Colonizing Earth 2.0 In Scifi... How Would You Do It?

[Spacescifi]

 

In scifi Earth worlds are common place, so it had me thinking, provided a semi-hard science approach what is the most optimal way to go about colonizing Earth 2.0?

 

Several factors influence the answer, such as:

 

1. Native life. If it has flora, it has fauna, the two are complementary to each other, and it is hard to even imagine having a world with one and not the other. They make each other thrive.

2. Native tech. Are they like modern Earth level? If so that can present a threat to your colonization efforts, as nukes do tend to ruin stuff.

Native politics: Being clueless won't help here.

 

Why even colonize ? If Earth worlds are rare, then there's the reason right there. Let's share a planet rather than keep it to one native intelligent sapient. Sure terraforming can be done, but that is so hard and time consuming that scifi civilization folk would rather just deal with native shenanigans as that is easier and takes less time to get what they want.

Living space.

 

How to do it: Three spaceships minimum for colonization.

 

Spaceship 1: This is meant for space only, an orbit to orbit spaceship. The only thing it can land on safely is stuff with very low or zero gravity. It carries some weapons but only for defense. If this is like Star Trek or SW it probably has a hyperdrive/insert FTL method here.

Spaceship 2: A big ship with belly landing thrusters designed to land. Once. This is a make it or break it colonization attempt after all. It carries all the colonists need for colonization of an Earth 2.0.

Spaceship 3:  A big ship like spaceship two that lands once, only difference is this one is chock full of weapons to defend the colonists. Included as standard are approximately 2000 mini flying AI or remote controlled quad fan drones that each have these specs:

1. 7 hour flight time.

2. Grenade explosive

3. Camera

4. Speakers for comminucation if the need arises for remote talking.

3. A solid fueled mini rocket engine, which can turn any drone into a mini smart missile for a brief period.

 

That's how I would do it, what about you?

Edited March 5, 2020 by Spacescifi

[kerbiloid]

Their flora and fauna are poisonous or at least inedible. Always.^*)
Even here, on the Earth, you need an acclimatisation to another food and can't resist local infections without vaccination.

Upd.
^*) Blood, too. Do not suck it if you're a vampire.

Edited March 5, 2020 by kerbiloid

[RCgothic]

Alien bacteria are going to be exceptionally lethal to any foreign organism. Interstellar civilisations like The Federation would be pretty much impossible. Attempting to colonize a planet that already has life on it sounds like a very bad idea. It'd be easier to take a nearly life-bearing planet and terraform it the rest of the way.

If I absolutely had to live on a planet that had something else on it first? Complete nuclear sterilisation of the surface.

Edited March 5, 2020 by RCgothic

[kerbiloid]

DLC Sterilize & Colonize

[KerikBalm]

34 minutes ago, RCgothic said:

Alien bacteria are going to be exceptionally lethal to any foreign organism.

...

If I absolutely had to live on a planet that had something else on it first? Complete nuclear sterilisation of the surface.

Maybe, maybe not.

One thing is pretty certain, the two groups of organisms will not be adapted for the other, and will likely not be able to coexist in equilibirum.

Also, there's going to be substantial subsurface life. It would take massive crust melting bombardment to sterilize. If a planet has its own biome, I'd leave it alone, or only use thoroughly sterilized robots.

They will likely have completely different biochemistries. Right off the bat, the the earth and alien organisms may not be able to make use of the other organism for food (although simple sugars will probably be usable, certain molecules are likely to show up repeatedly, we have found amino acid chains in space after all).

Our immune systems should easily recognize foreign microbes as invaders, they would be so dissimilar, it would be pretty much a sure thing. Some of our defenses however are tuned specifically to Earth-life, and would do nothing to alien life: something like the membrane attack complement system may or may not work depending on the alien membrane composition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complement_membrane_attack_complex cell wall presence, etc. Likewise, alien pathogens would have evolved to get around alien defenses, and would likely be of no use against our immune systems. If they can't really make good use of the organic molecules in our bodies, they will be at a further disadvantage when "trying" to infect us. Some of our defenses like acidic compartments after macrophages engulf foreign microbes should work even if the alien microbe has different biomolecules (acid is acid, and will cause chemical reactions in lots of compounds). I'm assuming we wouldn't be walking around in acidic environments. Earth has some bacteria that can tolerate very high acidity, and are adapted to it, but they aren't pathogenic because they aren't adapted to the ambient environment of our bodies and cells.

