Solomani are missing Uplifted species

[J. L. Brown]

Uplift humans.

I think, in the context of the Solomani & Terragens, that human-uplift is very likely. It might (as in David Brin's excellent 'Uplift War' books) be a secret project.

This brings us to another topic related to 'What animals would be cool to see as Uplifts'; and that is:

'Which species are likely to be seen as useful or valuable Uplift candidates by the Solomani, and why?'

I can certainly understand why Solomani might uplift other apes -- the result is a species that can do the kind of works humans are currently doing. Dolphins and Orca are both very intelligent, and operate in an inconvenient-to-humans-but-still-important environment -- but, honestly, uplifting a fish (if there were any that were good candidates) would seem to be more valuable. An Octopus Uplift might be at least as likely; the biggest barrier there is the short life-span -- which might actually be an asset in a species which is being uplifted, even though it means a shorter useful work-life.

Caprisaps are a mystery to me; goats are used as a food animal, which also sometimes produces wool -- why is adding intelligence to a food animal a useful upgrade? Certainly humans have bred some species to be smarter -- herding dogs, for example -- but dogs bred to be food (like 'Poi dogs') are profoundly stupid.

 

[MarcusIII]

An Octopus Uplift might be at least as likely; the biggest barrier there is the short life-span -- which might actually be an asset in a species which is being uplifted, even though it means a shorter useful work-life.

I thought of the same thing. But if there is enough knowledge to uplift, increasing lifespan shouldn't be difficult.

 

[CordwainerFish]

why is adding intelligence to a food animal a useful upgrade?

One K'kree is enough, thank you.

 

[AndrewW]

Can mainly think of animal characters that appear in children's fiction, mythology and animation. Could adapt them so they become a race in their own right. These sources show how easy it is to give an animal an extra-ordinary sentient character and behaviour.
Pig - Snowball and Napoleon from Animal Farm

Could consider Hercules the Legendary Journeys as well (Porkules episode).

Beaver - dunno, Walt Disney somewhere

Chronicles of Narnia?

 

[G'Naakbusters]

An idea that I find amusing -- have a newly rediscovered world with two sophont populations, one Humaniti of Terran Confederation-era Solomani descent and the other a species that is supposedly an uplift "from old Terra" but which is blatantly not.

"We are descended from the Humans of Earth, and our friends here are descended from the One-Eyed, One-Horned, Flying Purple People Eaters of Earth."

"The what?"

"Surely the skies of Terra are still full of their ancestral brethren?"

 

[Fluffy Bunny Feet]

Make it a low g planet and the 2nd species is flying Droyne who are referred to as Angels. They might even police the humans for good behaviour.

 

[Terry Mixon]

Uplift cats. Then the Aslan would have smaller adventure buddies.

 

[rinku]

Uplift humans.

Yeah, the Solomani did a fair bit of that too.

 

[Terry Mixon]

Yeah, the Solomani did a fair bit of that too.

 

[rinku]

There was a whole war waged against a Solomani group supposedly making so called "supermen" who seem to have actually been fairly benign. The gibbons and orangutans survived it, but the uplifted humans didn't.

However, there's plenty of transhuman stuff in Robot Handbook if you want to go there.

 

[rinku]

Caprisaps are a mystery to me; goats are used as a food animal, which also sometimes produces wool -- why is adding intelligence to a food animal a useful upgrade? Certainly humans have bred some species to be smarter -- herding dogs, for example -- but dogs bred to be food (like 'Poi dogs') are profoundly stupid.

Are you possibly missing the point that a lot of these Solomani uplift projects are basically mad science? Logic and utility aren't always the prime factors.

But even putting that aside, the goats may not have been the end game, but might have been just intended to testbed something that was easier to do on a goat than a monkey or a rat. Six months into the project they could have discovered that goats are easier to make smarter than they thought, or that an uplifted goat has some unexpected edge (they're really good at multidimensional calculus or something), so someone manages to line up more funding, or takes the opportunity to do their PhD in Trans-capran social dynamics. End result: we now have a population of talking goats and an appointment with the Ethics Committee...

That's pretty much how science works.

 

[Fluffy Bunny Feet]

Uplift humans.

