Space whales

“The reason it doesn’t exist is because it doesn’t exist”

Well, theres most likely a reason why it doesn’t exist.

The organisms on earth that have chloroplasts are green because they’re adapted to absorb a certain type of light effectively.

Unless a star emits all wavelengths of light, there would be absolutely no reason to have this be a favorable trait, and thus be ignored while other traits are favored.

Well a now hidden post in this thread was reported as nonsensical magical handwaving (I didn’t have enough mental energy to read and digest it so I asked someone else on the team). Seeing as there are now multiple people getting offtrack in trying to prove things, this thread is at a great risk of being locked now.

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they’re basically arguing that just because things didnt evolve on earth, doesnt mean that they cant evolve
which is true
but thats just like arguing that just because we havent sent any teapots to space, doesnt mean that there arent any teapots in space
its not gonna help you argue for the existence of space whales
you need to prove that space whales can evolve and show a plausible evolutionary path


EDIT: skimmed through their post again
they actually did suggest some stuff
i somehow missed that
this is what happens when you skim through posts about a useless discussion that you dont care about

anyway, lots of sugestions and possibilities, no explanations as to how these things might work, no mentions of specific materials and molecules, no precise, detailed, and plausible evolutionary pathway, nor any proof for space whale existence

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I am very pro-space whales but you’re completely right. This is a big problem on the forum, people disprove other people’s fallacious points instead of making a good argument. I plan to do some research tomorrow and get a plausible set of steps for how to evolve lawk-like methods for getting into space. However my end goal isn’t space whales. It’s space reefs. Those just make much more sense to me.

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I wrote this yesterday, before Topcode’s post was hidden, but I spent quite a bit of time writing it, so I’ll post it anyways. Tell me if it’s bad or if could’ve used better wording or something.

Because a chemical like that doesn’t exist. Unless you’re talking about visible light, in which case the organism is completely belgium anyways.

And again, even if a chemical that absorbs all wavelengths of light existed, it wouldn’t make a difference. The organism would actually suffer much more damage than if it didn’t have that. And then there are all the other issues that me and others have pointed out.

Just so you know, stars do emit all wavelengths of light, just not equally.

@Topcode I was essentially just saying that Thrive can include anything that could’ve evolved on Earth.
There’s no need need to be so aggressive or to insult people.
But your arguments seem to be pretty flawed,
so first of all,

We do, actually. The tides were likely very important in the development of terrestrial life, and it reflects light onto parts of Earth that are in nighttime.

Second,

that ecosystem argument is pretty much irrelevant, as you didn’t explain how an ecosystem would form, and it is in no way a solution to the lack of water and nitrogen in deep space. The conditions of your little jar ecospheres and deep space are COMPLETELY different.

nobody said that there is no light. The issue is that there’s too much of it, and if an organism wants to protect itself from that light (and from the lack of any pressure), it needs durable, thick protection. But photosynthesis also needs light, which the protection is covering. There’s a tradeoff between protection and photosynthesis.

And this is also not a solution, because if its outside is transparent, then the radiation can get through, which means a dead organism.

Sure, but how would life be able start on those environments? And that doesn’t actually explain how or why they would get to space.

You clearly do not get just how tall those organisms would need to be to get through a planet or moon’s atmosphere, and how would they get the other ingredients for photosynthesis (nitrogen, water, carbon) or nutrients to survive? If you say from the soil, then all that stuff has to travel from the surface of the world to the leaves up above. There’s still the issue of protection from unfiltered solar radiation, and the last problem I can think of is how the organism would hold itself together, because even in a world with 0.1% of Earth’s gravity, it would either snap or bend so much that it’s no longer in space.

And lastly, it very much does matter. Evolution does not work like your imagination. Organisms evolve when there is pressure to. This entire discussion is about how life in deep space could realistically evolve, not about impossible magically-appearing organisms. Go look in Forum Games if you want that kind of stuff.

I have thought of a potential way for a space organism to get some energy passively, but I obviously do not think space life, at least how it’s been discussed, is possible, and this idea I have has plenty of issues.
Essentially, it’s outer surface is thick, heavy, and shiny enough to block a majority of non-ionizing radiation and some ionizing radiation, and whatever gets through is partially absorbed by radiosynthetic cells covering the inside of it’s outer surface, allowing it to get energy from light without getting scorched.
Again, I know this probably wouldn’t actually work.

