Correcting the wikia regarding the technological scale of human and thargoid civilizations

Fanghur Rahl

Fanghur Rahl
So I was reading the Elite Dangerous Wikia page the other day and looking into the lore and backstory of the game, and just to showcase how big of a nerd I am, I feel compelled to correct a common if understandable misunderstanding it has unwittingly perpetrated. And it has to do with the classification it assigns/suggests to both the human and thargoid civilizations -- namely, saying that humanity is a type-II civilization on the Kardashev Scale, and the Thargoids possibly a Type-III. In actual fact, in the Elite Dangerous universe, humanity most likely does not yet merit the label of a Type-II civilization, and while we admittedly do not know much about the Thargoids yet, they almost certainly do NOT merit the label of being a Type-III civilization, certainly not in this galaxy at any rate.

The Kardashev Scale is based on the total amount of continuous energy output/availability that a civilization has at its disposal at any given time, and while the exact figures are difficult to quantify, the general rule of thumb is that a Type-II civilization has the total energy output of a star, while a Type-III has the total energy output of an entire galaxy. The signature feature of a genuine K2 civilization is the construction of a Dyson Swarm around at least one of the stars that it controls, whereas in the case of a true K3 civilization, EVERY star in their galaxy would have been converted into Dyson Swarms. So the mere fact that humans exist in this galaxy at all pretty much disproves the contention that the Thargoids are a K3 civilization. And the fact humans have not done much more than colonize a few hundred planets and have bases in a few thousand systems means that we have not yet reached the K2 status yet. A true K2 civilization that had FTL technology would be able to annihilate the whole of humanity without breaking a sweat, as their total population would most likely measure not in hundreds of billions, but rather billions of billions.

If anyone's curious, here's a really good video describing how the Kardashev scale would actually work. And there we go; nerd-mode exited. lol.

[video=youtube_share;J0ZMk0785kI]https://youtu.be/J0ZMk0785kI?list=PLIIOUpOge0Ls3WMYP_2FpP9Y0mjgtf98M[/video]
 

thirstyfish

thirstyfish
On an interesting side note, scientists have noticed a star that has weird light dimming. Kinda like what a planet would do, but it does not fit that pattern at all. Like it gets partially blocked at irregular intervals. One theory suggests it is the shadow caused by an incomplete dyson sphere. But a swarm of comets or something similar is more likely, and more boring.

article that might be helpful:
https://www.sciencealert.com/researchers-just-found-a-second-dyson-sphere-star
 
Last edited:

B1rdy

B1rdy
Fanghur Rahl said:
In actual fact, in the Elite Dangerous universe, humanity most likely does not yet merit the label of a Type-II civilization, and while we admittedly do not know much about the Thargoids yet, they almost certainly do NOT merit the label of being a Type-III civilization, certainly not in this galaxy at any rate.
Click to expand...
After watching the video, if Thargoids really are supposed to be a K3 civilization, humanity would´t have survived one attack of them. Also they needed to inhabitat almost an entire galaxy to be called K3. I guess both humanity and Thargoids are definately sub K2 civs.
 

Vasious

Vasious
Are we even at K1 in Elite, as whilst energy seems to be plentiful and cheap, but seems like Humanity sees to struggle if you look at any given system.
 

Fanghur Rahl

Fanghur Rahl
Well, the one caveat to keep in mind is that the Kardashev scale is based solely on the continuous energy output that a civilization has at its disposal at any given time, and it pretty much implicitly assumes that Clarketech-permitting physics does not apply; it does NOT deal with how technologically sophisticated a civilization is. Technically speaking, modern humanity with nothing more than our current understanding of physics, other than maybe needing nuclear fusion technology, would in principle be capable of at least beginning the construction of a Dyson swarm, and in a few tens of thousands to millions of years we could be a full K3. The fact that a Sci-Fi civilization does not yet meet the requirements of being a Type-III or even a Type-II civilization does not necessarily mean that they are inferior to either of those if they are based only on real-world physics.

For example, the Commonwealth in Peter F. Hamilton's 'Commonwealth Universe' technically is not a Type-II yet either (not in the classic sense anyway, in actuality they might very well be since they are capable of direct matter-to-energy conversion for their power sources), and yet at least by the second trilogy they would likely be able to flat-out curb-stomp a K2 civilization and maybe even a K3 simply by virtue of having access to countless technologies based on physics entirely unknown to us in the real world, including being able to make a star go supernova in minutes and having some degree of control over the very fabric of spacetime. That's why I personally don't find the Kardashev scale to be a terribly useful system in classifying civilizations in science fiction settings. That and its labels are very commonly misapplied, as in the case of the Wikia.
 