Alien viruses infecting our cells would be a non-starter, they can't hijack our cellular translation machinery if they have never encountered it, and use different genetic molecules/a different genetic code.

So I actually thing the risk of infection is overstated... however, our bacteria and their bacteria would immediately "go to war". Their bacteria would be adapted to the conditions on that planet, and would seem to have an advantage... but time and time again we see on Earth that an introduced species becomes invasive because nothing has evolved to counter it. We also see cases where introduced species simply cannot compete with the native life in the native conditions. Its likely a binary outcome... either our biosphere wins out, or theirs does. If the bottom falls out of our biosphere, our food production will fail, and the colony will fail. I do not see 2 very different biospheres coexisting.

If it seems their biosphere wins at the microbial level: It might be possible to wipe out native macroscopic life, and adapt our plants to coexist with their microbes, but we may also need to adapt, as our intestinal flora may need to be changed for native flora. Their microbes should rapidly adapt (years? decades? centuries?) to make use of our biosphere's organic molecules as nutrient sources. I can imagine them fairly rapidly forming symbiotic associations with plants and our guts following that...

Or, our microbes win out. If we're careful what we bring, if we can introduce our bacteria and archea without any phages, then the base of our biosphere may have an advantage. There will surely be native viruses that will harm native life but not our own. Right now phages are an enormous selection pressure on our microbes. If native life has its replication rate checked by viruses, and our microbes don't, if they are more or less equally adapted to the environment, ours might win out if we can avoid introducing our biosphere's viruses.

So, I suppose if you want to terraform, and don't have a moral objection to wiping out the native life, you start by introducing large amounts of diverse (and thoroughly screened) kinds of our microbes to the planet, and see if they take hold.

If they do, then you just wait for the biosphere replacement. If they don't you'll need to cause the equivalent of the LHB, and try again in a few millenia.

[Dirkidirk]

22 minutes ago, KerikBalm said:

Maybe, maybe not.

One thing is pretty certain, the two groups of organisms will not be adapted for the other, and will likely not be able to coexist in equilibirum.

Also, there's going to be substantial subsurface life. It would take massive crust melting bombardment to sterilize. If a planet has its own biome, I'd leave it alone, or only use thoroughly sterilized robots.

They will likely have completely different biochemistries. Right off the bat, the the earth and alien organisms may not be able to make use of the other organism for food (although simple sugars will probably be usable, certain molecules are likely to show up repeatedly, we have found amino acid chains in space after all).

Our immune systems should easily recognize foreign microbes as invaders, they would be so dissimilar, it would be pretty much a sure thing. Some of our defenses however are tuned specifically to Earth-life, and would do nothing to alien life: something like the membrane attack complement system may or may not work depending on the alien membrane composition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complement_membrane_attack_complex cell wall presence, etc. Likewise, alien pathogens would have evolved to get around alien defenses, and would likely be of no use against our immune systems. If they can't really make good use of the organic molecules in our bodies, they will be at a further disadvantage when "trying" to infect us. Some of our defenses like acidic compartments after macrophages engulf foreign microbes should work even if the alien microbe has different biomolecules (acid is acid, and will cause chemical reactions in lots of compounds). I'm assuming we wouldn't be walking around in acidic environments. Earth has some bacteria that can tolerate very high acidity, and are adapted to it, but they aren't pathogenic because they aren't adapted to the ambient environment of our bodies and cells.

Alien viruses infecting our cells would be a non-starter, they can't hijack our cellular translation machinery if they have never encountered it, and use different genetic molecules/a different genetic code.

So I actually thing the risk of infection is overstated... however, our bacteria and their bacteria would immediately "go to war". Their bacteria would be adapted to the conditions on that planet, and would seem to have an advantage... but time and time again we see on Earth that an introduced species becomes invasive because nothing has evolved to counter it. We also see cases where introduced species simply cannot compete with the native life in the native conditions. Its likely a binary outcome... either our biosphere wins out, or theirs does. If the bottom falls out of our biosphere, our food production will fail, and the colony will fail. I do not see 2 very different biospheres coexisting.

If it seems their biosphere wins at the microbial level: It might be possible to wipe out native macroscopic life, and adapt our plants to coexist with their microbes, but we may also need to adapt, as our intestinal flora may need to be changed for native flora. Their microbes should rapidly adapt (years? decades? centuries?) to make use of our biosphere's organic molecules as nutrient sources. I can imagine them fairly rapidly forming symbiotic associations with plants and our guts following that...

