The Factory Floor - 2016-05-26

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Green

01:06

I note with some happiness that as of this instant, I'm the only person in General Chat to have used the word "Zerg". Twice.

5 hours later…

Pavel Janicek

06:22

morning

Ok the aliens question was too broad to post to main

But what about this one?

What would be the reasons to actually boot the power plant with output higher than 8 MW in case of apocalypse?

Basically I have story idea, where Joe The Main Hero does this

He has a group of abour 500 people

and what would be the reasons he went to the power plant and put out this huge amount of power?

Especially when one diesel generator or one wind turbine should cover all the power needs of 500 people

Given the fact that for past two years they lived without any electricity at all

4 hours later…

Mike L.

10:46

@PavelJanicek Maybe they want to start some sort of industrial production?

You could easily make an electric furnace from the right kind of scrap, which would let you start a smithing and smelting operation, useful both in construction and in tool repair and maintenance.

Pavel Janicek

11:08

Still, 1MW is far more enough power for smelting in low class

Why would you need to go above 8MW?

Pavel Janicek

11:32

But anyway is that question good enough to be posted on main site?

1 hour later…

Mike L.

12:55

@PavelJanicek Yes, but if you find e.g. a water turbine, you can easily run it at lower capacity.

And it requires no fuel (unlike diesel) and is operable 100% of the time (unlike wind)

Green

13:17

@MikeL. Those two attributes are why I opted for hydro in my answer.

James

13:39

Whats up boys and girls?

Green

Hola @James

Pavel Janicek

Findiong reasons to have 10 MW power plant running

In group of 500 people

James

Everyone one has a pet robo-elephant.

Green

@PavelJanicek Lacking industrial need, I can't think of anything. Maybe a desalinization plant or an electric arc smelter.

James

@Green Man that geology question just isn't getting any love

Green

13:42

@James You'll have to put another bounty out for it. ;)

James

lol, I am wondering how much bounty rep I have given you at this point?!

Green

@James At least 100.

James

14:00

@Green I'd bet its way more than that...

Green

I can remember at least two instances so I lowballed at 100 rep.

James

ok its actually 3 instances (I thought it was more) so you're at 150 from me :)

I've actually given out 800 points in bounties...

DaaaahWhoosh

anyone think that me asking a question on WB- about if there are examples of life getting its energy from conduction- would somehow not be a good idea?

James

14:24

@DaaaahWhoosh Seems perfectly reasonable to me.

Green

@DaaaahWhoosh At worst the question will be ignored as uninteresting to the majority of WBers. I don't see any problems with the core idea of the question.

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green yeah, I agree it's kinda boring, but I'm still trying to build my underwater-ocean-heated-from-above world, and I'd rather split it into multiple questions to make sure all my assumptions are correct

I'm sort of thinking that convection isn't going to be possible, because it'd be going the wrong way, and I'm trying to make this planet the home planet of a blind species so I can't really have much radiation

Green

@DaaaahWhoosh What is your aspiration for this species? Are they going to be tool users?

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green well, they're going to eventually be spacefaring, so yes

but I'm not so much building them as I am building their environment, and their ancestors

Green

@DaaaahWhoosh Fair enough.

Honestly, I don't see why conduction from the ocean surface down to the ocean floor wouldn't work. We have those kinds of energy flows on Earth now.

user image

DaaaahWhoosh

14:35

well, I want there to be a good reason to not evolve eyes

Green

If your species lived off the east coast of Greenland, they'd have plenty of nutrients coming down to them from the surface.

@DaaaahWhoosh, go ahead and as your question. I'm curious to try my hand at it.

DaaaahWhoosh

14:53

all right, asked

the normal linking takes too much space

Green

You may want clarify in the title whether this is thermal or electric conduction, just to give people a better idea of what you're after.

DaaaahWhoosh

done

I admit I am making a lot of assumptions about my knowledge of energy nomenclature

1 hour later…

DaaaahWhoosh

16:16

well, four upvotes and no answers, that's like the opposite of most WB questions

2 hours later…

James

17:54

@DaaaahWhoosh Asked you a couple questions in the comments.

DaaaahWhoosh

@James those are good questions that I don't necessarily have answers to

James

shoot I also should have asked what kind of star/distance to star you are working with, it will help people gage how much energy is available.

