General Q&A about worldbuilding and other speculative developments that can be extrapolated from science.
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Is there a toxin which could plausibly exist in the atmosphere of a planet, which could make people sick but not too sick? Is it possible that plants grown in the soil from this planet might be ab...
I remember reading somewhere that some intellectuals from the medieval period thought the equator would be uninhabitable because it would be too hot. That made me ponder about a worldbuilding idea ...
A planet orbiting an Red m-dwarf is tidally locked to its sun. Can it have a satellite which is not tidally locked to the sun? Also can the satellite be tidally locked to the planet ?
Imagine a planet with extremely low density, and thus low gravity and an equivalently thin atmosphere, but a very active and strong magnetosphere that prevents solar radiation from destroying compl...
In my story interstellar travel is common, but nothing's perfect, and a mining ship returning from a deep-space run (you'd be surprised what's out there) just discovered that something is very, ver...
In this alternate scenario, Earth is the third planet in a binary star system. One star is a K-type main sequence star--or "orange dwarf"--that has 80% the mass of a G-type main sequence star--or ...
Diseases in nature tend to naturally become less virulent over time, in part, because the disease vector changes and in part because the host population develops immunity to it. How possible is it...
Someone has created an AI of human-level intelligence, and within hours this AI has grown in intelligence and power to the point that human life no longer seems so sacred. In an instant, all life o...
I had a dream last night where I was coordinating a space program for an Earth-like planet, with a Moon much like our own. The Moon in the dream had an annoying quirk... The space program kept se...
So when making my space stories I have put them in a technological time in history where gravity manipulators are available to the common creature and you can use it to go to other planets and live...
I'm thinking of constructing a flying machine in the comic story I'm working on. Since I'm not an aviation expert, I'll try my best to describe this aircraft and you guys can tell me if this mach...
So this planet enters our solar system from the 'south' pole at 30 kilometers per second. A bit faster than the first Interstellar asteroid ever discovered. Of course, it plunges into the Sun's ph...
How would the human body be affected if oxygen levels increased by a lot? Our air is 78% nitrogen and 21% oxygen. If it increased to 30% oxygen, what would the effects be and how long would it ta...
** * Xenobiology expedition 'Profundity': Log entry 634 * ** These things are remarkably tricky to study!! Puffer lizards live on the open salt pans of Arbslex IV (an incredibly Earthlike planet)...
What would happen if there was a Shkadov Thruster in place around a single star in a binary star system? I don't care about the moving stars thing. I just want to know about what would happen in th...
The coming of age in a group of werewolves is the first transformation. Some will transform properly and some will die in the process. However there are some who get stuck in between their human an...
So I am making these giant(human sized) amoeba-like aliens and to have something this big it requires a skeleton to maintain shape and to support its body but also needs to be flexible so it can do...
A character of legendary status has the ability to bleed the life out of the objects around him. He was born with the ability on a lesser scale, but now it's progressed to the point where he is abl...
I have created a planet called Betiler. I don't want Betiler to be in a classic space system like a star and some planets. So I put it around a white hole called Phulom. In my world, wormhole doesn...
Intro and Context (feel free to skip if TL;DR) This question does not come in isolation. It is intrinsically linked with several previous posts (Challenge of Control and Humans as Pets) that have ...
In the year 2340 on the planet Ionia, a small colony of about 20,000 people was founded. They were camped out near a small lake between two canyons. The colonist all came from advanced planets like...
What would have to happen for a giant tidal wave to wash its way around an entire planet? The planet can be like earth, with the same size, mass, and everything else. However the wave must start wi...
In my world, people have powers based on the four fundamental forces. One of my characters can generate spontaneous gravity to crush his opponents. He's also resistant to his own power (so I ignor...
I'm looking for a way to render a large percentage (30 to 50%) of Earth's human population infertile in about 10 years. Medicine and tech levels are approximately where they are now, maybe slightl...
Okay so I am making these arthropod looking humanoid mammalian species, so think of a human with armadillo armor and jointed sloth arms. And I have heard that the pancreas produces Chitin so my que...
