How FTL might change a civ

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

Rarr, gentlemen. Hypothetical scenario ahoy!

Suppose that somehow we got to the stars, became fruitgul and multiplied, towards the point where we had, say, a hundred or so worlds. Assuming the laws of physics hold, this would of course be a very different civilisation from the one we know today, with effectively hundreds of independent little worlds which take decades to communicate with other ones and will probably never see ships other than in-system ones and their own colony ship.

Now, suppose some eggheads on some backwater world make a discovery: Instantaneous FTL technology, cheap and simple enough to produce for any ship larger than tiny patrol boats. How would this change whatever civilisation was in place?

[Guardsman Bass]

Rather than a bunch of essentially autonomous planet-states (or just planets, if the colonists break up into further nation-states on planet), you could probably get a few interstellar nations, with possibly trade but more likely travellers and information going back and forth between the worlds. You might even get some interstellar warfare, but it still seems kind of unlikely, since you could annihilate a planetary colony pretty easily by just knocking a decent-sized asteroid onto the world.

[Jew]

... effectively hundreds of independent little worlds which take decades to communicate with other ones and will probably never see ships other than in-system ones and their own colony ship.

Even in-system space travel would be hideously expensive, so I suspect that the civilizations and cultures would be almost entirely planet-bound. Even in the same solar system the only real exchange would be information, because you can send it by radio without the need for expensive space travel.

So even if you invent FTL spaceships, it's still going to be expensive to send things out into space. My guess is that very little would change; inter-stellar commerce would be virtually non-existent, because it simply would be too expensive even with FTL.

However, a few FTL courier ships would exist to ferry data back and forth. Interstellar commerce in ideas (e.g., new inventions, scientific discoveries, entertainment) would flourish.

[wolveraptor]

Before FTL, there would be no multi-system nations. It would be hard enough to transmit information from inner planets to outer ones, so keeping other systems up to date would occur only every fifty years or so.

With FTL, depending on expenses, nations might ally themselves or wage war: it all depends on how rich the country is already, and how much they're willing to dish out.

[Jalinth]

You'd first of all have planets "consolidating" their local solar system under one government as non-FTL drives would make having even a real solar government unlikely unless you are dealing with a core planet plus a few minor mining settlements, etc... scattered around the system. How long this takes depends on the system - might be very short or a cold war type battle

Then the rich systems would start to colonize new planets and likely influence other systems. Whether they would actually takeover depends on the government and the richness (are we talking about a valuable system or one that barely scraps by)

[Nephtys]

Before FTL, there would be no multi-system nations. It would be hard enough to transmit information from inner planets to outer ones, so keeping other systems up to date would occur only every fifty years or so.

With FTL, depending on expenses, nations might ally themselves or wage war: it all depends on how rich the country is already, and how much they're willing to dish out.

War is pointless when you have interstellar technology and (relatively) cheap spaceflight. Unless one party is squatting on an Earth-type habitable world and someone else wants it, there's nothing worth fighting over compared to looking for more planets. Even if a rocky colony goes to war with Earth 2.0 for the prime real estate, who do you think is going to be in a better position to fight? The guys stuck in domes, or the ones building open-air factories?

[wolveraptor]

Real-estate is not the only reason one fights a war. In fact, every major war in the 20th and 21st centuries had little or nothing to do with conquest of land.

[Nephtys]

Real-estate is not the only reason one fights a war. In fact, every major war in the 20th and 21st centuries had little or nothing to do with conquest of land.

Conquest of land, or population pressure of said land.

WW1- Because those guys we're bordering are jerks. Also: Some Sepratists shot our leader. Sweet, a chance to fight!
WW2- To get land and resources for Japan, to get vengance on france and an everlasting empire for Germany. And for the hell of it for Italy.
Israel Wars Ep 1-6: To get land/to not get land taken.
Dozens of civil wars in Africa: Who owns the land?
Vietnam, Afganistan, Korea: Who calls the shots on this land?
Falklands: Argentina wants the land badly. Good luck.
Gulf War 1. Who owns that tiny peice of land which has so much oily goodness?
Gulf War 2: The Vengance - To bring 'freedom' and secure um... economic... interests in the area.


Although they're not explicitly about land, the fact that territory/resources are seriously huge deals in every one of those I've listed.

[Arrow]

Real-estate is not the only reason one fights a war. In fact, every major war in the 20th and 21st centuries had little or nothing to do with conquest of land.

