Types of Universal Civilizations; Type 0, I, II, III, IV, V ... God?

Originally posted by beyondSciFi
We do have the ability to detect big enough incoming asteroids and comets, its just that there are not enought people scaning the skys to find all of them...

I said "deflect", it's no use to be able to detect object bigger than certain size because effects of impact would be so huge you couldn't protect yourself from them.

Originally posted by Mephorium
I just hope as we evolve technologically, we don't forget to evolve spiritually.

"That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons of history."
"Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means for going backwards."
-Aldous Huxley

"The power of man has grown in every sphere, except over himself."
-Winston Churchill

"All our lauded technological progress -- our very civilization - is like the axe in the hand of the pathological criminal."
-Albert Einstein

So where we might be in scale measuring that?

sorry, coming to the discussion late.

ive read all sorta about the scale, and its fascinating. for starters, it provides an amazing resource for sci-fi writers (of which im (trying to be) one). a laid out plan of what happens when, and with what does it bring.

the best thing about it, however, is the scale. we, for all intents and purposes, kick ass. we're 0.7. it really puts things into perspective.
'hey, look at all we've done!'
"thats nice. look at all you could do!'
'... Crap. GET TO WORK BOYS!'

if only we actually got to work.

the other best part is that its not based on material achievements, or certain milestones, but rather the capabilities of the civilization. its one thing to be able to to send a man to mars, but its quite another to harness all the energy the earth can give us.

finally, a good tool should allow for further advancement. in reality, it offers no extra knowledge of any of the higher levels, but it instructs about what really happens 'up there.' outlines a plan for later dev.

also, beyondscifi, try NOT to post the whole wiki article. its not yours, its long, and unprofessional. anyway, unification of the whole planet isnt specifically implied, but itd be hard to imagine all the resources of the planet being used without some sort of cooperation.

ive used quotes too much today.

``

even the esteemed (Late) Dr. Carl Sagan
the widely accepted, spokesperson of science and
presenter of "COSMOS"...voiced the speculations
and theories of the few more adventurous physcists
...when he presented the idea that advanced
(or our future) civilizations might be able to produce
'pulsars' or 'quasars' as an engineering feat,
perhaps merely as a 'beacon' to warn-off intruders?!

