Questions about Organisms, Humanity, EM Drives and Space

[Nameless Knight 1,001]

I have some questions and want to hear some Forum Members' answers. Most if not all have opinion answers.

 

What would you call an Animal that goes through Photosynthesis? 

 

What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.)

 

Do you think Aliens would really be hostile towards Humans? 

 

If NASA got that EM Drive they have been working on working and in use, where do you think we will try to go first? (The EM Drive could possibly make spaceships go near the speed of light if not faster. Think of it something like a realistic Warp Drive.)

 

What would happen if live animals were able to grow plants on their bodies (think Bulbasaur)

 

Whats your reaction to this statement? NASA discovered that some of the lasers that make the EM drive work go faster than the speed of life.

 

Why do so many people just deny things because something goes against what we think we know?

 

I may add more questions, but for now I just want to know your opinions.

[simba86 1,541]

I think we are a long way from interstellar travel, even if they do manage to get up to light speed we don't know how humans and the spacecraft would handle it, humans could get smashed by acceleration and we are not sure of the space time effect or any other problems with traveling at light speed and then think of the ship,if it gets going at 186000 miles a second think of the damage a tiny piece of space junk could do if it hits, and even at the speed of light many places are still really far away,like the new planet they found that could support life that's 12 light years away that's still 12 solid years of travel in space one way! and then a radio signal is gonna take 12 years to get back to earth to communicate, heck for all we know time could compress on the ship at light speed or faster and 12 years on the ship could be like 100 earth years

[Nameless Knight 1,001]

I think we are a long way from interstellar travel, even if they do manage to get up to light speed we don't know how humans and the spacecraft would handle it, humans could get smashed by acceleration and we are not sure of the space time effect or any other problems with traveling at light speed and then think of the ship,if it gets going at 186000 miles a second think of the damage a tiny piece of space junk could do if it hits, and even at the speed of light many places are still really far away,like the new planet they found that could support life that's 12 light years away that's still 12 solid years of travel in space one way! and then a radio signal is gonna take 12 years to get back to earth to communicate, heck for all we know time could compress on the ship at light speed or faster and 12 years on the ship could be like 100 earth years

Apparently to the Theory of Relativity, Time on the craft would go slower. It may take 12 years for people outside the ship but to the people on the ship it could feel like 12 minutes and they would have only aged by 12 minutes. Just imagine that, you go on a space trip and when you get home, everyone on Earth is 24 years older, but you are merely 24 minutes older. But its a theory, something else could denounce it tomorrow. 

 

(Law: What happens and for the most part set in stone, Theory: Why it happens and can change)

[1111 1,284]

I think aliens being hostile would just depend on what there motives and junk are. 

[I used to be a stranger 7,993]

The EM Drive so far is likely to be invalidated by future testing, but is the first stepping stone towards an Alcubierre engine. Which means EM Drives probably are not in the future, but that doesn't spell doom for spacetime-warping technology.

(Alcubierre engines do not accelerate objects, they translate their location in spacetime at an effective rate greater than lightspeed. This means that when you turn it off, you "arrive" with the same relative velocity as when you left. This complicates orbital mechanics significantly, and places an extremely high demand on conventional thrusters in addition to building the Alcubierre system)

 

It has already been predicted that it is unlikely any interstellar propulsion of any kind will be completed in this century.

 

The most obvious candidate for any sublight-speed system would be Alpha-Proxima Centari since it is the closest. We are hoping to catch a glimpse of whether or not that system has any planets with successors to Hubble and Keppler (like the James Webb Space Telescope) but as it stands we still don't know.

[simba86 1,541]

Apparently to the Theory of Relativity, Time on the craft would go slower. It may take 12 years for people outside the ship but to the people on the ship it could feel like 12 minutes and they would have only aged by 12 minutes. Just imagine that, you go on a space trip and when you get home, everyone on Earth is 24 years older, but you are merely 24 minutes older. But its a theory, something else could denounce it tomorrow. 

 

(Law: What happens and for the most part set in stone, Theory: Why it happens and can change)

aand even if that proves true the communication via radio waves will still take how ever many light years to travel to earth because we know how the radio waves used to communicate with the mars rover and stuff that has a several minute delay so how would that work if you are sending out a transmission and it is minutes on the ship but years in space to get to earth? could you even understand the message or would the words be slowed down to take 12 years to play back?

[I used to be a stranger 7,993]

Apparently to the Theory of Relativity, Time on the craft would go slower. It may take 12 years for people outside the ship but to the people on the ship it could feel like 12 minutes and they would have only aged by 12 minutes. Just imagine that, you go on a space trip and when you get home, everyone on Earth is 24 years older, but you are merely 24 minutes older. But its a theory, something else could denounce it tomorrow. 

 

(Law: What happens and for the most part set in stone, Theory: Why it happens and can change)

 

You would need to be going extremely close to the speed of light to experience time slippage that drastically. Like, more than what you get on planet Miller in Interstellar. In the order of 0.999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999c. In the order of you need more energy than what exists in the galaxy to accelerate an object that fast.

 

Relativity is the reason why GPS satellites experience Earth-years 4 seconds faster than people on the surface, and require un-leap-seconds to keep their internal clocks coordinated. This is because they're constantly travelling at 22000 km/h. The faster you're moving, the slower time progresses for you. We normally ignore this fact and didn't even think it was a thing until 1940 because the difference speed makes only becomes appreciable when you're moving at a noticable percentage of the speed of light. This relativity stuff is not a theory, it's a plain practice component of engineering for spacecraft design. Mission Controllers and Astronauts must account for differences in GET (ground elapsed time) and MET (mission experience time), because the International Space Station is constantly moving at 8.1 kilometers per second. While this isn't much compared to lightspeed (300 000km/s) it's a hell of a lot more than anything a skateboard or fighter jet can do.

