General Q&A about worldbuilding and other speculative developments that can be extrapolated from science.
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The question of whether or not humans could reach space without various resources has been exhaustively researched on this site, but one question has not been touched- what about the social and pol...
EDIT: As suggested by L.Dutch, I turned the original post into a series of its own. Some Context A "Hive Mind" is an aggressive type of shared consciousness (for more information on shared consci...
The key idea in the concept of metallic hair color is the word "metal." Metal is shiny. Metal is iridescent. Metals come in a range of finishes from warm gold to icy silver. Metallic hair colors,...
We have a fleet of sub-light speed generation ships and associated engineering devices/ships. Their original world can no longer support their species, and they must move to survive. The fleet of c...
This question is pretty straightforward. I would like to build an earth-like world in which humans don't have access to iron, or at least can't mine any prior to full scale industrialization. They ...
Question Context: I've been developing insect-looking bipeds that have evolved on a mostly jungle/ocean planet in addition to small, scattered grasslands. This is justified (from what I've read) b...
Related questions How can I make a net beneficial genetic trait occur only in a small fraction of the population, sustained? What percentage of the population has the "magic gene"? Premise W...
In Warlords Mars was once home to a thriving mining business, until Prometheus cracked open Deimos that is. Now the mines have either been closed or have scaled down dramatically leading to mass la...
In a galaxy far far away, during a fit of inspiration for a super massive marvel of technology, the Imperator dedicates an astounding 10% of energy and materials from his civilization's dyson spher...
Earthlings, I live on a world where most places on my planet has four seasons, just like yours does. We also have one sun and one moon, presumably. It's been not even a year since I came of age (2...
So, in my world, a scientist (tries to) invents a machine that will recode your cells in a very particular way, making you immortal. He tests it out on a 13 year old male. It goes....extremely wron...
I'm relatively new to all this. I'm thinking of studying a little Earth sciences in the hope that it tells me but, up front, I want to know if I'm completely off. I want to know if a world with no ...
I'm creating a near future world where laboratories could create human gametes (sperm & ova) using chromosomes from different people. So theoretically we could take 1st chromosome from a 1st pe...
Let us say that the humans, with our era of technology plus 5 to 10 years, are contacted by an intergalactic alien union. They want us to join them, and we gladly do. As it is common when several c...
I'm working on a story set in an Earth-like world but with rings (say, proportionately similar to Saturn's). I'm trying to get a solid handle on how these rings would affect the sky. For the purp...
Let's say humans moved to Mars and have lived there for millions of years. Mars is of now uninhabitable, though in this case some terraforming has happened. The poles have been nuked to release gre...
I am a post-human adapted for permanent life in vacuum and micro-gravity. How might my physiology and biochemistry overcome the following challenges? Please note I have a strong cultural aversion ...
Is it necessarily a given that a compass (as they magnetically function on Earth) could be made to function similarly on an alternate, Earth-like, ringed planet? Another way of asking: is it feasi...
In my narrative several people can hear a soft buzzing when it is very quiet. It's almost unintelligible, but discovered it is what's on the radio. The people aren't related, but they may be very...
I'm working on a sci fi story which heavily integrates themes of varying alien configurations and how they shape society, culture and language. As part of this theme, I want to have some of the hum...
In my universe technology is advanced enough to have non-jet and non-rocket booster technology. For a disc shaped UFO all of the technology is crammed in the ship and there was no more room left ...
Since having (eg.) two arms is a result of evolution, how can we, considering modern technology, force embryos to grow another limb? Polymelia is known to me, but it is considered a birth defect. I...
I have had an ingenious idea of combining the two most dangerous creatures the world has ever seen by using my massive and titanic intellect. Mankind, the deadliest land mammal, and sharks, the mos...
Europa's surface is marred with huge, curved cracks, called lineae, which may - depending on the thickness of its icy crust - expose the subsurface ocean to sunlight. Pictures like the one above...
So, in my story there is a species of aliens, called the Ko'dor. The Ko'dor are a species of shape-shifters, who can change their forms at will. Naturally, they are four-eyed, green octopus like cr...
