Questions tagged [alternate-earth]
For questions relating to radically changed Earth. This alternate Earth could be a post-apocalyptic Earth, or Earth with major changes in the current social/political/economical schemes.
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Could deliberately induced Kessler Syndrome stop ICBMs?
In a previous question I asked how Mutually Assured Destruction could be made not assured. Most of the highly rated answers focused on political methods, but one answer raised the possibility that ...
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Noah's flood actually happened. When does science prove that it happened?
Plot
Noah's Flood actually happened more or less as written. Suddenly appearing flood waters covered the Earth, excepting a few mountain tops, and all land animals had to wait it out on an Ark. The ...
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A Raptorial Parrot
This scenario is based on the kea, the world's only alpine parrot.
Even though it eats plants like other parrots, it also eats meat, and therefore could be New Zealand's answer to the smaller diurnal ...
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Could humans wipe out all remaining wild vertebrates on Earth in one year, if no effort is spared in doing so?
Humans already exterminated more than 50 % of wild vertebrates individuals since 1970 1, 2.
I was wondering if it is possible to wipe out the remaining 50 % in less than a year ?
Note that, in this ...
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Creating an earth-like planet without a tropical rainforest?
What I have
I plan to create an 'alternative timeline' for the earth, which means most of the earth's features are identical, the only major difference is, that humans appeared at another time, so ...
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An Inverse Great Dying
252 million years ago, the worst event in the history of life on Earth occurred. 70% of all terrestrial species and 96% of all marine species became extinct through, according to geological records, ...
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Gravity Change on Earth [closed]
Ok so hypothetical situation, the gravitic force of the Earth is changed. Let's say that the Earth still revolves around the sun, and the moon still revolves the Earth in the same way, but within our ...
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How Would The Listed Towers Be Described? [closed]
In some foreseeable future, we have had transdimensional historians studying alternate Earths with multiple different points of departure, sometimes within the same Earth. In one of them, the Black ...
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Striving to develop a single-system management [closed]
I was thinking of a world like ours where everything, each separate sub-system works within a single-system management. I mean, a planet has one country, an empire, with one bank company, one building ...
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How much dirt would be needed to be added to the Earth to cover most of civilization?
I am building a world where the new world is built on top of the old one, and the old world is kept under a layer of "immigrated" dirt from other worlds via portals.
If there was a portal (or ...
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Habitation of early Earth
Based on various methods of geological dating, particularly radiometric analysis, Earth is estimated to be around 4.5 billions years old. This is around the time the Earth's Moon was thought to be ...
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Can the location and structure of continents be altered?
In the novel I am writing one of the twists is that story actually takes place on a distant earth except it’s unrecognisable due to it being permanently altered by a long series of devastating wars.
...
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On a planet without gravity, how can water stay on the surface? [closed]
In a fictional world that is round, and has no gravity, how would you go about making the water not fall off the planet (Or even people, for that matter?. Is there some kind of futuristic force field ...
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Can Pinnipeds Fit in a Worm Forest?
In an alternate Earth, coral has been extinct for over 400 million years. In their place were the following:
Bivalvia (clams, oysters, mussels)
Cirripedia (barnacles)
Canalipalpata (bristle-foot or ...
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A peculiar and complex cause for a war for over 2 centuries [closed]
Okay, so my world is basically classified into 9 quadrants, with 8 being land and the other being a single gigantic body of water. All of these land quadrants are separated from each other by water. ...
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Could an intelligent worm-like race invent and build computers?
We have a regular Earth as we know it, but instead of humans, there is this worm-like race, intelligent similarly as nowadays humans.
Their inner physiology is different from our worms (and not ...
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The World's a Jungle Again. How Many Species Would Crowd the Continents? [closed]
In accommodation to my last question, we are now transferring from meteorology to ecology.
Today, tropical rainforests take up only 3% of the world's surface, yet they take up half of the plant and ...
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Possible height and size of a giant tree on an Earth-like planet?
I'm working on a story about another dimension of this same Earth but without the same human development and history. The land and natural conditions would be the same except for the ones directly ...
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The World's a Jungle Again. Would Doldrums Blow the Global Air?
From 56 to 34 million years ago, Earth was so warm that we have found evidence of jungle plants inside the Arctic Circle. Nowadays, jungles are confined in or near the equator, and those latitudes ...
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A K-Type Binary Dawn/Dusk in the Equator
In this alternate scenario, Earth is the third planet in a binary star system. One star is a K-type main sequence star--or "orange dwarf"--that has 80% the mass of a G-type main sequence star--or "...
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Earth Orbits a K-Type Star. What Would the Visual Scenery Look Like?
To clarify on the title, K-type main-sequence stars--shortened as "orange dwarves"--are subjects of excitement for astronomers and astrobiologists.
Why?
They emit enough radiation to provide a ...
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What if the geographic pole were in the Himalayas?
From a climatic point of view, what if Earth went through a radical polar shift that would place the geographical pole right where the Himalayas and Tibetan Plateau are? (No matter if southern or ...
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What are the traits of and how could a compound(mosquito) eye be used for bug-sized equipment [closed]
How could a medieval nomadic explorer air-ship (bug-sized people) use the African mosquito's eyes for equipment building? there is no magic in their world apart from the fact that such a tiny species ...
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Red clouds with a blue sky
Is there anything that could change the colors of the clouds while still maintaining the sky blue? Or any other color for the clouds, except blue. You can use our solar system as a basis for this. ...
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Can death create a loophole for two exact duplicate people existing in the same universe? [closed]
Here'a another one of my weird questions...