Or, our microbes win out. If we're careful what we bring, if we can introduce our bacteria and archea without any phages, then the base of our biosphere may have an advantage. There will surely be native viruses that will harm native life but not our own. Right now phages are an enormous selection pressure on our microbes. If native life has its replication rate checked by viruses, and our microbes don't, if they are more or less equally adapted to the environment, ours might win out if we can avoid introducing our biosphere's viruses.

So, I suppose if you want to terraform, and don't have a moral objection to wiping out the native life, you start by introducing large amounts of diverse (and thoroughly screened) kinds of our microbes to the planet, and see if they take hold.

If they do, then you just wait for the biosphere replacement. If they don't you'll need to cause the equivalent of the LHB, and try again in a few millenia.

At this point i'ts probably easier to just turn earth 2.0's moon into a giant Mckendree cylinder. 

[kerbiloid]

1 hour ago, KerikBalm said:

our bacteria and their bacteria would immediately "go to war"

Later they will go to love, and this is much worse.
Our cells are colonies of oxygen-breathers inside a bulky anaerob. They are like alien invaders for each other.

1 hour ago, KerikBalm said:

Also, there's going to be substantial subsurface life. It would take massive crust melting bombardment to sterilize.

Ivstinvs Bibero is not enough? Use subwoofers for underground.

[KerikBalm]

4 hours ago, kerbiloid said:

Later they will go to love, and this is much worse.
Our cells are colonies of oxygen-breathers inside a bulky anaerob. They are like alien invaders for each other.

I'm well aware of the symbiotic nature of our cells. My PhD thesis was on a class of nuclear encoded proteins that are imported into mitochondria and modulate mitochondrial gene expression. After all our cells have 2 types of genomes, and their expression needs to be coordinated.

However, we'd never have symbiosis to the extent that we find between the Alpha-proteobacteria and lokiarchaeota (aka: Eukaryotics cells with mitochondria), because horizontal gene transfer wouldn't happen unless tere is something highly favored about our biochemistry *and* translation code, such that it pops up completely independently.

Horizontal gene transfer for protein coding genes won't happen if ATG means start/methionine in our system, and an amino acid that we don't even have in the alien system... for example.

[Spacescifi]

14 hours ago, KerikBalm said:

Maybe, maybe not.

One thing is pretty certain, the two groups of organisms will not be adapted for the other, and will likely not be able to coexist in equilibirum.

Also, there's going to be substantial subsurface life. It would take massive crust melting bombardment to sterilize. If a planet has its own biome, I'd leave it alone, or only use thoroughly sterilized robots.

They will likely have completely different biochemistries. Right off the bat, the the earth and alien organisms may not be able to make use of the other organism for food (although simple sugars will probably be usable, certain molecules are likely to show up repeatedly, we have found amino acid chains in space after all).

Our immune systems should easily recognize foreign microbes as invaders, they would be so dissimilar, it would be pretty much a sure thing. Some of our defenses however are tuned specifically to Earth-life, and would do nothing to alien life: something like the membrane attack complement system may or may not work depending on the alien membrane composition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complement_membrane_attack_complex cell wall presence, etc. Likewise, alien pathogens would have evolved to get around alien defenses, and would likely be of no use against our immune systems. If they can't really make good use of the organic molecules in our bodies, they will be at a further disadvantage when "trying" to infect us. Some of our defenses like acidic compartments after macrophages engulf foreign microbes should work even if the alien microbe has different biomolecules (acid is acid, and will cause chemical reactions in lots of compounds). I'm assuming we wouldn't be walking around in acidic environments. Earth has some bacteria that can tolerate very high acidity, and are adapted to it, but they aren't pathogenic because they aren't adapted to the ambient environment of our bodies and cells.

Alien viruses infecting our cells would be a non-starter, they can't hijack our cellular translation machinery if they have never encountered it, and use different genetic molecules/a different genetic code.

So I actually thing the risk of infection is overstated... however, our bacteria and their bacteria would immediately "go to war". Their bacteria would be adapted to the conditions on that planet, and would seem to have an advantage... but time and time again we see on Earth that an introduced species becomes invasive because nothing has evolved to counter it. We also see cases where introduced species simply cannot compete with the native life in the native conditions. Its likely a binary outcome... either our biosphere wins out, or theirs does. If the bottom falls out of our biosphere, our food production will fail, and the colony will fail. I do not see 2 very different biospheres coexisting.

