General Q&A about worldbuilding and other speculative developments that can be extrapolated from science.
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I read a novel that mentioned about a past civilization before the Big Bang. They predicted such phenomenon would happen some day, and to preserve their species and recreate their population after ...
How would intelligent lifeforms evolve bio magnetic resonance imaging? No bionic components or any other prosthetic technology is allowed, how can I extend the ability to see through dehydrated obj...
On an Earth-like planet, with the technological and cultural level of ancient Rome: What kind of terrain would be statistically best suited for a powerful city to be located?. The most important ...
I'm trying to construct a most realistic desert possible. I've made a continent with my little knowledge and may ask further questions about climate and similar stuff, but now I want to center on a...
Assuming in a galaxy far far away there is a Type 2 civilization (currently on the verge of making the transition to Type 3). Their scientists predicted that the star (red giant) they are orbiting...
I'm going for the ultimate in world building here: Creating a whole new star. I have a race that's about a Type II civilization (as per the Kardashev scale). The important thing here is that they'...
There is an intergalactic war going on in the Milky Way, to get more resources. My company have been called upon to mine nebulae. There is no nebulae in the vicinity but I have got a few high mass ...
By Mars sized I mean with masses between 0.10 (M⊕) and 0.25 (M⊕), the planets need to have independent orbits around the star. We can assume the habitable zone stretches from 0.70 AU, to 1.5 A...
Under what circumstances would a species develop an adaptation to employ surrogate wombs of their own species or others? The species implants its zygotes/eggs in the uterus/brood pouch of a surrog...
I'm writing a science fiction, although I'm not from a physics background. A part of my plot is: In a futuristic Earth threatened by huge power demand and climate change, a scientist creates a qua...
The binary stars system is comprises of a red giant with 6 solar masses and a Sun-like star, the exoplanet is orbiting in the Goldilock's zone with a molten iron core which generate a magnetic fiel...
I'm not talking about stuff like radiation and mutations. I'm talking about mechanics (for now). Necessary effects: With superstrength, you can... lift objects weighing many tons without your f...
I have a scenario where, thousands of years ago, an alien AI is imprisoned in a human body in place of a traditional AI box to limit its mental capacities (it's being punished and not expected to d...
As a high mass star which have already burnt through all of the lighter elements and is now building up iron, the fusion reaction will no longer produce sufficient energy to counter its own weight....
Newton who laid out a set of mathematical rules to predict the motion of objects from a falling apple to planets orbiting the Sun, however it was Einstein who described how two masses tend to accel...
Caloric intake varies vastly even in just the world of mammals, from the hundreds of pounds of leaves an elephant eats everyday, to the small amount a sloth eats. Obviously, caloric intake is impor...
Like, if you massively accelerated the Moon's orbit or propelled it somehow so that it moved from one side of the Earth to the other in a very short period of time, what effect would that have on t...
With all this talk of Alien Lifeforms over the past few weeks, I have been pondering a small question. May be a simple yes, no answer. May not. Can a species accidently uplift another species? I s...
If the range of gravity abruptly shortens from infinite to mere 10 light minutes, assume no other changes in properties and this effect occurs at no time at all. What happens beyond the Sun's gravi...
Imagine that, suddenly, a rather large cone shaped hole from the core to the crust appeared. All the land mass of the cone just vanished. Which could be the changes that this event would produce i...
This is the map of our Permian from 300 to 252 million years ago: As you can see, (nearly) all of the continents had joined together to create one massive landmass called Pangaea. To the sharp ...
Earth's 2 poles, north and south, form a magnetic dipole that goes though the center core, and on a flat map we see the poles on the top and bottom. I have a world which consists of only a single ...
Let's say the Earth suddenly and jarringly accelerates to the point where day becomes night in a few seconds (assuming it was originally noon at the point of observation and that equal time was tak...
Earth is entering anther ice age and this time there will be no liquid water on the surface of the planet, the water cycle disappear as a result no Coriolis effect. What would the weather be like t...
A mutated species of hominid now grows up very quickly (perhaps 3x its normal growth rate) has a natural regeneration factor. Like an axolotl*, it can regrow complex structures that it loses, like ...