 

If you accelerated to 0.5c (that is, half the speed of light), coasted for three lightyears until you reached Alpha Centari, and then decellerated, the whole trip according to the adventurer's watch would have taken probably 10 years. For outside observers, it would have taken 12 years. (And we'd only know about it after the receiving signal got back from Alpha Centari over the distance of 4.9 lightyears, thus taking 4.9 years to arrive. So we'd only known he safely arrived 16.9 years after he left.)

Edited December 28, 2015 by Blue

[Nameless Knight 1,001]

aand even if that proves true the communication via radio waves will still take how ever many light years to travel to earth because we know how the radio waves used to communicate with the mars rover and stuff that has a several minute delay so how would that work if you are sending out a transmission and it is minutes on the ship but years in space to get to earth? could you even understand the message or would the words be slowed down to take 12 years to play back?

Waves are different then a massive space craft. Since Radio Waves are electro-magnetic waves and have little to no mass they would not be effected. Radio Waves are already traveling at the speed of light and aren't effected.

 

 

You would need to be going extremely close to the speed of light to experience time slippage that drastically. Like, more than what you get on planet Miller in Interstellar. In the order of 0.999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999c. In the order of you need more energy than what exists in the galaxy to accelerate an object that fast.

 

Relativity is the reason why GPS satellites experience Earth-years 4 seconds faster than people on the surface, and require un-leap-seconds to keep their internal clocks coordinated. This is because they're constantly travelling at 22000 km/h. This relativity stuff is not a theory, it's a plain practice component of engineering for spacecraft design, since Mission Controllers and Astronauts must account for differences in GET (ground elapsed time) and MET (mission experience time).

 

If you accelerated to 0.5c (that is, half the speed of light), coasted for three lightyears until you reached Alpha Centari, and then decellerated, the whole trip according to the adventurer's watch would have taken probably 10 years. For outside observers, it would have taken 12 years. (And we'd only know about it after the receiving signal got back from Alpha Centari over the distance of 4.9 lightyears, thus taking 4.9 years to arrive. So we'd only known he safely arrived 16.9 years after he left.)

What about creating energy through Anti-Matter and Matter by annihilation. It sadly destroys the matter but creates extremely large amount of energy. According to E=mc^2, 1 gram of Antimatter and Matter creates 8.98755179e13 Joules of energy. That is an extremely huge amount of energy. Now imagine a single kilogram of matter turned into energy, that is 8.98755179 × 10^16 Joules. The energy may not exist in the universe, but what if we make it exist? (I should probably add that to the questions above)

Edited December 28, 2015 by Times & Shadow

[simba86 1,541]

Waves are different then a massive space craft. Since Radio Waves are electro-magnetic waves and have little to no mass they would not be effected. Radio Waves are already traveling at the speed of light and aren't effected.

 

 

 

What about creating energy through Anti-Matter and Matter by annihilation. It sadly destroys the matter but creates extremely large amount of energy. According to E=mc^2, 1 gram of Antimatter and Matter creates 8.98755179e13 Joules of energy. That is an extremely huge amount of energy. Now imagine a single kilogram of matter turned into energy, that is 8.98755179 × 10^16 Joules. The energy may not exist in the universe, but what if we make it exist? (I should probably add that to the questions above)

problem with antimatter is containing it, I have heard of magnetic containment but if the antimatter touches matter then you are going to have a very very efficient nuclear explosion which would be bad if it touches the container. as far as I have heard they have only managed to make a few particles of antimatter in particle accelerators and they only last a fraction of a second

[Nameless Knight 1,001]

problem with antimatter is containing it, I have heard of magnetic containment but if the antimatter touches matter then you are going to have a very very efficient nuclear explosion which would be bad if it touches the container. as far as I have heard they have only managed to make a few particles of antimatter in particle accelerators and they only last a fraction of a second

Our Species is still young and we will always have a childlike hunger for knowledge, we can find a way if there is one!

Edited December 28, 2015 by Times & Shadow

[Spanish In Physician 295]

Well, I will probably tackle only one or two questions for the time being, as I am feeling a little sour, but this ones for the hostility of aliens.

 

I am honestly uncertain as to whether an alien species arriving on earth would cause us a threat intentionally or not. We have to consider the possibility that we, or they for that matter, may accidentally kill one another simply by coming in contact with one another through the transmission of bacteria and disease unbeknownst to our immune systems. I would love to be alive should the day ever come, whether it be in a manner of peace or hostility. Even should I die, I would have been glad to lived in a lifetime where we find we are not the only thing out there. I know there are many on both sides of the argument as to whether or not we are alone. I personally do believe in alien life, but I would say a race of beings capable of long distance universal travel would be careful and study us with a watchful eye from afar before attempting to make contact. That being said, for all I know it could literally be something along the lines of a single living organism that would reach earth first attempting to assimilate all in its path in an effort to survive the harshness of the existence.

 

I decided while typing to go ahead and do one more question. This one is for the question of why humans can deny something just because it goes against what they think they know.

