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[RAM]

You could probably set up a taste alphabet with the right minerals... And if you can produce your own electricity, you can probably rig something up as soon as you find something conductive, possibly even a fluid...

[WillowLuman]

Taste is a chemical reaction, each tasting degrades the medium. It's not the issue of producing enough electricity, it's developing electronic storage small enough to be practical. People couldn't store data electronically at first without literally buildings full of vacuum tubes for the simplest things. Electronic storage of any kind requires intricate and precise arrangement of small amounts of metal, which no society can develop right off the bat.

Tactile engravings, on the other hand, just need a firm surface and something to engrave with. Smell and taste encodings would only be slightly more advanced, but would again require resources that might not always be available, and besides wouldn't last so long without advanced preservation technology.

The most primitive possible arrangement for an electric alphabet would be based on a binary code of lead-acid batteries, with either the positive or negative terminals up. Still, any meaningful info would require massive amounts of such batteries, so large that reading a passage would require a bit of a walk, and a society would need at least indutrial level technology to produce such a thing.

As such, for the longest time information would likely be passed down from generation to generation, in the form of stories told "orally" via EM wave speech.

[Neonivek]

You could probably set up a taste alphabet with the right minerals

There are some chemicals that can create chemical reactions in saliva without becoming part of the chemical reaction.

It is how the Everlasting Gobstopper works (and once again... the LEAST impressive invention Willy Wonka created.)

[WillowLuman]

But even if you could find enough non-toxic minerals (or even toxic) minerals to encode information with, it still wouldn't be practical or widely used because that form of inscription would require access to minerals, and not to mention the information would easily be destroyed or corrupted by other processes such as oxidation or carbonic acid reaction.

Marking surfaces to change their texture would be easily accessible almost anywhere, and being more convenient and easier to discover, would likely be the dominant form of writing for a long time until electronic storage developed.

[Mech#4]

::Sticks his oar in::

How about their books are sheets of stone/clay with pieces of metal in it. The metal is finely tuned strips made up of different levels of alloys that give variable electrical resistances when a current is run through it. They read by sending an electric current through the beginning of the page and detecting the different resistance levels, where each level has a different meaning and intensity.


Pardon my thoughts. Good work with the Let's Play so far! Spore is a fun game (at least up until you get swamped with quests and pirates in the space stage).

[WillowLuman]

To develop such a system, they'd have to master working with several kinds of metals, not to mention "fine tuning" them, a post-industrial level of technology. They'd probably develop scratching stuff on surfaces, because that doesn't require being a sophisticated brassworker to write down your holy texts or shopping lists.

[Neonivek]

Could be a planet where copper is so common that you can find it in the rocks.

Or where most of the rocks have metallic components that slight alterations can produce different sensations.

[Mech#4]

To develop such a system, they'd have to master working with several kinds of metals, not to mention "fine tuning" them, a post-industrial level of technology. They'd probably develop scratching stuff on surfaces, because that doesn't require being a sophisticated brassworker to write down your holy texts or shopping lists.

Oh, of course. It would be quite a complex process.

Hmm... Early on they could write only the most important documents down using base ores scavenged from the environment, before that they could use various more perishable objects in place of metal such as damp sticks or salt water in sand. I'm not that sure of what else as I don't know much about the mechanics of electricity.

Humans have worked with metal for quite a long time, possibly since these creatures have a specific method of interacting with it, via electrical currents, it would spur more development into that area.

[RAM]

It's not the issue of producing enough electricity, it's developing electronic storage small enough to be practical. People couldn't store data electronically at first without literally buildings full of vacuum tubes for the simplest things. Electronic storage of any kind requires intricate and precise arrangement of small amounts of metal, which no society can develop right off the bat.
...
The most primitive possible arrangement for an electric alphabet would be based on a binary code of lead-acid batteries, with either the positive or negative terminals up. Still, any meaningful info would require massive amounts of such batteries, so large that reading a passage would require a bit of a walk, and a society would need at least indutrial level technology to produce such a thing.

