Silicon-based Species
- Thread starter seijika-san
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I'm working with diatoms, algae that chemically precipitate silica (silicon dioxide) in their cell walls. So silicon is absolutely reasonable to have as a part of a biological lice-cycle. It's just that on earth it could never replace carbon as the primary building block because it's not reactive enough. You would probably need a much hotter planet for this to work. At around 500 degrees (Celsius ofc.) I think aluminium and a couple of other metals are liquid but silica is still a solid, so you could possibly imagine silicon-based life on certain hothouses.
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Where was it confirmed that you could have artificial life pops? I guess if you can have those, then you can do something to make them your dominant species and then essentially wind up with an empire composed of artificial life forms.
It was confirmed EVERYWHERE that you can build toaster pops and then upgrade to sentient synthetic pops.
For example:
https://mobile.twitter.com/Martin_Anward/status/721682574628757504
You can also watch Henrik brag about his Super Bird empire's toaster pops in that video with Angry Joe.
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Silicon is actually more common on Earth than carbon, yet all life here is based on carbon, this alone should tell you something. The primary problem for silicon is that whilst it shares much of the potential chemistry as carbon it is a larger atom marking it harder for it to form the same chemical bonds.
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That's pretty cool, thanks. I haven't been following the Twitter, etc announcements at all. I just recently got on board the hype train.
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For total weight of planet, you are actually right. That is very interesting... I glanced through some different data, and earth actually has a far lower carbon content than is to be expected. So earth is one of those carbon poor silicon rich planets relative to Milky Way and solar system. Never actually compared earth composition vs total composition. I guess that really is another nail in the silicate coffin.
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Ahh, welcome aboard then! And don't mind me, I was mostly annoyed by how inconvenient it is to find/copy links on my phone... stupid toaster!
You mean Scallophead isn't a silicoid? How do you know?
That's... not really how it works. We know that carbon can be used for a basis for life, we literally have the blueprints and know exactly what sort of stuff goes into it, but how long have we been able to reasonably synthesize the building blocks of our life? There's a lot about silicon chemistry we do know, and a whole lot more that we don't know. There's a lot of different temperature and pressure ranges to explore its chemistry at. Under novel conditions, longer silane chains and complex silicon molecules might be quite stable.
I personally don't think that silicon based life is terribly likely, but to conclude that it can't because 'we haven't done it yet' seems rather shortsighted.
Why wouldn't silicoids have to eat or respire? Why would they be immortal? How do they grow, reproduce, move, etc if they don't take nutrients in and utilize them? Contrary to what you're thinking (and the typical trope), a silicon based lifeform is about as likely to resemble rock or sand as a carbon based lifeform is to resemble graphite or diamond.
I know it's the trope that silicoids are usually rock/mineral people, but it's honestly a ridiculous trope.
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If I were to hazard a guess I would say silicon life was most likely on planets way outside of Earth norms for temperature and pressure, so it would almost certainly not be life as we know it.
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I mean the things you need is:
I think this is due to silicon sentients have to eat silicon, i.e. rock and sand. Except of course there would be silicon based plants and silicon based microrganisms.
- A wall to keep lifeform in and not-lifeform out. Hypothetically solveable by other means, but that would cause a lot of limits.
- A way to store genetic material, there are less complex systems than DNA out there
- An endothermic process that allows the entity to do work.
- Some mechanism for replication
I think this is due to silicon sentients have to eat silicon, i.e. rock and sand. Except of course there would be silicon based plants and silicon based microrganisms.
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Not necessarily - I think it's safe to say that species based on carbon/water are the most likely to arise in most cases - simply because their chemistry is most favorable for creating the compounds and reaction we (currently) believe are needed to support life. Carbon-based species that use ammonia, methane etc as a solvent in place of water (perhaps on planets where water isn't a liquid) are probably the next most likely. Species that use silicon instead of carbon are less likely than that. However, as people have already suggested, although this may not be favourable for forming life on an Earthlike planet they may be more viable under certain conditions than carbon-based life is (such as a world with extremely high temperatures and an atmosphere without oxygen). This article goes into a bit more depth on the subject: https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/~ejchaisson/cosmic_evolution/docs/fr_1/fr_1_future5.html
I've also seen boron suggested as a theoretical alternative to carbon - though boron is even less abundant in the galaxy than silicon is.
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Why would silicoids look distinctly different than carbonoids?
I don't look very much like coal and that tree outside doesn't look much like meat. Unless you want some mechanical differences between carbon and silicon based creatures, you can just make whatever up! Heck, maybe your silicon dudes hate water, that's why their homeplanet is desert.
Alternately, what you're asking for is pictures of rock dudes instead of meat/plant dudes. Which is fine, but has nothing to do with their biology.
Edit: Oh and making meaningful mechanical differences between Si and C based stuff may be difficult. You could just capture those differences in traits or ethos instead and then not limit them to specific portraits or whatever....
I don't look very much like coal and that tree outside doesn't look much like meat. Unless you want some mechanical differences between carbon and silicon based creatures, you can just make whatever up! Heck, maybe your silicon dudes hate water, that's why their homeplanet is desert.
Alternately, what you're asking for is pictures of rock dudes instead of meat/plant dudes. Which is fine, but has nothing to do with their biology.
Edit: Oh and making meaningful mechanical differences between Si and C based stuff may be difficult. You could just capture those differences in traits or ethos instead and then not limit them to specific portraits or whatever....
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Perhaps 'Mineraloid' would be a better name for the phenotype group than 'Silicoid' if Pardox were to add one? Though technically mineraloid already means something: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mineraloid
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The title immediately reminded me of Fafner in the Azure.
Back on topic I do hope there is a chance for this, if not in release the DLC or modding.
All this is well and good but it still doesn't overcome the numerous barriers.
Carbon respiration: O2 (gas) -> life form -> CO2 (gas)
Silicon respiration: O2 (gas) -> life form -> SiO2 (solid) But that breaks down again because Si doesn't want to double bond...it wants to single bond into silicates.
Without boring over long chemistry, silicon based respiration simply won't work in a real-ism setting. For a simple primer on it, you can read wikipedia for an intro.
That said, from a scifi perspective I'm all in favor of the Silicoids and Chmmr. I just needed to voice up against the idea that silicon is similar enough to carbon.
Carbon respiration: O2 (gas) -> life form -> CO2 (gas)
Silicon respiration: O2 (gas) -> life form -> SiO2 (solid) But that breaks down again because Si doesn't want to double bond...it wants to single bond into silicates.
Without boring over long chemistry, silicon based respiration simply won't work in a real-ism setting. For a simple primer on it, you can read wikipedia for an intro.
That said, from a scifi perspective I'm all in favor of the Silicoids and Chmmr. I just needed to voice up against the idea that silicon is similar enough to carbon.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_welding
This is a big problem for synthetics living in a vacuum...
The science doesn't matter, though. You know why?
Because silicon-based life rocks.
Because silicon-based life rocks.
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If any species deserved the trait repulsive, it would be Silicoid, not Blorg.
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It's a little known fact but Silicoids are actually hunted aggressively across the galaxy and now an endangered species. Bold bounty hunters and merciless outlaws have ravaged the galaxy and annihilated whole colony worlds for the riches to be made.
Riches from selling them into bondage. A bondage to hipsters.
Riches from selling them into bondage. A bondage to hipsters.