Kardashev-Sagan analyses

The Dark · Post by **The Dark** » 2003-01-05 07:39pm

OK, here's a topic to debate Kardashev-Sagan civilization levels, as described here: http://www.angelfire.com/on2/daviddarli ... hevciv.htm.

(Many thanks to Enlightenment for pointing out this website).

I'm going to start with the Star Kingdom of Manticore from David Weber's Honor Harrington series.

Space technology: Use inertial compensators, gravitational impeller bands, and multiple fusion reactors for transport (a standard heavy cruiser has three power plants, two necessary to operate plus a back-up). Weaponry consists of grasers, lasers, plasma torpedoes, grav lances, and missiles with either nuclear or bomb-pumped X-ray laser warheads. Ships capable of 450+ g acceleration common in all classes of military ship; FTL speed of multiple thousands of c standard.

Medical: Can prolong life greatly (80 is considered middle-aged, suggesting a life span of 150+). Regeneration works on most people; cybernetics are not quite as good as real organs/limbs, but workable, and often contain special features (weapon compartments in arms, variable zoom lens in eye, etc.).

Other: Can colonize worlds contaminated with heavy metals (cf. Grayson). 20th C firearms considered obsolete, replaced with needlers and pulsers. Old firearms considered loud, jokingly called "hand cannon." Still useful for covert action, as cannot be detected by search for power sources. Can model reasons for building collapse on computer and determine non-natural cause relatively easily. Contact and communication established with felid race, telepathic among selves, empathic with humans. Species, called "treecat," native to Sphinx, roughly 9 kilos, hexapedal. Able to kill an armed human with claws (cf. Nimitz defending Protector Benjamin). Highly agile, nerve nodes at second hip contain telepathic sending wetware. Controls a wormhole with multiple junctions; has led to Manticore being a trade nexus.

Extent of civilization: Originally three planets around a binary star; Manticore, Sphinx, Gryphon. Also includes Medusa system through Wormhole Junction. After beginning of war with People's Republic of Haven, includes the Protectorate of Grayson, Caliphate of Zanzibar, and captured "Peep" systems. At least double, possibly triple digit systems by end of war, though best estimate would be no more than 30 inhabited systems.

Evaluation: Roughly Type II.0 at the beginning of the series, possibly II.2-II.4 by end of series. Capabilities improve vastly over the course of the war, and overall power production of the military fleet alone is incredible, even ignoring the larger merchant marine. The addition of the systems of the Alliance would make the Manticoran Alliance a II.1 definitely. By comparison, the People's Republic of Haven would be (estimated) a II.4 or II.5, but with much larger borders and inferior training and government.

Crown · Post by **Crown** » 2003-01-06 01:01am

It might be better to first define the Kardashev Levels, for those who are unfamiliar with them. Feel free to correct me if I am wrong;

K1 - civilasations use the entire energy available from a planet.
K2 - civilasations use the entire energy available from a star.
K3 - civilasations use the entire energy available from a galaxy.
K4 - ?

I think that's right, although for those unfamiliar with Kardashev, a K4 level is something that I just threw in for fun.

Xon · Post by **Xon** » 2003-01-06 02:54am

Crown wrote:It might be better to first define the Kardashev Levels, for those who are unfamiliar with them. Feel free to correct me if I am wrong;
K1 - civilasations use the entire energy available from a planet.
K2 - civilasations use the entire energy available from a star.
K3 - civilasations use the entire energy available from a galaxy.
K4 - ?
I think that's right, although for those unfamiliar with Kardashev, a K4 level is something that I just threw in for fun.

K4 would be a good way to describe the Xeelee

I always get a kick out of the fact that the Xeelee-verse humans converted a neutron star & surrounding starsystem into a huge fractal-c missile.

Enlightenment · Post by **Enlightenment** » 2003-01-06 03:01am

Crown wrote:It might be better to first define the Kardashev Levels, for those who are unfamiliar with them.

Visit the link in the first post of this thread.

Currald · Post by **Currald** » 2003-01-06 03:10am

It appears to be dead.

Enlightenment · Post by **Enlightenment** » 2003-01-06 03:31am

Remove the full stop/period at the end of the link.

http://www.angelfire.com/on2/daviddarli ... hevciv.htm

Rathark · Post by **Rathark** » 2003-01-06 10:54am

A Type III civilization that uses the entire power output of a galaxy would average approximately 10^38 watts at any given time. The first Death Star would use a significant fraction of this in the minutes or seconds needed to destroy a planet. Even if it requires hours to charge up for this task, it is safe to say that the Galactic Empire is close to being a Type III civilization.

From what I hear, the Culture would have to be orders of magnitude beyond the GE in terms of power generation. They are also sharing a galaxy with several older civilizations; although all in question would certainly use energy sources other than stars (the Grid).

The Xeelee might be close to being a Type Omega civilisation. Here's a possible extension of the scale (not my idea, but proposed in a book called "Impossibilty: The Limits of Science" or somesuch):

Type IV: Equals the power generation of an entire galactic cluster.
Type V: Equals the power generation of an entire galactic supercluster.
Type IV / Omega: Equals the power generation of the entire universe.

It seems that most of the "young" civilizations in B5 and ST would be between Type I and II. Could anyone verify this?

Rathark · Post by **Rathark** » 2003-01-06 11:01am

Here's that book i mentioned:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/ ... 15-9187349

Xon · Post by **Xon** » 2003-01-06 11:19am

Here is another Type IV / Omega civilization (also a Stephan Baxter creation...)
Downtime Humans from the Manifold series. They are humans that survive to the heat death of the universe, while probable covering most of the universe. Then they go back in time(~2020), & trigger a collapse in spacetime(expanding at c across the universe), imploding the universe creating a(n apprently infinite) multiverse. They routinely create pocket universe, and play around with strange quark nuggets left over from the big bang for self defence & to tigger the collaspe of the universe. Then through the multiverse they biuld a moon which travels through the multiverse giving humans in universes with certin parameters (no aliens in their universe, pre-moon body colliding with Earth then playing to see how things shape out). 1 guy is shafted by this woman in all 3 books(3 different universe, all in the same multiverse. 1st book is in the original universe,2nd & 4rd are in the multiverse)

The_Nice_Guy · Post by **The_Nice_Guy** » 2003-01-06 02:54pm

Is it possible for a type IV civilization to manipulate gravity or reverse overall universe entropy, thereby preventing infinite expansion, and the heat death?

If not, then what level of civilization can achieve this?

The Nice Guy

Currald · Post by **Currald** » 2003-01-07 04:37am

I'd put "Doc" Smith's Civilization from the Lensman books pretty squarely into Type II. I doubt they'd use their sunbeam for communication, but I guess they could if they wanted too!