Fanghur Rahl

Fanghur Rahl
Vasious said:
Are we even at K1 in Elite, as whilst energy seems to be plentiful and cheap, but seems like Humanity sees to struggle if you look at any given system.
Click to expand...

But to answer your question, I would guess that humanity in ED would probably be something like a 1.3 or 1.4 on the Kardashev scale, though they certainly hav all the technology they would need to reach K2 status in a relatively short time.
 

TheNut

T
The wiki doesn't limit civilization class based on power output from a singular source, but rather as a collective whole. The argument being that humans:

  1. Posses frame shift drives that allow faster than light travel and that one could travel around the galaxy in the time it would take you to drive east to west coast of North America. That in itself is worth more to uplifting a civilization than a galaxy of dyson spheres with sublight propulsion speeds.
  2. Harness energy from thousands of stars rather than building a dyson sphere of a star to monument their status in the galaxy. A dyson sphere which is also unnecessary given how power efficient human technology is.

So I am inclined to agree with the wiki that humans are a type II civilization in the ED universe.

Thargoids are also still a mystery, as the wiki outlines:
It's unclear whether Thargoids are a Type II or Type III civilization based on the Kardashev scale. Their lack of control over the Milky Way galaxy indicates they're Type II. However, since Thargoids may originate from another galaxy, parallel universe, or spatial dimension they could be Type III.
Click to expand...

So the uncertainty will continue to float until FDev claims otherwise. However, for video game entertainment purposes, clearly the Thargoids will be downscaled to a level on par or slightly above humans to make conflicts more engaging. Otherwise ED will change from space simulator to rebuy simulator. Time will tell, however.
 

Shinji Ikari

Shinji Ikari
TheNut said:
The wiki doesn't limit civilization class based on power output from a singular source, but rather as a collective whole. The argument being that humans:

  1. Posses frame shift drives that allow faster than light travel and that one could travel around the galaxy in the time it would take you to drive east to west coast of North America. That in itself is worth more to uplifting a civilization than a galaxy of dyson spheres with sublight propulsion speeds.
  2. Harness energy from thousands of stars rather than building a dyson sphere of a star to monument their status in the galaxy. A dyson sphere which is also unnecessary given how power efficient human technology is.

So I am inclined to agree with the wiki that humans are a type II civilization in the ED universe.

Thargoids are also still a mystery, as the wiki outlines:


So the uncertainty will continue to float until FDev claims otherwise. However, for video game entertainment purposes, clearly the Thargoids will be downscaled to a level on par or slightly above humans to make conflicts more engaging. Otherwise ED will change from space simulator to rebuy simulator. Time will tell, however.
Click to expand...

I'm sure that if the thargoids were to be class III then we would have found many power plants or infrastructure of them all around the galaxy.
 

Fanghur Rahl

Fanghur Rahl
TheNut said:
The wiki doesn't limit civilization class based on power output from a singular source, but rather as a collective whole. The argument being that humans:

  1. Posses frame shift drives that allow faster than light travel and that one could travel around the galaxy in the time it would take you to drive east to west coast of North America. That in itself is worth more to uplifting a civilization than a galaxy of dyson spheres with sublight propulsion speeds.
  2. Harness energy from thousands of stars rather than building a dyson sphere of a star to monument their status in the galaxy. A dyson sphere which is also unnecessary given how power efficient human technology is.

So I am inclined to agree with the wiki that humans are a type II civilization in the ED universe.

Thargoids are also still a mystery, as the wiki outlines:


So the uncertainty will continue to float until FDev claims otherwise. However, for video game entertainment purposes, clearly the Thargoids will be downscaled to a level on par or slightly above humans to make conflicts more engaging. Otherwise ED will change from space simulator to rebuy simulator. Time will tell, however.
Click to expand...

You're missing the point. Yes, I agree that if we are comparing a classic K2 civilization operating solely under real-world laws of physics to that of the human civilization in ED which has access to at least a few fictitious physics loopholes, then yes, the latter is more technologically sophisticated than the former. However, the Kardashev scale has nothing to do with how technologically advanced you are or how much Clarketech you have, unless that Clarketech happens to be something that is capable of producing more power than an entire star does every second. It has to do solely with how much energy you have at your disposal.