With all that said, in my opinion this thread should be closed. What’s being discussed doesn’t fit into Future Game anymore, and it’s going the same way the various underwater civilization threads have.

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I will make a suggestion here to prevent circles of meaningless arguments and help us obey rule 15.

Rule 15:

If you want to make an argument for space whales go ahead, but if you want even the slightest chance of ever seeing anything like it in thrive, start from the ground up. Cite a source for EVERY claim you make.

Stop with wild speculation like:

To the people arguing for space whales, provide proof for every claim you make. In a debate like this you do not have the luxury of saying “I’m sure one exists.” Prove it.

While I take issue with some of the claims made in the proof for underwater metalworking, I respect the argument made here. If you want to change minds, make a solid argument, because that changed my mine far more than anything I’ve seen in one of the threads.

(For the record I’m still not convinced an UWC is possible, but this is not the place to discuss that. It just serves as a good example and I need to make sure this doesn’t come back to bite me lol)

I really don’t want every thread under Future Game to turn into another underwater civs like so many others have before. So many have been closed now. Continue as you will, but I will remind you once again of Rule 15. It will be enforced.

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Ah yes the first 217 words which is almost just facts about how little we know about life.

Skipping 2 paragraphs the 140 words which has some more opinion sprinkled in, but is also just mostly facts regarding the needs of life, and why they are met in space given the right conditions.

Moving back to the skipped 60 words, that’s just summarizing the issues with the space whales idea.

The next 43 words are a bit of an iffy part because I’m too lazy to research all of what life can and can’t produce to find something that fits. There’s plenty of clear things that would work, just no idea if life can make them.- obselete cause i finally did research, was boring, creatures can make very high quality glass tho

The next 42 words are simply stating that there are situations where it is way easier to get to space, there are. I could have elaborated on all the methods to actually get there, but I won’t

The next 95 words is the most speculative of all, which is that plants like light, getting above other plants is more light, so plants go high, high plants maybe go to edge of space and have similar adaptations to space. Most of that, is based on the established fact that things grow tall. The rest is based on the fact that very high altitude is very similar to space in hazards. But that doesn’t explain how they make the jump, which I won’t bother doing, because I’m not making a research paper.

The final 21 words is me telling everyone to not be tied to an earth centered point of view, and to think about possibilities outside of earth.

So of these over 600 words, roughly 60 of them are strongly based on speculation. I have no idea how that is nonsensical or magical, but I guess the community has spoken.

So if I understand this correctly, the only thing allowed on this post is “Space whales are possible because X”, or “space whales are impossible because Y”. Not “this reason for space whales to be possible/impossible is bad because Z” This seems to be some sort of unspoken rule that I was unaware of, sorry.

I am not writing a research paper on space whales, and neither is anyone else here.

There are some valid complaints that could be made, such as it being rude to call people’s ideas stupid. Whatever the case, it seems I don’t have any wanted input, so whatever.

Just go back, read the whole post. It can be very beneficial, my posts are sometimes scattered and not ordered perfectly, and while that’s my fault it doesn’t help when you don’t read all of it.

you already forgot the section regarding ecospheres, they dont need a constant supply to survive in the described premise, only to grow. Periodically our high altitude balloon animals could return to the surface to intake nutrients, reproduce, etc while using the high altitude to escape predators and reach light. In addition, the jump to complete isolation would only happen when they transitioned to space, the air would still be accessible until then.

the why is later… read at the post before responding

water can protect from most of the most harmful, admittedly some may get through, but pigments and such can be used to mitigate that.

on a moon? good question. refer to the earlier section of the post where I really explain how little we know about life. I cant answer how life would start there, neither can anyone definitively answer how life would start anywhere.

how? good question, i cant tell you for sure, low gravity means a higher atmosphere which means that while getting to space is easier, its still not easy. volcanic eruptions, geysers, meteor impacts, etc could all be spontaneous ways that this occurs. intentional ways though, less of an idea.

