General Q&A about worldbuilding and other speculative developments that can be extrapolated from science.
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I'm thinking a quadruple stars system where a binary star system orbits another but more massive binary star system is probably fine, however so far I never encounter binary planets orbiting triple...
I recently came up with a lizard that had a sort of crystal-gem like attachment on its back. The problem was finding a way for such a thing to have evolved to have a largish crystal on its back. ...
Implants and/or augmentations in human brain are widely shown in fiction: improving and/or enhancing certain functions of the brain by artificial means can have nearly endless possibilities. All o...
In a million years or so, descendants of humans (intelligence comparable to wolves) are driven into caves due to competition with land and resources from descendants from alligators and crocodiles....
Suppose human beings have evolved markings covering the face and hairs. The cells contain a colony of bacterium capable of producing multiple arrays of visible light. Each bacteria reacts differen...
Some information about their homeworld: Their homeworld, 0.34247 (M⊕) 0.54 G, 10156 km. The atmospheric pressure of their homeworld is 62% of the Earth's, and the planet has an average temper...
In a world inhabited by small grassland herbivores, night-time is a very scary time indeed. With no moon or other substantial light-source to illuminate the plains, they are in great danger of beco...
Setting A binary planet system consisting of two terrestrial planets (hereafter Alpha/α and Beta/β). The system barycentre (C) is between the two planets; for the sake of this question the exact...
Five years ago, our company reached the stage where we were able to create, maintain, and communicate with digitized brain transfer images. These trials were conducted on patients with life-limiti...
Ignoring the tails humans already have. Let's say it's the year 2016. Merpeople exist. They live in the ocean or rivers, breathe air, and have to surface occasionally. They also evolved from earli...
I want to create a system orbiting an Orange Dwarf star, approximately 0.5 M☉. I've a 5-planet system, one of which needs to be within the habitable zone of this star; this planet will be 2 M⊕...
Would there be any benefit to this? At first I was thinking if you had an outpost on Mars you could spend less money on the actual trip to the belt itself, but I'm not sure if having your launch st...
Consider a billionaire living on earth today. What would be the most effective way to deploy sensors to a vast area of the earth's sea depths? (Sea depths referring to the sea floor, and slightly a...
Aside from resorting to a grey goo-ish nanoplague that kills indiscriminately regardless of biochemistry, how might an alien virus, bacteria or other pathogen still be dangerous to humans? Could a ...
So, I'm writing a set of short stories (i.e. in the "Martian Chronicles" format). It was going to be centered around life on Earth through the sudden dissapearance of the Sun, but after surprinsing...
I got to thinking a simple throwaway thought on this video where this dude flushes mercury in a toilet (in a closed loop) For one thing, it's easy to think about the properties of mercury (mostly ...
I was trying to put together an idea for a Gas Giant like planet that could possibly support some kind of fairly complex life, and I hit upon a few ideas: -Located in a habitable zone roughly simi...
Our most iconic bridges can be categorized in two basic types: Suspension... ...and cantiliever. Here is the scenario in question: There is a straightforward (as in radiating out in cardina...
A superhuman character in my book has the ability to sense objects outside of his body by simply being around them without touching them. There is some sort of field that extends outside of his bod...
I want to have a star cluster of main-sequence stars (yellow dwarfs [like our sun], orange, and red dwarfs) that are on a distance of 1-2 light years between each other, so interstellar travel is ...
For all who are unaware, synesthesia is a condition in the brain where two or more senses are connected; for example being able to see sound or hear color. Of course they do not actually see color ...
This is an answer I found while looking up random factoids. And it's gotten me wondering. ((If I should take down the picture, and just paraphrase the text, please let me know.)) Charlie here i...
I have an idea for this crazy blood thirsty monster and the reason behind its love for killing is red is the only color it sees, but I don't know how or if that is possible a logical scientific exp...
I'm designing creatures with naturally occurring white or pale grey irises and pupils so that it looks like their eyes are all white. What effect could this have their vision (colorblindness, light...