And the only way it's possible to harness the entire solar output of a star, which to give you a rough idea of just how mind-bogglingly huge that amount is, every second the Sun puts out approximately 3.86 x 10^26 watts (that's 386 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 watts), is to surround it with a Dyson swarm; that's a simple fact. And to further put that into perspective, your typical nuclear power plant has an energy production ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand megawatts. If we could perfect nuclear fusion technology we could probably raise that number. But even with fusion, it would take many millions of fusion reactors just to match the influx of solar energy hitting the Earth, never mind the entire energy output of the star in total.

The only theoretical technology that might, MIGHT be capable of realistically matching the energy production of a Dyson swarm without throwing thermodynamics out the window would be if you were somehow able to convert huge amount of matter directly into energy and harness/capture every bit of it, and unfortunately that does not appear to be in the cards based on known physics, and certainly not in Elite Dangerous to my knowledge. So yes, even taking into account the fact that in ED humanity has colonized hundreds of systems, they still would not be anywhere close to K2 energy output. But like I said, the Kardashev scale doesn't have anything to do with how technologically advanced you are; a classic K2 or K3 civilization could theoretically not be much more technologically advanced than we currently are, though that's pretty unlikely in my opinion.
 

Cmdr Wullfen

Cmdr Wullfen
I definitely think we are type II here in 3303. We may not be harnessing a full star in one sense but the amount of energy our civilisation uses and has control of definitely suggests it to me at least

Heck we can get 100s of lightyears worth of fuel for our ships in seconds my ASP instance can scoop 300 odd lightyears from a star in 36 seconds and we do that all day every day in 3303
 

Fanghur Rahl

Fanghur Rahl
Cmdr Wullfen said:
I definitely think we are type II here in 3303. We may not be harnessing a full star in one sense but the amount of energy our civilisation uses and has control of definitely suggests it to me at least

Heck we can get 100s of lightyears worth of fuel for our ships in seconds my ASP instance can scoop 300 odd lightyears from a star in 36 seconds and we do that all day every day in 3303
Click to expand...

True, but the mere fact that we get out fuel from the solar wind completely falsifies that idea. Hyperspace jumps clearly do not require very much energy in ED considering that said energy comes just from scooping a few tons of material from the star, unless it converts that fuel mass directly into energy at 100% efficiency. Even then, converting that mass directly to energy wouldn't come anywhere close to the total solar output; a 50 light year jump in my Asp takes approximately 7 tons of fuel, which converts to approximately 8x10^20 joules of energy. That's six orders of magnitude lower than one second of solar output.

So if ED has direct mass to energy conversion, then maybe we could qualify as a K2 if we take the whole of human space into account. But as far as I know, that isn't what Frameshift Drive technology or power plant technology is based on.
 
Last edited:

ste

S
In the elite universe we arent at our peak, wars have set us back a bit, we are rebuilding from apocalypses, its a make do with what we got society, rebuild, we had the tech but got knocked back abit, thats why we still fly ancient ships and scrape together a living like hobos
 

Fanghur Rahl

Fanghur Rahl
ste said:
In the elite universe we arent at our peak, wars have set us back a bit, we are rebuilding from apocalypses, its a make do with what we got society, rebuild, we had the tech but got knocked back abit, thats why we still fly ancient ships and scrape together a living like hobos
Click to expand...

I'm not entirely sure if this was meant to be a serious or a sarcastic comment...
 

Fanghur Rahl

Fanghur Rahl
CMDR S. Russell said:
What accent is that?
Sounds like a foreigner who has spent a considerable amount of time in or around, I want to say, Louisiana? Texas maybe? I could be far off point though, lol.
Click to expand...

It's not an accent actually, it's some kind of speech impediment. He's unable to correctly pronounce the letter 'R'.
 

the100thmonkey

the100thmonkey
Why don't you just create a Wikia account and have at it on the talk pages, or edit that articles to be more accurate?

CMDR S. Russell said:
What accent is that?
Sounds like a foreigner who has spent a considerable amount of time in or around, I want to say, Louisiana? Texas maybe? I could be far off point though, lol.
Click to expand...
Sounds like New England to me.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom