# What If Worlds #1: Super-Earth **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 17, 2012, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830 "2012-01-17T21:01:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![space\_loner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@space\_loner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/space_loner)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/1 "2012-01-17T21:01:43Z")
What If Worlds It has always occurred to me that the world we emerged from and the bodies we are given are, all things considered, rather arbitrary. Many features of the Earth and of ourselves have been constantly changing on a geological or evolutionary timescale until suddenly, civilization kicked in, and what constitutes as progress begins accelerating faster and faster so that now, at a technological timescale, we are essentially fixed with and limited by the planet and bodies we have. That being the case, I have always wondered what would have happened if “civilization” kicked in while the environmental factors were different, and whether it would have been beneficial or detrimental to the development of the human race. That has lead to this series of thought experiments I term What If Worlds. Super-Earth The Super-Earth in this exercise is a planet 10 times the volume and about 5 times the surface area of our Earth. For the purpose of the experiment, everything at a continental scale or smaller, as well as the effects of gravity, are similar to that of Earth. Ecologically we are at the state of the Earth 1 million years ago, and the first population of early hominins are emerging in the Super-Earth equivalent of Africa. How will things develop from here? My Initial Hypothesis Unlike a lot of other conjectured worlds, Super-Earth is almost strictly advantageous for the development of civilization. The initial effects will not be as obvious, as it will take a rather long time for human to spread throughout the globe. There may also continents so far segregated from others that they will not be colonized by humanity until the advancement of much more sophisticated seafaring and navigation. However once the world reaches an 18th century level of technology the explosion will be far greater than even what was seen on Earth. Imagine the collective brilliance of a hundred billion minds, with ten times the natural resource at their disposal, and it should be clear that their combined power at innovation is far greater than what we have. I would conjecture that starting from that point their technology would advance exponentially faster than ours. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/2 "2012-01-17T21:52:39Z")
> [@space\_loner](#): > > as well as the effects of gravity, are similar to that of Earth. If you’re writing fiction, at least make it consistent. At this point, you’ve already thrown out physics, so you may as well decide anything you like. > [@](#): > > Imagine the collective brilliance of a hundred billion minds, with ten times the natural resource at their disposal Technological innovation has rarely been closely related to high populations, except inasmuch as those populations have the concentrated economic power to support a technological base. That kind of concentration has very little to do with raw numbers or even having lots of resources theoretically available. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 9:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/3 "2012-01-17T21:58:59Z")
In the year 4339BB(Before Buzsbart the Great) a scientist by the name of Allocene Redfern O’Chang releases a strain of squirrelpox that wipes out every living creature on Superearth…except for the dodoes. ---
**Author:** ![space\_loner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@space\_loner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/space_loner)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/4 "2012-01-17T22:14:38Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > If you’re writing fiction, at least make it consistent. At this point, you’ve already thrown out physics, so you may as well decide anything you like. What I mean is that it is pointless to speculate how life would evolve differently because of a difference in gravity since nobody has any good idea about that and it is besides the point, so we should just assume everyone accommodates for it and behaves the same as they do here. I only want to consider the effects of a bigger landmass that has more resources and can support a much larger population. > [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > Technological innovation has rarely been closely related to high populations, except inasmuch as those populations have the concentrated economic power to support a technological base. That kind of concentration has very little to do with raw numbers or even having lots of resources theoretically available. It takes a certain number of people doing some variety of mundane tasks in a society to support one person who works at the forefront of technology. Everything scales up. You do not think there would have been more people the like Newton and Einstein born simply by merit of the fact that there are more people born in general? You do not think we would find things out faster if there were 10 CERNs, 10 JPLs, instead of 1? ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/5 "2012-01-17T22:16:33Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > In the year 4339BB(Before Buzsbart the Great) a scientist by the name of Allocene Redfern O’Chang releases a strain of squirrelpox that wipes out every living creature on Superearth…except for the dodoes. I presume Buzsbart the Great is a dodo? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/6 "2012-01-17T22:19:20Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > I presume Buzsbart the Great is a dodo? Of course. They tried a democracy for awhile, but it was too boring. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/7 "2012-01-17T22:32:04Z")
> [@space\_loner](#): > > The Super-Earth in this exercise is a planet 10 times the volume and about 5 times the surface area of our Earth. Close, but it would be more like 4.6 x the surface area of earth, rounded to the nearest decimal. Just thought I’d get that in before anyone does. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Acid\_Lamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Acid\_Lamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acid_Lamp)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2012, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/8 "2012-01-17T23:46:59Z")
I’m not certain your conclusion is inevitable. The far greater landmass means far greater natural resources to exploit. It is easily as likely to support a much larger population of nomadic herders. Since such populations are fairly optimized at a low level of technology, I see no reason that it should spread exponentially. If there is room for everyone, then no need for cities, agriculture, or luxury technology to make life more bearable. ---
**Author:** ![space\_loner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@space\_loner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/space_loner)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2012, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/9 "2012-01-18T00:12:55Z")
I suppose in my cynicism I believe the moment civilization reaches a point where culture goes hand in hand with military prowess, it will immediately engulf every piece of exploitable land and proceed to “cultivate” their peoples, such as had happened since the age of exploration. Of course before that point of technology, barbarians tend to be better at wiping out civilizations, and do so on a semi-regular basis. It is hard to say how long it takes for “civilization” to grow to a point where it can defend itself against the barbarian hordes, but I don’t think the size of the planet makes much difference. But I don’t believe just because there’s more land everyone will get along. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2012, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/10 "2012-01-18T01:49:45Z")