There IS a pressure for plants to go higher, and space is about as high as you can get.

nty, i was unaware that i needed to write a research paper here
but anyways doing some research it does exist, some organisms can create large and clear silica crystals, which is basically just glass, which does the job of clear sturdy thing good enough, and ill even cite a source, granted its Wikipedia but i cant be bothered.
ill let you get to deleting all the posts that dont cite sources (the entire thread)
and no, i wont make sources for the other speculative claim, as stated i cant be bothered to make a research paper, and what sparked this is already hidden.

@hhyyrylainen can i make a group chat for this topic without the people who constantly try to prove that space whales could exist without using any evidence for their claims

i meant several chemicals that each absorb different parts of the spectrum but all produce ATP not one magical chemical that uses all the wavelengths so i guess i did not explain it well enough.
if i post an explanation that does not make sense try to think of it in a way that makes more sense

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As long as I don’t eventually have to jump in due to people reporting each other. I’m aware that some forum games have DMs with quite a lot of participants.

and this is the problem.

If you expect to win this kind of arguement, specific, scientifically plausible examples need to be provided. Can you anticipate all the ways life could potentially evolve on a moon, or all possible materials that could fit your purposes? No, but you could provide a fleshed out example, from initial development to end product, of how a creature or multiple creatures could survive in space.

A well written, polite argument with valid sources, using a specific speculative example and citing valid scientific evidence for your speculation is a hundredfold more likely to get people to consider your argument than a flippant, vaguely described argument backed by little evidence other than your say so.

I personally agree that space whales are possible. But when arguing in favor of something, it is your job to find and share evidence, not the job of those who disagree with you.


This is true, my game hasn’t even come out and its chat has 13 people in it, and Immortal‘s chat has even more (roughly 16-20 people)

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I’ve been following the thread as best I can. From reading everything, there does not seem to be any specific evidence explaining how an organism could reliably get into space, gather material while in space, and how an organism could naturally evolve the traits needed.

I’ve seen geysers mentioned, but since the acquiring of such traits would cover over thousands of years of evolution. Geysers are not a reliable method long term. Various means of organic engines have been mentioned, but there is no explanation to the pressures that would result in that forming.

Since material is required to create fuel and to grow, there is also no mention of the methods needed to feed while keeping the internal pressure in check. Solar energy has been suggested, but acquiring other matter becomes difficult in the emptiness of Space.

There has also been talk of hibernating to reduce the metabolic pressures of the organism. Hibernation is not a magical cure. When tartigrades and other organisms go into hibernation, they become completely oblivious to their surroundings. Which means your organism would be randomly floating about in space with no control over where it ends up. There are limits to everything, so its quite likely the organism would get smashed to pieces by an asteroid, or die before reaching a place with suitable resources.

In regards to the guy who says, “free yourself from the tethers of earth”, he has not provided any examples or hypothetical materials that could exist. I would like more specifics on how an organism could evolve to reach a space living state.

As it stands, it is unlikely for a player to be able to evolve space whales in Thrive. The best you can hope for is to see cameos of such creatures in other space themed games.

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@Topcode
You cherry picked certain parts of my post, assumed I didn’t read yours entirely (which I did, multiple times), and didn’t address the issues I clearly pointed out.

@Evolfire
I completely agree with you.

I just found out “whale” wasn’t a random name given.

Anyway.

I think

  1. A radiotrophic species can be brought from the surface (like the mushrooms on earth) for forming the space whale symbiote.

  2. The specie of the player can evolve radiotrophy (animals have melanin on earth) by using mitochondria

  3. A normal plant may be brought from the surface, but its chloroplasts may evolve to do radiosynthesis and the animal part may supply the melanin

Arguing for or against a concept wouldn’t change the outcome. A person trying to prove a thing may disprove it, or a person trying to disprove it may prove it(1). I think questions and answers is a good way to keep the conversation going.

Topcode

This correlation makes no sense.

If you are talking about molten rock, it is in the wrong temperature

don’t carry large creatures into space. They can only carry microbes between planets. Also these methods of getting to space should be repeating frequently so that creatures can go halfway there, adapt, go a little bit more, etc. until they can survive in space full time.

What? Growing doesn’t result in suddenly not being connected to the ground.

Is it worth growing higher even if there isn’t air around (and carrying carbondioxide, because suddenly you can’t get it from the environment)? There is also an upper limit to carrying water, (2) which would now evaporate into space.

