Posts tagged earth
Premise I want to explore the possibility of a planet that is extremely misshapen. If we were to extrapolate what we have observed from our solar system and the extra-solar planets discovered so f...
Earth's deepest point, the Challenger Deep, is almost seven miles below sea level. By contrast, Europa is smaller than even Earth's moon, yet its oceans are anywhere between 40-100 miles deep! So t...
Humans are the equivalent of bacteria to planet-eating monsters. And since, as we all know, eating humans is dangerous business, these monsters have decided to cook our great planet Earth before ea...
Say another Earth orbited the Earth, instead of the Moon. What effects would that have? Would gravity change in relation to the planets slightly during their orbits? I am world building and am tryi...
Let's say I have a terrestrial planet superficially like earth, except that it rotates much slower (about 10-15 days per rotation) and its atmosphere is ideally several times thicker. If I want thi...
This is about "giants" inhabiting a fictional earth-like planet somewhere in the Universe (like those in the movie Prometheus, for example). Assuming that all the conditions (temperature, gravity,...
Knowing foam is formed by trapping pockets of gas in a liquid or solid, what could a foam able to support life on an earth-like planet be made of? This foam ought to be stable enough and large eno...
Edit: It has been suggested that my question is a duplicate of What could humans do to render the earth uninhabitable?. That question only asks what would be necessary to make human life impossibl...
I had an idea for a planet which has very hot days, roughly 40 degrees C on average, and very cold nights, average -5 degrees. These figures are subject to change. Of course, there are places which...
In my future setting on Earth (or an Earth-like planet; haven't decided), the fields of robotics and AI have taken off and we have intelligent, ambulatory robots. (They were initially thought of a...
If you have miles of steel pipes 10m thick, could you pump water from the sea to the centre of Antarctica, then pump it into the air like a geyser so that it falls around the pipe. As the fallen se...
For visual reference: Apes are visual species who rely more on their eyesight than any of the other senses. As a result, they see the world in three shades of color, whereas other mammals see i...
After several centuries in exodus, humanity returns to earth to recolonize the planet. Naturally, their first question is the same as mine: Where are the best place(s) on earth to settle? Paramet...
Long ago, I asked a question on how to make the Nine Realms of Norse mythology--Niflheim, Muspelheim, Asgard, Midgard, Jotunheim, Vanaheim, Alfhiem, Svartalfheim and Helheim--a reality in regards t...
A secret government organization created the largest and most advanced computer cluster ever. Ridiculous amounts of money went into it, and it is decades ahead of the competition. The goal of thi...
The title pretty much says it all. I'm wondering if it is possible through "digital" means only (aka any physical disruption of satellites is not allowed) to disable the US GPS satellite constella...
In a sci-fi RPG I eventually intend to run for a couple of friends, I had the idea of them visiting ancient ruins on a planet orbiting a shedding red giant. Now, ignoring the problem of intelligen...
If there were an absolutely terrible accident, and part of Earth's core was displaced toward the surface, making a bubble of liquid nickel and iron, what would be the major problems with this?
Recently, I came across an inverted world map on the MapPorn Reddit made by MChainsaw. "Inverted" as in, the "continents" are now below sea level and the "ocean floors" are high and dry. (Conside...
An alternate world is populated by mainly intelligent trees and other plants. These plants are almost exactly the same, biologically, as Earth's plants. The world's climate and geology are very sim...
I have been slowly losing my mind trying to build a somewhat realistic climate map for a fantasy world I'm building for my book. A geographer I am not... I modeled the climate zones and such after ...
I am working on a planet that has insignificant (almost 0 degrees) tilt, no moon, rotates twice as fast as Earth. I intend to create quite an exotic "biome", so to speak, in a subtropical desert z...
Disclaimer: I am not a meteorologist. Snow forms when supercooled water droplets nucleate onto particles in the atmosphere. After forming, they grow further by both tumbling around within the clou...
What is the largest planet I can get, while still remaining within Earth-like parameters? My concern is with gravity, water pressure and atmospheric pressure. Escape velocity is less of a concern. ...