whereas, less advanced civiliaztions would satisify
themselves with 'monoliths' or 'oblisks', like the meme
in "2001 A SPACE ODDESSY'...then advance to the
terra-forming of planets, then solar-systems...etc
~~~~~~~~~~

#2: on the whole group of mankind, or a significant %,
being in a group mind/hive type of deal....
i think that around 4000BC in a place called BABYLON,
a united effort to ascend to the (stratosphere?)
heavens? was thwarted....or? imploded??
> Lesson; no matter the idealism/altruism...
eventually, Power Corrupts and Absolute Power
Corrupts Absolutely!

#3: ?technologically Advanced civilization/culture?
a long time ago they were the Rishis, Vedas, the
Atlantians, the Olympians, the Pantheon, etc etc
...today we seem to think that technological gadgets
are the salvation of mortal humans....I counter
that these 'gadgets' are necessary today, because
we collectively have lost/atrophied our collective
natural abilities to the 'mechanistic' data massaging,
baser method of manipulating matter to our liking.

**just cant help mixing science, philosophy, metaphysics,
in a single concise reply...

o-o? reading is fun...

Originally posted by Amorymeltzer
also, beyondscifi, try NOT to post the whole wiki article. its not yours, its long, and unprofessional.

I didn't post the WHOLE article, as you can eazyly see if you go to the site that I did not post the charts with the calcualtions and other stuff. The only reason why I did post most of the written part was that links didnt work a couple of times when I posted before, so it was just a back up.

P.S. go to the site to read all the info that I didnt post on ATS.

Originally posted by Kidfinger
This is the most interesting post I have ever read on ATS. The thing that gets me about it is its from a fairly new member.

GREAT JOB BSF

Everything presented seems to fit and make complete sense. I like how you have alluded to God being a type VII civ. It makes me wish I hadnt been born for another 300 years! I would love to be around then just to see what we would be like. Agian, good job, and you deserve the way above I am about to give you

Edit:
You have voted beyondSciFi for the Way Above Top Secret award. You have used all of your votes for this month.


You even got my last vote.

[edit on 11/23/04 by Kidfinger]

Hey, who knows! In 300 years, we might surprise you with how Dynamic Life and Death really are and bring you back to see it for yourself! Hmm...isn't that one of the definitions of a god right there?

Originally posted by beyondSciFi
A very cool theory about the possiable classifications of all the civilizations in the universe including ours.

en.wikipedia.org... (highly recommended)

The Kardashev scale is a general method of classifying how technologically advanced a civilization is, first proposed in 1964 by the Russian astronomer Nikolai Kardashev. It has three categories, based on the amount of usable energy a civilization has at its disposal and increasing logarithmically:

Type I - A civilization that is able to harness all of the power available on a single planet, approximately 10^16 W (given the Solar constant for Earth, this value for Earth exceeds 1.74�10^17 W).
Type II - A civilization that is able to harness all of the power available from a single star, approximately 10^26 W (the Sun outputs appoximately 3.86�10^26 W).
Type III - A civilization that is able to harness all of the power available from a single galaxy, approximately 10^36 W.
All such civilizations are purely hypothetical at this point. However, the Kardashev scale is of use to SETI researchers, science fiction authors, and futurists as a theoretical framework.

Human civilization is currently somewhere below Type I, as it is able to harness only a portion of the energy that is available on Earth. The current state of human civilization has been unofficially named Type 0. Although intermediate values were not discussed in Kardashev's original proposal, Carl Sagan attempted to extrapolate and calculated humanity's current civilization to be 0.7.

A possible contender for the advancement to a Type I civilization is to begin the heavy use of ocean thermal energy conversion, wind turbines and tidal power to obtain the energy received by Earth's oceans from the Sun. However there is no known way to successfully utilise the full potential of Earth's energy production without complete coating of the surface with man made structures. In the near and medium future, this is an impossibility given humans' current lifestyle.

A hypothetical Type II civilization might employ a Dyson sphere or other similar construct in order to utilize all of the energy output by a star, or perhaps more exotic means such as feeding stellar mass into a black hole to generate usable energy. A Type III civilization might use the same techniques employed by a Type II civilization, applied to all of the stars of a galaxy individually, or perhaps might use other mechanisms not yet proposed.

A common and recognisable example of a fictional civilization capable of entering a Type III level are Star Trek's Borg who utilise energy on a massive scale, being in between Type II and Type III. One of the proposed uses of such energy sources is star lifting, by which stars may be mined for raw materials.

Weakness by supposition?
