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I'm current planning a story which includes a race of diminutive humanoid aliens, one of whom crash-lands on Earth. They're fully sentient, and have the same average intelligence level as humans. The other main difference from humans, besides their height, is that their lifespans are much shorter.

Using sols (Earth years) as a comparison: an average human reaches maturity around their mid-to-late teens, and has a life expectancy of 70-80 sols. An average member of the alien species reaches maturity at around 4 sols, and has a life expectancy of about 20. 30 is almost unheard of. The crash-landing alien is therefore astonished that the first human he runs into is 36 sols old.

This raises an interesting problem. 20 years isn't an awfully long time to do anything at all. If they spend the same number of sols in education as we do, they won't have much time to do anything with that education by the time they graduate. If they spend the same proportion of their lives in education as we do, that's about 3-4 sols, which is nowhere near enough time to actually learn a whole lot.

So I imagine, compared to humanity, these relative mayflies are going to find technological progress quite difficult. It won't be so much "standing on the shoulders of giants" as "balancing precariously at the top of a chain of fifty aliens, all standing on each others' shoulders". So I ask you: could a species whose average livespan is only 20 years ever progress far enough to reach space?

By "reach space", I mean a program comparable to the Apollo missions - if they can get that far, I'll make the bold assumption that they will eventually reach interstellar travel.

You may assume that their resources, planetary environment, and desire are all sufficient for space travel.

You may assume that their discoveries are sufficiently documented to be remembered and built upon, as mankind's discoveries (generally) have been.

You may assume that the aliens do not have the means to artificially extend their lifespans (be it via DNA modification, cybernetic enhancement, or whatever).

I'm aware of this question, but there, the "shorter lifespan" is that of humanity. I'm going 3-4 times shorter than that, and I want to know how ''far'' they could progress, not how fast.

Makes me think of the Salarians from Mass Effect.
â€“Â Renan
46 mins ago — 46 mins ago

Mateus Scheper 211 · Answer 1 · 2018-10-22 13:27:43Z

It depends on their culture.

(I'm assuming they've reached a society more or less like ours (without space programs, of course)).

Guilds

They are divided in guilds that put together aliens with the same area of interest, like guild of chemistry, guild of politics, guild of art, of history, etc.

Another model of schooling

They don't spend years studying everything as we do in school, but instead, they focus on how they are going to contribute to society.

We humans divide our society by making each individual specializing on a career. The difference between us and them is that we humans spend too much time in entertainment, while they focus on their choice (groups of scientists, historians, politicians, etc).
Let's say that, instead of learning math, english, science, art, history, etc, etc, etc. in school, they learn they the very basics (language?) and focus on what they need. Of course historians and politicians could lead them to disaster, but that's not the topic here.

Practical examples

Alien borns;

Spends a year learning basics (4 to 5?);

Starts studying, let's say, chemistry (We could put 8~10 sols here);

He/She joins a scientist group (Guild of Chemistry) focusing on a new project called Alienpollo Project;

When he/she achieves an advanced age (16?), he/she retires and starts lecturing to young aliens.

Friendship with humans?

You didn't mention if they have anything with the humans (or any other species).
If this is a possibility, they can reach space.

Tim Bâ™¦ 56.3k22158276 · Answer 2 · 2018-10-22 12:44:31Z

By reaching maturity at 4 Sols this isn't actually too bad, they have 16 years of maturity per generation, which would be equivalent to all humans dying at 36.

Yes 36 isn't super-old, but it's old enough to have done significant amounts of work.

They would need to develop very efficient ways to teach and propagate knowledge from one generation to another and would most likely tend to specialize. Rather than knowing a little thing about everything they would tend to be experts in one field.

You may well see master-apprenticeship type structures form as well where ongoing work gets handed down from one scientist to another. For example a physicist may train up a number of students, then select one to be their apprentice. The two would then work together closely for ten years until the elder retired whereupon the new one would train up their own apprentice so you always have (at least) two people working on every important project.

They commonly say it takes a human ten years to master something, well that gives these aliens time to apply that mastery even if it takes them just as long as humans...

