You would probably have many people questioning the definition and applicability of consciousness as the yardstick for having rights. Pro-android lawyers would argue that if it has a desire to keep ...

It seems there is but one obvious answer: Build giant lasers and point them at major cities. Use a subtle strategy to launder the energy and use the capital to build energy weapons. Once the threat ...

There is a structure that has evolved independently several times in nature that fits some your requirements. Whether it could be made practical for defense is something that has yet to be seen in ...

Aerodynamics has no effect in space, the relative velocities are too high for particle interactions to be anything other than "impacts". The nose must be armoured, but the armour is, by design, the ...

I'd argue the schools would form naturally if you could only be a master a very small area of what would seem to be a continuum of disciplines at the magical-phd level. The topics are split almost ...

This seems similar enough to the origin/purpose of the Olympic games. You have several small societies that need cohesion, cooperation and military resource conservation due to external threats/...

If we're talking about predicting technological development, instead of designating something as the "cause", here are some fun spurious correlations: -Meat Consumption. More specifically haggis ...