General Q&A about worldbuilding and other speculative developments that can be extrapolated from science.
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I previously asked how best to use wormholes for spaceflight, focusing mainly on propulsion in space. I'm now wondering if there's a good way to get off Earth with this ship. The ship needs to be ...
I'm new to this and my scientific knowledge is massively lacking in this area (so please take it easy on me!) I'm writing a historical science-fiction novel. Parts of it set in the past (1977) and ...
In our timeline Alexander Fleming accidentally discovered penicillin by accidentally leaving petri dishs out over a long period of time. If a person from an earlier time, e.g. ancient Rome, woke u...
I am trying to find a solution for a specific subset of the Stealth in Space Problem: dealing with waste heat without tipping off properly positioned observers. This question is scoped specifically...
After an age of highly developed technology, including many different satellites in various Earth orbits, humanity loses the technology needed to control those satellites. After many centuries, how...
The Megapodes are a family of birds in the galliformes order. They live primarily in Australia and are notable in being extremely precocial and laying more eggs than any other bird. They build larg...
In an Earth-like planet filled with humanoid creatures (upright, two legs, two arms, head, etc.) the inhabitants have evolved to grow bowlegs. The question is why? What advantage would it bring...
My planet has a day length of ~52 earth hours. This means storms like hurricaines and thunderstorms will be weaker. How do I combat this and generate really strong storms and winds on a slow rota...
So I'm almost done with my draft of a story I'm writing. And I just got a random question popped into my head. Is it possible for Zues (the kaiju size dino) to survive? I already got a little bit o...
This is not my question. In my story, I have a machine that you can connect to using electrodes. It allows one to enter a small virtual reality room where everything from gravity and electromagnet...
So, the dragons of my setting were inspired by several things, which include D&D dragons, a mockumentary and Asian water monitors. Now, dragons look something similar to this: They glide for...
Setup: Earth developed in an alternate universe with small oceans and little water. A little before animals first left the oceans and began to walk on land, when all of Earth's land was barren sand...
Let's say there is another planet in our solar system that harbours sentient life and this sentient life can build castles, buildings, and other such structures. When would we notice that? We ca...
I have this creatures which were hiding underground for millennia. They are, from the beginning of their history, exclusively nocturnal. They emerged back on surface after moon disappeared (irrel...
I am trying to find out if I have thought of the correct anatomy requirements for designing non humanoid alien species. I am designing as many different biological species as I can with the aim of ...
Say humans found a way to exponentially increase the capability of plants to grow. Is it possible for it to cause an environment that can cause oxygen toxicity in humans?
I have a spaceship which I want to have travel very quickly around a system like our own solar system -- let's say about 10 million miles per minute, which would go from Mars to Earth in ~15 minute...
While the intended end state is that this planet can support space-faring lifeforms, the solution under question needs a sanity check. I cannot commit to many numbers with how speculative this all ...
66 million years ago, something brought an end to the long-established dinosaur empire. The pendulum just kept shifting between an asteroid and a comet, astronomical bolides that actually have dif...
I have an Earth-like world (approximately 1000CE technology--horse/mule for travel) that I want to have my characters traverse over the course of the book. I want the areas to have distinct geograp...
I'm working to design the atmosphere of a fictional planet inspired by Venus (let's call it Cael). Cael's atmosphere at an altitude of 50 km is essentially identical to Earth's atmosphere at sea l...
Many know that the Lantern Corps of DC Comics are capable of constructing objects of any shape or size out of hard light using their power ring fueled by their emotions. However, I'm wondering what...
Inspired partially by this comment on one of my answers, I got to thinking on what the quickest way to communicate would be on an intergalactic scale. Say humans have colonised the galaxy, and use...
When torturing people or executing them in slow and painful ways, your victims sometimes fall unconscious, which ruins the point of the exercise. After all, if they aren't feeling the pain, then wh...