Battle 40910 · Answer 3 · 2018-10-22 13:47:06Z

Rapid evolution in a harsh climate and environment

They'd have to reach maturity quite early on, and assuming their cognitive abilities are similar to humans (same learning speed, same memory on average), most of those who can specialize in one domain will die long before they can sufficiently advance on that. Let's say maturity is reached at age 5 (equivalent to human age 20), they'd have ~15 years on average for that. For humans it takes up to a long lifetime in order to provide something innovative to society, and only the least of us are capable to even do so. If you reduce that number even more, the chances get even worse.

However, the speed of evolution for that species is strongly boosted, meaning the gene pool can adapt much faster than that of humans. The outcome could be that the average IQ can increase a lot quicker along with other traits. Be reminded, genetic adaptation devoid of mere conditions of survival is mostly subject to reproduction - thus also a matter of societal circumstances. But, it's genetic adaptation, meaning intelligence and industriousness have to be evolutionarily preferable - or to be more precise: Females have to prefer to reproduce with males with high values in the metrics of such traits. Peacefulness (as of non-violent behavior) would be an advantage as well, given that "trust" is an extraordinarily important commodity in a society.

Naturally, environments significantly contribute to shape species' course of genes. Harsher conditions like having a wildly alternating yearly climate with a very cold season is a good requirement. Surviving such conditions requires thinking ahead in time, planning and the ability to defer gratification, all the while there are 2-3 seasons in which productivity can flourish. What could be helpful is that all the while they adapted to that environment, the climate would have to continue to become more and more harsh, which would raise the necessity for all the traits mentioned even more. Predators may also be quite helpful in order to continually cull the "weak."

At this point we are talking about a theoretical, evolutionary super-forge. But that would be necessary to counteract the disadvantages of short lifespans. The result can be that of a species way more advanced than humans themselves. However, they couldn't reach the mastery, experience and general education humans can achieve. So it's not that clear how both species would compare.

The education system

For the education system itself - there is no time to waste. A method would establish which would educate children and students in a quite narrow domains intensively without providing more than a minimum of education in other areas. Ambitions, intelligence and talents of children would be measured quite rapidly - IQ tests would solve most of that, the rest is up to any combination of choice, randomness or continuing to work in the domain of one's parents.

How education works in particular is up to you. It would be certainly different from our education systems. If the government is involved too much, well... count that in as a factor of degradation of its quality. But I assume it wouldn't be a monoculture for the entire species, just as humans don't have either - even though we have quite some similarities in how our education systems fundamentally work.

Conclusion

It's not easy, but if you shape the environment and culture in which they evolved over long periods of time correctly, it can become quite plausible that your species can advance technologically and reach space. I bet most of them would talk and think as fast as Ben Shapiro though. But be reminded, their average IQ would have to be significantly higher than that of humans in order to compensate for their shorter lifespans, probably around 130. That said, those participating the space exploration and travel are likely those with above average intelligence, the best in their domains of work, who are also tested to have top health conditions.

great answer! I'd also like to point out that you can see a ghost of the education system you describe when humans themselves had a shorter lifespan - apprentices and the like were very common. Not until the average lifespan started to increase did we achieve a broader education as a society. — 2 mins ago

Separatrix 70.4k30166275 · Answer 4 · 2018-10-22 13:09:52Z

We waste a lot of time repeating things to children without the maturity to care. Most of school maths could be taught in a year by skipping all that repetition. Most of the rules of grammar are slightly pointlessly rigid. A slightly dystopian society would allow early testing of abilities to push people directly into a specialist career rather a more general education and freedom to choose.

A few upgrades on their ability to learn and consciously recall information without needing as much repetition then they could easily compress at least our basic first 18 years education into no more than 3. Meaning they'd be 5-6 years old on completing higher education. 10 years of working life and a low tolerance for bureaucracy would even leave them with some retirement time.

If we consider the rate of technological progress during WWII, a period when certain technologies got the full focus of certain governments. Replace the 4-5 year funding cycle with something that moved fast enough for the necessary pace of their society. They would feel like they truly were standing on the shoulders of the slightly taller members of the previous generation as they went into space.

Jannis 37210 · Answer 5 · 2018-10-22 13:47:57Z

If the aliens have an IQ of lets say over 9000 nothing is impossible

They would learn pretty fast and can do many things more than we in 20 years. An apollo mission is definetly in reachable span.

