Re: Cannibalism (and yes it was on topic)

>Rob wrote:
> >We're talking cannibalism and you have a "gut feeling?"
Anyone else getting
> >a little worried about Beth's significant other? ;-)

Beth replied:
>Too much of a lady to comment on that one.... ;P

<innocent look>
No, Beth, Rob's not a lady, nor even female--I've met him & his
wife.

>Not a bad idea, though I wouldn't necessarily restrict it to
other
>'bioships', if they live in space I seriously doubt they have
to eat other
>living matter as food, much more likely to 'filter' feed
hydrogen atoms,
>skim planetary atmospheres or even the outer edges of stars or
engulf
>asteroids... so a starship shouldn't be too far off what they
could
>tolerably ingest. Given the amount of energy they'd have to
produce to
>support themselves I'd go for something like...

I still find the idea of a biological fusion plant more than
slightly peculiar, but St Jon (unaccountably) neglected to
solicit my opinion..

>"While know to consume solid matter, asteroids and the odd
unlucky
>starship, as a means of boosting or supplementing their uptake
in the short
>term, the Sa'Vasku are thought to be primarily radiosynthetic.
Apparently
>they absorb free gases or actively skim planetary and stellar
atmospheres
>absorbing the gaseous forms of the nutrients required as apart
of their
>radiosynthetic metabolism.

Perhaps they migrate from Jovial planets (to get
material--skimming gas giants or their moons), then in to about
the orbit of Mercury  (to get energy to process it) and back.

Of course, given the amount of radiation Jupiter puts out,
perhaps they just stay around Jovians.	I visualize herds of SV
ships grazing around brown dwarfs...