Rhinocrates
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With hindsight, others have discounted that 'dinosauroid' concept as being excessively humanoid. A more realistic what-if might involve troodontids evolving into forms with longer armed and shorter necks. That would have eventually allowed for the development of larger-capacity brains in bigger skulls as well as literally encouraging manual dexterity (with resulting benefits to cognitive function).
Russell et al had to make their 'dinosauroid' stand fully erect to make up for its absence of a tail. Of course, bird evolution took a totally different approach to (almost complete) tail-loss. A crouching stance like a bird might scale better if the biped in question was fully terrestrial with more robust bones for muscle attachments. But, an armed bird analogue still wouldn't result in an upright, humanoid life form.
In reality dinosaurs continued their evolution, you know the all the birds are essentially current dinosaurs evolved by therapods.I saw Dale Russell's dinosauroid at the old Natural History Museum in Ottawa back in the '80s. A very cool concept ... but kind of freaky to stand looking eye-to-eye with!
Don't forget about CorvidsAn intelligent and tools exploiting dinosaur?
We already have it exactly now on Earth: take the big Amazonian parrots.....
Indeed.Kea: a species of intelligent, tool using, curious, destructive dinosaur descendants.
Kea - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Do. Not. Trust. Them. Around. Your. Car.
For those who don't know what the Fermi paradox is (see here for a great summary video): the galaxy is 10bn years old, and it would only take an alien civilisation 0.002bn years to colonise the whole thing. There are 6bn warm rocky Earth-like planets in the galaxy. For the sake of argument, imagine 0.1% generate intelligent species. Then imagine 0.1% of those species end up spreading out through space and reaching our field of view. That means we'd see evidence of 6,000 civilisations near our solar system - but we see nothing. Why?
The issue with many proposed solutions to the Fermi paradox is that they must apply perfectly to those 6,000 civilisations independently. For example, aliens could prefer to exist in virtual reality than explore the physical universe - but would that consistently happen every time to 6,000 separate civilisations?
Surely the most relevant aspect of the Fermi paradox is time. The galaxy has been producing stars and planets for 10bn years. Earth has existed for 4.54bn of those years. The earliest known life formed on Earth 4bn years ago (Ga). However, there is some evidence to suggest it may have formed as early as 4.5 Ga (source). Life then existed on Earth as single celled archaea/bacteria until 2.1 Ga, when the first eukaryotes developed. After that, key milestones happened relatively quickly – multicellular life appeared 1.6 Ga, earliest animals 0.8 Ga, dinosaurs 0.2 Ga, mammals 0.1 Ga, primates 0.08 Ga, earliest humans 0.008 Ga, behaviourally modern humans 0.00005 Ga, and the first human reached space 0.00000006 Ga.
It's been proposed that the development of the first eukaryotes (eukaryogenesis) was the single most important milestone in the history of life, and it's so remarkable that it could be the only time in the history of the galaxy that it's happened, and therefore the solution to the Fermi paradox. A eukaryote has a cell membrane and a nucleus, and is 1,000 times bigger than an archaea/bacteria. It can produce far more energy, and this energy allows for greater complexity. It probably happened when a bacterium "swallowed" an archaea, but instead of digesting it, the two started a symbiotic relationship where the archaea started producing energy for the bacterium. It may also have involved a giant virus adding its genetic factory mechanism into the mix. In other words, it was extremely unlikely to have happened.
The galaxy could be full of planets hosting archaea/bacteria, but Earth could be the first one where eukaryogenesis miraculously happened and is the "great filter" which we have successfully passed to become the very first intelligent form of life in the galaxy - there are 3 major reasons for why:
This paper analyses the timing of evolutionary transitions and concludes that, "the expected evolutionary transition times likely exceed the lifetime of Earth, perhaps by many orders of magnitude". In other words, it's exceptionally lucky for intelligent life to have emerged as quickly as it did, even though it took 4.5bn years (of the galaxy's 10bn year timespan). It also mentions that our sun's increasing luminosity will render the Earth uninhabitable in 0.8-1.3bn years, so we're pretty much just in time!