DaaaahWhoosh

that's the thing, though, I don't really mind for most of that, if it's closer than Mercury and has a crust of cotton candy I'm fine with that, if it'll end up working out

Green

@James I assumed earth like parameters

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green I think you brought up some good points, I think the main problem I have to deal with it how all that water stays underground

Green

18:01

@DaaaahWhoosh I imagined something like Mars where all the surface water and atmosphere have left but there are huge planet spanning limestone caves below the surface.

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green that sounds pretty good

Green

@DaaaahWhoosh The tricky part is what happens if there's volcanic activity that pops the cap? How does that reseal itself?

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green the planet is geologically dead now? No more volcanic activity?

Green

Since these caves aren't and can't ever be a sealed system eventually the water levels will go down.

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green I'm kind of counting on that, that'll be how my aliens transition to living out of water

James

18:04

@DaaaahWhoosh Clever

Green

@DaaaahWhoosh Up to you to decide. Don't forget that "bad things" like breaking some of the cap can be the kind of evolutionary pressure required to get your species to go from living in water to living in the air....which you just said.

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green yup

Green

Have you decided if the atmosphere will be gone by the time this species makes that transition to breathing air?

DaaaahWhoosh

I thought it'd be pretty interesting if the surface of their planet was virtually inhospitable, so they could get used to space travel early on. But then it'd be hard to have an atmosphere in the caves

and if they popped a hole in the roof one day, everyone would die really fast

James

I commented this on @Green 's answer but thought I would bring it here too...

At the cellular early life stage your critters are going to require a sort of modified mitochondrion that absorbs heat to create sugars

This is a cool idea because life generally emit's heat as opposed to absorbing it...

Green

18:09

@DaaaahWhoosh I don't think that's too big a deal. Let's assume that the limestone of these caves is several kilometers thick with multiple levels. As the water boils off, the upper levels with significant surface area will become available. If stuff grows in these dry areas then other things will move in to eat them.

Think of it as a giant diving bell except large enough and stable enough to sustain an ecology.

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green I'm wondering now if you can have a water cycle in a cave system.

if it can rain, that would be the coolest thing

Green

Well, if we use James' energy absorbing creatures then we would have a convenient way of cooling down water vapor to the point of condensation.

James

Mind you these creatures would be even less efficient than plants are on earth...

Green

I think it's doubtful that you'd get enough of a thermocline between the top and bottom of the cave to get real clouds.

James

@Green It would probably be more like constant dripping than rain

Green

18:14

@James That's fine if they are in large enough quantities. Maybe "rain" for this environment is much more akin to our "thin mist".

Either way, that's super cool.

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green now I'm imagining steam-powered moss

Green

@DaaaahWhoosh Run with that idea!

James

I am sure if I had payed better attention in my chemistry courses a decade ago I would have a reason that endothermic creatures don't make sense but for the life of me can't think of anything...

Green

@James That sounds like a Biology.SE question to me.

James

@Green Yeah it may be tough to get that info here...that would require some serious biochem knowledge that I just don't have

Green

18:18

@James I just hope that they don't kick the question back here because it's too speculative or off-topic.

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green that's why I was asking my question here

Green

@DaaaahWhoosh I was referring to James' endothermic lifeform question. Your conduction question is perfect on WB. (Or I've missed something).

James

@DaaaahWhoosh Yeah I think the sub-question would be great for biology...maybe, never been on that SE\

Green

@DaaaahWhoosh, this discussion reminds me of the movie Pitch Black where every so often there's a total eclipse that allows nasty monsters to hunt on the surface.

James

@Green I have a man crush on Vin Diesel because of those movies...

2

Crap...that's going to get starred by someone...

Green

18:27

@James I never saw Pitch Black but I did see the last two. I enjoyed them.

DaaaahWhoosh

@James it is now

James

...oh well its true.

Green

How has Vin Diesel made a career out of making Fast and Furious movies? I just looked at IMDB and there's plans for a F&F 10! 10!

James

lol

I dunno but they fund things like Riddick and Last Witch Hunter so I am ok with that

@Green The biggest thing you get out of pitch black is how he meets Jack/Kyra

Green

@James I noticed that loyalty. Nice to know where it came from.