I think the OP's scenario would lead to wars over intellectual property rights. What we have here is a bunch of independent worlds living different environments - they're bound to have different technologies. Some may have better materials, others better space engines or ships, or better medical tools, or better computing technology, etc. Once these worlds are reintroduced to each other, they'll see who has what, and they'll each be grabbing new tech off of each other.

The folks with better technology probably aren't going to be happy over the 'lesser' worlds taking their toys. And since there isn't a galaxy-wide government to appeal to, the only recourse will be covert wars, blockaides, bombardments and maybe even invasions.

[wolveraptor]

WW1- Because those guys we're bordering are jerks. Also: Some Sepratists shot our leader. Sweet, a chance to fight!

How is this about conquest? It's about rebellion. Granted, it presupposes a time when mean ole' Austria-Hungary conquered this place.

WW2- To get land and resources for Japan, to get vengance on france and an everlasting empire for Germany. And for the hell of it for Italy.

For America, the greatest nation on Earth, however, it was because Nazi Germany was evil, and were conquering out allies. In a space verison of these events, the war might still have occurred to prevent or minimize the Holocaust.

Israel Wars Ep 1-6: To get land/to not get land taken.

Point taken.

Dozens of civil wars in Africa: Who owns the land?

Are those really "major" wars?

Vietnam, Afganistan, Korea: Who calls the shots on this land?

That's a war for political ideology, I would think. The US never intended to actually conquer the land.

Falklands: Argentina wants the land badly. Good luck.

Point taken.

Gulf War 1. Who owns that tiny peice of land which has so much oily goodness?

Point taken. In space, we'd just look for more oil.

Gulf War 2: The Vengance - To bring 'freedom' and secure um... economic... interests in the area.

Exactly. It wasn't about conquest or resources whatsoever. At least on paper.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

... effectively hundreds of independent little worlds which take decades to communicate with other ones and will probably never see ships other than in-system ones and their own colony ship.

Even in-system space travel would be hideously expensive, so I suspect that the civilizations and cultures would be almost entirely planet-bound. Even in the same solar system the only real exchange would be information, because you can send it by radio without the need for expensive space travel.

So even if you invent FTL spaceships, it's still going to be expensive to send things out into space. My guess is that very little would change; inter-stellar commerce would be virtually non-existent, because it simply would be too expensive even with FTL.

However, a few FTL courier ships would exist to ferry data back and forth. Interstellar commerce in ideas (e.g., new inventions, scientific discoveries, entertainment) would flourish.

Not really. A sublight civilization occupying the hundred most suitable nearby systems will have to be, at a bare minimum, many centuries old. (The odds of finding a planet that will be perfectly ready for Earthlife to inhabit without first constructing some significant support infrastructure beforehand can be described by a number looking remarkably like a zero.) Arguably, with the difficulty involved in establishing enough space infrastructure to launch starships, a civilization capable of founding that many, presumably, successful colonies, will be several thousand years old. This is enough time to complete the sorts of projects required to cheapen intra-system travel. Projects requiring huge investments and very long lead-times, such as space-elevators, fuel production facilities, asteroid mining facilities, even enormous space-based lasers and other exotica.

It is arguable that this civilization will have a well-developed in-system infrastructure and getting into space will be relatively inexpensive. The civilizations on the oldest systems will be mature, and the ones at the edge of the expansion will be generally planet-bound (really, they'd probably be bound to asteroid habitats, since those are easier to build and less catastrophe-prone, and it's easier to construct space-based infrastructure when one is already in space.)

However, if you introduce cheap FTL to the mix, interesting things will probably happen. All these 100 planets will probably have radically different cultures, and in several thousand years, you can accumulate enough genetic drift and adaptation that humans hailing from the low-gravity, cold, thin-atmosphere world of Bumfuck IV, Middle of Nowhere system will start to look rather different than the peoples of Earth. Interactions between mature civilizations could potentially be rough, as a heavily populated system might be looking to export surplus population, and may want to back-fill systems with pre-existing infrastructure (since, while travel in a system with infrastructure in place is cheap, breaking new ground and sticking all the required public works on it is very expensive.) The systems in question may well object to people, who are effectively aliens, swamping the native cultures. You may also find disagreements among the systems with enough people and infrastructure in place to consider founding colonies of their own. While this might've been solved amicably in a sublight culture (mostly because things take place too slowly in a sublight world for competing colonies to have any choice other than cooperation,) cheap FTL travel suddenly means that claim-jumpers can go home and bring back friends to enforce their claims.