It has been argued that, because we cannot understand advanced civilizations, we cannot predict their behavior; thus, Kardashev's visualization may not reflect what will actually occur for an advanced civilization. Theories like this are discussed at Carbon chauvinism. This central argument is found within the book Evolving the Alien: The Science of Extraterrestrial Life (A more controversial discussion can be found at Future Hi: Exotic Civilizations: Beyond Kardaschev (www.futurehi.net...).

It is also possible that the unique conditions on Earth allow for specific technologies to develop which would take many times longer for a Civilization not having these conditions to achieve. The list of presumably unique conditions on Earth, and of related discoveries, is quite long. Some examples:

The Hall-Heroult process and the Bayer process, if not discovered in the late 19th Century, might have lead to a delay in the creation of Aluminium dependent technologies, such as Aircraft and Rocketry.
The Moon produces tides, and offers some protection from asteroids, comets, and radiation.
Many discoveries were essentially accidental, such as the discovery of Penicillin, or the laser.
It is possible that the conditions for the creation of hydrocarbons, coal, or natural gas would not exist on other planets. These fuels were essential for us to move past dependence upon wood and animal based energy systems. Although waterwheel, wind, and solar energy technologies existed, they were not developed further until suitable industrial techniques were found to produce better materials. These techniques consume massive amounts of energy, and therefore could not be powered by the unimproved technologies. A similar argument could be made that without fossil fuel technologies, more powerful technologies, such as nuclear reactors, could not develop.

Counter-argument: abundance of alternative sources
Human perception has a natural bias towards the known energy development paths of Human civilization. It must also be noted that during both the 1973 energy crisis and the 1979 energy crisis highly industrialized societies continued to function; many moved towards developing alternative energy technologies on a massive scale under the assumption that these could provide the energy needed to continue industrial and commercial processes should fossil fuel supplies be compromised in some critical way.

Given this development, it is possible that a society could develop without a stage where fossil fuel based energy production occurs. This version of Buckminster Fuller's argument on Current solar income conforms with Paul Hawken's idea of restorative economy, stating that fossil fuel based energy production is not essential nor desirable given the effects and alternatives. Also, it must be noted that the principles behind the fuel cell were discovered by Christian Friedrich Sch�nbein in 1838, and were applied by Sir William Grove in 1843, before there was widespread usage of fossil fuels other than coal. This raises the possibility that for alien civilizations fuel cells could be used in place of hydrocarbon fuels. It was only in the 1850s that the first industrial petroleum extraction was started by Edwin Drake.

Civilization implications:

Possible Kardashev Scale Expansion of Human Civilization from Long Term History (www.darkage.fsnet.co.uk...) Given the fact that there must be a transition between civilization periods for each level, social upheval can be prevalent in transition, especially with the Type 0 to Type I transition, where it is speculated given current conditions on this planet, that self-destruction is highly likely. Many individuals have pointed to the faster upheval of civilization periods as indicative of an upcoming change over to Type I civilization. It is notable, if the numbers given under Current Values are accurate, that we are accelerating towards the eventual Type 0/ Type I transition. Further discussion of this can be read at Long Term History(www.darkage.fsnet.co.uk...), though the factual accuracy of this souce must be taken lightly.

Contact constraints:
For pre-Type I civilizations, it is costly to attempt contact with other more advanced civilizations because of the energy output needed. It has been predicted that in order to provide a reliable contact beacon of sufficient power to be noticable to a Type II civilization, it must output such high energy levels that the cost between $1 trillion to $10 trillion in energy. The latter figure is the approximate GDP of the United States at the end of the 1990s through the beginning of the 21st Century. Further discussion can be found at Interstellar Probes: A New Approach to SETI (www.rfreitas.com...); the consensus is that civilization must advance high into Type I before the energy required for reliable contact with other civilizations becomes sufficiently low that it does not drain a civilization's economic resources.

Hypothetical extensions
The exponential structure of the scale allows ready extrapolation to higher types. For example:

Type IV: control of the energy output of a galactic supercluster; approximately 10^46W.
Type V: energy control over the entire universe; approximately 10^56W. Such a civilization approaches or surpasses the limits of speculation based on current scientific understanding, and may not be possible. Frank J. Tipler's Omega point would presumably occupy this level.

Fictional extensions
These extensions are mainly used in science fiction. They are not "official" and may differ from source to source. For example, some authors would class a "Type V" civilization as Type IV instead. Further examples of extensions of the scale follow:

Type VI: Energy control over multiple universes; a power level that is technically infinite
