Both are impossible, as they haven’t been shown to work from start to finish. Everyone coming in here and just offering one point to one specific issue, doesn’t bring us closer to actually showing that underwater civ can start from only what occurs naturally underwater and get space age technology.
oh ok thankyou for informing me
Fun and all but 1: all tomorrow’s used the rule of cool to allow for so much more in the field than actually possible. 2: that will never get you into space. Might get you into industrial stage via some gimic though
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That’s actually a bit dangerous slope. We’ve argued about smelting metals under water because when you can do that you’ve presumable managed to build and air filled pressure chamber. At that point you can do basically anything you can do above water. So at that point the underwater civs are confirmed, so that’s why I’m really interested in someone making a full explanation how that first big step is possible.
I just had the stupidest idea. It’s so dumb. Become a near industrial civ based on biotech and than domesticate smart amphibians. Train them to be perfect factory workers. Send them above water with some ore and plans.
Just be careful that they don’t rebel once they manage to make iron weapons…
Why are we so focused on smelting in the first place?
While metallurgy was common in human cultures, I see no reason why an aquatic society couldn’t progress and invent all sorts of metalless wonders. By the point that they strictly need metal to continue, they’d already have walking land-suits with arms and legs that let them just go on land to smelt
This wouldn’t even need to be some alternative tech tree, they’d just have to follow the standard tree in an unconventional order
P R E S S U R E
F O R G I N G y.
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how do they make the land suits?
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First they’d need a suit of waterproof material, which they could make by impregnating some fabric with some sort of wax or oil. This would make the bulk of the suit, keeping the water in
They would also need to include a set of bellows to aerate the water and provide oxygen to the gills. This could be powered either by the wearer or maybe with a spring, or perhaps both. These could be made with bones and other such materials
Manipulate could be done with gloves, and movement could be performed with body-powered wheels or, if the terrain requires, adjustable leg mechanisms. As above, these could easily be made with bones and more fabric
You forget the muscular ability of sea creatures. Excepting tails most sea animals are weak. The only creatures able to work on land are exoskeletoned creatures, for who going on to land is plenty doable, especially with a watering thing on their gills. And that’s basically an amphibious speicies, which is boring.
As you said, the tail has strength, so why can’t it be used to power the wheels and bellows? They’d just need a slider crank strapped to their tail and now they can more or less swim on land
ok so by now I think we are getting away from the whole “Under water” civilization part of this, the goal is to create a civ, and I quote “under water”, so honestly while your land suit idea is pretty cool, It does not fit the category of underwater civ, in my opinion, that is, I think you will need a thread for amphibious civs
The land suit is basically the end goal of the metal smelting. That’s kind of been the goal all along, once you can go normally on land (when needed), you’ve just proven underwater civs can work.
Most of the civilization part would still have taken place entirely in the water, and that underwater civilization is why they even have the infrastructure to go onto land. You wouldn’t say that an underwater civilization that reaches space isn’t really underwater?
That requires robotics. Like, a limited version, but still. The only creatures that could handle themselves on land are exoskeletoned or amphibious creatures, who are amphibious civs.
You dont need to go on land when you can bring the land to you with underwater contained pressure vessels with air
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Why would they need any robotics? I don’t see why their landsuits would need to be any more mechanically complex than a modern bicycle
A bicycle can’t forge. Reminder: to make iron, you need: a bloomery. Takes skilled workers carting around plants and clay all day, fire, abd than coal. You also need iron ore. And than you need to make the metal. And craft it. Takes some muscle. Tailed, non-amphibious critters don’t have strong arms, it’s evolutionary logic, octopus like creatures don’t have the muscular strength of a tail to propel themselves on the “bicycle”, and crustacean-like critters are effectively amphibious.
Strong tails don’t preclude strong graspers. For example, there are many aquatic fish-like creatures, such as manatees and sturgeons, that can grab onto things with their lips, and I see no reason that something like this couldn’t increase in dexterity and strength if the need arises. At the very least, it should be more than enough to lay down bricks and pipes in a forge, especially if they have mechanisms to help them out