gbaba speculation

You guys are right on the money. I'm starting to re-read OAR to refresh my awful memory (it's hell getting old), so thanks for clearing up a lot of things for me.

But now I have other questions. The Federation was able to "capture or knock out" some Gbaba ships and examine them. But I don't remember reading anything about the Gbaba that were on-board those vessels. Were they biologic? Were we able to biopsy/autopsy them to see what they are made of? Were any of them captured alive? Pei thought they were perhaps no longer sentient, but what would that mean? Perhaps they are just computer programs or robots? I don't know, I'm just throwing this stuff out there to see what you all do know. Ha.

TBird50 wrote:You guys are right on the money. I'm starting to re-read OAR to refresh my awful memory (it's hell getting old), so thanks for clearing up a lot of things for me.

But now I have other questions. The Federation was able to "capture or knock out" some Gbaba ships and examine them. But I don't remember reading anything about the Gbaba that were on-board those vessels. Were they biologic? Were we able to biopsy/autopsy them to see what they are made of? Were any of them captured alive? Pei thought they were perhaps no longer sentient, but what would that mean? Perhaps they are just computer programs or robots? I don't know, I'm just throwing this stuff out there to see what you all do know. Ha.

If there were no Gbaba aboard Gbaba ships, I would think it would have gotten mentioned. Since it wasn't, we can suppose there were Gbaba aboard.

I've tried to avoid figuring out what 'sentient' is supposed to mean, and I've got a philosophy degree. Here, I'm going to take it that he questioned whether or not they had a mental life that featured the flexibility that's a hallmark of thinking as we know it. Whatever it was, they were certainly up for effective interrogation of captives, for instance, which is hard to picture without a considerable degree and depth of mental representation going on. The Gbaba didn't, at least, seem to have an interest, ability, or willingness to conduct searching explorations of technological possibilities or of giving peace a chance.

munroburton wrote:That number could fit one of the earlier Achuultani Great Visits in the Dahakverse.

In fact Dahak says it was, early in "Mutineer's Moon".

TBird50 wrote:You guys are right on the money. I'm starting to re-read OAR to refresh my awful memory (it's hell getting old), so thanks for clearing up a lot of things for me.

But now I have other questions. The Federation was able to "capture or knock out" some Gbaba ships and examine them. But I don't remember reading anything about the Gbaba that were on-board those vessels. Were they biologic? Were we able to biopsy/autopsy them to see what they are made of? Were any of them captured alive? Pei thought they were perhaps no longer sentient, but what would that mean? Perhaps they are just computer programs or robots? I don't know, I'm just throwing this stuff out there to see what you all do know. Ha.

We really have no information on the Gabba other than they were sentient, slightly more advanced than the TF at the beginning of the war, and far less (in most things) at the end of the war, They did not innovate, their dominion is huge, and ancient (ships 6000 years old), and they fear other races.

The TF captured some of their worlds in the first big counter attack and destroyed the local forces, which just invited a sh|t-storm of pain since.

If you hold their planets, you should get some info on them and how their live, but David has not shared any of that with us. To the best of my knowledge we don't even know what Gabba means (although I heard something about "bad-a$$ed bikers")

Tararoys wrote:I had a thought last night about why the gbaba don't actually show any sign of ticked logical change. The gbaba (as in the beings that inhabit the spaceships that are fighting the Terrence Federation) aren't actually the sentient species. They are the immune system of a far larger organism spanning light years, and they regard anything that emits electricity as a disease to be hunted down and destroyed. Has this idea come up before?

Electric emissions cannot be the thing for which the Gbaba seek, since the defensive system of the Rakuri, and the computer system under temple, all require electricity in order to operate. Such emissions obviously were "allowed" by Langhorne et al.

All of those are shielded with the best available TF technology, which probably wasn't practical to use everywhere in a technological civilization.

SciFi90 wrote:Electric emissions cannot be the thing for which the Gbaba seek, since the defensive system of the Rakuri, and the computer system under temple, all require electricity in order to operate. Such emissions obviously were "allowed" by Langhorne et al.

Expert snuggler wrote:All of those are shielded with the best available TF technology, which probably wasn't practical to use everywhere in a technological civilization.

Not only are TF electronics shielded, they are much lower powered than early electrical emissions. As "electrical equipment" evolves into "electronics" random noise and deliberate transmissions are reduced and refined -- a modern spread-spectrum cordless phone, for example, uses less power and can tune to more specific frequencies faster and more accurately than Vietnam Era top secret military communications equipment and it's harder to eavesdrop on.

TF electronics that transmit would look like background noise unless you happened to be synched with their random number generators. You wouldn't even detect that much further than a couple hundred meters, if that far, even if you were looking for it.

Weird Harold wrote:

SciFi90 wrote:Electric emissions cannot be the thing for which the Gbaba seek, since the defensive system of the Rakuri, and the computer system under temple, all require electricity in order to operate. Such emissions obviously were "allowed" by Langhorne et al.

Expert snuggler wrote:All of those are shielded with the best available TF technology, which probably wasn't practical to use everywhere in a technological civilization.

Not only are TF electronics shielded, they are much lower powered than early electrical emissions. As "electrical equipment" evolves into "electronics" random noise and deliberate transmissions are reduced and refined -- a modern spread-spectrum cordless phone, for example, uses less power and can tune to more specific frequencies faster and more accurately than Vietnam Era top secret military communications equipment and it's harder to eavesdrop on.

TF electronics that transmit would look like background noise unless you happened to be synched with their random number generators. You wouldn't even detect that much further than a couple hundred meters, if that far, even if you were looking for it.

AFAIR, the leader of the previous attempt at a secret colony had messaged back to Earth that he felt it was the electrical emissions that led the Gbaba to detect them. And while a ship may be shielded an electrically active planet is an electrically noisy place.

Which is why the original decision was made to keep the new colony electrically quiet for several hundred years except for buried/shielded enclaves.

while i agree that they said they had been tracked via their emissions, i don't remember it being said it was ELECTRICAL emissions.

and the banning of elec was to prevent the ability to start to develop tech that would LEAD to federation tech.

Dauntless wrote:while i agree that they said they had been tracked via their emissions, i don't remember it being said it was ELECTRICAL emissions.

and the banning of elec was to prevent the ability to start to develop tech that would LEAD to federation tech.

Good point. What The Gbaba would have detected would have been the spoor of Federation tech which would have been FTL. Emissions originating from electrical transmission would have only traveled the speed of light and probably would have dissapated long before they reached the Gbaba.

Don