Echox 512127 · Answer 6 · 2018-10-22 13:50:51Z

There a few places where you can gain time to do stuff in a very short life :

As you said, faster maturation. They are as aware at 4 than we are at twenty.

No mind degeneration. They die to some organ failure but their minds are very sharp to the end (so you get a full 16 years of smartness).

Better knowledge transmission. They could have a way (maybe biological) to transfer memory from an individual to another, or maybe they just have a better memory altogether. Memory is not intelligence, they could still make as much errors as anybody and be close minded to humans.

Hive minds. Each individual control several bodies that can do simultaneous tasks. A normal individual could control four or five bodies at the same. A few to produce and the rest to study (your wandering alien just happened to have lost his other bodies, bad luck)

They don't sleep. Their short lives are one third more productive than ours.

They have no fun. They just work all day and don't really need to pause that much.

If you combine two or three of these propositions, I think you can get an interesting species that would be able to evolve very fast.

Mateus Scheper 211 · Answer 7 · 2018-10-22 13:27:43Z

It depends on their culture.

(I'm assuming they've reached a society more or less like ours (without space programs, of course)).

Guilds

They are divided in guilds that put together aliens with the same area of interest, like guild of chemistry, guild of politics, guild of art, of history, etc.

Another model of schooling

They don't spend years studying everything as we do in school, but instead, they focus on how they are going to contribute to society.

We humans divide our society by making each individual specializing on a career. The difference between us and them is that we humans spend too much time in entertainment, while they focus on their choice (groups of scientists, historians, politicians, etc).
Let's say that, instead of learning math, english, science, art, history, etc, etc, etc. in school, they learn they the very basics (language?) and focus on what they need. Of course historians and politicians could lead them to disaster, but that's not the topic here.

Practical examples

Alien borns;

Spends a year learning basics (4 to 5?);

Starts studying, let's say, chemistry (We could put 8~10 sols here);

He/She joins a scientist group (Guild of Chemistry) focusing on a new project called Alienpollo Project;

When he/she achieves an advanced age (16?), he/she retires and starts lecturing to young aliens.

Friendship with humans?

You didn't mention if they have anything with the humans (or any other species).
If this is a possibility, they can reach space.

Tim Bâ™¦ 56.3k22158276 · Answer 8 · 2018-10-22 12:44:31Z

By reaching maturity at 4 Sols this isn't actually too bad, they have 16 years of maturity per generation, which would be equivalent to all humans dying at 36.

Yes 36 isn't super-old, but it's old enough to have done significant amounts of work.

They would need to develop very efficient ways to teach and propagate knowledge from one generation to another and would most likely tend to specialize. Rather than knowing a little thing about everything they would tend to be experts in one field.

You may well see master-apprenticeship type structures form as well where ongoing work gets handed down from one scientist to another. For example a physicist may train up a number of students, then select one to be their apprentice. The two would then work together closely for ten years until the elder retired whereupon the new one would train up their own apprentice so you always have (at least) two people working on every important project.

They commonly say it takes a human ten years to master something, well that gives these aliens time to apply that mastery even if it takes them just as long as humans...

Battle 40910 · Answer 9 · 2018-10-22 13:47:06Z

Rapid evolution in a harsh climate and environment

They'd have to reach maturity quite early on, and assuming their cognitive abilities are similar to humans (same learning speed, same memory on average), most of those who can specialize in one domain will die long before they can sufficiently advance on that. Let's say maturity is reached at age 5 (equivalent to human age 20), they'd have ~15 years on average for that. For humans it takes up to a long lifetime in order to provide something innovative to society, and only the least of us are capable to even do so. If you reduce that number even more, the chances get even worse.

However, the speed of evolution for that species is strongly boosted, meaning the gene pool can adapt much faster than that of humans. The outcome could be that the average IQ can increase a lot quicker along with other traits. Be reminded, genetic adaptation devoid of mere conditions of survival is mostly subject to reproduction - thus also a matter of societal circumstances. But, it's genetic adaptation, meaning intelligence and industriousness have to be evolutionarily preferable - or to be more precise: Females have to prefer to reproduce with males with high values in the metrics of such traits. Peacefulness (as of non-violent behavior) would be an advantage as well, given that "trust" is an extraordinarily important commodity in a society.