In short, it's rather like taking a group of complete strangers and locking them up in the same house . . . only you've gone and removed all the locks from the bedroom doors beforehand. They may work out their differences eventually, but it will be interesting in the interim.

[Nephtys]

WW1- Because those guys we're bordering are jerks. Also: Some Sepratists shot our leader. Sweet, a chance to fight!

How is this about conquest? It's about rebellion. Granted, it presupposes a time when mean ole' Austria-Hungary conquered this place.

WW2- To get land and resources for Japan, to get vengance on france and an everlasting empire for Germany. And for the hell of it for Italy.

For America, the greatest nation on Earth, however, it was because Nazi Germany was evil, and were conquering out allies. In a space verison of these events, the war might still have occurred to prevent or minimize the Holocaust.

Israel Wars Ep 1-6: To get land/to not get land taken.

Point taken.

Dozens of civil wars in Africa: Who owns the land?

Are those really "major" wars?

Vietnam, Afganistan, Korea: Who calls the shots on this land?

That's a war for political ideology, I would think. The US never intended to actually conquer the land.

Falklands: Argentina wants the land badly. Good luck.

Point taken.

Gulf War 1. Who owns that tiny peice of land which has so much oily goodness?

Point taken. In space, we'd just look for more oil.

Gulf War 2: The Vengance - To bring 'freedom' and secure um... economic... interests in the area.

Exactly. It wasn't about conquest or resources whatsoever. At least on paper.

That's what I mean. They don't all have to be explicitly about gaining territory, but they ARE about who controls the territory. The Cold War proxy wars all weren't about one nation physically taking land and resources, but rather them gaining political control of that resource, installing friendly governments and so on. It's second-hand landgrab.

[Jew]

The odds of finding a planet that will be perfectly ready for Earthlife to inhabit without first constructing some significant support infrastructure beforehand can be described by a number looking remarkably like a zero.

You might be interested to read The Seedling Stars, a collection of four stories by James Blish. He posits that it is easier to adapt mankind to a new planet than to change its environment to fit mankind. Given another century or two of genetic research, I think we might have the tools to redesign man to live on new worlds.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

The odds of finding a planet that will be perfectly ready for Earthlife to inhabit without first constructing some significant support infrastructure beforehand can be described by a number looking remarkably like a zero.

You might be interested to read The Seedling Stars, a collection of four stories by James Blish. He posits that it is easier to adapt mankind to a new planet than to change its environment to fit mankind. Given another century or two of genetic research, I think we might have the tools to redesign man to live on new worlds.

Earthlife as complex as a human being can only tolerate a certain range of conditions, even with genetic engineering. Certainly you could take bacteria and simple animals and taylor them to live in environments as diverse as the clouds of Venus to the cryovolcanoes of Titan. But it's another matter entirely to get something as complex as a human being to use, say, a slightly different amino acid set, or prosper in a high-radiation/high-metal/high-toxicity environment. There are too many interconnected and redundant chemical systems coded into human DNA, which comes from life that has spent the last four billion years adapting to a single planet and doing things in a rather specific way.

Our future descendents, if they were to colonize a reasonably Earthlike planet, they would likely first seed the place with life that's easier to manipulate. Over time, these initial waves of seeding will modify the world to the point that we can safely send humans to live on it. It will likely be more of a compromise than a wholesale terraforming, though. It will still be rather time and resource-intensive.

[Ender]

I presume this is FTL that does not violate casualty, correct? Because if not, then there are a ton of issues here no one is looking at.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

I presume this is FTL that does not violate casualty, correct? Because if not, then there are a ton of issues here no one is looking at.

No such thing as FTL that doesn't violate causality. FTL travel will always be time travel in at least one other frame of reference. Considering the alternative, it's always easier on the sanity just to assume the generic handwavium sci-fi FTL in these scenarios and leave it at that.

[AK_Jedi]

One thing that I think would happen is the rise of "bread basket" worlds. Before FTL, each planet would have to be completely self-sufficient. With FTL, worlds would be able to import or export resources from any other world. Throw in some external pressure from richer governments, and you get worlds that export only a few select resource.

