Questions tagged [communication]
For questions relating to the exchange of ideas and information between beings.
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0answers
10 views
How do tongues affect speech? [duplicate]
If you had your tongue removed, would you still be able to form coherent words? What sounds would you lose the ability to make and why?
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17answers
5k views
How to make a language evolve quickly?
Imagine a world in which the language barrier is a means of propaganda defence.
In this world, one of the primary concerns of each country is the migration of natives, since they know their native ...
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5answers
2k views
Can radiation block all wireless communications?
Can radiation block all wireless communications?
My idea is that heavy meteorite storms are spreading radioactive dust around the atmosphere. I know that traces of radioactive elements can survive ...
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5answers
3k views
How could a civilization detect tachyons?
In an effort to work out a believable form of faster-than-light communications for my setting, I've ruled out a few things: wormholes (which are in use, but are too random in where they lead, to be ...
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2answers
272 views
Which sounds could a tongueless person produce?
In my world, officials dealing with sensitive information have their tongues amputated.
Naturally writing and a special, government-only sign-language are the main forms of communication, but ...
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2answers
317 views
How long would it take to eliminate the lovecraft mythos from the human consciousness?
Hundreds of years ago during the black plague, an individual named Howard Phillips Lovecraft started what would lead to the doom of humanity. Although a mediocre writer himself, his works of ...
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4answers
233 views
How can a person become completely mute without external indications?
I have searched for a while now, but I cannot find a definite answer.
A character I am writing has been captured by the antagonist, operated on and released, now completely mute.
I've looked ...
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4answers
466 views
How can a team of shapeshifters communicate?
There is a group of people who can shapeshift. They send out hunting parties, scout teams, etc. In a circumstance where a group of ten people can look like ten different species (one human, one wolf, ...
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13answers
6k views
Most bit efficient text communication method?
What would be the most efficient text communication method for a spacecraft operating on a super low bit rate (I'm talking something like 5 bits an hour, excluding error handling)?
As you want both ...
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8answers
1k views
Could an empire control the whole planet with today's comunication methods?
I remember watching a documentary some time ago and at one point they were talking about how empires were limited to a certain size since there was no way to communicate across the empire quickly and ...
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6answers
1k views
How could sorcerers who are able to produce/manipulate almost all forms of energy communicate over large distances?
Sorcerers possess the ability to sense, generate, and manipulate energy; however, their abilities are largely limited to controlling energy that they/other sorcerers have created, and not naturally ...
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9answers
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Why would telepaths have difficulty communicating with each other? [closed]
Humans in this world are born with the ability to communicate telepathically. The range and skill grows with age and practice, with adults being able to communicate between 5 - 7 ft. An individual can ...
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1answer
76 views
Life on other planets via nuclear signal
A nuclear explosion in space? Directing a nuclear explosion is difficult even in theory, but is it possible to direct one in space, with a trajectory and width of a significant diameter and wavelength ...
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7answers
375 views
How can animals of various species organize themselves against a super-predator?
Cats in New York City are an invasive species that are a plague to the animal kingdom. It is well documented that these bloodthirsty psychopaths are responsible for the murder of billions of innocent ...
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3answers
247 views
Keeping GHz wireless RF out of our heads without stopping the internet?
Premise: Neurologists found that GHz wireless RF had modest but quite negative effects on people's brains. Subtle collective effects in neuronal firing patterns across the brain due to interactions ...
11
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8answers
281 views
How might a highly intelligent aquatic species (mermaids) communicate underwater?
I'm trying to create basically realistic mermaids, and working on developing body language and vocalizations. I have most of the vocalizations I can think of (suggestions are still appreciated), but ...
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4answers
206 views
How does my spell ignite the sky?
For years, humanity and nephilim have battled (more or less) together to staunch the unending flow of demons and angels wrecking havoc on Earth in their unending wars.
Now, we are finally in ...
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1answer
225 views
How can people adjust spoken language to adapt for the discovery that they live on a non-orientable surface?