> [@space\_loner](#): > > You do not think we would find things out faster if there were 10 CERNs, 10 JPLs, instead of 1? Not neccessarily, no. You will note, if you observe your history that progress has very little to do with total human population. ---
**Author:** ![space\_loner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@space\_loner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/space_loner)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2012, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/11 "2012-01-18T05:14:07Z")
Really? The effect doesn’t kick in fully until the information age, but has not both technology and population both seen a tremendous and unprecedented spike in the last century? Sure correlation is not causation but… ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2012, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/12 "2012-01-18T05:17:05Z")
Another nitpick. Why would there be a hypothetical hundred billion people and ten times the resources? The surface area is about five times Earth’s surface area. So assuming the same general population density, you’d have about five times the total number of people that Earth has. In theory, you might be able to claim there are ten times the resources due to the tenfold increase in volume. But realistically, we’re limited to the resources that are at the planet’s surface. So again you’ll have the same fivefold increase. So you’d have about the ratio of people:living space:resources we have on Earth. It’s just the totals would all be five times greater. ---
**Author:** ![robinson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/848f3c/32.png) [@robinson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robinson)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2012, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/13 "2012-01-18T05:38:28Z")
The development of civilization has never been space-limited. Anytime population density got high, disease knocked it down. The advent of 20th century public health measures allowed population density to increase, but IMHO, the correlation between population density or total population and technological progress is weak. In another thread, I estimated it takes half a million people to restart a present technology civilization (production of a variety technical materials). Beyond that it is just proportional to total demand. The breakthrough geniuses are so sparse that land area is irrelevant. All in all, the larger area would just impede communication. ---
**Author:** ![space\_loner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@space\_loner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/space_loner)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2012, 7:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/14 "2012-01-18T07:50:14Z")
So do you think a landmass the size of the Americas is enough for civilization to develop at a similar pace to ours? If so, why were the American aboriginals’ technologies behind those of the civilizations of the African-Eurasian landmass? If not, then are you saying that Earth is somehow the perfect size for optimal growth of civilization, and anything smaller would be bad but anything bigger has no advantages? This almost has the smells of intelligent design, wouldn’t you say? ---
**Author:** ![space\_loner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6de8d8/32.png) [@space\_loner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/space_loner)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2012, 8:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/15 "2012-01-18T08:02:00Z")
Missed my edit window. Concerning the New World versus the old, the margin is admittedly small, depending on how you look at it. In many ways the Mesoamerican empires were on par with the European. But then again, in many ways the Europeans themselves have not changed for hundreds of years. But looking at technology and culture as a whole I would put the Aztecs and Incas about 500-1000 years behind the most advanced civilizations of the Old World (and this is a fair comparison since it is the most advanced civilizations that drive progress onwards). Not a very long time, but technology seems to develop at an exponential rate and the more you go forward the more 500 years would tend to spell the difference between night and day. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 18, 2012, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/16 "2012-01-18T12:03:42Z")
> [@space\_loner](#): > > If so, why were the American aboriginals’ technologies behind those of the civilizations of the African-Eurasian landmass? Because their continents are oriented N-S rather than E-W. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2012, 1:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/17 "2012-01-19T13:13:33Z")
One thing that’s occurred to me is that on a super-Earth, there might be higher odds of successfully getting two separate Homo species (or even a non-Homo intelligent species) with a (relative) technological parity before contact, so we could conceivably have more than one humanoid race (like Ringworld, Trek or numerous fantasy settings, I guess) in the Modern era. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2012, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/18 "2012-01-19T15:03:10Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > One thing that’s occurred to me is that on a super-Earth, there might be higher odds of successfully getting two separate Homo species (or even a non-Homo intelligent species) with a (relative) technological parity before contact, so we could conceivably have more than one humanoid race (like Ringworld, Trek or numerous fantasy settings, I guess) in the Modern era. I dunno, even a slight disparity is likely to spell doom for one or the other. In primitive times, maybe one has iron that other doesn’t. The only way both species get to “modern times” intact is if they’re isolated from each other (or have a implausible but perfect balance of power, allowing a lengthy status quo) in which case when they meet, one side (or both) gets devastated by the other’s germs. For the sake of argument, what if the something akin to the Americas had been colonized across an ice bridge in ancient times by something akin to Neanderthals, who would eventually develop vast competing empires comparable to Incas or Mayans, and eventually contacted (or were contacted by) the homo-sapiens analogue who dominated the Europe-Asia-Africa analogue. Even putting aside the microbe issue (assume the species are sufficiently different that neither is affected by the other’s germs), a few decades’ advantage in tech spells victory for whichever species has it. In short, a predator species like humanity needs competition and challenge to advance beyond scattered nomadic bands, and this same element that causes humans to conquer other humans isn’t going to stop just because they encounter some species that isn’t quite human. This is not a well-written observation, I admit. I’ll refine it by and by. ---
**Author:** ![CutterJohn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/91b2a8/32.png) [@CutterJohn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CutterJohn)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2012, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/19 "2012-01-19T16:36:07Z")
> [@space\_loner](#): > > What I mean is that it is pointless to speculate how life would evolve differently because of a difference in gravity since nobody has any good idea about that and it is besides the point, so we should just assume everyone accommodates for it and behaves the same as they do here. I only want to consider the effects of a bigger landmass that has more resources and can support a much larger population. May be pointless to think about the effects of life, but not pointless to think about the effects on technology. For instance, good luck getting a rocket into space on a 3g or 5g planet. Mines would be a lot more dangerous. Bridges far more difficult to construct. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2012, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830/20 "2012-01-20T01:26:47Z")
I doubt that the amount of land surface is as significant as it’s distribution, climate due to orbit and inclination, etc. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-worlds-1-super-earth/609830.md?page=2)