If it seems their biosphere wins at the microbial level: It might be possible to wipe out native macroscopic life, and adapt our plants to coexist with their microbes, but we may also need to adapt, as our intestinal flora may need to be changed for native flora. Their microbes should rapidly adapt (years? decades? centuries?) to make use of our biosphere's organic molecules as nutrient sources. I can imagine them fairly rapidly forming symbiotic associations with plants and our guts following that...

Or, our microbes win out. If we're careful what we bring, if we can introduce our bacteria and archea without any phages, then the base of our biosphere may have an advantage. There will surely be native viruses that will harm native life but not our own. Right now phages are an enormous selection pressure on our microbes. If native life has its replication rate checked by viruses, and our microbes don't, if they are more or less equally adapted to the environment, ours might win out if we can avoid introducing our biosphere's viruses.

So, I suppose if you want to terraform, and don't have a moral objection to wiping out the native life, you start by introducing large amounts of diverse (and thoroughly screened) kinds of our microbes to the planet, and see if they take hold.

If they do, then you just wait for the biosphere replacement. If they don't you'll need to cause the equivalent of the LHB, and try again in a few millenia.

 

I see, so even if the scifi aliens only want peaceful colonial co-existence their natural bacteria will declare war the moment they step foot on land.

 

So it is an adapt or die scenario I suppose, for both the host race with the homeworld, and the visiting colonials from elsewhere.

 

Even so, technology can make things happen even when natural laws say no or don't do it.

Edited March 6, 2020 by Spacescifi

[Nuke]

i think it would be significantly simpler just to colonize lifeless worlds. any world with life on it is going to be very incompatible with whatever biology humans would need to bring with them to bootstrap a colony. if you aim for a strong terraforming candidate, right mass, magnetic field, big stabilizing moon. i think you would be better off colonizing the moon initially until enough science can be done to verify the target planet. 

[Spacescifi]

16 minutes ago, Nuke said:

i think it would be significantly simpler just to colonize lifeless worlds. any world with life on it is going to be very incompatible with whatever biology humans would need to bring with them to bootstrap a colony. if you aim for a strong terraforming candidate, right mass, magnetic field, big stabilizing moon. i think you would be better off colonizing the moon initially until enough science can be done to verify the target planet. 

 

 

Interesting points.

I guess it depends how much a civiization is willing to pay in resources and more importantly.... blood.

Are they willing to die in the pursuit of their colonization efforts?

If not, then terraforming lifeless worlds looks really attractive, even though it may take a millenium to even get the place even on the way to habitable, at least you need not worry about native life ruining and wrecking your colony.

 

The safer way to deal with modern Earth tech aliens is to do low orbit trade. They send up stuff to LEO with relative ease, and the alien vessel can grab it and be on it's way.

 

That sums up the safest way to have an interplanetary or interstellar relationship.

Edited March 6, 2020 by Spacescifi

[kerbiloid]

I see no purpose in colonisation or terraforming at all.

By the time when these get possible, you already have city-sized starships with artificial gravity, where you spend all your life.
So, a really advanced civilization becomes space nomads living in giant RV which they can park wherever they want as long as they wish.

[p1t1o]

On 3/5/2020 at 6:04 AM, Spacescifi said:

 what is the most optimal way to go about colonizing Earth 2.0?

 

Cluster munitions get a pretty good and even coverage. I'd say about 10-100 humans per square kilometre should be sufficient to get the planet up and running into an industrial era within a few decades. 

Edited March 6, 2020 by p1t1o

[Spacescifi]

3 hours ago, p1t1o said:

 

Cluster munitions get a pretty good and even coverage. I'd say about 10-100 humans per square kilometre should be sufficient to get the planet up and running into an industrial era within a few decades. 

 

Well the OP goal is peaceful coexistence with native sapients.

 

2000 drones is only a security measure for native terrorism.

If the colonials really are under the threat of heavy attack, the orbiting vessel has the equivalent of orbital antimatter ICBM's.

[kerbiloid]

6 minutes ago, Spacescifi said:

orbital antimatter ICBM'

orbital ICBM?

[p1t1o]

@Spacescifi

Ah,

• I assumed an uninhabited planet
• "Colonising" an inhabited planet raises a great many further issues, both moral and practical, changes things wildly.
• Different definitions of "colonise". Sometimes it means a single small settlement co-existing cooperatively with natives, sometimes it means a military conquest of the entire planet.
• Cluster munition for rapid delivery of bulk humanity (ie: humans as submunitions), was mainly in jest....buuuuuuuut....