After all, look as some of the 3rd world countries the WTO is active in.

[darthdavid]

One thing that I think would happen is the rise of "bread basket" worlds. Before FTL, each planet would have to be completely self-sufficient. With FTL, worlds would be able to import or export resources from any other world. Throw in some external pressure from richer governments, and you get worlds that export only a few select resource.

After all, look as some of the 3rd world countries the WTO is active in.

Depends on how fast the speed and how much energy it requires though really. Because chances are it's going to take more energy to get the grain/meat/whatever from the growing point to the consuming point. Energy costs money remember, and it could be much cheaper just to put up garden satellites and ship the stuff around in system, allowing even a system with no space left on planets to grow enough grain to feed it's population. Hell, they could even make a multi layered dyson swarm, with each layer absorbing a different wavelength of light and converting it to power. And in the long term there's a good chance that it'd be cheaper than FTLing the goods in.

[wolveraptor]

Nephtys: suppose Neo-Nazis take control on planet Inbredhickia, and the persecuted groups send a secret holo-ultra-mega foil trans-combobulated message with super-mega double encryption and mega bytes to the dominant power on planet Kickassia, the Canadians. The message calls for aid and relief from oppressive Neo-Nazi rule. Might not the Canadians wage war to save the persecuted?

[Lord of the Abyss]

Depending on how ambitious and ruthless the people who first get the FTL tech are, you could see some really brutal wars of conquest, or extermination and resettlement ( saves you the centuries of effort to terraform a planet ). Since each system is virtually isolated, they aren't likely to have some sort of huge space navy, or a ground military larger than necessary to keep the peace. Plus, without FTL tech of their own, they won't see an enemy force coming, either. Someone's going to find that a temptation.

This scenario also may occur if the creators of the FTL technique trade/give it to others, or have it stolen.

[Guardsman Bass]

The odds of finding a planet that will be perfectly ready for Earthlife to inhabit without first constructing some significant support infrastructure beforehand can be described by a number looking remarkably like a zero.

You might be interested to read The Seedling Stars, a collection of four stories by James Blish. He posits that it is easier to adapt mankind to a new planet than to change its environment to fit mankind. Given another century or two of genetic research, I think we might have the tools to redesign man to live on new worlds.

Earthlife as complex as a human being can only tolerate a certain range of conditions, even with genetic engineering. Certainly you could take bacteria and simple animals and taylor them to live in environments as diverse as the clouds of Venus to the cryovolcanoes of Titan. But it's another matter entirely to get something as complex as a human being to use, say, a slightly different amino acid set, or prosper in a high-radiation/high-metal/high-toxicity environment. There are too many interconnected and redundant chemical systems coded into human DNA, which comes from life that has spent the last four billion years adapting to a single planet and doing things in a rather specific way.

Our future descendents, if they were to colonize a reasonably Earthlike planet, they would likely first seed the place with life that's easier to manipulate. Over time, these initial waves of seeding will modify the world to the point that we can safely send humans to live on it. It will likely be more of a compromise than a wholesale terraforming, though. It will still be rather time and resource-intensive.

That's if they are lucky, though, and the bacterial and larger life they introduce can push out the native life so that the humans can create an environment where they can live in the open. It could easily go the other way; an example I remember is from David Weber's Honor series, where the capital planet of the Anderman Empire was impoverished for decades because the native bacterial life had a voracious appetite for terran chlorophyll.

It might actually be better to try to colonize planets that are uninhabitable, but easily terraformable, rather than planets that already have advanced ecosystems.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

That's if they are lucky, though, and the bacterial and larger life they introduce can push out the native life so that the humans can create an environment where they can live in the open. It could easily go the other way; an example I remember is from David Weber's Honor series, where the capital planet of the Anderman Empire was impoverished for decades because the native bacterial life had a voracious appetite for terran chlorophyll.

It might actually be better to try to colonize planets that are uninhabitable, but easily terraformable, rather than planets that already have advanced ecosystems.