There is no need to store the electricity. The creature can already emit and, at least this is the impression I have gotten from the updates, sense electrical signals. So all you need is something that interacts with electricity, or probably just electric fields. They could probably just create water channels that would be recognisably different if they stuck their probes into either end. They could probably embed conductive materials in non conductive materials and differential some configurations by waving their electrical organ over the surface. They might be able to identify some magnetic fields. All of the necessary materials should occur naturally, if in limited supplies...

[WillowLuman]

Computers don't "store" electricity. They store information on transistors, which can be read or rewritten when electricity flows through them, but don't lose their hard-written information when the power gets shut off. Humans supply power from outlets when they need to read it, just as these creatures would supply power from their bodies when they need to read it. However, a transistor is a complicated thing.

Water isn't as conductive as you think it is, and makes for a poor battery. Electrosensitive animals in real life sense only magnetic fields generated by the flow of electric impulse through nervous systems, as well as the waves of electrocommunicative animals, who generate wave signals by oscilating their voltage.

Binary takes a lot of coding, and without microtransistors, anything encoded via electricity would take up a lot of space. You can't differentiate much more than north or south pole, positive or negative end, potential/voltage difference, or on/off state, most of which are binary, and putting any of them near each other (except for on/off, with transitors), merges or cancels, destroying the information.

For example, to encode information based on voltage difference, each character or word would have to be a separate circuit with a different volt power supply, which would have to be spaced far enough apart (and require constant power) to prevent connecting through air or when the creature touches them, as if connected the circuits join and have the same potential difference. A book of magnets held in different positions would try to tear itself apart, and the magnetic fields of all the magnets would eventually realign to be the same anyway, destroying the information, unless they were kept far apart, and the pages very thick, making for a very large book indeed.

All of which is far more complicated than just simple engraving for texture, which can be accomplished with a rock, a tentacle, and another rock. Read by feeling the grooves and bumps with the skin. Becomes ubiquitous form of writing, because people discover it before they figure out how to mine iron or copper or silicoln to make electric writing. Why make water grooves with dipoles (which wouldn't even work that well) when the grooves read just fine without water?

Sorry for the long post. Didn't anyone else here take physics and chemistry?

[Eotyrannus]

*reads*

HRRRNG SUDDEN URGE TO PLAY SPORE

EDIT: Also, try picking up an object and clicking on your body. EASTER EGG FIND.

[GreatWyrmGold]

It is how the Everlasting Gobstopper works (and once again... the LEAST impressive invention Willy Wonka created.)

I dunno...I'd say the lickable wallpaper is kinda dull, too. Aside from the snozzberries, there's not much there.
There's also his best-selling product--high-quality but utterly ordinary chocolate.

And while engraved surfaces would be the first writing system, I think that inlaying the grooves with metal would make it more erosion-resistant, and anyways big metal letters would make it possible to read at a distance. After all, metal's conductivity is a lot different than stone's or air's.

Update coming "soon," I'm starting work on it.

[birdy51]

What if their late technology works like a page from Tesla... The idea that they would be able to transfer knowlege over long distance via waves of energy. They absorb radio waves. But, instead of sending messages to a TV or Radio, they receive it on a personal level in the ideas of pictures and thoughts being absorbed into their minds. Early reading could very well be necessary, but late technology can be a bit more open to intepretation.

[GreatWyrmGold]

"Welcome back to you-know-what, where we're seeing Snickersnacks! They tried to mimic flowers, but not everyone liked their act..."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"As always, the Snickersnacks killed those weaker than themselves, because they could and because they wanted less competition."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"But don't think that the Snickersnacks were ALL violent..."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

(I'd show you a picture of us allying a creature, but all they wanted to do was sing and dance! WE ONLY HAVE 1 SING AND 1 DANCE!)

"And all of this went to their heads."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"And, despite being smart, they were sometimes stupid."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

-----

250+ DNA. 1 Dance. What shall we do and what shall we call it?

[RAM]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

To the best of my knowledge, nobody is suggesting that they have computers. There is no need for batteries. The idea is that they might be able to tell the difference between a series of different metal letters due to electrical flows and fields. And they can probably use other materials too. And binary is not likely either, the theory is that they could be just as complex as lettering, or, well, similarly complex, possibly much more or less, but there is no relevance to binary or batteries.

Meh, stuff it, not important.

Get us a third wing and call us the Rubnch