 

As a species we have seen a lot of things that can kill us, and have been bred fearing anything we don't know for the simple possibility of its lethal capability. Many people will gladly suppress fear with denial for the soul fact that it is easier to look past something without acknowledging its existence. A perfect example is when a person witnesses a murder but refuses to testify. This is out of fear, and its easier and 'safer' to simply pretend we didn't see anything. Instinct dictates that we do what is necessary for survival, and the terms of that in this day and age show in the form of fear and what may or may not be ignorance. (I am not saying this as an insult to anybody.) To put it mildly, if you don't understand something, kill it with fire and go about your day. Of course these are all just my opinions.

[I used to be a stranger 7,993]

What about creating energy through Anti-Matter and Matter by annihilation. It sadly destroys the matter but creates extremely large amount of energy. According to E=mc^2, 1 gram of Antimatter and Matter creates 8.98755179e13 Joules of energy. That is an extremely huge amount of energy. Now imagine a single kilogram of matter turned into energy, that is 8.98755179 × 10^16 Joules. The energy may not exist in the universe, but what if we make it exist? (I should probably add that to the questions above)

 

Energy is never created or destroyed. By reacting materials, you are simply taking advantage of energy that is already there. When you burn gasoline, you're taking advantage of the energy stored in the bonds between carbon and hydrogen. When you react matter and antimatter, the annihilation is releasing energy in the form of particle neutralization (though the majority of that is lost in the formation of unrecoverable neutrinos). it's not creating anything.

 

Converting matter directly into energy aka squishing quarks until they're electrons, is horrendously inefficient. It would be an incredible miracle to convert even a microgram of anything into energy at an efficiency of 0.0001%. (That is, 99.9999% loss due to waste radiation, friction or other things.) But the problem is real world efficiency of such an attempt would be even lower. it would probably be so inefficienct (like 1*10^-20 %) that it would be questionble to even attempt a postive return. The cores of neutron stars are probably composed of quark-gluon plasma, and even that doesn't burn hot enough to turn matter into energy. (This is to say, proton destruction is a seperate energy release mechanism than antimatter-matter annihilation; it's much harder to do.)

 

The simple fact is its cheaper, easier, smaller, more efficient and in all practical ways better to do nearly anything else than direct matter-energy conversion. Fusion and Antimatter annihilation for example.

 

Back to antimatter annihilation. The specific impulse of antimatter annihilation is fantastic compared to any other fuel. (Gunpowder has an ISP of about 60, ammonium perchlorate ~270, liquid oxygen and H2 ~390, hot uranium and hydrogen ~1200, ion-xenon 3500, ion-argon 4000, airbreathing external combustion steam-power ~6000, airbreathing internal combustion petroleum ~10 000, airbreathing Jet A1 turbines ~30 000, airbreathing SCRAM-Jet ~70 000, antimatter-matter annihilation ~250 000.)

However the biggest problem within our lifetimes is going to remain the fact that antimatter is difficult to manufacture-- it can only be made in particle accelerators, so far. The largest amount of it we've ever had was about 1000 atoms of antihydrogen at once. That's less than a sexillionth of a microgram.

 

Another problem with antimatter beyond being able to make it, is storing it. Antimatter has a habit of exploding when it comes in contact with matter, which means it must be suspended by high energy magnetic fields. These fields are not easy to generate; they take expensive equipment and high electrical demands, which is going to make resource extraction expensive, storage even moreso, and make your spaceship very heavy with the addition of a pretty beefy power generation system (whose absence will make your spacecraft explode due to propellant containment failure).

 

With the Large Hadron Collider working at full power for a century, we would drain the world's oil reserves three times over and make a few tons of antimatter. This might be enough delta-V to put a spacecraft anywhere in the Solar System within a few months (which would be incredible) but it's still piddle compared to large fractions of lightspeed. Also remember that however fast you intend to go, you'll need quadruple the initial fuel requirement and more: 1 ration for the initial acceleration, 1 to slow down again, and 2 more for the return journey, plus a bunch more to account for the weight of those four rations, plus a bunch more to account for the weight of that first accounting ration, plus more for the second accounting ration... All in all, you're going to need either more efficiency than what antimatter can produce, or a very clever way of making or gathering antimatter. You could harvest it from the sun using a massive space station near Venus or something, but that's going to be expensive and time-consuming to built too.

 

Simply put, there is no way of squaring up the logistics easily. One can ignore them but to do so is to firmly plant your foot in science fiction away from the hard direction and on the soft side of the wall. There's no problem with being in soft science fiction. Star Wars is soft science fiction, where lasers can blow up planets and spaceships have artificial gravity that makes their internal reference frames feel like cars, ships, busses or airplanes. But when talking about the nitty gritty of distances, travel times, speeds and so on, physicsts beat you to the punch 50 years ago because they were paid to crunch the numbers on exactly what you're thinking about-- who were thinking about it for the same reason you want to, except they went to university for years in the pursuit. Don't think you can outsmart them in an afternoon.

Edited December 28, 2015 by Blue

[alpinefroggy 451]

I have some questions and want to hear some Forum Members' answers. Most if not all have opinion answers.

 

What would you call an Animal that goes through Photosynthesis?

 

I don't know. An autotrophic animal

 

What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.)

 

 

if it eats with a mouth then it's an animal. Does it still have chloroplasts and cellulose?.

Do you think Aliens would really be hostile towards Humans?

 

too subjective to have an opinion on. Depends on the alien.

 

If NASA got that EM Drive they have been working on working and in use, where do you think we will try to go first? (The EM Drive could possibly make spaceships go near the speed of light if not faster. Think of it something like a realistic Warp Drive.)