So there's two universes, two of many in a many worlds/multiverse scenario. We'll call one Universe A and the other Universe B for sanity's sake. And there ...
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The fields (of scienrific expertise) required by crew members in order to conduct research on an unknown planet [duplicate]
I am working on a story where a group of people in the supposed future leave their planet in a spaceship to do research on another not yet known planet (more or less like Prometheus).
Let there be ...
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30km deep canyon in Central Europe
Let’s suppose that there is a canyon, several hundred kilometers in length, stretching from Leipzig to Geneva and reaching the depth of 30 kilometers. It is up to 60 kilometers wide, cutting through ...
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City for introverts?
I am busy drawing a fictional map of a city. It has all the technology, economics and sociology of the real world. The city has no nightclubs, very few restaurants, no bars: very few places to ...
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How could mankind of ancient times cause significant climate change?
They don't posses any advanced knowledge, their knowledge is in fact irrelevant, just their possible actions (it doesn't matter how irrational those actions might be) that would cause significant ...
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Could a water-world planet with tides that create land support human civilisations?
If we lived on a planet similar to Earth with the same lengths for day and night - but the entire planet was covered (at some point in the year) by water, could civilisations exist and prosper as they ...
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Would the ground actually shake due to the steps of a large quadruped machine? [closed]
Let's say there is this a very large industrial-era quadruped machine, somewhere on the order of magnitude of the Bagger 288. Construction is probably similar the Eiffel Tower. For more scale ...
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Perceptions on a slightly differnt terrestrial planet [closed]
What would be the perception for a human being on a planet with an axial deviation identical to the terrestrial one, but with a surface temperature of 292 K, a temperature range between 288 K - 310 K ...
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The World of Floating Islands [duplicate]
If there was a world of air and clouds with the only solid floating then how would this be? What are the possible ways for these islands to float. This is assuming they were almost like small, ...
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Could This Sort of Castle Defense Work?
This is a basic map of a castle in an alternate Earth. It was built with two walls, both of which were always built in a circle, with four broad, circular towers/gatehouses built in four cardinal ...
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Antarctic Climate on Greenhouse Earth
Scenario: Say we have a massive release of greenhouse gases into Earth's atmosphere, however much for the ocean around Antarctica to get just warm enough for hurricanes to form during the summer (28.5 ...
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What would be the key differences between real-world nuclear warfare and alternate reality where each nation has only a single thermonuclear weapon?
Consider an Earth-like world where every nation in the world agreed to dismantle and divide all nuclear arsenals so that every nation was allowed only a single 50 megaton thermonuclear bomb (equipped ...
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How to explain human life expectancy increase?
What could be most reasonable explanation for rapid increase in life expectancy for all people on earth?
Some points:
Effect can be increased over time: 100 years in 2020, 140 - in 2030.. and so on,...
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The 372-Day Calendar
There seems to be a connection between orbital revolution (one year) and distance from the star the body orbits. For example, Earth orbits the sun at a distance of 93 million miles and completes one ...
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How fast would the people of an alternate earth progress technology/medicine wise without religion? [closed]
One of the main themes of my series is an infinite multiverse, and one of the main characters was born on an earth where religion never existed. The humans of this world except for my MC do not and ...
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Can hydroponics and aquaponics replace traditional agriculture on the village level where soil is eroded?
I'm working on a post-apocalyptic desert scenario in the near future where people live in small, loosely connected communities that trade with each other on a small scale and might have agreements ...
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How many moons can form around this alternate Earth?
Say in an alternate timeline, Earth developed with more moons. Many, many many more moons. In fact, it developed with the absolute maximum amount of moons a planet of its size and mass can physically ...
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Is there dense, non flammable gas that I can cover the Earth in?
This question is related to Deadly, Heavier than Air Gas, and Is a world with two different types of air possible? but has several different criteria. I've also looked at https://chemistry....
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Is there a way to have coal but not oil?
Reading this answer I realized that for my purposes I don't really want a fully steampunk world. All I want is lack of cars and planes as we know them, and lack of oil, or inaccessible deposits of oil,...
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Plant and Animal Life in a Taller Tibet--Possible or Not?
Back home, the Tibetan Plateau averages 4,950 meters above sea level with its highest point being Mount Everest, 8,848 meters--29,029 feet--above sea level. At such heights, problems are resulted as ...
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Economic super power with little political clout?
Is it possible for a country to be economic & technological super power but to have relatively little political clout?
If its possible under what circumstances it could happen?
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Is there a reason why a country would only use open negotiations?
For plot reasons I need a country that will always negotiate with foreign delegations using open door policy. The media can watch and record the negotiations but they can't participate.
Is there a ...
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Climate conditions and/or atmospheric changes required for the Everboom
Relating to this question: Ensuring an endless war, and an endless stalemate
In a planet such as our Earth, what climate conditions and/or atmospheric changes would be required for the formation and ...
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If Earth's Core Had Mercury's Super Core
Earth is protected by a magnetic field. Not only does it shield life from solar radiation, it also guides animals to their migratory grounds. But here's the thing, according to Universe Today:
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What to do as a society if obliterated by sight of humans? [closed]
Who are the Qu?
When a person dies unobserved they give rise to a being called a Qu. This has happened since the beginning of time. They have caused many of the myths of ghosts and gods throughout ...
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Massive, Rapid, Unlimited Global Warming [closed]
Something has happened, and it's irreversible. The world will die in fire, not ice. Perhaps the sun has expanded, a megavolcano has blackened the sky, a fusion reaction has become un-killable, aliens ...
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