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| The Incredible Tool Using Octopi | |
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| Topic Started: Dec 15 2009, 11:34 AM (2,103 Views) | |
| Temporary | Dec 21 2009, 10:09 AM Post #31 |
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Transhuman
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Why can't they make tools? They can't beat rocks, if they have the muscular skill they can tie things. They can make spears, spades, clubs, daggers, besides fire they can make something equivalent to everything our ancestors did. |
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| ATEK Azul | Dec 21 2009, 11:34 AM Post #32 |
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Transhuman
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Maybe instead of melting metals these creatures might carve metals(with tougher things)? Only later will they find more efficeint means of using metals. |
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| Flisch | Dec 21 2009, 01:28 PM Post #33 |
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Superhuman
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Actually a second major problem nobody here has even thought about yet is the most basic material. Water-based sapients can't even shape stones, because they simply can't bring up the force to hit one stone with the other. Just try it underwater. It doesn't work. Another major problem I see is them using wood or another organic material. In terrestrial environments, wood is much more durable, as there are no decomposers, who can travel through air, except for fungi and even those need humidity to grow. So, if you can keep the wood dry it won't decompose. However... how do you keep something dry underwater? Also many of the arguments I have heard in the past is something like "They can do it if they do it right." Like, for instance, putting an airproof coat around the wood to stop it from decomposing. The problem here is that, they don't have the knowledge that it would actually work. In terrestrial environments, we can build houses out of wood and it will work for a while until they break apart. However, we know we can use wood, we just have to find a way to make it more durable. An underwater species doesn't even get to that stage, as it will immediately dismiss wood or anything organic as highly unstable due to its quick decomposing. They won't even try to find a way, as they don't even know it is possible. Same thing with electricity. We, "air-dwellers", know, that when a lightning has struck a tree nearby, that its electricity doesn't affect us as the air doesn't conduct it. Therefore we know that electricity in close proximity does not put oneself into danger as long as there is no connection to it. And due to this knowledge we were able to create electrical conductors to allow us to use electrcity in our homes. Water-dwellers wouldn't even get to that stage. Since lightning will kill almost all life in a big radius, water sophonts would probably stay the hell away from lightning and electricity in general. Trial and error, the most important steps for advancing technology is not present when it comes to stuff like this, as the trial part is entirely missing. However, note, that I don't say it's impossible at all. I just want to say that I have yet to see a possible scenario for water-dwellers to invent higher technology. (Let alone building spaceships.) Edited by Flisch, Dec 21 2009, 01:29 PM.
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| ATEK Azul | Dec 21 2009, 02:22 PM Post #34 |
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Transhuman
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Maybe they would have piston, gear and pressure based technology? They could use material that doesn't float in the water and put them in cylinders making a piston of sorts that uses the water pressure and gravity to generate pressure which turn gears? I know they can't do as much with technology in this form but it is possible to atleast get some technology this way. |
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| Temporary | Dec 21 2009, 03:26 PM Post #35 |
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Transhuman
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Is there any way they could use chemicals for energy instead of electricity? Also, as for the rock thing, it actually doesn't take much force on the right kind of rock. Instead it takes the appropriate angle, I imagine that it could still work. |
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| Empyreon | Dec 21 2009, 03:30 PM Post #36 |
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Are you plausible?
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Flisch is right. A species just coming into its own technology doesn't waste time/effort figuring out how to use something that doesn't immediately work. It's so much more in their interest to yank out a *pulls random alien out of nowhere* sharkodon's serrated fang and used that as a tool/weapon than it is to skull out how to make wood/rock/metal work. How about a technology based on bone and coconut shells? And when does this turn into an actual project?
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Take a look at my exobiology subforum of the planet Nereus! COM Contributions food for thought
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| Holben | Dec 21 2009, 03:41 PM Post #37 |
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Rumbo a la Victoria
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If they started with a friction-based thing, like amber on a coral? Canis Lupus, high gravity at the sea floor? I thought it was higher pressure. I thought gravity was 0 at the core, peaked at the surface, then declined? A hydraulic system, perchance? |
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Time flows like a river. Which is to say, downhill. We can tell this because everything is going downhill rapidly. It would seem prudent to be somewhere else when we reach the sea. "It is the old wound my king. It has never healed." | |
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| ATEK Azul | Dec 21 2009, 04:13 PM Post #38 |
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Chemical energy might be a very good replacement for electricity and heat. Though under water they need a way to contain it with out it reacting to the stuff in their water enviroment. Using organic parts and breeding living life to use in every day life might be a major part of their life style, especialy early on. Friction and Hydrolic based technology could easily be put into my list of gears, pistons and pressure based technology(along with the above mentioned chemicals) And a creature evolved to be strong and fast underwater will be able to hit rocks together especially with the angle statement made earlier. I would also like to know if this will be a project? I also think we should keep with the article and have this as a future evolution project about Octopods. |
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| Flisch | Dec 21 2009, 04:20 PM Post #39 |
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Superhuman
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And we are moving in a circle again. How do they shape the appropriate tools and components, and out of what? Also, chemical energy. It doesn't really work, as you need something to convert the chemical energy to whatever you need at the moment. This only works with already advanced technology, where we are at step one again... Just an interesting thought: If water-dwellers were to use chemicals they would most probably prefer gases the same way we prefer liquids, because gases would be much more handy for them, since they don't dissolve into the surrounding water. (OK, some do, but you get my point.) Edited by Flisch, Dec 21 2009, 04:21 PM.