- The appearance of the eukaryote took much more time than the appearance of life itself: It took 0.04-0.5bn years for archaea/bacteria to appear on Earth, but it took a whopping 1.9-2.4bn years for that early life to become eukaryotic. In other words, it took far less time for life to spontaneously develop from a lifeless Earth than it took for that life to generate a eukaryote, which is crazy when you think about it
- The appearance of the eukaryote took more time than every other evolutionary step combined: The 1.9-2.4bn years that eukaryogenesis took is 42-53% of the entire history of life. It's 19-24% of the age of the galaxy itself
- It only happened once: Once eukaryotes developed, multicellular organisms developed independently, over 40 seperate times. However, eukaryogenesis only happened once. Every cell in every eukaryote, including you and me, is descended from that first eukaryote. All those trillions of interactions between bacteria, archaea and giant viruses, and in only one situation did they produce a eukaryote.
Earth has been the perfect cradle for life (source) - it's had Jupiter nearby to suck up dangerous meteors, a perfectly sized moon to enable tides, tectonic plates which encourage rich minerals to bubble up to the crust, and it's got a rotating metal core which produces a magnetic field to protect from cosmic rays. And yet it's still taken life all this time to produce an intelligent civilisation.
I've been researching the Fermi paradox for a while and eukaryogenesis is such a compelling topic, it's now in my view the single reason why we see no evidence of aliens. Thanks for reading.
Oxygen might not be an indication of life at all.They need active plate tectonics (probably), they definitely need a moon to cause tides, they need a liquid core and a planetary magnetic field, then we can look for free oxygen in the air.
Oxygen is reactive enough that it won't remain floating around as O2 molecules, it'll get bound up into something in the long term.Oxygen might not be an indication of life at all.
‘Dark oxygen’ in depths of Pacific Ocean could force rethink about origins of life
Electrically charged metallic lumps found to produce oxygen in total darkness in process aking to how plants use photosynthesiswww.theguardian.com
HiKea: a species of intelligent, tool using, curious, destructive dinosaur descendants.
Kea - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Do. Not. Trust. Them. Around. Your. Car.
New Approach called the geological solution to the Fermi paradox
A Study by Robert J. Stern and Taras V. Gerya
Point on the importance of planetary tectonic for biological evolution
mean since Earth has planetary tectonic and Life, while Mars And Venus no planetary tectonic and no Life [or not found yet]
Imply that Life can only originate on World with active planetary tectonic
[This also imply theory that earth like Planet need a Moon for keep planetary tectonic active - or be Moon of Gas giant (Pandora) ]
There conclusion is grim, since of 8 planets in Solarsystem, only Earth has Intelligent Life.
So life can be rare in Univers...
more on theory
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sTbkHDXEA0&t=731s
Source
The importance of continents, oceans and plate tectonics for the evolution of complex life: implications for finding extraterrestrial civilizations - Scientific Reports
Within the uncertainties of involved astronomical and biological parameters, the Drake Equation typically predicts that there should be many exoplanets in our galaxy hosting active, communicative civilizations (ACCs). These optimistic calculations are however not supported by evidence, which is...www.nature.com
What Zen means is the Aquatic Ape HypothesisHumans be the product of rock pool apes on some forgotten coast.
Yes it's the best explanation of these features of humans.What Zen means is the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis
That our early ancestor life in pond or coast and adapted to aquatic life style.
my last line is bit misunderstandig , the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis, is misused today as pseudoscience explanation for Mermaid.However pseudoscience is of no relevance. I don't know why you'd even mention that?
This is not a consequence of tectonics alone.8 planets in Solarsystem, only Earth has Intelligent Life
Professor Brian Cox's take on the Fermi Paradox . . .
"Until recently my guess has been that the answer to the Fermi Paradox might be found in biology - complex biological systems are rare.
I’m increasingly of the view that the reason for The Great Silence is that civilisations are inevitably crushed by the weight of nobheads shortly after inventing the internet."