The Idea is to move large amounts of water vapor high into the Troposphere, thereby blocking some of the sun's intensity. Factors that contribute the Earth's solar heat gain include reflectivity/e...
Disclaimer: This question is the third of a new series of questions of mine about introducing hexapeds to the fauna of my conworld. There are/will be other questions addressing i.a.: characteristic...
So having read a couple of other questions on here, and postulating over this for a while, here's my question. Is it possible to have two magnetars in a distant binary orbit, with an earthlike pla...
In a setting I am presently working on, I have envisioned a world similar to Star Wars' Takodana, in that its water is mainly in the form of large rivers, or smaller seas (I generally picture it b...
From 5.96 to 5.33 million years ago, disaster struck the Mediterranean Sea. A tectonic snag turned this... ...into something like this. In this alternate scenario, the sea separating modern ...
How to get humans that can change their skin color? Approximately 1.6 million years ago, hominids lost their hair and gained dark skin (so says the New York Times). Evidence shows several several...
Storms can devastate lives and property, but they have benefits as well--plenty of water for the plants and nitrogen for the soil. Even drought has its benefits, giving the landscape an occasional...
Suppose the Wicked Witch of the West was simply an alien life form that was stranded in Oz. She comes from a race of beings that are water soluble. She would have to be able to resist a small a...
Inspired by comment under this question "Darling, does this dress make me look fat? QUICKSAVE "Uhm ... no?" WRONG ANSWER, WANNA TRY AGAIN? We all dreamed about having possibili...
Satyrs, fauns, pan, and even the devil are commonly depicted as humanoid bipeds with goatlike unguligrade hooves for feet. However, common as such beings may be in fantasy and mythology, I have bee...
So let's say that some advanced future civilization is capable of creating and manipulating wormholes, and uses a network of wormholes for their FTL transportation. If an enemy gets too close to o...
How fast does the Earth's core rotate currently, and what would happen if its speed of rotation were to increase dramatically?
This question concerns this Alternative Earth. To make a certain fictional country which occupies the northern part of Russia more interesting, I want to make agriculture feasible in Siberia and t...
I am making a "structure" out of carbon nanotubes in deep space. This structure can be any shape or design, I just want it big. Big in just one direction is cheating (so no long thin structures),...
Based on the situation described by this earlier question: recap If due to some strange phenomena that changed our universe laws, time stopped and can only move if a creature capable of observing...
As we all know, hydrogen and by extension water, gaseous, liquid or frozen, is pretty much everywhere in our solar system besides maybe Mercury. The most abundant source may be the Asteroid Belt, w...
Could an artificial plant species be designed and created that lives in a vacuum - for example on the surface of our moon? The main problems I can see immediately would be the lack of an atmospher...
A mad scientist decides to hold the moon hostage for one million dollars. He accomplishes this using a tractor beam of arbitrary power to trap the moon directly between the Earth and the Sun. The t...
Newton's first law of motion states An object remains with the same velocity, or position of rest unless an external force is exerted. What if we created a hypothetical universe where A...
I'll keep it nice and simple. On a world that does not rotate is it possible to have a mountain that is high enough that when you sit at the top, you can see the divide between daylight and night t...
What adaptions would humans obtain if they lived on Mars? (eg. get taller/shorter because of gravity) In a universe where humans terraformed mars to have breathable air and house some plants, what...
Earlier today I came across this question, asking as to the effects of having a planet with a shell around it acting as a planet itself, so there was a planet within a planet with neither in contac...
The errant planet is similar in size with the star and it's made all of water. Usually is icy, but probably gonna melt when approach the star. What happens during the process of collision between ...
What if, through advanced psychological techniques and enough knowledge of a human mind, could someone construct a building that when a person lives there for an amount of time, could subliminally ...
I've wanted my fantasy world to be as realistic and science-based as possible (aside from magic), but I also want there to be dinosaurs or creatures that are very similar to dinosaurs. So what woul...
I was wondering what would happen if there was a planet with a "shell" of stone entirely surrounding it (not connected, just held in place by gravity), with a few holes all the way through the oute...