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| Empyreon | Dec 21 2009, 04:27 PM Post #40 |
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Are you plausible?
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Which is why I think they would start with edges and sturdy materials found naturally around them: bones. A sufficiently robust rib could be a skewer or pick, a long tooth scavenged from a dead predator already has a cutting edge to is, and a long bone can be cracked/crushed to provide useful splinters. |
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Take a look at my exobiology subforum of the planet Nereus! COM Contributions food for thought
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| ATEK Azul | Dec 21 2009, 04:43 PM Post #41 |
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Transhuman
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Natural materials would be what they use for most of their existence. Those materials would be made from either things around them or from living things like Coral and animals. Maybe they even breed animals to form parts of their bodies into usable tools or materials more easily turned into tools. And those same natural materials could form or be used to form the gears, pistons and other parts needed for pressure, chemical and hydrolic technologies. Also instead of using chemicals that have to be transformed into energy they could use several reactive chemicals found in great abundance which when mixed make their own energy or reaction that would run the "Machine". |
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| Ànraich | Dec 21 2009, 05:31 PM Post #42 |
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L'évolution Spéculative est moi
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Or perhaps clockwork, powered by giant "currentwheels," like a waterwheel, only it's set up next to a current rather than a stream (being under water and all). I suppose they could sharpen rocks by rubbing them, but more than likely they would have technology like that of the native Hawaiians. You see they native Hawaiians didn't use stone all that often, finding good stone for knapping was too difficult (as it involved a climb up an active volcano). So instead they used something that was readily available both above the water and under it; bones. Shark's teeth, fish bones (which are really sharp, if you've ever swallowed one you know what I mean), shells (also really sharp, cavemen used to shave with them), and more sharp teeth and bones. Octopi could probably make stuff out of bone, it's not all that hard. Finding the right kinds of bones and teeth from dead things might be, but unlike wood and stone spears and tools, bone tools don't break as easily, and every meal you catch with it means you get more materials to work with. They've also been seen stacking rocks, so they could probably build that way, so long as they figured out how to arrange the rocks in a way that they won't fall (since they probably won't have mortar), hell they could probably weave seaweed and various other underwater plants into shelters, but I doubt they would need shelters anyways. There aren't really any elements they need to be protected from, being underwater, and they don't actually sleep (they have a function like it, but it's more like a trance really), and their lifestyle is generally nomadic anyways. It would be an interesting civilization, to say the least. Probably a bit like the Native Americans on the Great Plains, who lived a nomadic lifestyle but still have some pretty advanced technology and knowledge (contrary to popular belief, they had written language also, and I'm not sure what octopi would do about that). |
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We should all aspire to die surrounded by our dearest friends. Just like Julius Caesar. "The Lord Universe said: 'The same fate I have given to all things from stones to stars, that one day they shall become naught but memories aloft upon the winds of time. From dust all was born, and to dust all shall return.' He then looked upon His greatest creation, life, and pitied them, for unlike stars and stones they would soon learn of this fate and despair in the futility of their own existence. And so the Lord Universe decided to give life two gifts to save them from this despair. The first of these gifts was the soul, that life might more readily accept their fate, and the second was fear, that they might in time learn to avoid it altogether." - Excerpt from a Chanagwan creation myth, Legends and Folklore of the Planet Ghar, collected and published by Yieju Bai'an, explorer from the Celestial Commonwealth of Qonming Tree That Owns Itself
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| Temporary | Dec 21 2009, 05:37 PM Post #43 |
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Transhuman
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I was thinking something like clockwork, but not powered by currents. I was thinking muscle powered, octopi can be quite strong, so get a few together working and you can get a lot of stuff done. |
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| Empyreon | Dec 21 2009, 05:38 PM Post #44 |
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Are you plausible?
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If they are nomadic, then the caves and holes that octopi currently use would suit just fine as a shelter, if they needed one. A written language could be scratched onto the surfaces of rocks, and probably would be washed away over time. Written language probably wouldn't be as permanent as above-water markings have been historically. |
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Take a look at my exobiology subforum of the planet Nereus! COM Contributions food for thought
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| ATEK Azul | Dec 21 2009, 08:09 PM Post #45 |
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Transhuman
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Yeah I don't think history can be a indepth topic for their civilisation. |
| I am dyslexic, please ignore the typo's! | |
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