 

mars. Going near light speed is highly improbable though. Way too much energy..

 

What would happen if live animals were able to grow plants on their bodies (think Bulbasaur)

 

Some energy would be derived from the sun still most from heterotrophic behavior because photosynthesis still requires physical inputs of water and co2

 

Whats your reaction to this statement? NASA discovered that some of the lasers that make the EM drive work go faster than the speed of life.

 

is nonsense there is a speed limit to the universe. We would need infinite energy or break the laws of physics

 

Why do so many people just deny things because something goes against what we think we know?

 

ignorance. Human intuition is often wrong

and people suck at this. No the universe was not created by an intelligent being necesarily even though it makes sense to you. 1) how do you know and 2) that's an argument from ignorance. Or about climate change. Same thing. The other thing is lack of critical thinking and reasoning coupled with skepticism.

 

 

I may add more questions, but for now I just want to know your opinions.

Answers in the quote. This is for character count

[Unikitty 1,212]

 What would you call an Animal that goes through Photosynthesis? A plant.

 

 What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.). An animal.

 

 To understand why these questions don't have any fantastic alternative, you have to know what differentiates a 'plant' from an 'animal'. The traits you described are pretty significant features that define what they are. A plant is designed to survive in contrast to animals, and vice-versa. There are some cases where one might be similar to the other in a certain way('meat' eating plants), but they're still primarily plants due to having primarily plant traits. A plant that is a lot like an animal, is just an animal. The same for the other way.

----------------------

 When you say 'aliens', you have to remember that it's a very broad term. It could refer to literally anything extraterrestrial. Be it bacteria, familiar biological creatures, or even something that completely defies our current understanding of life. In theory those supermassive gas clouds, or even galaxies themselves could be some sort of life form we've yet to comprehend. We can only really go off what we currently know.
So on that note, Wondering if an alien may be hostile is nothing more than a complete guess. Even if we encountered a species similar to our own(advanced, carbon-based life forms), it's impossible to accurately know of their intentions as the difference between our society and theirs would be immense. We casually listen to music and have lived with sound all our lives, but they could be extremely sensitive to it and simply talking could harm them. We require oxygen to breathe, but maybe they rapidly absorb the oxygen in their vicinity, making it dangerous for humans to be near them.

There are near-infinite variables in the way. We can't really determine whether an alien may be hostile.

----------------------

 If NASA was to unveil some kind of fancy warp-drive, chances are our plans wouldn't change so much. They'd just be done faster.
They'd still opt to go to Mars, then to further out planets of interest. Then we'd probably venture to the edge of the solar system, for sake of travel. Then it'd be off to the nearest star. Then to visit earth-like planets that we currently know of. All of these are already desires, but we're just stuck on the limits of travel.

----------------------

 There are already many cases of plants(fungi primarily) inhabiting animal hosts. However this isn't really symbiotic as the fungi generally slowly take over, killing the host. As far as something like Bulbasaur goes, I don't think anything like that would naturally evolve, due to the far-above information about a rather clear difference between plants and animals. An animal is the way it is because it can't do what plants do, and a plant is the way it is because it can't do what animals do.

----------------------

 That statement is pretty jarring to read and doesn't make all that much sense. But any discovery that could help advance our technology is always a plus.

----------------------

 People don't like change. As we spend a great chunk of our lives trying to learn how to survive and adapt to the world around us, it becomes too difficult to imagine things not being the way they are. Uncertainty leads to mistakes and mistakes lead to death(and whatever other negative results that exist as a part of our society). So we are scared of change. Even the most progressive of people fret over things not being the way they think it should be. It's just how humans are wired.

Edited December 28, 2015 by Unikitty

[Nameless Knight 1,001]

What would you call an Animal that goes through Photosynthesis?

I don't know. An autotrophic animal

 

What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.)

if it eats with a mouth then it's an animal. Does it still have chloroplasts and cellulose?.

It has plant cells not animal cells; Chloroplast, Cellulose, Cell Wall, Vacuole, ect.

Do you think Aliens would really be hostile towards Humans?

too subjective to have an opinion on. Depends on the alien.

 

If NASA got that EM Drive they have been working on working and in use, where do you think we will try to go first? (The EM Drive could possibly make spaceships go near the speed of light if not faster. Think of it something like a realistic Warp Drive.)

mars. Going near light speed is highly improbable though. Way too much energy..

 

What would happen if live animals were able to grow plants on their bodies (think Bulbasaur)

Some energy would be derived from the sun still most from heterotrophic behavior because photosynthesis still requires physical inputs of water and co2

 

Whats your reaction to this statement? NASA discovered that some of the lasers that make the EM drive work go faster than the speed of life.

is nonsense there is a speed limit to the universe. We would need infinite energy or break the laws of physics

Scientific evidence says other wise. Some particles are able to go a tiny amount faster than light. Sadly the process needed for this to happen without infinite energy is not possible for spaceship because these particles were created initially with FTL speed in particle collisions.

 

Why do so many people just deny things because something goes against what we think we know?

ignorance. Human intuition is often wrong

and people suck at this. No the universe was not created by an intelligent being necessarily even though it makes sense to you. 1) how do you know and 2) that's an argument from ignorance. Or about climate change. Same thing. The other thing is lack of critical thinking and reasoning coupled with skepticism.

Do you mean denying or accepting climate change?

I may add more questions, but for now I just want to know your opinions.

 

 

 What would you call an Animal that goes through Photosynthesis? A plant.