If one has a sufficient understanding of genetics, and a good understanding of the conditions of the target world, it is concievable that one can create bacteria capable of pushing out the natives, or at least mitigating their effects. Of course, the ultimate end-results will be difficult to predict, since our introduced life will start accumulating mutations. (Presumably, the way alien life does things will be sufficiently different as to prevent horizontal gene transfer between modified Earthlife and the natives, so that won't be a factor.) And it will probably be difficult to find uninhabitable, easily terraformed planets. (Even in the Solar System, the task of terraforming Mars or Venus will be non-trivial.) Worse still, it seems that life will arise on a suitable world as soon as it becomes suitable. (We suspect that life on Earth may have been around since the planet cooled enough to support it.) So we'll probably have to hijack or adapt primitive ecosystems to suit our needs. I stress the "primitive" because while we'll probably lose little sleep over the mass-destruction of native slime-mats, more advanced life will probably draw significant protest.

[Guardsman Bass]

That's if they are lucky, though, and the bacterial and larger life they introduce can push out the native life so that the humans can create an environment where they can live in the open. It could easily go the other way; an example I remember is from David Weber's Honor series, where the capital planet of the Anderman Empire was impoverished for decades because the native bacterial life had a voracious appetite for terran chlorophyll.

It might actually be better to try to colonize planets that are uninhabitable, but easily terraformable, rather than planets that already have advanced ecosystems.

If one has a sufficient understanding of genetics, and a good understanding of the conditions of the target world, it is concievable that one can create bacteria capable of pushing out the natives, or at least mitigating their effects. Of course, the ultimate end-results will be difficult to predict, since our introduced life will start accumulating mutations. (Presumably, the way alien life does things will be sufficiently different as to prevent horizontal gene transfer between modified Earthlife and the natives, so that won't be a factor.) And it will probably be difficult to find uninhabitable, easily terraformed planets. (Even in the Solar System, the task of terraforming Mars or Venus will be non-trivial.) Worse still, it seems that life will arise on a suitable world as soon as it becomes suitable. (We suspect that life on Earth may have been around since the planet cooled enough to support it.) So we'll probably have to hijack or adapt primitive ecosystems to suit our needs. I stress the "primitive" because while we'll probably lose little sleep over the mass-destruction of native slime-mats, more advanced life will probably draw significant protest.

What about the possibility of native life being edible? Of course, the genetics are different, but there may be some forms of alien life that your stomach could break down.

I'd be more worried about native bacteria getting into your gut and starting to displace some of the more important bacteria who help keep you alive.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

That's if they are lucky, though, and the bacterial and larger life they introduce can push out the native life so that the humans can create an environment where they can live in the open. It could easily go the other way; an example I remember is from David Weber's Honor series, where the capital planet of the Anderman Empire was impoverished for decades because the native bacterial life had a voracious appetite for terran chlorophyll.

It might actually be better to try to colonize planets that are uninhabitable, but easily terraformable, rather than planets that already have advanced ecosystems.

If one has a sufficient understanding of genetics, and a good understanding of the conditions of the target world, it is concievable that one can create bacteria capable of pushing out the natives, or at least mitigating their effects. Of course, the ultimate end-results will be difficult to predict, since our introduced life will start accumulating mutations. (Presumably, the way alien life does things will be sufficiently different as to prevent horizontal gene transfer between modified Earthlife and the natives, so that won't be a factor.) And it will probably be difficult to find uninhabitable, easily terraformed planets. (Even in the Solar System, the task of terraforming Mars or Venus will be non-trivial.) Worse still, it seems that life will arise on a suitable world as soon as it becomes suitable. (We suspect that life on Earth may have been around since the planet cooled enough to support it.) So we'll probably have to hijack or adapt primitive ecosystems to suit our needs. I stress the "primitive" because while we'll probably lose little sleep over the mass-destruction of native slime-mats, more advanced life will probably draw significant protest.

What about the possibility of native life being edible? Of course, the genetics are different, but there may be some forms of alien life that your stomach could break down.

I'd be more worried about native bacteria getting into your gut and starting to displace some of the more important bacteria who help keep you alive.

For native life to be edible, it would have to produce the nine essential amino acids that we can't synthesize on our own. Alien life would be inedible for us if it used a different set of amino acids, or it used amino acids of the opposite chirality of ours, or if it generated proteins that spawned a violent immune response on our part.

The converse is also true for any alien microbes seeking to live in your gut. They would have to adapt to the pH levels in your gut, and the organic resources available to them. Though microbes tend to be highly adaptable, the ones that come with you have the home-court advantage. They're already adapted to living inside people, and can likely out-compete alien bacteria while they attempt to adapt.

[wautd]

If we just get FTL tech, how do we navigate? Is it even possible with current technology?