Usually, people are aware what the other person is talking about. If people have two contradicting data about reality, a source on that matter is necessary.

That is not what I think he said. You said why that idea is bad, and he said “why that idea is bad” is bad[1].

Space whales not being on Earth could mean that there is a reason preventing their existence [2]. It is called the Copernican principle[3].

According to wikipedia, ecosphere is a planet sized ecosystem. The correct term would be “Closed ecological system”. I called it a terrarium, because that was the first word that came to my mind.

This rant is unnecessary, it doesn’t talk about your arguments, and you can’t know what is wrong of it if someone doesn’t tell you[4], but that is just the unfortunate reality.

TristanMisja

Both internal and external fertilisation requires foreign objects to enter the body. This can be ensured with a system similar to airlock. The creatures can also afford to take some damage, as mating once a lifetime is sufficient.

The organism doesn’t use fuel for energy, because it already does photo/radiosynthesis. In a closed system[5], it wouldn’t survive for long without photo/radiosynthesis. It makes resource gathering a race against time and makes hibernation impossible(how slow can that be?)

Comet nucleus - Wikipedia

That ecosystem would form because[6] it is the default option. Having an open system (constantly losing mass) makes the creature shrink and disappear.

This is a good solution, as far as I can see, it works.

Evolfire

Geysers are powered by geothermal energy which is constant for millions/billions of years.

Because the pressure isn’t falling. It shouldn’t fall. A volume where fuel is stored can be emptied without affecting other regions.

what is that

This is like saying frigate birds (3) would fall to the ground mid flight. Or bears would freeze in winter because their body temperature fell below zero.

Hibernation is just slowed metabolism. The creature can be conscious, aware, just experiencing time hundreds of time slower. It is done to save energy, it is not ceasing all bodily functions because it is a microscopic organism.

Asteroids don’t try to hit you like guided missiles. Two random moving objects in space have a very low probability of colliding with each other.

If someone throws you a tennis ball you can instinctively catch it with your hand because your brain evolved in this environment, it knows how things move. It is the same for space whales. They don’t have to accelerate towards different directions for the entire journey inside the solar system. They can predict where they will end up.

I don’t think people breaking a rule should make the topic itself undiscussable. Reddit doesn’t get much attraction, underwater civ subreddit only has 4 posts and no comments.


I think pressure and temperature problems were (in principle) solved. Tell me if you don’t agree. I will now talk about the problem of layering. I will talk about movement and access to materials tomorrow[7]. “Would an unguided evolution do these things?” needs to be addressed for each question separately.

The layering problem could be summarized as “how can there be a layer that protects against the radiation and vacuum of space, but allows photosynthesis at the same time?” I talked about the necessity of photosynthesis before.

My solution was “place the plant cells outside the radiation defense. Let them be exposed to radiation, and replace them as they die” which isn’t a good solution[8]. So I decided to look at why radiation is dangerous, and how can the species that resist it resist it.

  • Naked mole rats

They don’t catch cancer. They have a large sugar molecule called hyaluronan which “physically cages potential cancer cells”(4), preventing them from replicating exponentially and forming a tumor. A cancer tissue can only form if all the cells become cancerous independently of each other. While cancer resistance may seem a waste of DNA points(5), in some similarly sized rats and mice, cancer is the cause of 90% of deaths.(6)
As space whales transition to spending more time in the orbit, they may use the same molecule or another molecule for the same tactic.

  • belgiumroaches

50% of belgiumroaches survive being subjected to 1000 rads, 74% of flour beetles survived the same amount of radiation. (7) So how do these insects survive absorbing so much radiation?

Ionizing radiation can break any molecule, but there doesn’t seem to be a big issue when they aren’t’ dividing. Space whales can have periods when they cover themselves completely and not do photo/radiosynthesis. What that translates to in gameplay is hp only increasing if you can get away from the predators and enter heal mode. Growth happens in many stages,(like caterpillar turning into a butterfly). Photosynthesis is done between the stages for storing fat/carbohydrate, and those reserves are burned during growth.

  • Radiotrophic fungi

If they are constantly exposed to radiation, they must be able to resist it right?

There is even radiotrophic fungi grown in international space station.

So, melanin protects against radiation. I didn’t needed to research the previous two.