Follow up to How can orientation-discriminating people keep their views when it turns out they live on a non-orientable surface?
To quickly summarize the world, their are rightie and leftie people ...
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5answers
130 views
Is that possible to make a world in which no one needs to speak? [closed]
In my ideal world, everyone will be very very Intelligent. By that I mean everyone can think and feel what other people around them think and feel, so no one needs to talk with each other. Everyone ...
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10answers
2k views
In a world with multiracial creatures, what word can be used instead of mankind? [closed]
So, I've been trying to find a word which means all the people in the world. One would think of humanity, humankind, mankind, or just people, but I want something that can express the meaning properly ...
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10answers
5k views
Is there a technology capable of disabling the whole of Earth's satellitle network?
Machine-based communication (and navigation) relies extensively on satellites. In the future, with the massification of 5G, more and more reliance will be put on satellites (e.g. the Internet of ...
4
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5answers
153 views
How can AI distinguish conscious and subconscious instructions? [closed]
In the near future everything is connected and can think. Robots walk the street but only to control traffic and pick up rubbish, etc. Nowadays, robots don't simply execute an instruction given ...
6
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3answers
461 views
Is a more visual language possible using spoken words?
I once participated in a contest. People grouped in pairs. The two members of each pair sit back-to-back. They can neither see each other nor what the other is doing. I was the one who opens an ...
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20answers
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Lying is illegal. How to make joking not an offence?
In the society I am building it is illegal for a government official to lie (this isn't a reaction to real world politics; I've been building this world for a while), while speaking/acting as ...
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8answers
7k views
Why bother programming facial expressions for artificial intelligence if humans are bad at recognising them?
Set in the near future, robots and mankind coexist amicably due to the great technological advancement in robotics and artificial intelligence. They are everywhere and some took a human form. All of ...
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10answers
4k views
What kind of near-future technology would enable extremely quick, mostly silent, communication between soldiers?
My book is about a near-future socialist insurgency. Think Che Guevara. Che Guevara won with only 22 men by garnering support of the local population. I've read his books and can't say I see many ...
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3answers
123 views
How could a creator develop from pure energy to a conscious all knowing being [closed]
Let's assume the purpose of life is to reproduce to survive and on the quantum level for sub atomic particles to bond for longevity.
Could an unknown force of energy throughout the ages of time ...
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4answers
477 views
What does my dragon sound like?
My dragon
So to give a quick description, this is a 2 mile long, nuclear powered dragon of doom. I think I’ll going with a fission/fusion hybrid creature for this beast. Another piece of relevant ...
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4answers
2k views
Ancient Roman Pneumatic tube Postal Service
The Romans had pumps, aqueducts, water wheels (which were used to grind flour, saw wood & stone etc), valves & pipes (they are known to have used stone, clay, lead & copper for pipes).
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2answers
229 views
Verbally communicating with a no-lips, no-nosed, spiked tooth alien
In my world, humans encounter an alien species. They want to communicate verbally with each other, so I'd like to know what sounds could be shared by both species.
The species has no/very thin lips, ...
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8answers
3k views
Ancient-Roman-type Postal Service with Rats as Couriers
Background
In the Great City the underground sewers extend to all but the most impoverished households. Most dwellings have an outside privy for their needs as indoor toilets are relatively new.
The ...
24
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14answers
6k views
Is it possible for a planet’s climate to block, or at least make wireless communication irrelevant?
So, I’m writing a sci-fi story, which has a setting which involves human colonists crash landing on a massive, icy hellhole. The weather is extreme on the surface, and because of it, wireless ...
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3answers
350 views
Could you carry a wormhole through another wormhole?
Okay, let's assume that travel between star systems is done through stable, stationary wormholes on the outer boundaries of each system. This alone is slightly magic for now, of course, but let's roll ...
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3answers
417 views
How must computers/telecommunication deviate from reality for a retrofuturistic setting?
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I love the aesthetics of retrofuturistic settingsand I aim to build my own.
