Questions tagged [detection]
Technologies or procedures that aid in the detection of people, creatures, or objects.
24 questions
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What is the largest distance at which a Cube-world is distinguishable from a spherical world?
A Cubeworld and Cubemoon with uniform surface gravity have been engineered using materials of arbitrary strength and density, the cubeworld made habitable, and placed into orbit around a star. The ...
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Stealth In Space Calculator
I want to make a calculator that can determine the range at which spaceships will be detected against an infrared detection system.
Figuring out how "stealthy" a ship is is mostly a matter ...
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How would humans on Earth detect a Shkadov thruster on other side of the Milky Way Galaxy?
Apologies if the title is confusing - I've been trying to figure out how to word it for a while now.
Essentially I am writing a (relatively) hard science-fiction story set in the present/very near ...
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Why wouldn't the world have advanced warning of a significant asteroid/comet strike?
Suddenly, the news warn of a civilization-resetting asteroid/comet about to hit the earth in hours. No-one knew a thing.
Why? Well, my research shows that such an event is extremely unlikely in any ...
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What would be easily missed, but undeniable, proof of life from non-advanced detectors?
I need a way for a spacecraft to detect absolutely irrefutable proof of organic, but not intelligent, life on a planet, most likely through spectroscopy or another similar concept. The spacecraft is ...
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Detectability of a Type III Civilization with a specific set of conditions
Conditions:
The civilization is in a galaxy which is not the Milky Way. For the purposes of this question, assume the target galaxy is 0.5 Mpc away.
The civilization has elected, for whatever reason ...
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Would an aircraft covered in radiation-absorbent sponges be invisible to radar?
Context:
In this semi-futuristic war history, some militaries looked at the ultra-high performance concrete used in bunkers and thought: "hum, the only problem with bunkers is that they can't ...
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Tracking a high-speed vessel in Sol
I am trying to establish whether humanity could detect and track a fast-moving alien ship arriving in the Solar System and whether we would get some sort of "advance" warning that it is ...
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How far away from earth could atomic weapon detonations be detected?
Let us suppose that ten high kiloton to low megaton range fission/fusion weapons are being detonated between three and five kilometers under the surface of the sea on a planet much like earth, in a ...
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What would be the most realistic approach for a Seismic Radar in a Land-ship?
Context:
For several reasons regarding the planet, such as its atmosphere density, landscape and its interference on electronic equipment, in this specific planet, people preferred to use land-ships ...
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How do you have Mutual Assured Destruction in space politics
Space is VAST, and many country occupied only a part of it. They do trade and make war just like we do on Earth. On Earth, we have our "peacemaker" between powerful nations in the form of ...
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How much warning will the Earth get if an asteroid that will hit earth "appears out of nowhere?"
This is another branch of my previous question.
Currently, in real life, space agencies around the world charts and tracks asteroids and other objects that orbit the sun. They project the object's ...
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How would businesses or government detect mind control in a society without knowledge of magic?
Suppose that magic exists, but is uncommon enough that most people don't have direct experience with it; and you have a government which wants to suppress knowledge of it, so that the general populace ...
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How would AI human detection differ in a synthetic landscape?
If AI based robots and humans were the only heat producing macro organisms how would the AI detect and thus humans avoid detection?
The only things humans do in this setting is be mass produced and ...
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Electro-signaling camouflage for animals?
In an aquatic environment that most predators developed shark-like electroreceptive organs, what would be the counteractive measures against it?
Copper shells can disguise electric fields, but how it ...
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Is there anything about photons and/or space-time that would allow the detection of an energy-based attack from a distance of ten light seconds?
Ten light seconds is a very long distance: 1.86 million miles (3 million Km). For comparison, the moon is about 1.3 light seconds from Earth and the shortest recorded distance between Earth and Mars ...
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Detection systems and trigger mechanism in a pre-electronic world?
I am building a setting that is essentially steampunk,being exact it would be pneumatic punk. What electronics and electronic equivalent exists, are primitive and extremely expensive. Thus the ...
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How Can An Alien Ship Harness Nuclear Energy? [closed]
A massive alien vessel is buried in a sandbank under the sea. Research subs detect a vast supply of nuclear energy held within it.
I've been researching power plants, fission and the processes that ...
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Do dead human bodies have a particular smell?
I'm working on a story where there is a crime scene where the protagonist (who has a superhuman sense of smell) notices a scent that smells like human corpses due to their abilities. I'm wondering how ...
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Could alien observers detect the Castle Bravo nuclear test?
I am considering writing an alternate history story in which 1950s nuclear testing attracts the attention of benevolent extraterrestrials who do not want to see us destroy ourselves. However a ...
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If a space ship entered Earth orbit, how likely is it to be seen?
Mostly what it says on the tin. If a spaceship, let's say about 200 meters long and 100 meters wide (made of modern materials) was approaching Earth and slowing down (say from 100 km/s to 3km/s), how ...
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Suspicious helicopter-borne relief packages
Jormungandr, the Snakebot of Doom, is sitting in the ruins of New York City, busily extracting iron and steel from the rubble in order to turn it into railgun slugs - and also extracting any survivors ...
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Would interplanetary transmissions in the Wolf 359 star system be detectable by Earth?
Inspired by: How much electromagnetic transmission noise does Earth have to emit to be noticeable?
Premise: Assume that the infamous Wolf 359 star system has one habitable planet and a second, ...
- 132k
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My ship is traveling at 0.05c, is the energy from debris impacts trackable?
While once living in Texas, my family and I had the privilege of watching a shuttle re-entry. It was breath-taking. I kid you not, it was like watching the finger of god drawing a line of fire ...
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