Node is the last active city of the lizard people. Node was built to be a self-sufficient city and a nexus of an interconnected bunker system. It was a vanity project from the peak of the lizard em...
A world has grassy plains infested with larger-than-normal (perhaps even giant) blood-sucking ticks. Ignoring their main diet for the time being: They should be dangerous enough to threaten humans ...
I'm creating a fictional world which includes tree dwelling octopuses that thrives in swamps and tropical rainforests. I'm wondering what evolutionary pressures could lead to the rise of such crea...
An alien automatic "beacon" tries to warn us about some imminent danger. It does so with launching a succession of large "veils" in front of their star so we can detect them via the transit method....
My postulated creature will look something like this: or like this: Its description is as follows: it's a non-obligate carnivore its height is, on average, about two feet it lives in arid h...
Quick Overview Here's the situation: your species, under directive of your friendly world government, has been informed that all "natural" (aka reproducing like your normally would and having a ch...
(I'm new here, so if I'm doing something wrong please let me know) I have an idea for a world where most fauna (and potentially flora) have floating, disembodied limbs that hover in place. Think R...
The "Weird" spell in my world is basically a magical version of the US government's goals with the "MK Ultra" project from the 1950s: it induces a shared hallucination in every creature within a 9....
Would it even be feasible under science fiction logic? It would allow nuclear weapons to be mass produced if the nuclear pasta could actually be collected and contained safely.
my question is as follows: How cold temperatures can withstand a genetically modified person who has the opportunity for a long time (more than a day ) at low temperatures (below -30 ° Celsius ) t...
In 2001:A Space Odyssey, from Space Station V the Earth appears to be spinning around a center that is near the edge of the planet. Phone call from space station scene If the same station (300 met...
In my world, electricity has not yet been discovered, and many advancements in society progress on a purely chemical or mechanical basis. Lasers are incredibly useful and multifaceted tools, and I...
I usually like to leave some wiggle room for myself when fleshing a concept out. Dragons make that sort of impossible, same's true for nanomachines but ripped senators are a question for another d...
For a spacecraft cruising without thrust it is my understanding that the sort of spin gravity utilized in the film 2001, for instance, would actually be debilitating to the crew due to the coriolis...
So I'm pretty new to chemistry and all this, but my world involves superpowers, which of course involves immense energy to have the characters use these powers. However, I want to stay consistent w...
The other side of this question can be found here: How to use heavier soldiers Imagine if tomorrow we find a way to create soldiers that are almost exactly the same in every single way as our curr...
If you were air dropped onto another planet, where multi-cellular non-plant life did not evolve, could you survive on what was only around you? The planet in question is a clone of earth, in almost...
My world is set in ancient times on a planet similar to Earth, but with a different civilization and different geography (and lots of canals). I need to find a way of giving the inhabitants better ...
Recently I got the idea that my humanoid race should have hydrophobic skin, because it sounds cool, and perhaps would help to maintain hygiene. However, on the second thought, I am not so sure. Wo...
I have done some research and so much contradict one another or I simply fail to understand. Do seasons occur on a tidally locked planet that isn't tilted on its axis?
The purpose of this question is to know whether or not organic tissue can be used to power and android. Compared to a nuclear cell or an ordinary battery this doesn't seem efficient, it needs food,...
So, dragons are rather large (2 meters at the withers and have a nose-to-base-of-tail length of 5 meters) creatures. Pic related by: KatePfeilschiefter They look something like pic related, albe...
For some reason, all the nations in the world have banded together. Their goal? Go to the Moon. Their budget? As much as the planet and humans can throw at it. How fast could we build a reliable a...
In a futuristic world, on a small military spaceship, I want to give it an external camera/telescope-like device that has incredible night vision so it can see the landscape underneath the ship in ...
My creature looks like a Psittacosaurus, with spikes all around its body, it hisses and uses its tail whip as a first. As last resort it will squirt an aimed stream of blood from its eyes toward it...
