There are restrictions to getting into space, tho. like, you need to be able to use tools, can't be massive or too small, probably land dwelling, reasonable life span, etc
I do think some of the suppositions that people make about the chemistry and basic structure of alien life are pretty convincing. Like any complex life form is probably going to have lots of liquid bits surrounded by solid linings, with lots of complicated carbon-based compounds throughout, simply because that's pretty much the only way you can get complicated chemical things to happen. Water is a good bet for being the main liquid component because it's extremely common and is a good solvent, though something like ammonia is also plausible.
Beyond that I think it's hard to be sure of anything. All kinds of strange body shapes could make sense on a world with different gravity, different geological formations and different plant life from ours. To be fair, a big reason why a lot of sci-fi sticks with aliens that are roughly the same size and shape as humans is because it makes storytelling easier, not to mention costumes/animation.
Fair. A whale sized creature living on a planet with 1/100th gravity could work. The square/cube law starts doing weird things tho at that scale. Like, could you build a pressurized space ship that big, or would the walls have to but meters think?
The thickness of the walls is determined by pressure it's trying to contain, a city sized ship and human-sized space suit are trying to contain the same pressure.
There are restrictions to getting into space, tho. like, you need to be able to use tools, can't be massive or too small, probably land dwelling, reasonable life span, etc
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I do think some of the suppositions that people make about the chemistry and basic structure of alien life are pretty convincing. Like any complex life form is probably going to have lots of liquid bits surrounded by solid linings, with lots of complicated carbon-based compounds throughout, simply because that's pretty much the only way you can get complicated chemical things to happen. Water is a good bet for being the main liquid component because it's extremely common and is a good solvent, though something like ammonia is also plausible.
Beyond that I think it's hard to be sure of anything. All kinds of strange body shapes could make sense on a world with different gravity, different geological formations and different plant life from ours. To be fair, a big reason why a lot of sci-fi sticks with aliens that are roughly the same size and shape as humans is because it makes storytelling easier, not to mention costumes/animation.
That's largely determined by the planet itself though, if it's smaller or spinning faster, it's easier to get into space.
Fair. A whale sized creature living on a planet with 1/100th gravity could work. The square/cube law starts doing weird things tho at that scale. Like, could you build a pressurized space ship that big, or would the walls have to but meters think?
The thickness of the walls is determined by pressure it's trying to contain, a city sized ship and human-sized space suit are trying to contain the same pressure.