, Humans are easily more intelligent than Jitnurys, yet it was the Jitnurys' who conquered Earth and not the Humans who conquered Ituria.  How, then, did the less intelligent Jitnurys defeat the more intelligent Humans?

Another common argument is planetary environment.  Planets with oxygen-rich environments promote lazy plants and animals that do not have to fight for their survival, so the argument goes, while sulfur-rich planets provide a stimulating effect to the inhabitants.  But this argument could just as easily be reversed, to say that life on oxygen-rich planets had the advantage because the plants and animals there had the free time, once they achieved a sufficient level of intelligence, to develop the technology to assert galactic power, whereas life on sulfur-rich planets, even after achieving sufficient intelligence, had to struggle to metabolize sufficient energy to survive.  Since we can draw two equally likely conclusions from the same evidence, it seems unlikely that such arguments about planetary environment had a strong effect on the development of technology.

A third common argument is that body chemistry played the deciding role, with either carbon or silicon playing the role of fundamental organic element.  Typically, the element argued to provide advantage depends on the composition of the arguer.  But again, although silicon-based life came to dominate the galaxy, carbon-based species like the Autiumyannias demonstrate that body chemistry does not prevent non-silicon-based species from developing space travel, high-energy weapons, or the instantaneous communication channels necessary to administrate a multi-system government.  Thus even differences of organic chemicals do not adequately answer John's question.

Thus we come to what seems the most likely argument.  Some species developed lasers, germs, and nanotubes, allowing them to subjugate and outpace other species who had only only mass weapons, poor medical care, and little knowledge of advanced materials.  But as clear as that is, why did some species have these advantages while others did not.  To find out, we must go back millions of years to the origins of intelligent life in the known galaxy, to see when and why some species found advantages while others did not.  We want to find out why it was the Gunkins, and not the Humans, who had the lasers, spaceships, and germs.