 

 What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.). An animal.

 

I know it is strange to bring a video game character into this but... What would you call this:

This little creature, besides being adorable, is a plant that is very animal like because it: A) it is a consumer, except it doesn't swallow, it just chews and absorbs nutrients like a venus flytrap, B- it is able to move around on its own without assistance c) It properly has animal like life stages (Spore - Adolescent - Adult). D)it has eyes and a mouth.  But it is also very plant like: 1) it has plant cells and lacks proper organs and organ systems (except for a skeletal system, it has that) 2) instead of claws, those are actually thorns, like a rose. 3) It gives off spores to reproduce which grow into adolescents. 

 

Now would you consider this an animal or a plant. Think long and hard about this, don't rush your decision.

Edited December 28, 2015 by Times & Shadow

[Unikitty 1,212]

I know it is strange to bring a video game character into this but... What would you call this:

This little creature, besides being adorable, is a plant that is very animal like because it: A) it is a consumer, except it doesn't swallow, it just chews and absorbs nutrients like a venus flytrap, B- it is able to move around on its own without assistance c) It properly has animal like life stages (Spore - Adolescent - Adult). D)it has eyes and a mouth.  But it is also very plant like: 1) it has plant cells and lacks proper organs and organ systems (except for a skeletal system, it has that) 2) instead of claws, those are actually thorns, like a rose. 3) It gives off spores to reproduce which grow into adolescents. 

 

Now would you consider this an animal or a plant. Think long and hard about this, don't rush your decision.

 

There's no real right answer because this is a creature of fantasy and thus can really be either. As is defined by the source, it is considered a plant. However, it lacks much information as to why it's a plant. It moves and hunts, and therefor very likely has a developed brain. Being able to move shows that it very likely has a complex muscular system.

Again, it is a fictional creature, so you could say it runs on magic. But by reality's standards, it would be considered an animal. Chances are the creator added the plant part to give it some creative flair. It's an animal with plantlike traits, and is no more a plant than Audrey II.

 

 

 

Edited December 28, 2015 by Unikitty

[Nameless Knight 1,001]

There's no real right answer because this is a creature of fantasy and thus can really be either. As is defined by the source, it is considered a plant. However, it lacks much information as to why it's a plant. It moves and hunts, and therefor very likely has a developed brain. Being able to move shows that it very likely has a complex muscular system.

Again, it is a fictional creature, so you could say it runs on magic. But by reality's standards, it would be considered an animal. Chances are the creator added the plant part to give it some creative flair. It's an animal with plantlike traits, and is no more a plant than Audrey II.

 

 

 

But wouldn't an animal that is part plant be in a whole other kingdom? If it is made of Plant Cells, then it can not be an animal because that goes against some of the things that make something an Animal. Also it gives off spores which no animal is able to do. Even if it is fictional it can't be ignored that creatures like these cannot be looked at black and white or Animal and Plant.

[Malinter 3,064]

 

 

What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.)

 

Still a plant and there are plants that "eat" like the venus flytrap and those trapjar plants. They'd probably create a new classification system for a sentient plant but it would still ultimately be a plant. 

[Unikitty 1,212]

But wouldn't an animal that is part plant be in a whole other kingdom? If it is made of Plant Cells, then it can not be an animal because that goes against some of the things that make something an Animal. Also it gives off spores which no animal is able to do. Even if it is fictional it can't be ignored that creatures like these cannot be looked at black and white or Animal and Plant.

 

Again, this is a fictional creature, so any rules can be applied. Yes, it indeed can be ignored, just as it ignores important aspects of reality in order to exist.

 

Animals and plants are different because they have different needs and methods of obtaining energy. Animals developed their traits due to the need to find food, as they can't directly absorb it from their surrounds(ie photosynthesis). Plants developed their traits because they were able to do such, and thus had no need to develop traits that help them actively seek food. There's no middle ground in nature. Sure, you could get a lizard and splice some photosynthesis cells onto its back, but then you'd just have a lizard who can absorb sunlight as energy.

 

Think of it like a spectrum. Plants on one side, animals on the other. The middle is trait-less basics. Cellular life at its simplest. As it evolves, it tips to one side a little. Over time, that tip continues further and further down the side it first leaned into. It doesn't go back the other way because that would be counter-productive. Animals developed the way they are because they needed the complexity to assist in surviving.

 

And on the note of spores, whilst animals don't necessarily replicate the function, there are aspects in animal reproduction that are very similar. Fish who release sperm into the water to fertilise eggs in a vicinity. Spiderlings that create little parachutes out of web to help them spread across a large area via the winds. These are all very alike to plant pollination.

[Detritus 258]

What would you call an Animal that goes through Photosynthesis? 

 

A Planimal. Seriously though, I'm not sure. That would be an entirely new kingdom-- neither animal nor plant.

 

What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.)

 

A Deku Scrub

 

Do you think Aliens would really be hostile towards Humans? 

 

I wouldn't think so. Any species advanced enough to have developed interstellar travel would probably be peaceful. Unless of course, they didn't actually develop the technology themselves but acquired it in some other way. A possible scenario might be a primitive, violent race uncovering ancient technology from a previous civilization that died out.

 

Another possible scenario: Imagine the last inhabitants of a dying world set out for earth in the hope that they can establish a colony here and save their race. After years of careful planning, they set out on their voyage. When they finally arrive here, they discover that the earth is already inhabited and doesn't have the resources to support another civilization. They don't have the fuel to make the trip to another star system, so they reluctantly decide that to save their own kind, they have no choice but to eradicate the human population.