Question in the title. A Rogue planet is a sunless world that exists in interstellar space. It might be possible for life to develop on one, but what happens when that happens? I've seen people sa...
If dolphins came out of the water again and evolved into something approaching human intelligence, how would that look, taking into account their physical characteristics and what happened evolutio...
Through scientific shennaganins, it has been discovered that humans are the best source of producing dopamine. By injecting them with a certain manufactory substance, the body creates a high return...
The 12 planets in my solar system orbit the G-type star of Nemo. It's about nine-tenths of the size of the sun, and has a stellar luminosity of 0.67 L☉, a diameter of 1.28 million kilometres, a s...
In the fantasy culture it's not uncommon to find Giant spiders with the upper body of a human. There are many variants as the spider body having only 4 legs and the upper human body have 2 additio...
My first time here, hope this is a useful question. Mostly about orbital mechanics and vacuum. So the crew of a general-purpose interstellar spacecraft have stumbled across a paradise planet. Afte...
Triskeles are popular Celtic decorative motifs. Everyone from modern day retro-Pagans to jewelry makers to Celtic bands uses them for the cool factor. But there is a little known creature, possibl...
I am writing a story centered around a planet orbiting a Blue Supergiant star. What I want to know is how far away a planet would have to be to be in the habitable zone of such a star. The star I ...
So, humans have finally figured out how to build a solar-system crossing ship. On the way to the first exo-planet to be colonized, an accident happens, and a few people wind up floating through spa...
The human hand can be flexed at the wrist, extended and even abducted or adducted while the forearm can also be twisted in supination or pronation giving the illusion of the wrist twisting. All o...
Previous parts here: Creating a scientifically semi-valid super-soldier, part 1: Skeleton Creating a scientifically semi-valid super-soldier, part 2: nervous system Creating a scientifically sem...
So aliens find Earth to be suitable for colonization and disregard humanity's claim. Not because they are racist, but because they are so different biologically and psychologically that humans simp...
Larry Niven wrote a novel called The Integral Trees, which was followed by a sequel The Smoke Ring. This is Wikipedia's synopsis of the setting: The story occurs around the fictional neutron st...
A network is classified as two or more connected devices that share information. In this world, the inhabitants use a system of trees that operate similarly to super-computers. These trees collect ...
One of the planets I am working on is supposed to have a day of about 6 earth hours long & I'm wondering what effects this will have on its surface and climate. Also, I don't know if this is r...
I have a world where humans have developed interplanetary space travel that allow them to travel to other planets. There is an issue though- the speed is slow, sublight; as an example it will take ...
I have evidence that at some point last night a very large man, with a very large sack, somehow came down the chimney, left a gift under my tree, and departed without my noticing. There are sooty f...
In my colonizing business, some colonists build a underwater base on a all-about nice planet. They are using food storage right now; but now they need to start farming. Ive looked up some farming t...
I read a blog post explaining why interstellar travel is terribly impractical. The short answer is that stars are far away and travelling that far takes a very long time and ridiculous amounts of e...
I have a story in a mediaeval setting with no magic. There are elves, but they are essentially just absurdly long-lived versions of humans with pointy ears and somewhat more acute senses. Unicorns...
There exists in folklore from various cultures of a condition in which rows of teeth are present in the female genitalia. The purpose of these stories, like most folktales, was to serve as a morali...
Humans are savage creatures. This is indicative in the way they get rid of bodily waste. Squatting over a glorified hole in the ground or aiming their spear tip toward same hole and hoping for succ...
How from a evolutionary standpoint hermaphrodite species can exist and have a good genetic diversity, with no self-impregnation? But, this race visually looks more like females, they do have breas...
I just wanna ask which option requires more destructive energy? Option 1 : destroying a planet like earth to rubble (tiny pieces of rocks) Or Option 2: splitting a planet like earth in halves ...
In the scenario I'm envisioning, my group is in a city. They've got a source of hydroelectric power, but a few downed power lines/utility poles are making it difficult for them to transmit the ele...