View: https://x.com/ProfBrianCox/status/1803357229208215883
cheers,
Robin.
The Great Silence only exists in the stupid theory that aliens use the radio to communicate.Professor Brian Cox's take on the Fermi Paradox . . .
"Until recently my guess has been that the answer to the Fermi Paradox might be found in biology - complex biological systems are rare.
I’m increasingly of the view that the reason for The Great Silence is that civilisations are inevitably crushed by the weight of nobheads shortly after inventing the internet."
View: https://x.com/ProfBrianCox/status/1803357229208215883
cheers,
Robin.
Einstein himself was pretty found of direct lazer signalsThe Great Silence only exists in the stupid theory that aliens use the radio to communicate.
If it is not possible to exceed the speed of light, then it makes no sense to speculate whether there are other civilizations in the galaxy.
If it is possible to exceed the speed of light, then there is no point in trying to communicate with them by radio.
If our theoretical physicists are not able to overcome Einstein's complex, AI had better do it.
That question is already answered: they voted for Neil Armstrong.The one and only true remaining question is: Who would all those dirty stinking apes vote for???
I have to admit that I find this guy likable, his faith in stones is soulful, and he has as much right to be heard as the guys on the superstrings.I'm not saying it was really alien aliens, but...
If the aquatic monkey hypothesis were true, we could spend as much time underwater as seals, dolphins or whales. But our respiratory system evolved to run long distances upright (behind gazelles... or in front of the Smilodon)my last line is bit misunderstandig , the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis, is misused today as pseudoscience explanation for Mermaid.
The mermaid is not a myth, I drink coffee every day at her house.What Zen means is the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis
That our early ancestor life in pond or coast and adapted to aquatic life style.
This Hypothesis is also connected as "pseudo scientific evidence" to Mermaid mythos.
More here:
Aquatic ape hypothesis - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
Gestalt organisms are immortal, their individual members at death are replaced by others and the collective memory remains.I quite liked the compound entities based on dog like units that when gathered into a pack attain consciousness from A Fire Upon the Deep.
It's been done: https://www.japan-guide.com/e/e6028.htmlWhat Zen means is the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis
That our early ancestor life in pond or coast and adapted to aquatic life style.
This Hypothesis is also connected as "pseudo scientific evidence" to Mermaid mythos.
More here:
Aquatic ape hypothesis - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
A little more detail:Oxygen might not be an indication of life at all.
‘Dark oxygen’ in depths of Pacific Ocean could force rethink about origins of life
Electrically charged metallic lumps found to produce oxygen in total darkness in process aking to how plants use photosynthesiswww.theguardian.com
Mineral-Rich Nodules Produce "Dark" Oxygen in the Abyss
Researchers funded by a polymetallic nodule mining company appear to have discovered an entirely new source of oxygen production in the abyssal plain...maritime-executive.com
In the book this is....not quite the case. Since the descrete individual consciousness is the product of a pack of dog-like creatures. Which individually do not have high enough intelligence. Each pack is a human-like conscious individual.Gestalt organisms are immortal, their individual members at death are replaced by others and the collective memory remains.
If the aquatic monkey hypothesis were true, we could spend as much time underwater as seals, dolphins or whales. But our respiratory system evolved to run long distances upright (behind gazelles... or in front of the Smilodon)
How many other apes can safely give birth in water, where instinctively the baby holds it's breath until it surfaces?
How many other apes shed salt out in such quantities as Humans?
How many other apes have the layer of subcutaneous fat?
Or the femals having 'monthly' cycles (appropriate term).
The Aquatic Ape is something very far back in human history. The Savanna is more recent relatively speaking.
The problem with the theory, is that the evidence of such is very unlikely to survive. Being on the coast and subject to erosion.
KongThe one and only true remaining question is: Who would all those dirty stinking apes vote for???
Thus the Spirit/Opportunity air-"The elders tell of a young ball much like you. He bounced three meters in the air, then he bounced 1.8 meters in the air, then he bounced four meters in the air.