As a result of thinking of this I've been designing Olympus as a world ruled by Gods and Goddesses who are uplifted humans. Most with Psionic awareness, the higher the status the more powers (also sexist in that the Goddesses are less enhanced) only the most powerful having Telepathy and Teleportation.

Other social levels having lower and lower stats (the inverse of uplifting).

Not a nice world to live on if you aren't a God and potentially deadly to visit if you annoy a God. Limited tech except "Godly Magic".

 

[paltrysum]

For inspiration, there are a few great sci-fi novels on uplifted octopuses: Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Ruin, and Ray Nayler's The Mountain in the Sea.

Children of Ruin is the second part of a trilogy. It's third part, Children of Memory, features uplifted corvids.

 

[Condottiere]

Half way there.

Or, retrogressing.

 

[rinku]

Lois McMaster Bujold plays around with the human side of things a bit, at various levels, in her Vorkosigan books. The Cetagandans are an empire of self-geneered elite; Jackson's Whole breed people to order - no ethics desired - and do the whole brain transplant into clones thing (evil version where the clone's brain is destroyed); Beta Colony developed functional hermaphrodites as an experiment; the Quaddies were designed to live in microgravity and were geneered to have arms replacing legs.

 

[actionman]

An interesting book. Important themes include the morality of uplifting species without consent and the imposition of cultures which the uplifted species neither consented to nor understand. Humanity is very much the "other".

There's also Beasts by John Crowley, in which human-animal hybrids are persecuted after society crumbles (nothing apocalyptic, just things sort of falling apart over several decades, civil disorder, systemic decay, then depopulation, etc., it's all very 70's). The author does go into the lion-hybrid culture/psychology a bit and how humanity in general reacts to hybrid non-humans in a time when humanity can't keep anything together.



There's also The Architect of Sleep, by Stephen R. Boyett. It has a sequel that the author refused to publish because of all the degenerate furry fan mail he got. It's sad because it was an excellent book. It's not about uplifts, but rather about an alternate evolution of racoons.



And of course there's David Brin's Uplift series.

Outside of Aldair and Beasts, most upliftery I've come across is the product of writers going down the "wouldn't it be cool if" semi-furry spiral instead of thinking through how it would play out in a cause and effect setting that Traveller characters would be living in.

Does someone's uplifted cat/doggo have to sequester itself in its room every time it wants to wash itself? Is it content to walk around naked once they know they are naked? If not, do they have hands to undo their clothes every time they want to relieve themselves? If they are uplifted, are they held legally responsible for their actions? Was there malice aforethought when it relieved itself on your lawn? If it bites somebody who goes to jail?

Is it really a good idea to add humanlike intellect to an animal, with all of its animal viciousness? Every uplifted species would be another tribe of "other", with its own needs, culture, and issues, which are greatly affected by its biology and may or may not be resolvable by human laws and court systems. If we ignore all this, all the biological-psychological-social realities of an animal given intellect it didn't evolve into over thousands of years, then they're just furries, and therefore pointless. If the uplifted gorilla security guard is no different than a big strong guy who's a security guard, what's the point?

But, because most writers/creatives don't go past the "wouldn't it be cool if" stage in their thought process, we get stuck with upliftery for no good reason.

 

[actionman]

The Solomani could uplift sloths and put them to work in government offices. Or they could uplift parrots, and train them to answer the phone at the VA and say, "Not service connected!"

 

[Tom B]

View attachment 5959
Children of Time by Adrian Tschiakovksy has uplifted Portia labiata jumping spiders. Uplifted by accident. Whoops. Also a variety of other bugs. Why isn't anybody uplifting spiders? Wasps? Or army ants? Those would be good to have.

The problem with uplifting insects, is they cannot have a large body. There's a restriction in the way they breathe. They would need to have lungs. I have created wasps, but these are not Earth wasps, they are an independently evolved species and they're for a different thread.

 

[Vormaerin]

That's true if you need them to operate in a Earth standard atmosphere. Get one of those old school high Oxygen atmospheres and Sentient Meganeura, here we come!

 

[Tom B]

Elephants are intelligent, long-lived and have a trunk which can be used as a hand. And they possibly have quite complicated communications in subsonic frequencies.

And long lived.

In Footfall Earth is invaded by a race of intelligent elephantoids (they were smaller than real elephants).

Footfall - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org