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Activity for bowlturner‭

Type On... Excerpt Status Date
Question Mosquito Assassin 2: Curiosity killed with A catalyst!
In the last mission, my mosquito drone needed to deliver a payload of deadly substance, but most of the items either had an antidote if discovered in time or could conceivably be traced back to a buyer. Now I'm taking a page from the Joker, I need a multi-stage poison. It needs to have 2-3 ingredie...
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almost 8 years ago
Question Could an abandoned Dyson Ring survive long enough for intelligent life to evolve?
Humanity survives long enough to create a Dyson-Ring around old Sol using many of the planets and asteroids currently in the system. Then 'something happens' we die out, we discover a way to travel to other stars, something. The ring will have some automated systems such as keeping the sun center...
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about 8 years ago
Question How big can the leviathan and kraken really be?
How big can an underwater animal really get before physics get in the way? (I'm sure feeding would likely get in the way first, but ignore that!). The Blue Whale is currently the largest animal on planet earth the record holder 108 ft. long. The Megalodon topped out close to 70 ft. The Lion's ma...
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over 8 years ago
Question What are some major architectural designs in spaceships for aquatic beings
Like this question I'm wondering about design considerations for an intelligent aquatic species that wants to travel into space. Would they have to try and create special body suits to keep moisture content or try and fill a ship with water? Or would they have to fill up a ship once it's in space (s...
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over 8 years ago
Question What are some major architectural designs that would be in spaceships for flighted beings?
I am wondering what are some of the major concerns/designs an intelligent flying species would have in designing a starship? Generally we consider space to be a premium and crew living space is almost an afterthought. I think Creatures with flight might have a lot more trouble with wings that would...
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over 8 years ago
Question That's no moon! It's a space station! How big can a space ship be before it collapses on itself?
Now a solid body of rock will collapse itself to a round shape when it hits about 600 km in diameter (400 km for ice). Now, the Second Death Star is estimated to be between 160 and 900 km. How big can a space ship be made of metal but still with "large open" living spaces. I assume it would still be ...
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over 8 years ago
Question The last ride of The Magic Schoolbus: Termination of the ignorant
It's been 21 years Ms. Frizzle has been doing her best to educate the masses. Even with all the knowledge available provided on the internet, not only do people not take advantage, they choose to remain ignorant of as much as possible, preferring sound bites that have nothing to do with facts. She ...
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over 8 years ago
Question What changes would be needed for humans to live in an ocean?
Taking genetic manipulation of humans to change them to live in other environments, besides maybe gills what other physical changes would need to be done for a human to spend 95+% time living in the ocean? I also suspect gills would only be partially useful, allowing longer submersion's but still req...
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over 8 years ago
Question Could large space ships land safely
Thinking about the question about Arcologies I was wondering using known science and even a little speculated science would it be possible to safely land a large space ship on a planet similar in size to Earth with a similar atmosphere? I'm talking about city sized space ships holding 100,000 plus p...
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almost 9 years ago
Question Evolutionary Explanations for Dragon Firebreathing: Interesting uses of indigestion
This is a question I've been thinking about for a while now. Dragons are, by all observances related to the reptile family, (or maybe lizards) either way these are cold blooded animals. Common places to see dragons are on mountain tops, flying high in the sky, "from the North" etc. Reptiles are ...
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about 9 years ago
Question What kind of reaction time could a mobile plant have?
We have Venus flytraps which move by closing their 'mouth' to trap prey. There are currently few identified plants with a 'quick' reflex like this. Blooms of course open and close through the course of a day and evening but that is pretty slow. We've all seen things like 'The Wamping Willow' in ...
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about 9 years ago
Answer A: Where should I place my city in space?
I think it depends on what 'near' is. If we can travel to Jupiter in a couple days, then almost anywhere in between will be reasonably close. If it takes 6 months to travel to Mars then being in some kind of orbit around the Earth, moon or a populated planet would be a much better idea. it would b...
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about 9 years ago
Answer A: How can I make a net beneficial genetic trait occur only in a small fraction of the population, sustained?
Your right, it is probably a multi-gene combo 2-3 to keep it to a small % the visible variance could be a large piece of the puzzle. The visible items could be very unappealing for sexual partners, or even more simple that it also is paired with a reduced ability to procreate. 4b. I don't see wh...
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over 9 years ago
Question Brown Dwarves: Dyson Spheres in disguise?
Would a Dyson sphere make a red dwarf appear to be a Brown Dwarf? Would it disguise a star enough to misidentify it what size it is? I'm just wondering if it could be possible that some Dyson spheres are out there drifting around, camouflaged like a rather innocuous and innocent star?