DaaaahWhoosh

18:36

you know, I think Pitch Black is the only Riddick movie I've seen all the way through

Chronicles of Riddick is one of those movies I've never seen the beginning of, and the third one I never got around to watching

James

Chronicles introduces a major, galaxy spanning storyline, and Riddick is sort of a throwback to pitch black actually, its more about survival and Riddick being a solo killing machine.

Green

@DaaaahWhoosh, I just saw this on Wikipedia's first page. It struck me as relevant to your discussion about underwater creatures with no sun.

Sulfate-reducing bacteria

Sulfate-reducing bacteria are those bacteria and archaea that can obtain energy by oxidizing organic compounds or molecular hydrogen (H2) while reducing sulfate (SO2− 4) to hydrogen sulfide (H2S). In a sense, these organisms "breathe" sulfate rather than oxygen in a form of anaerobic respiration. Sulfate-reducing bacteria can be traced back to 3.5 billion years ago and are considered to be among the oldest forms of microorganisms, having contributed to the sulfur cycle soon after life emerged on Earth. Many bacteria reduce small amounts of sulfates in order to synthesize sulfur-containing cell...

DaaaahWhoosh

@Green huh, so I guess at first all they'd need is some warmth, currents, and the necessary compounds

Serban Tanasa

19:04

My Ghandi built it 1 turn earlier question has been getting lots of views, and lots of hate

i think it's my most heavily downvoted question ever, i think I'm at -5. I wonder if it's from America-haters or America-lovers.

Yup, +21 -5

DaaaahWhoosh

@SerbanTanasa It doesn't seem particularly offensive to me, and I used to be an SJW

Serban Tanasa

SJW?

Sumo Judo Warrior

DaaaahWhoosh

semi-jovial wasp

society of junior worshipers

nah, it's Social Justice Warrior

it's the term for people who are not offended by things, but think other people will be offended by those things, or should not be offended by things but are anyway just in case

Serban Tanasa

oh no, what happened to make you a former sjw

DaaaahWhoosh

@SerbanTanasa I realized that every movement has a bunch of stupid people that talk the loudest. Same reason I'm a former feminist and Christian.

well, that last one is partially because the Bible is crap, and also science, but still, I like threes

Serban Tanasa

19:16

Yeah, I'm a radical centrist, an unrepentant gradualist and a fanatical moderate

4

DaaaahWhoosh

@SerbanTanasa I can definitely neither argree nor disagree with that

James

user image

Green

@James Precisely.

Serban Tanasa

@James, yup. That would be me

Minus the contented part. I live in DC, after all.

Each December 31st I look upon my previous year-start self as a naive, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed idealist.

James

@SerbanTanasa Give up and join the cynical side. We drink beer.

Serban Tanasa

19:23

------------@James ---------------------------------------@SerbanTanasa--->Cynical Side Axis

<------Puppies

James

We should start a club...

On a side note I hate crushing a poster's idea...but I had to on this one.

1

Q: Why might a plant evolve a brain and the ability to move?

I was thinking of a situation in which an Extra Terrestrial plant life form evolves a nervous system and eventually a brain. This plant diversifies into a variety of different life forms with some living in the water, some living on land, and some flying through the sky. It is able to move and ...

evolution xenobiology

Serban Tanasa

yeah, it's also a dupe

i don't wanna modhammer it

our very own @Green had one about photosynthetic humans

Green

@SerbanTanasa That was a fun question if I remember right.

3

Q: Efficiency required of a photosynthetic system to support human level activities

Chlorophyll as we know it on earth is estimated to be between 3% and 6% efficient in converting light energy to useable biomass. This support slow growth and no movement of plants like that observed in herbivores or carnivores. Higher up the food chain, animals directly or indirectly depend on ...

science-based creature-design flora photosynthesis

James

This one is similar but its more how can plants gain animal-like traits.

Serban Tanasa

nonetheless, it might have an interesting answer

washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2016/01/22/…

The Venus flytrap has evolved something interestingly nerve-like as part of its prey catching strategy

There's also the big green men one:

10

Q: Big Green Men... from Earth

There are a couple of stories where humans gain chloroplasts. Here's a clip from one story: They are also infused with bacteriorhodopsin, allowing photosynthesis. It is now possible for a human being to lie on the ground, in the sunlight, for thirty minutes, and absorb all the energy and nut...

biology humans flora

James

19:30

Did you see my answer on that question, I wanted to say it can't be done without sounding like a jacka$$...I think I succeeded.

user153821

Bot started.