 

If NASA got that EM Drive they have been working on working and in use, where do you think we will try to go first? (The EM Drive could possibly make spaceships go near the speed of light if not faster. Think of it something like a realistic Warp Drive.)

 

If this actually pans out, it would at least open up the entire solar system for manned exploration. Interstellar travel would still be impractical. Even at light speed, it would still be something like nine years round trip to visit the nearest star system. I suppose a probe to alpha centauri might be possible, but it would have to be entirely robotic because we'd have no way of communicating with it at that distance.

 

What would happen if live animals were able to grow plants on their bodies (think Bulbasaur)

 

I don't know, but it might make for some interesting symbiotic relationships. The animal might benefit in some way from the plant's photosynthesis, while the plant might benefit from the animal's mobility.

 

Whats your reaction to this statement? NASA discovered that some of the lasers that make the EM drive work go faster than the speed of life.

 

Speed of life? I guess you meant speed of light? Anyway, I'm guessing that would rewrite our understanding of the laws of physics.

 

Why do so many people just deny things because something goes against what we think we know?

 

I'm guessing it's because people tend to fear change. Skepticism is normally a good thing, but not when it comes at the expense of an open mind.

[Codelyy 1,286]

I'll answer the Alien question for now

 

I highly doubt any Alien species would be hostile to us unless they have a reason to be which would be highly unlikely. You would think that a species that has got the intelligence to create something to be able to travel to another inhabited planet without dying on the way would have some common sense and not just attack anything they see...  Especially a intelligent Species since they could easily work with us as allies.

 

Though if they were hostile to us then we might as well surrender right away since we wouldn't have any chance considering they could get to Earth in the first place.

[Seraph 128]

What would you call an Animal that goes through Photosynthesis? 

 

Animalia Solis (If my latin is completely off, forgive me)

 

What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.)

Plantae Animalia

 

Do you think Aliens would really be hostile towards Humans?

 

I don't think that Aliens will be outwardly hostile to humans at first, unless they are part of a more war-like race or a conquering race, then that might be a point of contention. I actually think that humans will be far more dangerous to them than they will be to us for various reasons, but there may be other things thrown into it.  It'll depend on the race really as well as various other factors now onto my wall of text:

When it comes to interaction, there are several possible scenarios I think of, the biggest ones being a sort of Clash of Cultures, being far more extreme than they would be anything else.  We don't know what their customs are or if they can even communicate for that matter. Its the same thing as going to another country the first time, something you do that's a normal gesture to you could actually mean something horrible to them.  I'm going to give a fictitious book example of what could very well happen in the case of aliens landing on earth unexpectedly. 

 

In the book Ender's Game, the alien's in that book level an entire city, to build their colony because they thought individual human lives were expendable, that they didn't have an individual consciousness just like their own race. They couldn't communicate verbally so any signs of pleading, they couldn't understand, it was only afterward they realized their mistake when they read a dying humans mind, but they couldn't communicate their apologies in time before the war started. 

I'd like to think that humans would attempt to try to communicate or reason with the alien species at hand, but I have strong thoughts that if they don't appear human in nature, people will be less likely to empathise with them.

 

Or at least friendly "Looking" in nature because we as humans tend to judge things by appearance, despite our best efforts not to so if the aliens aren't very human looking or can't be anthropomorphized very well we may view them as lesser beings unless proved otherwise, a sad fact of humanity.  I'm hoping it won't happen.

Now, there is a chance everything will be fine and we won't be complete jerk faces to the Aliens, I'm a bit of an "Optimistic Sci-Fi Writer" for in my own book humanity decides to reason with aliens and manages to form an alliance with them and a whole galactic alliance begins.  

 

This is the ideal that I'd like to see so we can learn more about other alien races, learn about other cultures and just embrace our alien neighbors. It could lead us to a scientific renaissance like in the case of Mass Effect or Star Trek, giving us a beautiful learning experience. To live through something like that and to see the world grow in tolerance and learning would be fantastic.  Now if it doesn't happen, I won't be surprised at all and be the first in the bunkers for the oncoming invasion since I always have a backup plan in case someone disappoints me, or in this case, if someone tries to murder us all.

 

If NASA got that EM Drive they have been working on working and in use, where do you think we will try to go first? (The EM Drive could possibly make spaceships go near the speed of light if not faster. Think of it something like a realistic Warp Drive.)

 The smart thing to do would be to play it safe, I think they'd go to Mars first since that's within our Solar System. It'd be a good test flight, a way for them to investigate Mars further than they already have and start that colony they've been talking about. 

 

What would happen if live animals were able to grow plants on their bodies (think Bulbasaur)

 

You mean like the Russian man that had a Fir Tree growing inside of his lung?

 

It'd depend on the plant I suppose, if the plant lived in a symbiotic relationship with the animal, then I think it'd be an interesting feat. I'd love to see how the creature would evolve further and how they'd work with one another. Problem is at the moment it seems that the potential relationships would be far more parasitic, especially if we start talking about Fungi.

 

(Also I'm so very glad more people are aware of this species of Fungus now thanks to the Last of Us, I've always found it terribly fascinating. I hope more people are planning to research more things like this for video games in the future because I love talking about this.)

 

Whats your reaction to this statement? NASA discovered that some of the lasers that make the EM drive work go faster than the speed of life.

 

Did you mean the speed of light? If so then I suppose that's a good thing.