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over 9 years ago
Question Is the Alcubierre Drive relatively free from relativistic collisions?
Related to the this question about not going SPLAT. That one was for conventional travel through space at high speeds. Now I want to know about how things would work with an Alcubierre drive. I'm trying to understand how this will work and how it will affect other objects. I know that it is supp...
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over 9 years ago
Question How to avoid objects when traveling at greater than .75 light speed. or How Not to Go SPLAT?
After asking my question about seeing black holes in your path between the stars, I also wondered abut other more mundane objects. Black holes affect large areas of space so even if you didn't get 'close' it could still affect your trajectory. The answers there are good for black holes. Now, say w...
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over 9 years ago
Question Can we identify black holes in our path flying between the stars?
When traveling at fast speeds through the galaxy, would it be possible to identify where all the black holes were on your path? I know most black holes are identified by their affect on other nearby objects. But what would happen if it was all by its lonesome? Would we be able to 'sense' it somehow ...
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over 9 years ago
Question Could planets switch orbits like Janus?
I was reading up a little while ago about Janus and Epimetheus and how every few years they trade orbits. The mechanics is interesting but I'm not going into them here. What I was wondering is first could planets going around a sun have a similar relationship and how might that affect any life on...
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over 9 years ago
Question Can a spaceship traveling close to light speed be knocked off course by a gamma ray burst?
This was spawned from this question about Blueshifting (BS) when traveling near the speed of light. I had found this while learning about the other question. @99.99995 percent c And interestingly, the students also realized that, when traveling at such an intense speed, a ship would be subjec...
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over 9 years ago
Question Being cooked for dinner! or What Danger of Blueshifting EM into X-rays and beyond?
When doing some research for some of the resent questions proposed, I ran across an article that pointed out a danger of traveling at extreme speeds in normal space as a high percentage of c I was unaware of. (besides just running into a few grains of sand...) The first problem after creating some s...
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over 9 years ago
Question Is Superman a peeping Tom? or Would x-ray vision be biologically reasonable?
Real x-ray vision, the ability to (at least) detect X-rays as a 'visible' light (or any other detection system) seems it would be very problematic. X-Rays are a high energy form of electromagnetic radiation and are very damaging to living tissue (at least on Earth). So developing a sensor to detect ...
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over 9 years ago
Question How close must a supernova be to severely harm the Earth?
I did a little looking and it appears stars outside of 10 parsec/33 ly will have very little effect on the Earth. What it did say was that inside that range the gamma rays would affect our ozone layer which would reduce our radiation protection. How close would it have to be for the actual gamma ray...
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over 9 years ago
Question Wouldn't building down make more sense when colonizing a dead planet?
Most science fiction stories has humans building large domes on the surface of planets like Mars or the Moon. But wouldn't it make more logistical sense to dig down and build down into the planet? I could see needing some dome space for human psychology so everyone wouldn't become agoraphobic but w...
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over 9 years ago
Question What factors go into whether a moon or planet is tidally locked?
I was thinking about a different possibilities for habitable planets. And I was wondering what actually causes a planet to be tidally locked? I am assuming it more than chance that the bodies rotation and period are the same. I started thinking what it would be like to be on a planet that circle...
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over 9 years ago
Question How would basketball change to accommodate zero-g
I was just wondering what kind of rule changes court layout etc would happen to have a 'basketball' game in a zero-g arena? I'm assuming the most likely thing to stay is a ball and 2 opposing baskets. I was wondering what kinds of recreation and entertainment would happen if people had lots of easy...
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over 9 years ago
Question Feasibility of anti-matter as a fuel
Now, taking out the cost to produce/collect it, assume somehow we perfected a formula or find a natural source (because that is currently very prohibitive), how feasible would be to use antimatter as a fuel source primarily for space-travel/exploration? Along with that, how much would you need to pow...
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over 9 years ago
Question Human/mammal growth on Mars
Some Science fiction stories have generations growing up on Mars would be a lot taller 7'+. How would growing up on a much lower gravity planet affect a mammals size? I understand bone density would likely be an issue. What are the other health concerns?
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over 9 years ago
Question Asteroid as a generation ship
I was wondering if it would make sense to hollow out an asteroid to use for a generation ship? Also, might it be a good idea to use hollow asteroids for any kind of long distance space ship? I'm thinking you can mount engines on the outside, you have some great hull protection, there may be some hand...
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over 9 years ago
Question Physical speed of insectoid lifeforms
Would humanoid sized insectoid lifeforms be relatively slow considering that their exoskeleton would have to be rather heavy since it takes more 'armor' to get the same relative protection? Generally they are portrayed as very quick physically, but I think they would actually be slower, like a knigh...
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over 9 years ago