General Q&A about worldbuilding and other speculative developments that can be extrapolated from science.
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So this is a question I've been meaning to brainstorm for a project I'm planning on. Its inspired by evolutionary biology and how circumstances defined by nature, has the potential to shape life. T...
In the game mass effect the Asari are an alien species...no one truly knows their shape and real form, but they do apear as sexy females to many other species, humans included. The asari can repro...
To build another world, I would want a perfected atmosphere that would sustain the air cycle and yet optimize a decreased cellular degeneration. i.e.: increase quality and length of life. Would ...
Considering there are at least several thousand depictions of trolls in the media, we'll be talking about the traditional trolls from Scandinavian folklore. They're usually described as being ...
So I'm creating an original world with a number of creatures, and original peoples. One of the peoples has a two-speak language. One element, the base of the language, is based off of local mytholo...
I have been wracking my brain with this one. I'm writing a story where a number of alien races who are unable to leave their homeworld for one reason or another send probes into space out of sheer ...
So, in a post-apocalyptic setting, when humans have gone extinct and their cities fell into ruin, I was wondering what animals might evolve to conquer the ruins of our cities. Notice: I know that ...
Background: I am designing an RPG world where the main characteristic is that a large fog has covered the entire fantasy planet. At the time the fog was released it was a mutating killer fog that ...
I watched a youtube video on the Darwin IV probe mission to this planet has lower mass than the earth, about the size of Mars, and has a single sea. According to the movie, the microbes that reside...
Assuming our current knowledge of exoplanets which star would you send a colony ship. Assume you a maximum range of 40 light-years. Earth is no longer habitable so the ship is simply playing the n...
In 1815 Mount Tambora erupted throwing so much dust into the atmosphere that the year became known as "the year without a summer". *There were a few other mitigating factors but Tambora is thought ...
An alien entity fell in love with Earth a long time ago. When he came back to her, she looked different. He would like to return Earth to her Hadean eon when she was much hotter. This entity has ...
Without going into too much detail, let's say someone has a superpower which gives them "control" over actual, physical light: Photons, electromagnetic radiation, what have you. This power requires...
Premise: bio-tech golden age where "wetware" is the new IT meta, organic AI that can interface with our standard computing technology. In this context, I'm imagining a future technology that woul...
One of the worlds I'm creating has a planet-wide communal sentient Biosphere (similar to Avatar). They have evolved the ability to bio-engineer whatever they need, and they have decided to send a p...
I'm currently working on a conworld that has never had any contact with Earth, and I'd like to create words for iconic gemstones, such as rubies, emeralds and sapphires. However, I can't help but ...
From what I've read, planets orbiting red dwarf stars would most likely be tidally locked. Under what circumstances might this change? For example, if a planet had been the recipient of some kind o...
Okay, now this question is a bit random. But, I'm planning for a possible book project about a 2019 expedition to an undiscovered island. The island is near the northern tip of the Ninetyeast Ridg...
Can you create an atmosphere on a celestial satellite by using giant walls? Perhaps assisted with some means of technology? In a story I am creating I want to create something different from the no...
I've been wondering about insular dwarfism, and would like to know if it only affects certain animals (Since some animals grow larger upon colonizing an island, often due to the absence of predator...
Assuming the information in this video by the Cambridge University is correct, Planthoppers can jump as far as a meter. Their size ranges from 1cm in cooler climates to 5cm in the tropics. With ...
The question popped into my mind when I read this. Since we know our scientists are searching for planets which might be capable of supporting life; most of them many light-years away, could the...
Say you are a plant-based life-form (imagine a walking tree). You have roots and leaves. You have two main vulnerabilities: You need sunlight on your leaves for photosynthesis to get energy. Y...
It turns out that a single strand of human hair measures 17 to 181 millionths of a meter wide. But anyone who creates or reinvents a fictional species of humanoid has the freedom to change the dim...
First of all: I don't think that diamond is a good material to use. It isn't even really resistant to pressure. So... it's a stylistic choice and of course I want to know if nature could be this cr...
