Jay Maity - 26-10-2004 at 05:11
let us consider about an unique man. All the constitunents of human body, as you know is mostly of carbon. If the carbon atoms were replaced by
silicon, somehow, how the outer look would express it? Actually how could we recognise the silicon man?
Esplosivo - 26-10-2004 at 05:40
Recognition of such a man . . . just imagine yourself exhaling SiO2 and you'll grasp the idea 
JohnWW - 26-10-2004 at 09:04
It could not happen, because Si, unlike C, can utilize empty 3d orbitals for bonding, resulting in coordination numbers higher than 4, and hence the
existence of species like SiF6-- and polymeric silicates containing 6-coordination, which have no carbon counterpart.
Or, are you talking about petrification, which could happen through water high in silica or soluble alkali silicates percolating over or through a
body?
Asimov on biology
Hermes_Trismegistus - 26-10-2004 at 09:23
Asimov postulated just such an idea, what would life look like, biochemically, on other planets.
It appears that the carbon basis of life on this planet is a funtion of reactivity, and that chemical reactivity is a function of temperature and
pressure, amoung other factors.
If the temperature and pressure of the ambient enviornment was significantly different, many other molecules would function as almost analogues.
I believe that on a cold planet, it was put forward that methane/ammonia mixtures might serve in much the same way as the kind of life reactions that
are now supported by haemoglobin/oxygen on our planet.
Also Silicon based life might be more adapted to far higher temperatures... Where silicon would be far less likely to get locked up in bondage :-)
Still, silicon does play a part in the metabolic process of many of the animals which inhabit the sea.
Diatoms
I am a little hazy on the details (and some of the broad strokes too) but perhaps I can come back to this discussion later. (I am really supposed to
be boning up for my calculus midterm right now)
Hermes.