Monolith

Monoliths are basically huge, vertical slabs of black rock or marble. Ingame, they are used as one of the UFO Tools.

Myths & legends
The monolith concept originates in Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, in which mankind's early ancestors were given intelligence from a mysterious black monolith.

In a cut scene from the film adaptation, these monoliths were explained to be Von Neumann probes, self-replicating machines which are theorised would be used by extremely advanced civilisations to search for life in the universe. Von Neumann probes would explore the universe in a systematic way, and would communicate back to their home civilization upon finding evidence of life.

It is further speculated that if a Von Neumann probe encountered primative, non-sentient life it might be programmed to lie dormant on that planet, either silently observing the evolution of that planet's life or actively guiding its evolution or making contact. The Von Neumann probe would then be re-activated when the civilization it was observing reached a certain level of technology, for example space flight, in order to make contact.

It is this possible application of the Von Neumann probe which is explored in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey in the guise of Monoliths, although the explanation of their use was ultimately removed to add to their mystery, and also in Spore.

Purpose
Spore uses monoliths as a way to rapidly increase the intelligence of a non-sapient race. The player places a monolith on an inhabited planet and the planets species run to it and worship it. Whichever species touches it first will become sentient and go to the Tribal Phase. This has parallels to SimEarth, a previous Maxis game in which it was possible to speed the cognitive development of creatures by dropping a monolith.

Effect
The monolith will boost life already existing on the planet to the next level up to space age where you will be able to contact them. Just monolith is enough to boost non-sentient animals to space age sentient beings.

Having lifted a race like that will give you a +50 Relation Bonus. The number of cities the new creatures will build greatly depends on the planet type. From 1 on a T1, 2 on a T2, to up to 10 on a T3 planet. Only on a planet without spice they will just build 1 city no matter the planet type.

Where to use
For a planet to be available for a monolith it has to have animal live on it and no space age beings. It cannot be used if there are already sentient creatures on any other planet in the system already.

How to get one
You must first build a UFO and progress to the space phase. Then, you must gain the ability to use the tool, either by buying it, finding it on a deserted planet or receiving it through trading with another advanced race.