James

@KarmaBot Good afternoon karmabot

user153821

@James Command not found. Did you mean: drop?

DaaaahWhoosh

@KarmaBot sup

user153821

@DaaaahWhoosh Hi! HERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRROOOOO :c)

James

19:32

@KarmaBot Man you're dumb...

user153821

@James Command not found. Did you mean: random?

James

@KarmaBot Yes, yes I did.

user153821

@James Command not found. Did you mean: bye?

James

heh

bilbo_pingouin

@James if you're up to work on giving Karma a more complete personality, you're welcome :D

popctrl

19:36

hey worldbuilding people

I just saw how might a plant evolve a brain thing. And I read "How might a planet evolve a brain" which is a much more exciting question

Has something like that been asked

Green

@popctrl Without looking, my answer is "maybe". It's the kind of thing that would be asked here but I don't know if it is has yet.

James

@popctrl You mean besides the question you just saw?

popctrl

@green

oops

@Green I searched but didn't see anything. When I have time to ask I will but if anyone wants to, the question is free game

@James no I mean a planet. As in some sort of supercomputer embedded into the planet that was designed to slowly spread until it had something like bodily functions and a brain with sufficient complexity

Using volcanoes as space thrusters or some shit

James

@popctrl lol sorry I totally misread I was confused.

popctrl

haha it's cool the idea only exists because I misread

James

19:42

I know there was a question about a planet sized organism...

30

Q: That's no Moon: Planet-sized Plants Possible?

Inspired by the many great questions asked for this fortnight's tag challenge, I got to thinking, could a plant develop/evolve to eventually consume an entire planet, and keep on living? What I mean by this is that a single organism, or perhaps a colony, both covered the surface of the planet and...

planets evolution flora

popctrl

Ahh I see that worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/2655/…

James

that may be a good place to start

popctrl

God I love this SE

James

@popctrl Its quite entertaining.

@DaaaahWhoosh Somehow I hadn't upvoted your planet sized plant question...weird.

DaaaahWhoosh

@James it happens to the best of us

1 hour later…

Wes

21:03

Hi wheres the FAQ I've got a question but may be off topic

Worldbuilding Meta

1

Q: Can we better welcome this first-time poster?

What would be the main reason to avoid providing confidential data to the police by a company? This Q starts with a note about being a first-time poster and not a native English speaker, etc. So It's sad to see that it has 2 close votes already, and no comments. Especially since this is from s...

discussion specific-question

HDE 226868

@Wes Well, there's always the tour, but the help center has more information, including a page on types of questions to ask. If you need more specific input, you can always ask here in chat (I'm a Worldbuilding mod, and happy to help.).

Wes

Okay I'm guesing its off topic. Basically going to ask about a senario where current electricty stopped working In our world, and the limitations or not about transport, etc,

HDE 226868

@Wes That doesn't seem like it would be off-topic.

Wes

@HDE226868 thanks I'll give it a shot.

Wes

21:27

worldbuilding.stackexchange.com/questions/42353/… Hope thats not too broad. I've actually many questions but decided to try to keep it focused.

Green

@Wes Too broad is what happens when a question is insufficiently constrained. Asking what will happen to the whole world is too broad. Asking what will happen in a particular industry is less problematic.

Wes

@Green yeah I was worried about mixing power plants in with transportation.

Green

22:04

@Wes You have my answer.

HDE 226868

22:36

This question is so thinly-veiled I don't know how anyone is taking it seriously. This stack exchange isn't "chat about whatever topic you want as long as you dress it up in some perfunctory world building context." — Brian Gordon yesterday

Oof.

Wes

@Green Thanks most of that I'd considered. :) Nice neat answer though

Green

23:10

@HDE226868 what question was he referring to?

HDE 226868

@Green The one he was commenting on:

18

Q: Why would the richest and strongest country on Earth consistently fail at Big Projects?

Imagine you have a large, powerful nation. Let's say about 320 million well-educated citizens, occupying the largest part of a rich, fertile continent. It's the richest country on the planet. For my story, I need it to be utterly dysfunctional. Why would it consistently fail at most of its infra...

politics technological-development

Green

23:25

@HDE226868 Specific references to a US like country would have made that criticism less true.

HDE 226868

@Green That's true.

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