I'm trying to develop a planet which has somehow developed sentience. By sentience I mean more of an animal intelligence than being a person. So far I've got a couple of ideas: It's actually a sp...
My post-post apocalyptic society (200+ years after the fall) is extremely technologically stratified, with the haves hoarding near-future technology and the have-nots making do with pre-industrial ...
A volcanic eruption is measured in two constants--gas and viscosity. For clearance, low viscosity is like squirting water off a nozzle, whereas high viscosity is like squirting caramel off a nozzl...
Imagine an intelligent virus that could back up portions of its code on every device connected to the internet. No matter how many times you try and delete the virus, it is able to reconstruct itse...
This is part of the Anatomically Correct Series. I've been wondering how an anatomically correct pegasus could evolve. Pegasus characteristics They are pretty obvious, but just in case: Horse ...
It's 2018. Dr. Evil tried to [rob a bank/destroy the city/take over the world] using a [unstoppable robot army/death ray/zombie ninja T-Rex]. Just when hope is lost, Superdude comes flying in with ...
I've been reading some texts about synthetic biology and how to produce Human Artificial Chromosome (HAC), and I was wondering if we could develop some kind of device that "reprogrammed" the genes ...
Slime molds apparently are incredibly smart for a single celled amoeba and where their smarts lie is in building efficient transport tubes for nutrients, which rival our own highways. They do this ...
I am writing a book, and I want to create either a sentient fungoid or plant and I wish for it to use hormones instead of neurons to transfer information. I'm not sure how this would work and affec...
So when I say everything, I mean everything. Humans, animals, plants, fungi, bacteria, all dead. If the bacteria and other detritovores and decomposers can't decompose anything since they themselve...
(Sister question to this question) BACKGROUND: I really like the Anime A Certain Scientific Railgun (it is superior to Index, deal with it). In it a certain character ("Railgun") has the ability ...
(Sister question to this question) BACKGROUND: I really like the Anime A Certain Scientific Railgun (it is superior to Index, deal with it). In it a character with the alias "The Queen" has the a...
My empire's flagship, the Persecutor class UJBHE1 Abhorrent, rides into the home system of my greatest enemy, Baron Obsequious, levels its Death Ray2 at his beloved home, and pulls the trigger.3 B...
Let's say that at an asteroid mining site, the workers live in a rotating wheel space station that can produce 1g. They use Earth's 24 hour day, and for 8 hours a day, people go to the asteroid to ...
Imagine that, in the near future, pollution, overpopulation and war leads to a massive extinction where almost all chordates, some invertebrates and many plants are wiped out. Small, resilient plan...
At 4:56 in this video essay, Edgar states that at an axial tilt of 60 degrees, the tropic and arctic climate bands will be switched, so that equatorial regions would be cold and polar regions hot. ...
I have a bipedal kaiju-style monster that walks upright on two legs and weighs 20,000 metric tons. Supposing, of course, that it can carry its own weight, its muscles can support the stress, and th...
I'm trying to find a way to explain an alien species' ability to control plants, specifically plant growth for crops, without it being 'magic.' So they can ensure the health and size of the plants ...
I am trying to construct a standing stone calendar for my world Jasmi, located at latitude 53.8 degrees South. To do this, I need the hour angle of moonrise and moonset for my world. The problem is...
I am creating a species for my alien world that will be seen as 'holy' by the planets dominant religion. I'd like to know if my 'holy' species could viably exist biologically/evolutionarily. Assu...
In this question, we were provided a look at what would happen if a human-like species was capable of moving faster than the speed of sound. The consequences of such a modification seem rather disa...
Imagine a world where the Earth's rotational cycle is 20 hours. It has wreaked havoc on ecosystems that need sunlight. Although some plant life can adapt, others are endangered. Is there a way to s...
The backstory for a key character in my story involves him receiving a harsh punishment for becoming corrupt. The tearing off of the wings themselves is easy to write. It's the state he's left in a...
My story is set in the future where space travel is cheap and humanity has colonized Mars and some parts of the asteroid belt. Asteroid colonies can grow their own staple food, but crops that requi...
