Now, finally, we're getting to the good parts. We have a map of a local area, or cell, with information regarding the amount of matter and energy available to do useful things... but getting from here to there is going to be a lot of work.
The first thing we need is a way to determine A) what elements are present in our cell, B) in what densities and C) at what locations. In order to determine that, we need to know how much energy is required to form elements, so it's back to chemistry.
In the real world, vast amounts of energy in the form of heat and pressure are required to fuse elements—14 million degrees Fahrenheit plus the gravity at the center of a star to fuse two hydrogen atoms together. We're not going to do anything like that here. Instead, we're going to simply use probability ranges to help determine distribution (with, of course, some randomness thrown in) and then the densities present in the local map we already have to determine how much fusion into larger elements will occur.
To simplify things, at least for now, we will first make the decision that we've already expended all the energy necessary to create a galaxy full of the simplest element in our periodic table, meaning that the global and local mass-energy values are what we have left over from that (implicit) process. So instead of just looking at the real universe's elemental abundance and dividing things up based on that, let's just say our entire local map is made up of Element 1. At first.
Now we need to examine the local map very carefully. We need to find concentrations of E1, their constituent values and their areas, which will help us start "fusing" them together into heavier elements. How do we find these concentrations?
To solve this problem, what I've done is created an "accretion algorithm." It's taken me about a month of weekend spare-time work to iterate, evolve and implement. Undoubtedly, I will go back and fine-tune it, but it seems to work well enough to move forward. The idea behind (astrophysical) accretion is the accumulation of celestial matter via the forces of gravity. As more material accumulates, it is able to attract more surrounding material, creating a feedback loop from which, eventually, enough material gathers to form planets, stars, etc. I can't directly simulate this process, not even in two dimensions and not even in a finite problem space—it would take trillions of floating point operations to even begin to see usable results. Instead, I take a few shortcuts using the information I already have in the local cell about where most of the material in the cell will most predictably wind up. After a successful run through (which typically takes a few seconds), roughly 97-99% of the existing material in the cell ends up in the brightest (densest) areas in differing concentrations. This material accumulation takes place in such a way that I record information about it, which will allow me to characterize the different accumulation points--the ones that gathered the most material the quickest could become stars or black holes, while the average areas could become planets, etc.
Sadly, there is nothing compelling, visually, to show for it yet: just a black image with a few white dots here and there. It's the information recorded from the process that will allow me to begin creating celestial bodies—bodies that will not simply be static fixtures, but bodies made of and born from material spawned from an internally-natural and consistent process and which are completely interactive. A gas giant will have harvestable gas. A world of hydrocarbons will have hydrocarbons—usable by anyone who can land there safely and extract it. These will not just be descriptions of static decorations and visual interest. Within the confines of Flat Galaxy, they will be real.
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