On an Earth like planet, is it possible to have a perpetual storm surrounding an island? And if so what would cause/maintain this storm? Edit: To be a little more clear, I'm looking for a storm st...
Suppose that I have a planet very similar to Earth. It has the same level of gravity, water-land ratio, temperature, air composition, rotation and revolution speed, tectonic activities, temperature...
I've written about these rocky hills with short grass, gravel, shrubs, and big boulders. At the bottom of one of the hills is a big bog. Basically I've designed some buildings to be sticking out of...
I made a map for my fictional world and it would be convenient for the story to have all of it affected by a somewhat similar climate. The map is made of several pieces of a Pangaea-like continent...
I want to know the how many people can live on Earth's oxygen. Is there a point when humans would use up all the oxygen? What would be the limiting factors? Given we have charts to show the rate of...
Basically, I want to freeze the technology of earth at a level reminiscent of pre-Industrial Revolution Europe. I'm trying to figure out what substance or material would have to be absent from the...
Being an engineer and someone who hates hot summers and frigid winters, and someone who really likes the Rocky Mountain view, I can not help but wonder if we humans could get to design a whole new ...
I've been toying with the idea of a global highway that completely circles the globe. Ideally it would (on average) be as close to the equator as possible but also hit or at least come close to maj...
I want this planet to be very earth-like on all aspects except for its size and the day-night cycle. The circumference is three times greater than the earth's circumference. The day-night cycle las...
I'm imagining a world populated with a species of intelligent, social, and "modern" (in terms of technology) humanoids. For the purposes of this question, they and their world can be near identica...
I'm trying to think of a scientifically plausible reason for humanity to be forced to abandon earth that would leave animals and plants largely untouched. Is there any natural disaster that would h...
Is there a possible scenario in which once a year a celestial body can be seen from the surface of the Earth-like planet for a short period of time? With it being big enough for early civilizatio...
I'm working on yet another iteration of a world map project. I'd like to ask for some opinions on the sea temperature map I've done: I also have a few specific questions about some areas on the...
Obliquity is the most important factor of seasons. Without axial tilt, eccentricity causes small temperature variations. What would climate and weather on Earth look like, if Earth doesn't have any...
Imagine a planet orbiting a star some billions of lightyears away from us, the planet is 4 times the mass of Earth and is covered with ice 100km thick on average. It is believed that liquid ocean e...
A tragic event strikes the Earth, killing all living plants and animals except humans. With no other food source, humans turn to cannibalism. Assuming fresh water and oxygen is still available, how...
Huge numbers of genetically modified flying insects (purpose not disclosed here but it relates to affecting the whole of humanity) are to be dropped into the Earth's atmosphere from space so that t...
If the entire Earth's gravity immediately shifted so it was pulling from East to West, what should people do? Keep in mind that this is not reversed, but merely tilted sideways, and maybe at an an...
In an earth-like world, what can I provide as examples of areas where high energy is generated naturally? I'm looking for sources of energy other than heat, for e.g, volcanoes and geothermic vents.
So I'm currently designing an alien habitable planet that orbits a star similar to our Sun. Assuming that the composition of the planet's atmosphere, as well as its pressure, are similar to the one...
The established fact is that the shape of a planet's continental coastlines is determined by the planet's climate. Higher temperatures mean less ice, which ultimately means higher sea levels. (Ca...
One of Milutin Milankovic's three big factors in his ice age theories was Earth's obliquity, or axial tilt. Earth's axial tilt varies between 22.1 and 24.5 degrees at an approximation of 41,000 ye...
I have created a planet which is a clone of Earth. Except I messed up where wasps, cobras and scorpions were concerned and they have turned out to be the size of elephants (everything in proportio...
The most popular type of stars are red dwarves, which regrettably tend to be flare stars. Yes, I know that geomagnetic storms and power lines do not like each other. Technology level: More or less...
An asteroid collision big enough and fast enough to see a massive ejection of rock and moon-chunks, from the surface of the earth AND not wipe out the population of the planet. What size and speed...
During the Ming dynasty, China was frequently attacked by centaurs from north. In order to ward off the invaders, the emperor of China wanted to build a long stretch of barrier along the mountain r...
