[FH] Colonisation again (was Re: Sa'Vasku Colours)

G'day Tom,

> or if there is, get rid of it. the first step in colonisation is

If we learnt anything from colonisation of our own world I'd hope the first
think we did was send a lead team/probe to discern whether the life was
hazardous or not, rather than just straight avoid or straight 'zap em
all'.
(Yes the cynic in me does realise how unlikely that is).

> no but seriously folks, my thinking is that if a planet has native

I'm curious, what do you mean by dead worlds? Ones which could easily support
life and just don't or ones that don't have life because they can't (anymore
or yet)? Besides that I think you're setting a pretty stiff task if you
'disallow' use of existing ecosystems (assuming they're even part

way compatible with us), based on my current understanding (and a little

supposition) I'd reckon most planets that can support life will already have
some examples of it by the time we get there. OK it may not be possible to
coexist with it because we have no 'common ancestory' on the

flip side it may be very possible that our lack of ancestory means we can live
side by side with little or even no impact on each other than resource use
(the most obvious being space, though any others aren't a given depending on
how the system is set up). There are two ways I can think of right now where
this may happen... 1) The physiology and resultant interdependencies,
resources and interactions the organisms display are literally so alien that
we can both
be in the same environment without effecting each other - say, for
instance, their life was based on silica (I'm not sure if that idea is now out
of favour, but silicon used to be thought of as a viable alternative

for carbon based on chemical properties such as the way they form lattices)
then there is nothing to say that our carbon based life will even need the
same things as them beyond common needs for space (and most likely liquid
water). 2) There may be vast tracks that are unexploited as nothing has
evolved to use it, for instance (and if there's someone with a better
knowledge of the early epochs than I please correct me here) say we came upon
a planet that was in the same condition Earth was 500 million years ago, our
land based needs wouldn't necessarily have any impact on the ecosystem as
everything would still be in the seas, even if it was like 375 million years
ago you still wouldn't have much animal life to compete with on the land. OK
you'll probably have some purists who advocate leaving it alone, but there's
nothing to say that society and decision makers will agree with them at the
time and maybe that in itself leaves the way open for an interesting faction
for someone to play (the militant greens out to cleanse the galaxy of
misguided contamination of nature...actually someone has come up with

something similar if I remember correctly(??)).

Right now any alien life seems of so precious to us, but I figure as we know
more about how common (or not) it is then our attitudes may well change. If it
turns out life is fairly common (and especially if all the

nicest most resource rich planets are already taken) and if it also turns out
that way can live with it (even if it requires a monthly dose of some or other
drug to neutralise the killer laserlight mosquito reaction) then I'm guessing
we'll just push right on in. Regardless of all our higher ideals the forces
behind our evolution dictates that you can't pass up a

resource if its staring you in the phase and we are really still ruled by
that.

Guess it would make for an interesting mosaic (and even more of a competitive
pressure between nations for the early sites) if you ended up with a mix of
planets along the lines of "can live here at a push, but must
build the ecosystem for yourself" + "everything we need and it isn't
deadly, its just like home" + "life but not as we know it, so you must
take
your pills every other morning or turn purple keel over and drop dead" +

"there's life there, but when we saw what it could do we ran like hell, built
a huge wall around it and threw away the key... and we still get
nightmares". Make for some interesting DS/SG scenarios if you landed on
the wrong planet...

Sorry for the ramble, probably got a bit carried away (as usual).

Have fun

Beth

P.S. I've just got a new version of Eudora which puts up those annoying grey
bars (which probably do awful things in digests, if they don't I won't worry
in the future) instead of the > when you reply, I'm having to remove them by
hand (which feels like a very dumb solution) so does anyone know of the
computer literate way of doing this?

> On Wed, 24 May 2000, Beth Fulton wrote:

> G'day Tom,

oh, i'm assuming that colonisation is preceeded by a fairly thorough
survey by scientific types - if whole ecosystems were wiped out without
a chance for study, scientists would go on strike. and, of course, there's
always the chance for a little bioprospecting, and the transnationals would
never pass that up:).

> >no but seriously folks, my thinking is that if a planet has native

the former: with the same insolation, gravity and elemental abundances as
earth (more or less), but where life hasn't emerged. i mentioned later on in
that post that i thought such worlds would be extremely rare, life being the
force of nature it is.

> Besides that I think you're setting a pretty stiff task

i strongly agree.

> OK it may not be

space - and with it the right to capture sunlight - can't really be
shared, and is the basic common currency of all life on terran-like
worlds, i would guess.

> say, for

i get the impression that silicon can only do biology at very high
temperatures, where it gets the ability to form double bonds and do other
useful things with its electrons. i'm not entirely sure about this, though. i
do know that there isn't anywhere near as much chemistry that you can do with
silicon as with carbon, so i would guess it's not as good. i don't think there
are any other serious contenders for the basic element
of life, although i have sometimes wondered about nitrogen-phosphorous
chemistry.

> 2) There may be vast tracks that are unexploited as nothing has

well, apart from our impact on the atmosphere and water cycle, which might be
considerable. this does seem like a good idea, though.

> OK you'll
then
> I'm guessing we'll just push right on in. Regardless of all our higher

> ideals the forces behind our evolution dictates that you can't pass up
+
> "there's life there, but when we saw what it could do we ran like

> nightmares". Make for some interesting DS/SG scenarios if you landed

rambling's good - i just wish i had the time to do it more myself 8(.

tom

G'day Tom,

> space - and with it the right to capture sunlight - can't really be

Yeah space is the one resource I think we'd always be competing for in some
fashion. One of the planets I've been fiddling with though is actually based
on chemosynthesis rather than photosynthesis (rather harsh place as you may
have guessed) but fun watching how others react to having to change their
frames of reference;)

> i get the impression that silicon can only do biology at very high

Ich, well there goes that idea! Unless of course that in itself left open
great swathes of area that that life couldn't exploit.... mmm maybe...

> i don't think there are any other serious contenders for the basic

The "we can only imagine carbon based life, because that's what we are
catch"... thought maybe the early evolutionary guys may have beaten that

one when I wasn't looking, oh well. Obviously the problems with Si woiuld be
compounded for germanium, tin and lead (even ignoring the toxicity issues of
the later two) right? So lattice wise guess C would be the best.

> although i have sometimes wondered about nitrogen-phosphorous

That's not a half bad idea. They don't have the same lattice formation
abilities as C, but they obviously work in a life formation context, so how do
their close analogs go, say boron? Mmm wish I knew more biochemistry!

<Settle pre-land life planet>
> well, apart from our impact on the atmosphere and water cycle, which

An impact true and potentially a large one, guess it depends on the prevailing
conditions and how advanced treatment plants etc are by then.

For instance even on Earth if you're a small island nation (say) in a high
flow area you could dump untreated human/organic waste straight into the

sea with no noticeable impact as the deposit feeders and physical dilution
would see it broken down before it could accumulate, its only when you get
high density settlements in low flow areas that the problems really mount up
in that area. Ecosystems have a lot of give in them and even when pushed too
hard they still function perfectly as an ecosystem just not necessarily the
one they used to be (or one that still allows the presence of man), guess it
would come down to how strongly the public of the time felt with regard to the
modification of the evolution of another planet.

Better stop musing and get back to work.

Have fun

Beth