 

• More darkly, if one treats individual humans as disposable, given how resourceful and robust we can be, one could easily put together a delivery package of several thousand cluster delivery units, several hundred tons of supplies and equipment in crates, drop them from orbit and leave them. Return in a century to open trade negotiations. Dont need to figure out a complex colonisation plan - they will figure it out themselves or die trying.
• Useful if one wants to colonise many planets in a spacial volume, get a firm toehold in the region, long-term.
• Though the colonies may not necessarily like you much, or want to be your allies, you will convince them with said antimatter crustbusters.

 

• Yet more darkly, dont use living adults as colonists. Clone/engineer them fully grown, drop them so they first make consciousness on the new planet, along with plentiful religious documentation painting your faction as godlike saviors, and a really, really generous description of why you put them there in the first place.

 

PS: you do know about "project rho" right? Theres a ton of stuff there you should see, including specifically this subject. Its a resource specifically for SciFi writers. Apologies if you already know (its not impossible that I said that exact same thing before...)

http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/

 

Edited March 6, 2020 by p1t1o

[kerbiloid]

How to colonize an inhabited planet.

Spoiler

 

[Spacescifi]

6 hours ago, p1t1o said:

@Spacescifi

Ah,

• I assumed an uninhabited planet
• "Colonising" an inhabited planet raises a great many further issues, both moral and practical, changes things wildly.
• Different definitions of "colonise". Sometimes it means a single small settlement co-existing cooperatively with natives, sometimes it means a military conquest of the entire planet.
• Cluster munition for rapid delivery of bulk humanity (ie: humans as submunitions), was mainly in jest....buuuuuuuut....

 

• More darkly, if one treats individual humans as disposable, given how resourceful and robust we can be, one could easily put together a delivery package of several thousand cluster delivery units, several hundred tons of supplies and equipment in crates, drop them from orbit and leave them. Return in a century to open trade negotiations. Dont need to figure out a complex colonisation plan - they will figure it out themselves or die trying.
• Useful if one wants to colonise many planets in a spacial volume, get a firm toehold in the region, long-term.
• Though the colonies may not necessarily like you much, or want to be your allies, you will convince them with said antimatter crustbusters.

 

• Yet more darkly, dont use living adults as colonists. Clone/engineer them fully grown, drop them so they first make consciousness on the new planet, along with plentiful religious documentation painting your faction as godlike saviors, and a really, really generous description of why you put them there in the first place.

 

PS: you do know about "project rho" right? Theres a ton of stuff there you should see, including specifically this subject. Its a resource specifically for SciFi writers. Apologies if you already know (its not impossible that I said that exact same thing before...)

http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/

 

 

Oh yes I am aware of Winchell Chung's website, but I rarely if ever use it anymore.

I have learned far more with less reading from KSP videos, Scott Manley, KSP forums, google research, science tv, and brainstorming.

I find that whoever writes the articles on Chung's site tends to 'speak' in a condescending manner toward the reader.

I do not like that, as I can learn without being talked down to, and I have.

Chung's site is great if you don't mind sifting through the endless superfluous text to get what you really want. If calculations are all you want, then Chung's site works okayish, assuming you're writing IRL scifi without the bells and whistles we expect normally.

If I want custom stuff, which is all I ever do, it's not a good place to look. Why do you think I come here?

 

 

 

Edited March 7, 2020 by Spacescifi

[p1t1o]

@Spacescifi

 

0_0 But..but...  Welp! Disagree, but thats your opinion, at least you're not missing out lol! Peace

 

Edited March 7, 2020 by p1t1o

[Nightside]

On 3/6/2020 at 4:57 PM, Spacescifi said:

 

Oh yes I am aware of Winchell Chung's website, but I rarely if ever use it anymore.

I have learned far more with less reading from KSP videos, Scott Manley, KSP forums, google research, science tv, and brainstorming.

I find that whoever writes the articles on Chung's site tends to 'speak' in a condescending manner toward the reader.

I do not like that, as I can learn without being talked down to, and I have.

Chung's site is great if you don't mind sifting through the endless superfluous text to get what you really want. If calculations are all you want, then Chung's site works okayish, assuming you're writing IRL scifi without the bells and whistles we expect normally.

If I want custom stuff, which is all I ever do, it's not a good place to look. Why do you think I come here?

 

 

 

I personally love The vintage SF peppering that site, but I agree many pages are more flavor than content. 
 

[kerbiloid]

Because Atomic Rockets is The Elder Scrolls of this. So, it scrolls like the scrolls.