How could melanin evolve? It is at first just used for radiation shielding, when the creatures start to spend a long amount of time in the upper atmosphere, they can find a way to generate energy from it.

Let’s look at the types of radiation.
penetrativeness

There are two types of ionizing radiation, either it is light or a particle[9]. Alpha (proton) and beta (helium nuclei) radiations are stopped very easily by any material. HZE (heavier nuclei) radiation constitutes 1% of particle radiation(13), but they carry more energy so they can “have a significant biological impact that is comparable to that of protons”(14).
radiation type
They are produced during solar storms, or come from outside the solar system(GCR, galactic cosmic rays). They can “penetrate many centimeters of tissue or other materials”. (14).
There are sea creatures with centimeters of transparent tissue. (photosynthesis and radiosynthesis[10] can be done at the same time)

Neutrons are a different type of radiation radiations.

The most amount of particle radiation that reaches deep inside the tissues could be neutron radiation.
The radiotrophic fungi grown in the international space station was shielded from alpha and beta radiation,

but not electromagnetic radiation, which they used as an energy source.
space radiation

The source doesn’t say anything about adverse effects due to neutron radiation.

  • Inflexibility

If the creature has a glass exoskeleton to stay pressurised, then it can’t move its limbs. If the glass plates were arranged like the scales of a snake^, it could move, but how much gas would leak from the gaps between the scales? Human skin is gas-tight by itself(17)[11], so the skin exposed to space[12] wouldn’t have a leakage problem. The next question becomes, can a tissue like human skin exist while being transparent? If we give up on trying for photosynthesis, there is no question left, human skin can carry high levels of melanin and the scales wouldn’t need to be made from glass.

How would the exoskeleton evolve? The scales need to exist beforehand, and as the transition to space is done, they are modified to apply pressure to the organism so that the water inside its tissues can remain liquid.


  1. saying “anything is possible” helps no argument. And saying a thing that isn’t observed can exist needs arguments ↩︎

  2. the other possibility is that they could have evolved, but haven’t ↩︎

  3. we should assume we live in a typical planet ↩︎

  4. unless you notice it by yourself ↩︎

  5. closed ecological system/terrarium ↩︎

  6. letting a moss grow on your back model ↩︎

  7. or later ↩︎

  8. before they die, can they generate more energy than their replacement cost? ↩︎

  9. proton/neutron ↩︎

  10. why not do radiosynthesis, if you already have melanin, which you use for radiation protection? ↩︎

  11. I was googling “do astronauts sweat outside of spacesuits” with no results and thinking about plant cuticles but a source I linked before already said human skin doesn’t leak air ↩︎

  12. if it is like human skin ↩︎

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i have made the a group chat called space whales without the main two reasons for the original thread being put in slow mode if you want to be included and are not burgeonblas or 50gens ask and you will be added unless you were purposefully removed due to cherry picking or saying things with little to no basis in known science

If you understood gravity it would make sense
Because after the very first reply it is clear you literally do not understand gravity, I’m not going to bother reading anything else that you have written. I simply do not care enough to deal with you. It’s actually quite funny how someone who doesn’t understand gravity, is trying to argue about anything regarding space.

That I just don’t care enough? Sure I guess that could be a problem to some people.

Aright I don’t mean to be rude, but if you did then you didn’t understand most of it. In the group dm I’m rewriting it to be a little easier to understand and I’ll even put some helpful links, but if you still don’t understand after that there is no hope.

You do know that I have a name and everyone knows who you are talking to… not sure what your goal is.

Well too bad you ain’t gettin much of that.

Actually, it’s the contrary.

A low gravity planet would have a shorter atmosphere because it wouldn’t be capable of trapping gasses that are too far away from it’s core.

@Topcode it is the truth, you can’t prove otherwise because it is true.

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The posts in this thread seem to care much more about proving the ‘other’ wrong instead of having a pleasant and civil conversation about the possibility of space whales.

Please try to be more polite and respectful

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if anyone other than burgeonblas and 50gens wants to join a version of this thread that the goal of it to perfect an argument for or against space whales until this thread gets closed(if it does) @me and and i will add you

If you want to make sure things dont turn into a Belgiumshow in that thread, feel free to add me

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@willow Re-add me please