Not an astronomer (obviously), but had a curious question. Is it possible to have a planet such that: Its star is right on the edge of a nebula The planet happen to be in the goldilocks zone and ...
The story My hero is an average European city boy of the 21th century. Eighteen years old, doing a bit of sport, eating well, with a job that doesn't require much physical efforts. He would appear...
The context: There is a population of people surviving on a lunar-analogue's surface, descended from the crew of a crashed spaceship. The rest of their society is not relevant to the question, but...
Let's imagine that people, if they'd want could freely leave Earth to pursue their own destiny on other planets etc. How far could we get assuming following: Assumption No. 1: It's trivial to get ...
If I had complete control over the plant's appearance, what would be the best shape for it? I need the plant to be able to float between the clouds. It doesn't have to spend its whole life cycle f...
Suppose you had a device with the ability to temporarily give your ship tachyonic properties. Would this allow for FTL? How would it affect warfare in a sci fi universe? The reason I am asking thi...
I'm currently trying to develop the world of a sci-fi story I'm working on, and a concept I've thought of adopting with the environment and characters is a common breeding system where identical tw...
Beforehand: I must excuse my english. It's not my native language. Neither take this question too seriously. It's a stupid concept and I don't think that I will keep it by. It's just very "cool" t...
I'm writing a story about a group of humans (or humanoid people) that are living on a spaceship that's orbiting a planet with high gravity; the force is too much for direct human involvement. There...
Essentially, what would be the most efficient way of causing the Earth's core to cool as much as possible without damaging human civilization in any other way (the outcome can damage it, but not th...
My story revolves around a group of human astronauts exploring various planets via a new revolutionary type of drive. One of the planets I'm envisioning is a Cold Super-Venus, i.e. larger in size, ...
Part of a series I'm starting since the recent What could make a star green? did quite well and others could use the information here in their worlds. There aren't any "violet" stars. When a ...
If the central Milky Way contained a highly active, accreting quasar, with a steady luminosity of 100 trillion solar that is 27,000 lightyears away and became active 27,000 years ago (the emissions...
Aruani is a planet that possesses a fifth of the gravity of the Earth. Humanity migrated to this planet 6,000 years ago and terraformed it to make its atmosphere suitable for human life. Would it a...
A disclaimer: There is a lot of real Science involved. Imagine a world which is exactly a copy of Earth (at least in terms of power as a species and technology). There is a company that aims to m...
After a long forgotten apocalypse, humanity struggled to rebuild itself, so of course, no one has been in outer space for over half a Millenia. In the early days after the cataclysm, newly formed f...
Can two objects solar powered, equal in weight, traveling on the same orbital path in the opposite directions propel each other to intersect on the opposite side of the Earth in alignment to propel...
I'm trying to calculate the solar declination at the solstices, solar altitude at solar noon, and hour angles at sunrise and sunset to build a standing stone calendar at latitude 53.8 degrees South...
I want to build a world where one planet could be visible from the sky, day and night with the naked eye periodically (like Earth's moon behavior) and not everywhere at the same time (since my worl...
I would like to know how possible/plausible it is that any space agency could spot an object larger than our sun, that doesn't reflect light, heading towards us in time to give us somewhere around ...
So let's say you have a typical Space Whale: 27 km from stem to stern, an ecosystem for many creatures in and of itself. I feel that I don't need to explain this part... just picture an average spa...
For a world I am working on humans managed to create a race of demi-human cat people. These people where tradionality treated as slaves/property but have in recent times been gaining some degree of...
My question involves the earth being blown up using theoretical dark energy. In this scenario, the crust and mantle are destroyed by precisely placed weapons so that all that remains is the core. W...
It's come to my attention that I asked my original question all kinds of wrong. I gave a bad example and I didn't give enough important story details. I've also realized I didn't even ask the quest...
I'm trying to figure out whether spacecraft could see explosions occurring on the surface of a planet, or under what conditions they could. To be specific: Given a spacecraft equipped with a dupl...