A mixture of a fantastical, Thundercats(2011),Outlaw Star x Star*Drive.
How yesterday saw tomorrow is quite fascinating ...
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5answers
942 views
What would make radio transmission unfeasible on a planet?
I am looking for a good reason to make radio communications on a planetary scale unfeasible or impossible. Short-range use is acceptable, but no transmissions should make it to orbit or over the ...
6
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1answer
107 views
Digital communication in pre-transistor era
Recently I have read about radioteletype devices capable of sending text messages via radio waves already in the first half of 20th century. Unfortunately, these teletypes used Baudot code, which is ...
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7answers
824 views
How to use a certain technology to communicate with colonies but keep the how-to a secret?
I'm building a world for a role-playing game campaign using the Stars Without Number system.
Some background information first:
Stars Without Number Original Setting: In the original story ...
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2answers
388 views
Could an alien evolve to speak through its anus?
Humans can speak making precise movements of our tongues, teeth and vocal chords.
I want a sentient creature whose carnivorous mouth-parts are completely unsuitable for speech to be able to ...
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4answers
152 views
Can any kind of public-key encryption hold up against a logically omniscient oracle?
"Logical omniscience" can be defined for these purposes as a form of hypercomputation in which all Turing-computable functions can be computed in constant time. Practically speaking, this means that ...
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21answers
10k views
How long can my small American city be without Internet access? [closed]
Let us say that I want a somewhat isolated farming city to lose Internet access for an extended period of time. The requirement is that all Internet access into the town have been cut off by some ...
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6answers
813 views
Time Travellers And The Roman Empire, Part 1: Transport and Control
I am a time traveller from the not so distant future. I have gone into the past to the Roman Empire (specifically the Nerva-Antonine period) and via -handwaving magical mumbo-technobabble- have become ...
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2answers
981 views
Natural gas based communication
In the faraway land of Backeye, people have developed a secretive language called Pasgas. Rather than enunciating words, or forming them with gestures, Pasgas speakers communicate by passing wind. ...
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2answers
129 views
Space colony in isolation due to Kessler Syndrome [closed]
Earth sent some colonist to a earth-like planet, interstellar distance away, a long time ago. This colony is very sustainable and growing. No need to worry about that. The problem is: Due to Kessler ...
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3answers
364 views
How would an alien telepathic race attempt to communicate with Earth on first contact? [closed]
I have been asked to clarify "effective".
"I have an alien contact concept running where they are telepathic. Right now I have imagery being sent mind to mind, but the only thing I can think of is ...
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2answers
165 views
Is this radio communicating creature viable? (Volutus sapiens)
I have already reviewed a few questions about the feasibility of a radio communicating creature. Like these:
How would organic EM transmitters/recievers be different than our mechanical ones
...
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29answers
13k views
How to monetize magical mirrors in today's world?
This is kinda a followup question to my earlier question about magical mirrors: Magical internet - unique addressing system
Two months ago, I discovered an ancient house in the middle of woods. As I ...
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10answers
7k views
How could you create a 95% effective global emergency broadcasting system?
THIS IS A TEST of the Galactic Emergency Alert system
No action is required.
Type: Milkyway Empire
The World
In the near future:
we discover FTL
we run into some friendly aliens that are ...
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0answers
69 views
How fast to become “most wanted” in medieval world? [duplicate]
This is the question every RPG player or D&D player had in mind: "What happens if I kill them all?" So, lets ask the question:
Imagine typical medieval fantasy kingdom. There is some magic and ...
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6answers
884 views
Getting Past Phonetic Limitations [closed]
For the sake of making things much, much simpler, most worlds I'm familiar with have a defining feature of language: there is a common language. This allows for universal communication and overcomes ...
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8answers
3k views
Would room phones work in a hotel during a blackout? [closed]
I'm writing a story about people being stuck in a large hotel. One character wants to call a loved one, but I'm trying to think of a reason that they can't. My initial thought was that the front desk ...