Naturally, environments significantly contribute to shape species' course of genes. Harsher conditions like having a wildly alternating yearly climate with a very cold season is a good requirement. Surviving such conditions requires thinking ahead in time, planning and the ability to defer gratification, all the while there are 2-3 seasons in which productivity can flourish. What could be helpful is that all the while they adapted to that environment, the climate would have to continue to become more and more harsh, which would raise the necessity for all the traits mentioned even more. Predators may also be quite helpful in order to continually cull the "weak."

At this point we are talking about a theoretical, evolutionary super-forge. But that would be necessary to counteract the disadvantages of short lifespans. The result can be that of a species way more advanced than humans themselves. However, they couldn't reach the mastery, experience and general education humans can achieve. So it's not that clear how both species would compare.

The education system

For the education system itself - there is no time to waste. A method would establish which would educate children and students in a quite narrow domains intensively without providing more than a minimum of education in other areas. Ambitions, intelligence and talents of children would be measured quite rapidly - IQ tests would solve most of that, the rest is up to any combination of choice, randomness or continuing to work in the domain of one's parents.

How education works in particular is up to you. It would be certainly different from our education systems. If the government is involved too much, well... count that in as a factor of degradation of its quality. But I assume it wouldn't be a monoculture for the entire species, just as humans don't have either - even though we have quite some similarities in how our education systems fundamentally work.

Conclusion

It's not easy, but if you shape the environment and culture in which they evolved over long periods of time correctly, it can become quite plausible that your species can advance technologically and reach space. I bet most of them would talk and think as fast as Ben Shapiro though. But be reminded, their average IQ would have to be significantly higher than that of humans in order to compensate for their shorter lifespans, probably around 130. That said, those participating the space exploration and travel are likely those with above average intelligence, the best in their domains of work, who are also tested to have top health conditions.

great answer! I'd also like to point out that you can see a ghost of the education system you describe when humans themselves had a shorter lifespan - apprentices and the like were very common. Not until the average lifespan started to increase did we achieve a broader education as a society. — 2 mins ago

Separatrix 70.4k30166275 · Answer 10 · 2018-10-22 13:09:52Z

We waste a lot of time repeating things to children without the maturity to care. Most of school maths could be taught in a year by skipping all that repetition. Most of the rules of grammar are slightly pointlessly rigid. A slightly dystopian society would allow early testing of abilities to push people directly into a specialist career rather a more general education and freedom to choose.

A few upgrades on their ability to learn and consciously recall information without needing as much repetition then they could easily compress at least our basic first 18 years education into no more than 3. Meaning they'd be 5-6 years old on completing higher education. 10 years of working life and a low tolerance for bureaucracy would even leave them with some retirement time.

If we consider the rate of technological progress during WWII, a period when certain technologies got the full focus of certain governments. Replace the 4-5 year funding cycle with something that moved fast enough for the necessary pace of their society. They would feel like they truly were standing on the shoulders of the slightly taller members of the previous generation as they went into space.

Jannis 37210 · Answer 11 · 2018-10-22 13:47:57Z

If the aliens have an IQ of lets say over 9000 nothing is impossible

They would learn pretty fast and can do many things more than we in 20 years. An apollo mission is definetly in reachable span.

Echox 512127 · Answer 12 · 2018-10-22 13:50:51Z

There a few places where you can gain time to do stuff in a very short life :

As you said, faster maturation. They are as aware at 4 than we are at twenty.

No mind degeneration. They die to some organ failure but their minds are very sharp to the end (so you get a full 16 years of smartness).

Better knowledge transmission. They could have a way (maybe biological) to transfer memory from an individual to another, or maybe they just have a better memory altogether. Memory is not intelligence, they could still make as much errors as anybody and be close minded to humans.

Hive minds. Each individual control several bodies that can do simultaneous tasks. A normal individual could control four or five bodies at the same. A few to produce and the rest to study (your wandering alien just happened to have lost his other bodies, bad luck)

They don't sleep. Their short lives are one third more productive than ours.

They have no fun. They just work all day and don't really need to pause that much.

If you combine two or three of these propositions, I think you can get an interesting species that would be able to evolve very fast.

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Conclusion

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