 

Why do so many people just deny things because something goes against what we think we know?

 

Many people don't like to be taken out of their own personal bubble of things they do know so they tend to deny things. Nobody likes to feel like an idiot and if you tell them that something they've known for years is wrong, then they may feel like an idiot or like they're being personally attacked by you.  It's why there are many that are so easily threatened by the truth and they'll label people in retaliation to it so they can stay inside their safe zone or hug box where they are right. To be honest it's quite disheartening to see.

 

[Nameless Knight 1,001]

Again, this is a fictional creature, so any rules can be applied. Yes, it indeed can be ignored, just as it ignores important aspects of reality in order to exist.

 

Animals and plants are different because they have different needs and methods of obtaining energy. Animals developed their traits due to the need to find food, as they can't directly absorb it from their surrounds(ie photosynthesis). Plants developed their traits because they were able to do such, and thus had no need to develop traits that help them actively seek food. There's no middle ground in nature. Sure, you could get a lizard and splice some photosynthesis cells onto its back, but then you'd just have a lizard who can absorb sunlight as energy.

 

Think of it like a spectrum. Plants on one side, animals on the other. The middle is trait-less basics. Cellular life at its simplest. As it evolves, it tips to one side a little. Over time, that tip continues further and further down the side it first leaned into. It doesn't go back the other way because that would be counter-productive. Animals developed the way they are because they needed the complexity to assist in surviving.

 

And on the note of spores, whilst animals don't necessarily replicate the function, there are aspects in animal reproduction that are very similar. Fish who release sperm into the water to fertilise eggs in a vicinity. Spiderlings that create little parachutes out of web to help them spread across a large area via the winds. These are all very alike to plant pollination.

The universe is vast and what we believe to be the rules of existence and life is primitive. Because we are bond to what we have on our planet, and we don't even know about everything here, our view is narrowed. If there is multi-cellular life out there then organisms may evolve against what we may have though was law because they had to evolve to different conditions. It may not be known to exist, but since we know little of our galaxy and universe (Hell we know very little about our own solar system) we cannot say a creature like the Poptop exists out there, Sentient (Animal-like) plants could be out their even if they go against what we once thought was law.

 

What if conditions they evolved around could make them require nutrients from consuming, like the venus fly trap. Now if required it could have evolved basic legs to allow them to acquire nutrients by hunting.

 

I'm talking about spores, that thing doesn't just give off eggs I mean literal spores. No animal shoots eggs or spores of its body when exposed to water.

 

What would you call an Animal that goes through Photosynthesis? 

 

Animalia Solis (If my latin is completely off, forgive me)

 

What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.)

 

Plantae Animalia

 

Do you think Aliens would really be hostile towards Humans?

 

I don't think that Aliens will be outwardly hostile to humans at first, unless they are part of a more war-like race or a conquering race, then that might be a point of contention. I actually think that humans will be far more dangerous to them than they will be to us for various reasons, but there may be other things thrown into it.  It'll depend on the race really as well as various other factors now onto my wall of text:

When it comes to interaction, there are several possible scenarios I think of, the biggest ones being a sort of Clash of Cultures, being far more extreme than they would be anything else.  We don't know what their customs are or if they can even communicate for that matter. Its the same thing as going to another country the first time, something you do that's a normal gesture to you could actually mean something horrible to them.  I'm going to give a fictitious book example of what could very well happen in the case of aliens landing on earth unexpectedly. 

 

In the book Ender's Game, the alien's in that book level an entire city, to build their colony because they thought individual human lives were expendable, that they didn't have an individual consciousness just like their own race. They couldn't communicate verbally so any signs of pleading, they couldn't understand, it was only afterward they realized their mistake when they read a dying humans mind, but they couldn't communicate their apologies in time before the war started. 

I'd like to think that humans would attempt to try to communicate or reason with the alien species at hand, but I have strong thoughts that if they don't appear human in nature, people will be less likely to empathise with them.

 

Or at least friendly "Looking" in nature because we as humans tend to judge things by appearance, despite our best efforts not to so if the aliens aren't very human looking or can't be anthropomorphized very well we may view them as lesser beings unless proved otherwise, a sad fact of humanity.  I'm hoping it won't happen.

Now, there is a chance everything will be fine and we won't be complete jerk faces to the Aliens, I'm a bit of an "Optimistic Sci-Fi Writer" for in my own book humanity decides to reason with aliens and manages to form an alliance with them and a whole galactic alliance begins.  

 

This is the ideal that I'd like to see so we can learn more about other alien races, learn about other cultures and just embrace our alien neighbors. It could lead us to a scientific renaissance like in the case of Mass Effect or Star Trek, giving us a beautiful learning experience. To live through something like that and to see the world grow in tolerance and learning would be fantastic.  Now if it doesn't happen, I won't be surprised at all and be the first in the bunkers for the oncoming invasion since I always have a backup plan in case someone disappoints me, or in this case, if someone tries to murder us all.

 

If NASA got that EM Drive they have been working on working and in use, where do you think we will try to go first? (The EM Drive could possibly make spaceships go near the speed of light if not faster. Think of it something like a realistic Warp Drive.)

 The smart thing to do would be to play it safe, I think they'd go to Mars first since that's within our Solar System. It'd be a good test flight, a way for them to investigate Mars further than they already have and start that colony they've been talking about. 

 

What would happen if live animals were able to grow plants on their bodies (think Bulbasaur)

 

You mean like the Russian man that had a Fir Tree growing inside of his lung?