The civilization may have gained the ability to alter physical laws across multiple universes
These civilizations can escape a dying universe, and thereby become eternal; it is possible that less advanced civilizations can do so as well.
Type VII: Hypothetical status of a deity, able to create universes at will, using them as an energy source
It is interesting and important to note that as of yet, no science fiction literature characterizes beings with energy usages in the range of Type VII. Type VII though is well beyond the stage of understanding that humans can incur beyond a technological singularity.
Futher discussion can be read at Just My Type: Kardashev Civilizations in SF and Beyond (www.suite101.com...)

Hypothetical futures
Science fiction, having extended these values has also provided guides for possible future changes associated with the fractionalized version of the Kardashev scale. A possible one is presented here�:

Type 0 No Civilization

0.01 Discovery of Fire
0.1 Stone tools
0.5 Industrial Revolution
0.6 19th century - 20th century technological expansion
0.7 Nuclear Weapons and Fission power
0.8 Late 20th Century, Early 21st Century
0.9 Fusion power, Space elevators
0.95 up to Type I Technological Breakpoint, with either civilization destruction or survival
Type I Single Planetary Civilization

I.1-I.2 near space industry and colonization
I.3 Asteroid mining
I.4 Planet Mining for fuels and energy
I.5 First Interstellar travel
I.6 Culture Orbital
I.7 Ringworld
I.8 Construction begins on Dyson Sphere or Alderson disk
Type II Civilization extends to the entire Solar System

II.0 Dyson Sphere completion
II.1-II.2 creation of the nearest star colony
II.4 star lifting
II.5 Colonization of the nearest 100 stars
II.6 Star Trek type civilization (debatable)
Type III Colonization of the Milky Way Galaxy

III.2 Star Wars type civilization (debatable)
III.5 Ability to survive the end of the Universe.
Type IV Colonization of the Local Group

Type V Colonization of Futher Galaxies and the Cluster surrounding the Local Group, including the Visible universe.

************************************************************************************************************************
Hummm i was wondering about the type I civilization... it kind of sounds like the unification of the whole planet... possiably a world government (the UN?), and single spoken/written language (english?), a unifed form of planetery comunication (internet) and the ability of the race to survive any natural disaster? Anyone else got a take on what would be needed for Earth to become a type I civilization beside the power factor???... like the social, political,enviromental and other implications?

[edit on 23-11-2004 by beyondSciFi]

First, we gotta do away with renegade towelheads, rabid right-wing people against a global form of governance and cultural communciation.

At the rate Earth (I propose we officialy change our planet's name to Terra makes it easier for the exraterrestrials.) is dying now, we should really work harder towards getting Type 2, or at least Type 1, because our time is running out really fast. If we don't get everything straightened out here on Terra, or perhaps the entire Terra system, soon, the next three generations may be the last.

Originally posted by invader_chris
At the rate Earth (I propose we officialy change our planet's name to Terra makes it easier for the exraterrestrials.) is dying now, we should really work harder towards getting Type 2, or at least Type 1, because our time is running out really fast. If we don't get everything straightened out here on Terra, or perhaps the entire Terra system, soon, the next three generations may be the last.

Hummm what do u expect to happen in the next 3 generations? Sounds like the end of the world from what your implying...(hope not). About the whole name of our planet thing... it is Terra in most languages except English and a few other ones.

Amorymeltzer, i thought we were at 0.8? or we are gonna be very soon. If we ever master fusion, then that should be a good marker for when we achieve a near type 1 civ

If u go by the chart on the website, our civlization, by the Kardashev Scale is around type 0.815 as of late 2004. en.wikipedia.org... (on the bottem half) it has other charts and graphs as well.

[edit on 28-11-2004 by beyondSciFi]

depends on where you look. we classify as 0.8 by that one scale. that scale is, as is said, one possible fractional version of the scale. sagan extrapolated us to be 0.7. personally, i like the one that attempts to prove mathematically where we lie rather than just say 'we are here.' its a good way to visualize it, but i think it detracts from the statement of the actual scale.

invader, to work towards type II is silly. a dyson sphere is far beyond any capability even imaginable to the human race. its millenia away.

Originally posted by Amorymeltzer
invader, to work towards type II is silly. a dyson sphere is far beyond any capability even imaginable to the human race. its millenia away.

Okay, maybe Type 2 is a bit far-fetched, but Type 1 is only a few revolutionary wars away.

Originally posted by invader_chris
Okay, maybe Type 2 is a bit far-fetched, but Type 1 is only a few revolutionary wars away.

or, you know, peace, or something...

war helps. personally, id prefer to go into this thang with a few good treaties under my belt. at every step into the next type, there exists possibility for civilization extinction or civilization success. i wanna succeed.

