Date: Thu, 28 Sep 1995 14:59:25 +0100 (MET)
From: Anders Sandberg <nv91-asa@nada.kth.se>


The Outsiders
(Own name-symbol: "1010101110000000000111", repeated in 
several frequencies)

The Outsiders live outside star systems, generally in the oort-
clouds of cometary nuclei or simply in deep space between the 
stars. They are adapted to the cold emptiness, and can only 
survive here. There is some speculation that they are not 
originally evolved out here, but were originally a more normal 
race. Of some unknown reason they altered their own bodies 
into their current ones, or even built their new bodies from 
scratch. Why they did it is anybodys guess.

Outsider Biology
Outsiders are large, since there is almost no gravity in their 
environment. A normal outsider may have a span of more than 
100 meters, and outsiders of much larger size is not unheard of. 
Some may even be several kilometres across. They look like a 
cross between a mantis and a spider web, a complex web of 
thin, insectoid limbs made of glittering ice and dark polymers. 
On the limbs complex antennae and smaller limbs are scattered 
randomly. They also have great, extremely thin sails, normally 
neatly folded into its limbs. These are used for sunsailing and 
energy collection. These sails may be several kilometres across.

The outsiders 2biochemistry2 is based upon thermoelectricity 
and superconducting polymers. They feed on the organic 
materials in cometary nuclei, but can survive almost 
indefinitely without food. They derive their energy from the 
thermal gradients between sunlight and shadow on their limbs 
and sails. They can't stand much heat, since their 
superconductors will simply stop working and some of their 
more volatile chemicals will boil away. Instead of a large 
centralised brain, they have several large brains and small sub-
brains in their limbs. They don't need all their limbs. Like an 
insect they can simply pull a limb of in case it is needed as a 
tool, food or it was simply in the way. 

They have extremely keen senses, and can see in almost the 
whole electromagnetic spectrum, from radio to gamma rays. 
Their sensory organs are scattered in all directions, and seem to 
constantly be aware of the universe around them. Their sub-
brains keep track of the most interesting things, and the central 
brains often ignore their surroundings completely. But some of 
their sub-brains seem to be on their guard all the time to alert 
the whole if something dangerous happens. This distribution of 
brain capacity means they tend to work on problems in 
parallel, and if they are surprised the sub-brains will work in 
contrary ways until their central brains manage to get 
everything in order.

They reproduce with simple division, and seems to have names 
based on whether they were the left or right side. Of course, 
only they know what side of themselves are the left or right, 
since nobody else can find any symmetry in them. The name 
ends in a special number, which is unique for each individual 
and represents itself. This last number probably have a great 
significance, perhaps religious, but nobody else understands it. 
A simple example is 2left-left-right-left-right-54878754542. 

The two young outsiders immediately move away from each 
other, often across the whole solar system. They have the 
memories of the original outsider, and in the beginning they are 
almost completely alike. After a few centuries they have 
become quite different, even if they share the same 
fundamental personality and the memories from their 2parent2. 
Relatives have a lot in common in personality, ways of thinking 
and experience.

Outsider Psychology and Society
The Outsiders seldom move or expend precious energy without 
reason. But their minds are extremely agile, using 
superconducting neurones and extremely unstable chemicals 
(which could not remain stable near a sun). Their memories are 
near perfect. They have a extremely high intelligence, and have 
a firm grasp of mathematics, philosophy, physics and 
astronomy. They can spend years (or centuries) patiently 
researching interesting problems. They have proven to be 
masters of cryptography, both to invent complex codes, and to 
break them.

Their technology is based on materials in existence in the outer 
reaches of the planetary system. They use ice reinforced with 
organic polymers, not unlike themselves. They also use some 
kind of microbes to perform different tasks, like building 
polymers or laying circuits. Most of their devices are used and 
then discarded. They seem to prefer to build new instead of 
carrying them around.

The Outsiders communicate with each other by radio 
transmissions or narrow beams of laser light, often across 
whole solar systems or between the stars. Due to long time lags, 
they tend toward long monologues containing everything 
relevant, different alternatives and expected reactions. Their 
language is an extremely complex system of binary codes, 
which seems to include several sublanguages for different 
subjects. Since they also frequently use encryption and data 
compression in their language, it is practically impossible to 
understand for an alien. 

They seem to have some sort of society, with different 
occupations and positions. But these occupations are very 
different from human occupations. Since they almost never 
even get near each other, they do not trade. An outsider can in 
general use a comet nucleus to build anything material it wants, 
or it may buy something from other species. They seem to 
trade in know-how. If an outsider wants to build a spaceship, it 
will find another who knows. It will trade some of its own 
know-how (for example the whereabouts of a swarm of comet 
nuclei, information about another race or a very useful 
theorem)  in exchange for the ability to build a space ship. 

It seems there are some kind of large co-ordination of the 
outsiders, but it is impossible for anybody else to understand. 
They don't have apparent leaders. They seem to group in a 
social system based on specialisation and family, but this is 
uncertain. Sometimes groups of over ten outsiders move 
together, spend some years exchanging information and then 
leave. This is unusual, since mostly outsiders prefer to be a safe 
distance of at least some millions of kilometres away from each 
other.

Sometimes most of the outsiders in a planetary system falls 
towards the sun, coated with some heat resistant coating, fold 
out their sails and slingshot out into interstellar space towards 
the next star. It is believed they simply stop thinking until they 
reach their destination after several millennia of flight. 
Nowadays many outsiders use spaceships of their own design. 
They use technology from other races, and melds it with their 
own frozen-polymer technology. It is often hard to tell where 
the ship stops and the passenger starts. Their ships don't have 
any life support except some energy emissions to sustain them, 
no hull and almost no instruments.

Since they are almost immortal, unless they have an accident, 
they are very careful. They hate dangerous or unpredictable 
situations, and avoid them at all costs. This makes them look a 
bit paranoid or even cowardly. An outsider never endanger 
itself, even if it is a very small danger. Sometimes they want to 
obtain information that is dangerous to obtain for them. In 
these cases, they usually try to trade it from other species. 

Outsiders and other races
The outsiders are very interested in other races, since they can 
build things using high temperatures and obtain information 
from the hot regions of space. In exchange they sell 
information, insights in mathematics and other sciences, or 
simply history. An outsider may live for several hundred 
thousand years or more, and can recall almost everything it has 
experienced (including radio emissions). The Outsiders seem to 
be interested in aliens for purely pragmatic reasons, not 
because they are interested in lesser beings. This may of course 
be a misconception, since other beings generally tend to regard 
the outsiders as arrogant and aloof. Exactly what they think 
themselves is hard to imagine.

Since they are fragile and require their interstellar cold they 
usually communicate with others by radio or laser over long 
distances. In these communications they usually use a 
mathematical language which is quite easy to understand, at 
least for a computer, or the native language of the other race. 
In the last case, they tend to either be very blunt and direct, or 
to use elaborate flowery language. Often they switch between 
the opposites randomly. 

They do not fully comprehend the idea of an dialogue, and tend 
to simply explain everything relevant in a long monologue, and 
then wait for an equally complete answer. Since other races 
tend to give sort answers or only talk for a short time before 
waiting for the other part to respond, the outsiders tend to find 
them irritatingly reserved and inactive.

They prefer the other part to remain at a safe distance of at 
least several million kilometres away, or even better at the 
other side of the solar system. This, combined with their mode 
of speech, have given them an unfavourable reputation for 
being hostile and arrogant. At the same time they think most 
other species are intrusive, dull and threatening. 