 

It'd depend on the plant I suppose, if the plant lived in a symbiotic relationship with the animal, then I think it'd be an interesting feat. I'd love to see how the creature would evolve further and how they'd work with one another. Problem is at the moment it seems that the potential relationships would be far more parasitic, especially if we start talking about Fungi.

 

(Also I'm so very glad more people are aware of this species of Fungus now thanks to the Last of Us, I've always found it terribly fascinating. I hope more people are planning to research more things like this for video games in the future because I love talking about this.)

 

Whats your reaction to this statement? NASA discovered that some of the lasers that make the EM drive work go faster than the speed of life.

 

Did you mean the speed of light? If so then I suppose that's a good thing.

 

Why do so many people just deny things because something goes against what we think we know?

 

Many people don't like to be taken out of their own personal bubble of things they do know so they tend to deny things. Nobody likes to feel like an idiot and if you tell them that something they've known for years is wrong, then they may feel like an idiot or like they're being personally attacked by you.  It's why there are many that are so easily threatened by the truth and they'll label people in retaliation to it so they can stay inside their safe zone or hug box where they are right. To be honest it's quite disheartening to see.

 

First Holy **** there is a man with a tree in his lung!? How does it get sunlight?

 

Yeah a lot of people noticed I accidentally put speed of life instead of light. I don't even know what the speed of life would be... 

[Unikitty 1,212]

The universe is vast and what we believe to be the rules of existence and life is primitive. Because we are bond to what we have on our planet, and we don't even know about everything here, our view is narrowed. If there is multi-cellular life out there then organisms may evolve against what we may have though was law because they had to evolve to different conditions. It may not be known to exist, but since we know little of our galaxy and universe (Hell we know very little about our own solar system) we cannot say a creature like the Poptop exists out there, Sentient (Animal-like) plants could be out their even if they go against what we once thought was law.

 

What if conditions they evolved around could make them require nutrients from consuming, like the venus fly trap. Now if required it could have evolved basic legs to allow them to acquire nutrients by hunting.

 

I'm talking about spores, that thing doesn't just give off eggs I mean literal spores. No animal shoots eggs or spores of its body when exposed to water... 

 

 

Again, you're using a completely fictional creature that is above the rules of reality. Life as we know it does not have a medium point. A plant acts like a plant because it is a plant. An animal acts like an animal because it is an animal. By the current knowledge and rules of evolution, that fictional creature cannot be both an animal and a plant. It can only really be an animal that appears to have plantlike qualities(the only plantlike quality it actually has is the nutrient absorption - which doesn't even have to count because we absorb nutrients too, just with the food in our stomach - so really the creature is just an animal, regardless of whether or not the creator calls it a plant.)

 

You don't quite seem to know what a Venus Fly Trap is. Yes, it eats insects. But that's where the animal qualities end. It's not a thinking organism. It doesn't have a brain. It lives entirely on automatic reactions to stimulus. A Venus Fly Trap works by having multiple little hairs across the inside of its 'mouth'. When something brushes across multiple hairs, it triggers a reaction in the plant, forcing the 'mouth' closed. The plant has developed ways to differentiate an insect from a piece of foliage, but for the most part can't tell what it's closing itself over. Because they don't have brains. A Venus Fly Trap will never grow legs, because legs require a brain. Hunting and foraging requires a brain.

We're not comparing apples and oranges. We're literally comparing apples and cats.

 

Yes, you can argue the whole "space is near infinite, life can come in many forms". In fact, I even mentioned this in the first post of this wild ride. There could be life in forms we couldn't imagine.

But this isn't some fantasy scenario. This is taking what we do know of life, and asking what would happen if it did something we know it can't do.

You have plants, and you have animals. There is no "planimal" or "animant". That's not how it works.

[Invincible 2,091]

What would you call an Animal that goes through Photosynthesis? 

 

A plant-creature? Not sure.

 

What would you call a plant that has Animal like Behavior and Characteristics? (Walking, Eating with a mouth, making noise, having eyes, ect.)

 

A floral-lifeform organism. Tough one.

 

Do you think Aliens would really be hostile towards Humans? 

 

depends on how the aliens view us. Depending on their (supposing they are intelligent) world view, they can see as friends, or as a threat, I suppose.

 

If NASA got that EM Drive they have been working on working and in use, where do you think we will try to go first? (The EM Drive could possibly make spaceships go near the speed of light if not faster. Think of it something like a realistic Warp Drive.)

 

That's a very big if, last I saw there was a lot of controversy around it. If a working version could be fitted onto a spaceship, it would make travel to mars very rapid, and since it's proximity to us and the scientific curiosity it provides to science, it would definitely be a location closely inspected and probed regularly.

 

What would happen if live animals were able to grow plants on their bodies (think Bulbasaur)

 

We already have that kind of thing. Think of fungal infections... okay, maybe it's a bad example because it's similar but not really. I guess they could be kept inside closed spaces for longer periods of time due to their synthesis of oxygen.

 

Whats your reaction to this statement? NASA discovered that some of the lasers that make the EM drive work go faster than the speed of life.

 

Speed of LIGHT, i suppose? Since LASER means Light Amplification by Simulated Emission of Radiation, and since generally lasers ARE light waves in a focused state, it would make little sense.

 

Why do so many people just deny things because something goes against what we think we know?

 

Let's see the strongest try uprooting all their beliefs and accepting a new reality. It's not something easy for most people. The rational demand facts and evidence. The irrational would have neither and just deny everything outright because it's easier.