Communities

Writing
Writing
Codidact Meta
Codidact Meta
The Great Outdoors
The Great Outdoors
Photography & Video
Photography & Video
Scientific Speculation
Scientific Speculation
Cooking
Cooking
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering
Judaism
Judaism
Languages & Linguistics
Languages & Linguistics
Software Development
Software Development
Mathematics
Mathematics
Christianity
Christianity
Code Golf
Code Golf
Music
Music
Physics
Physics
Linux Systems
Linux Systems
Power Users
Power Users
Tabletop RPGs
Tabletop RPGs
Community Proposals
Community Proposals
tag:snake search within a tag
answers:0 unanswered questions
user:xxxx search by author id
score:0.5 posts with 0.5+ score
"snake oil" exact phrase
votes:4 posts with 4+ votes
created:<1w created < 1 week ago
post_type:xxxx type of post
Search help
Notifications
Mark all as read See all your notifications »
Q&A

Faux-natural barriers between environments in a world-sized zoo

+0
−0

Suppose a K-II civilization built a terrarium or zoo, featuring life and ecosystems from different worlds as it travelled through the universe. (By K-II I mean in terms of resources and energy budget required. I don't mean technology indistinguishable from magic, as that's a cop-out in a hard SF story. In general, I want to minimize the number of exceptional things that are not real (known) physics or go unexplained.)

Clearly you need "hard" compartments for different domains that are fundamentally different in atmosphere etc. But it would be more pleasing if exhibits were separated from each other in a more unobtrusive natural-looking way.

Having contenents or suitably-sized islands is no barrier since life can fly, swim, or blow in the wind. If there were subtle partitions in the water as well that would not stop air travel and would block ocean circulation.

If you had tall mountains, you need a hard partition as well to reach even higher in the air and prevent any tunneling through. And that causes problems with weather.

Active defences as a backup against normal-ish barriers? How would they work?

And finally, how to visitors and explorers manage to go where they please, when even clever natives with lots of time cannot.

History
Why does this post require moderator attention?
You might want to add some details to your flag.
Why should this post be closed?

This post was sourced from https://worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/q/45410. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

0 comment threads

0 answers

Sign up to answer this question »