Eburacum45 said:
Actually the distribution of many elements will be roughly the same between solar systems, but there might be exceptions.
A-class stars are notorious for producing excesses of certain elements, and this material will be expelled when they leave the main sequence, so a planet nearby might have an excess of arsenic, or lithium, or gold. With abundant gold, electronics might be developed early...
Similarly a planet near a nebula like the Helix might have an excess of silicon dust, or carbon dust, on the surface;
a civilisation on such a world could develop technology based on glass or graphite/diamond/buckytube allotropes.
or perhaps excessive chlorine, sulphur or phosphorous would alter the surface conditions so much that iron is quickly corroded; this civilisation might use ceramics or plastics instead.
or a civilisation might simply develop underwater and never develop fire. Such a civilisation might rely simply on biotechnology, if it can somehow attain a useful form of this technology without going through an industrial revolution
Perhaps, but one must always remember that knowledge is based on a foundations (accomplishments made standing on the shoulders of giants
). Now to start it off, a planet with excess chlorine and phosphorous would not be able to support life. Although given how reactive these chemicals are, you will never have them just floating around in elemental form. Most plastics are the result of extensive developments in organic chemistry and have a large dependence on petroleum, before the advent of synthetic plastics was developed anyways. You will not see primative peoples developing plastics ever. Ceramics have been with us since the dawn of time, some of the earliest artifacts are ceramic stoneware and pottery. Basic requirement is dirt. you need to have an understanding of chemistry for the rest. Now also remember the development of electronics and discoveries in electricity did not require gold ever. The fundamental foundation of electricity lies in chemistry. These discoveries were made using common metal salts and studying redox reactions, golds only function in electronics is that it's the perfect electrode seeing as how it never corrodes. Copper was and still is the most commonly used material in electronics, and most wire used in electronics these days has a thin plastic coating to prevent corrosion. Platinum and iridium are just as good as gold in electronics and copper seems to work great in combustion engine spark plugs in spite of its ability to corrode. and if more abundant than gold on a certain planet, it'd be logical to think that it would be the primary metal used in electrodes of alien electronics. Just because an element is prevalent doesn't mean it will speed up technological development. Again look at our history. In the beginning, we knew of rocks, trees, and animals. Hence we had weapons and tools of rocks, used trees for shelter, and wore animal skins. as We've progressed we knew of metals, fabric, and masonry to improve our way of life. Our technology isn't based off one distinct group of elements and never has been. They call it the Iron age simply because it was the principal metal for weapon and tools at the time, not because buildings and infrastructure were made out of it. The industrial age used more iron in it than Ancient Rome ever did. A planet with an abundance of carbon might've had its "Carbon Age" in their ancient history much like our Iron Age, but as science progressed, they'd find metals to be more reliable and better for tools and weapons as our ancestors did when they went from stone to bronze, and then bronze to iron and so on. more resources would be necessary, and thus sought after, and more methods for extracting those resources etc. would be developed. We use diamonds for quite a bit of industrial uses, so too would the alien civilization with an abundance, only diamonds wouldn't be the highly prized gem they are on our planet if they were common as quartz is here. As for our approach to discovery, most of the early discoveries where serendipity. The rest came through the process of hypothesis, test, test, test more, theorize, test again, keep on testing, and finally generally accept until something comes along and proves it wrong. Scientific method. Our discoveries with fission and fusion were hardly a "brute force" method. We already knew what would happen when these reactions took place. we knew that chain reactions would occur and the amount of energy they would release before we built a weapon that utilized it (this is what I'm thinking you're getting at). I don't see how an alien civilization could come to nuclear power plant before making a nuclear bomb; whether they sought to use it as a weapon or exclusively thought of it as a tremendous power supply (we saw it as both) is up to the sociopolitical stance. Still, you can't make a steam engine without burning something and you can't make a combustion engine without blowing something up, but learning to control it, refine it, and harness it is all part of the game and it has indeed been done. a rickety gas engine from a Model T built in 1904 is a far cry from the sophisticated, refined, and computer controlled engines of today. As for fusion, we are still working on that one. At present, the energy the experimental reactors have been producing is still not nearly as much as the energy required to start the reaction so it's neither cost efficient, nor practical at the moment. It's not going to be right the first time, it never is (but it still works), being satisfied with something isn't what science is about. I'm not going to say there's only one way to get from point A to point B with science cause thats a load of crap, but I'll say that there are only certain ways to do it, and without the scientific method, advancement is impossible. Our industrial revolution occured when it did and not sooner only because the human condition held it back. Wars, superstition, and the Dark Ages, an era where reasoning and curiosity was replaced with theocracy and divine absolution halted discovery in its tracks and ironically (though much less) the Age of Discovery was rekindled when people started to look back to the ancient times when learning and science was welcomed and encouraged. The idea of an aquatic civilization is fanciful, and indeed possible, but they will never be as technologically advanced. Remember as far along as we've gotten on this planet, there are still groups of people who live as if the world was stuck in 10000 BC. These isolated groups did not have the resources available the rest of the world had, no contact with the rest of the world to get an exchange of ideas and resources, and as a result are stuck living with the resources they've got. If it's just stone, wood, fire, and cloth, they aren't going to happen upon a jet engine anytime and they will not spontaneously develop bio technologies or whatever either.