Ryzom

Ok. This is my long post. It was going to be longer! But then I realized that I was getting way too much into Biochemistry and Astrobiology, and I'm sure peeps around here are not going to be interested in stuff like that... Nor is important to answer the main question: "Is Atys posible? Is life without minerals an option?".

The quick answer to that is, and like I said before, "No, it isn't"... Or at least not "life" as we understand/know it... And there resides the main problem here! Atys is life as we know!

Here are a couple of facts we know about Atys just by looking at the enviroment:

- We can create fire, so there is oxygen present. More or less the same amount as on Earth (20-ish% of the atmosphere)

- There is water, thus there is a good amount of Hydrogen around. We also know that temperature and atmospheric preasure are very similar to those on Earth, after all there is fog, water and snow present. There may be ice, but I'm yet to see it.

From that we know that there are other gases other then Oxygen and Hydrogen as well, after all homins managed to discover fire without turning the whole planet into a short lived inferno

So lets assume that at least must of the Non-Metallic gases (Hydrogen, Nitrogen, Oxygen), all of the Noble Gases (From Helium to Ununoctium) and a few Halogens (Fluorine and Chlorine) are present. I left a few Non-Metals and Halogens out of the list because their sole presence destroys the whole idea behind a planet without minerals.

Now, to create life as we know it we need a backbone! An element that can be bonded to other, to form complex molecules. And not only complex molecules, but stable molecules... And at this point is where the whole idea of a planet without minerals crumbles down like a house of cards! Gases and liquid are not enough, we need things like Carbon.

And turns out that Carbon is one of the Non-Metals I left out of the list before, as Carbon by it's lonesome destroy the idea of a life without minerals.

Now, since I don't want to be called a carbon chauvinist I should also mention that it doesn't matter what backbone we're going to be using, the result is always going to be a mineral one way or another.

I'd like to finish this exercise by paraphrasing my favorite books, "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy":

"Oh dear," says Atys, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.
"Oh, that was easy," says Lemoi, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets killed at the next zebra crossing.



Anyways, some of the things that I left out of this post are things like how life in Atys has to be carbon based, that there must be metals present, how imposible is for an organism as big as Atys to exist, and how there is no real explanation to the Atys Astronomy except for poor programing But like I said, Biochemistry and Astrobiology are out of the scope of the previous exercise.

And I think that is it. Time to go visit the impossible planet
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ehehheeee... I just watched the GiGa-TV Show with Jessica as a guest...
She´s saying a few VERY interesting things at the beginning of the interview, regarding just how "imposible" Atys may be, or may not be...
The one Word that struck me like a Hammer was "Terraforming-Bombs" *gulp*

Allright, I just uploaded the 4 Parts of the Show, so see for yourself all you non-belivers.

Acridiel

some of the things that I left out of this post are things like how life in Atys has to be carbon based

This is what I'd be interested to hear. Why does life on Atys have to be the same as life on Earth?

I don't know much on the subject, but it seems to me to be an assumption based on our limited perspective of what we can observe from Earth. Have we ever been to a truely alien planet, with truely alien life forms? No. So how can we assume that the entire universe operates on the same biological rules as life on Earth does?

acridiel wrote:ehehheeee... I just watched the GiGa-TV Show with Jessica as a guest...
She´s saying a few VERY interesting things at the beginning of the interview, regarding just how "imposible" Atys may be, or may not be...
The one Word that struck me like a Hammer was "Terraforming-Bombs" *gulp*

Allright, I just uploaded the 4 Parts of the Show, so see for yourself all you non-belivers.

Acridiel

That was a pretty cool R2 demo. Too bad I don't speak gibberish, so I couldn't understand half of the stuff that those guys were saying... Good thing the other half was just that one guys translating what Jessica was saying.

And yes! Jessica saying that Atys is actually a terraformed planet gone wild is telling us a LOT! It's telling us that Atys was in fact created by the Karavan... Or at least it seems that way. As a Kami that is going to make me re-examine my believes!

But still that doesn't change the fact that minerals are needed to sustain Atysian life forms

Oh! And 97 levels to explore still down there?!?!WTFOMGBBQ!1111one2! yummy

But still that doesn't change the fact that minerals are needed to sustain Atysian life forms

Whyyyy?