Although war is a way of making big advancements in a short amount of time, the only type of war that would be able of this is total war, where the whole economy of the nation is directed towards the war effort. Anything less then a world war won't accomplish this, but now since we have the power of nuclear weapons, this would mean the end of the human race, so there probably wont be any more wars on that scale. (well at least i hope not) So i think that the only reasonable way of getting to type one faster is through a peaceful effort of getting the rest of the world to modern standers. More industrial nations helping 2nd and 3rd world countries should help...

I concurr with beyondSciFi. Total war is hopfully a thing of the past, because with todays weapons its not desirable to rule over a dead planet. There is a but of course. What if we develope a perfect Nuke defense or develope a weapon much more usfull(but not necessarily more powerful) than nukes. I can see Nanobots taking the stage in a Post-Nuke type of world which IMO we are heading towards at a breakneck pace. And in that type of world wars could be waged with minimum or no deaths(ie if one country developes then first then sets them loose to disarm every nation on the planet except theirs what would happen?) Talk about Total Hegemony.

EDIT: A united earth would get to type 1 way faster than a devided one IMO

[edit on 29-11-2004 by sardion2000]

Originally posted by beyondSciFi
Anything less then a world war won't accomplish this, but now since we have the power of nuclear weapons, this would mean the end of the human race...

Definitely... at least end of current civilisation.


"I do not know with what weapons World War 3 will be fought, but World War 4 will be fought with sticks and stones."
-Albert Einstein

Kardashev assumed the evolution of a society would follow the curve y = e x, but history shows that societies follow the curve of y = Sin x. Any advanced galactic civilization we encounter is as likely to be archaeological ruins at the bottom of the saddle as it is to be 'more advanced' than us.

This is good news; we may still be contenders for the title of Galactic Overlords- if we can stop bickering and focus on space travel for a few generations.

Originally posted by sardion2000
war is hopfully a thing of the past, because with todays weapons its not desirable to rule over a dead planet.

when was it good to rule over a dead planet?

total war is something else, when you throw the entire country behind the effort. WWI, WWII were total wars, Vietnam was not (notice the outcome of them). the current Iraq war is not. total war i support because it is far more helpful to the victors than otherwise. its when wars become overly destructive that they get worse than normal.

Originally posted by Chakotay
Kardashev assumed the evolution of a society would follow the curve y = e x, but history shows that societies follow the curve of y = Sin x.

Although i see what you mean about the trend in societies following the sin x graph ,(for example the roman empire and many more), advances in humanity as a whole does follow a rough positive exponential curve. Even though the were some dips, it general the graph does show a constant increase. The only way to get a sin x graph would be a natural disaster that effects the whole planet or nuclear war (which I hope never happen).

[edit on 29-11-2004 by beyondSciFi]

Originally posted by LazerLordzFirst, we gotta do away with renegade towelheads, rabid right-wing people against a global form of governance and cultural communciation.

I'm no extremist, but I'd like to know: which of these methods will you be using to 'do away' with me...

A.) Simple execution. Ex: Gas, electric shock, firing squad.

B.) Work me to death in a labor camp. Ex: Public works of some sort.

C.) Peacefully debate with me and present evidence in support of your argument so that I eventually switch sides and work with you to build the one world government, which of-course is not the New World Order.


Can we become a Type I or II civilization without meeting the energy requirements put forth by the author of the original chart? I mean, I think it's possible that in our own lifetimes we could begin colonization of Mars and/or the Moon and upper atmosphere. (Perhaps by the end of our lives) Yet I don't forsee us harnessing all the power available on earth.

I also think the world can be"united" while still preserving separate nations. (There is no reason for a hive mind) We pretty much have it now; the U.N., currently it seems to be too weak to really function as it was intended, but with a little work I'm sure that's possible.

We've also already seen the various advanced nations of the Earth working together when it comes to space exploration, we can be united (most of us) yet still live in our individual nations with no real "one world government" that resembles say... the American Federal Government.

I also think that it's entirely possible that within the next few generations that colonization of the rest of the solar system could begin, which would take us on our way to being Type II, even though we would ofcourse be an extremely long ways off from building a Dyson Sphere. (I don't know what that is, but I immagine it is a sphere surrounding a star to harness its energy?)

Perhaps several Type II civilizations all across the galaxy will have been started before any of them actually harness an entire star.