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Ocean Needed ?; Is a marine stage really necessary ?!
Topic Started: Jan 18 2010, 01:46 PM (787 Views)
Venatosaurus
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HAUS OF SPEC
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I had thought about this long ago, even before I had joined the forums, but now I decide to post the idea. For life to arise, I understand water is usually a necessary substance, but could life still happen without having ever lived in an ocean. What if subterranean life or even terrestrial life was the first to arise, with water being present in underground aquifers or terrestrial streams, life evolve more and more complexity, but never arose from any sea. Would such a thing be possible to occur, with life managing to gain complexity like ours.



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Vultur-10


Even if it needs water ... water definitely doesn't require oceans.

Subterranean "black smoker" places certainly seem feasible.

One thing I would work up if I had time would be a really flat planet (much fewer and much smaller mountains & trenches than Earth) so it's basically a wetland planet - very little ocean or highland, mostly marshes and swamps with occasional highland areas being heavily forested (since those are the only places where the land is deep enough for tree-equivalents to have room for their roots without them rotting beneath the water table). I had an idea for critters with natural 'snowshoes' only they used them for mud rather than snow.
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Empyreon
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Are you plausible?

So I guess a marine stage, referring to large bodies of water like oceans or seas, can be bypassed, but some liquid stage is necessary for life at least initially...
Take a look at my exobiology subforum of the planet Nereus!

COM Contributions


food for thought
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