I am a skilled metallurgist and engineer and, like most well-educated people, I'm terrified by the possibility of an impending apocalypse. Let's not worry too much about what form it takes. Nuclear...
Assuming the feasibility of utilizing a brown dwarf for a gravity assisted slingshot, or Oberth Maneuver, what sort of hazards/difficulties could one expect during such a maneuver? EDIT: To make ...
Sea levels are rising due to global warming. The Moon brings tides that also rise the sea level. If we destroyed the moon could this problem be solved? Would it have other consequences?
Litter size varies vastly even in just the world of mammals, from the single spawn of an elephant to the up to 30 children an opossum can have. Obvious, litter size will determine population, cultu...
I'm a newbie here and I'm slowly building a story based on Ancient Egyptian mythos that revolves around a primarily solar powered city in a vast desert. There will be magic and Gods involved, but I...
Okay so I have a sci-fi world masquerading as a fantasy world where numerous different genetically-engineered humanoids live on nine different ringworlds orbiting an artificial Earth-mass black hol...
I am facing a great difficulty to come up with a working principle for a permanent force field on my spaceship which will only permits guest while simultaneously deny strangers or foe. The followin...
Could something like, say, elephants losing their trunks or avian species losing/gaining the ability to fly happen in just a couple hundred thousand years or would it take millions?
In the award winning Studio Ghibli film, Arrietty, there exists a creature known simply as the Borrower. Borrowers are a small version of human, no taller than a few inches, yet are otherwise the s...
In my world, instead of mammals, birds have become the dominant order. Similar to how Quadrabirds replaced the grazing mammals; Aquabirds will take up the niche cetaceans occupy. My goal is that t...
In the world I am designing, instead of mammals, birds are the dominant species. In this world, replacing the niche of deer gazelle and cattle are a group of animals known as Quadrabirds. These are...
On our own world, following the fall of the dinosaurs, mammals became the dominant class. This was caused by a cluster of factors, such as the rapidly changing temperatures and their ability to ada...
I suppose there is sufficient time for us to achieve type 2 civ status on the Kardashev scale, that means we cannibalise the Sun! Joke aside would such a civilization level be sufficient to revert ...
I am wondering what the world would be like because in this story I am making, it is in the future where the ozone layer is gone and big cities have big structures that generate an artificial barri...
In my story, a group of people were stranded on an uninhabited 600 km2 sized island. They were forced to glide there due to fuel starvation of the airplane. Its only "domesticated" animal are feral...
What would happen to an Earth-like planet if its core completely and instantly vanished? Would the planet begin to pull in on itself due to asymmetry and the empty space in the middle, or would it ...
Assume the planet's orbit around Sirius B is much closer to its parent star than we are to the sun so it still receives enough light and heat to form an Earth-like environment. What does night look...
Let's suppose anti-gravity/gravity-manipulation/telekinetic technology is found in the near future. It allows to move large ships (thousands tons) into space from the surface of the Earth with re...
So everyone has different sections of their brain wired to specific senses. A sections for sight, touch, smell etc. Now if someone loses a sense their brain will rewire itself to allocate more bra...
If force fields haven't been invented and ships must be able to deploy and return too fast for doors, how might a capital ship be able to protect its hangar from space debris and opposing fighters
What would be the most effective feet design for sustaining massive weight and also allow for the ability to climb? The organism in question has 12 limbs, 8 of which are large and strong legs that...
Purely hypothetical question here. Would it be feasibly possible to have a planet entirely covered in a dense network of interlocking trees? The idea is that the trees themselves act as the 'cr...
In a species I am designing, they have eyesight similar to a cats, their vision at a distance is excellent, but the closer you get, the blurrier the vision is. One solution I had for this was for t...
When calculating large values with computers one is using Floating points, when calculating distances this can be a problem. The floating point problem: Eg. In early Kerbal Space Program t...
In this world, as soon as humans invent FTL, they launch "telescope-satellites" (I don't know what to call them) out in several directions. They travel at 10c, can communicate instantly with Earth,...