Isaac Asimov, a classic Science Fiction writer and a university professor explained somewhere that evry life out thare *has* to be based on carbon and that only carbon can do it.

I'll try to find that book and will quote it here.

katriell wrote:This is what I'd be interested to hear. Why does life on Atys have to be the same as life on Earth?

I don't know much on the subject, but it seems to me to be an assumption based on our limited perspective of what we can observe from Earth. Have we ever been to a truely alien planet, with truely alien life forms? No. So how can we assume that the entire universe operates on the same biological rules as life on Earth does?

hehe... As I was getting ready to post I click the wrong options and had to star from scratch... Here we go again

I said this before but I'm going to say it again because is very important: Atys and Earth have a very similar atmosphere.

Now, to create and mantain higher life forms (That is, things bigger then bacterias) you need large, complex and stable molecules.

To form large, complex molecules you need 1 basic thing: Elements with an oxydation of +/-4... That is, atoms with 4 unpaired electrons in it's outer shell/orbital. The smallest atom with that characteristic happens to be Carbon. Next on the list is Silicon, and then there are others.

Anyways, as you can see from this picture even though Carbon and Silicon share the same basic structure, Carbon's 4 electrons are in it's 2nd orbital. The second orbital accepts up to 8 electrons.
Silicon's 4 electrons are in it's 3rd orbital, the 3rd orbital accepts up to 18 electrons... And so on with the rest of the elements.

So, even when Silicon has atoms bonded to 4 of it's sides (The same as Carbon), the Silicon bonds aren't usually as strong/stable as the Carbon ones. This same is true with any element! The larger the element, the more unstable it self and their compounds are.

And then we come back to Atys' Atmosphere. Temperatures seem to be between 0C and 130-ishC, with lots and lots of water (Ask the Trykers)

Under those conditions a molecular bonding with anything other then Carbon is not only inefficient, but must of the time imposible. A couple of examples:

- Silanes (SiH4), the Silicon base analogous to hydrocarbons is very reactive to water (Water just destroys them)

- Silicones (SiOx, Sand is a good example of this) are very stable but at that temperature range they're non soluble solids, making almost imposible to mix with other elements, specially water.

- There is Phosphorus, another element that can form long molecules with Oxygen, but it's very reactive.
You could combine Phosphorus with Nitrogen (Remember, 80% of Earth's air is Nitrogen), but it requires a lot of energy to combine molecular nitrogen. You would need an ammonia or nitrogen dioxide rich atmosphere to be able to efficiently use Phosphorus (Earth's atmosphere is mostly Nitrogen AND Oxygen, not nitogen dioxide... 2 different things)

Now, with all this I'm not saying that Carbon life is the only type of life posible, after all I'm not a carbon chauvinist person, all I'm saying is that under conditions similar to those on Earth any other type of life is just inefficient.

Just a couple of fun facts here:

There are 84 Carbon based molecules known in the Universe, compare to only 8 based on Silicon. Now, of those 8 Silicon based, 4 of them contain Carbon as well... Also, across the Universe there are about 10 times more Carbon atoms then Silicon ones.

Now, Earth is (For some odd reason) Silicon rich and carbon poor, yet Earth life is carbon base.

If you want to learn more about this just google "Alternative Biochemistry", "Cosmic Evolution", or "carbon OR non-carbon based life forms"... You're sure to find tons of info.

manya wrote:Isaac Asimov, a classic Science Fiction writer and a university professor explained somewhere that evry life out thare *has* to be based on carbon and that only carbon can do it.

I'll try to find that book and will quote it here.

His essay "Planets Have an Air About them" perhaps? I'm yet to read it (I don't care much for Asimov's works, but I think that one talks about that)

lemoi wrote:His essay "Planets Have an Air About them" perhaps? I'm yet to read it (I don't care much for Asimov's works, but I think that one talks about that)

Actually, I think the book is titled "The Tragedy of The Moon", a collection of very interesting scientific essays.

Was it stated that Atys has no metals, or no minerals? No minerals is ridiculous on the face of it (proven above, and ask yourself just WHAT bones would be made out of), but no metals might be workable with changes. The first of those changes, of course, is blood containing iron for oxygen transport...