MirceaKitsune

Thank you, that's very useful and complete. Also many terms I didn't know. And yes, that was indeed 6 months not "somewhat over 1"... not sure why I remembered a slightly lower number.

I live somewhere in Europe. Like all people who live here or in America at least, we're used to a classic day time cycle; The sun rises from one location, travels in an arch across the sky, then sets in another location... same story for the moon. At the poles of course, things are really different: A day and a night typically last for over a month. Since that's around the center of the Earth's rotation axis, it makes perfect sense too, considering Earth's spin barely reposition those locations in relation to the sun unlike living in areas where the spin has greater effect. But I was wondering one thing: What happens in between those two locations? If around the planet's "belt" the sun rises and sets every 24 hours due to spin, while at the "ends" it rises and sets on a monthly basis due to position in orbit and / or tilt, it sounds that somewhere along the way there are places where we should see quite some unusual sun movement. Maybe even the sun slightly wobbling back and forth. One case that comes to mind: Somewhere between the outer edge of the world (in the spin's direction) and one of the poles, we should have one of two things: A place where a day lasts for say a week rather than either 24 hours or more than 1 month, or a place where you can see the sun only shining in one direction during the 24 hour day while other areas are only lit during the monthly day. The second feels like the correct option... since the Earth's spin is after all the same everywhere, so there should only be a virtual line where sunlight cuts off regardless of the Earth's rotation around the spin axis. So in practice, shouldn't this mean that somewhere out there, there's a place where if you climb on top of a mountain, you can see daytime to your left and nighttime to your right during certain hours and days? Where and what are the most unusual day cycles on Earth, in case there are any? Are there any pictures or videos of them that you can share also?

Ok... so evolution couldn't have made such a complex system work that way by itself, because electrical switches can only be produced intentionally by a person rather than also in nature? That explains why neurons which communicate with direct elecric impulses don't exist. Thanks for clarifying.

Yes, that would be a more correct way of putting it. I believe I wanted to refer to the best and most optimal biological systems being the ones that tend to survive and evolve. Then again, if something else that works was there first, it has high chances of staying, even if something better could have theoretically taken place before it and replaced it. I didn't wish to refer to neurons being entirely just wires, although I might have done that. Obviously there would still need to be a controlled way of passing signals over, rather than turning the brain network on or off as a whole. Still, would have using direct electrical circuits between neurons been possible too, given they could transmit signals in a similar fashion?

Although I'm still learning about synthetic biology and biohacking, I heard a few things about how DNA and cells are being programmed on computers in labs. Obviously, the typical computer user doesn't have an USB device they can plug in, script, and have a tiny form of life pop out when they press Enter... despite hearing that something similar is supposedly possible to some extent. Still, that doesn't mean there aren't interesting things programs alone can do in this domain. So I was wondering what exists in regard to PC software. Are there any applications available for computers, that can be used to program cells or code your own DNA sequences? Even if just for preview purposes, and not to actually apply them on a living being. For example, can you preview how a small creature will look like if you make changes to pieces of the DNA? Of course I'm not looking for something magical here... just offering an idea of what I'm wondering about. Note that I only run Linux at this day. So if I am to test such a program, it must have a Linux native version too or run on WINE. But the thread isn't just for me, so please post anything you know of at all.

Today I happened to hear in a bit more detail about synthetic biology and biohacking. It sounds like a fascinating domain, and I already have a lot of questions to wonder about. One of them, which wasn't specified directly in the documentaries and articles I saw, is what are the greatest achievements of this new technology... in terms of modifying or creating new forms of life? What are the most complex living being created / altered by scientists at this day? Were any entineered species created to any extent? Could any animals be given improvements that evolution didn't offer them, for example? Or can the technology be used to improve a human body beyond what one can have by default? I heard about a few palpable results in this area. Such as creating bacteria that can produce gas and oil, which is indeed impressive. But what about larger and more complex forms of life? The best I've seen was a documentary approximately an year ago, about a scientist being able to implement a flourescent gene in a fruitfly making that fly's body glow. I'm interested about more things like this if there are any. To make a relevant thing clear: I do not support or agree with animal cruelty, even if it's for science! I do however agree with harmless experiments if useful... such as creating new species through genetic modification, granted this doesn't involve mutations that cause pain or discomfort or death to the poor creatures. So I hope my wish of seeing achievements in this domain isn't confused with ignorance toward the lives involved.

Quite some time ago, I saw a documentary about understanding the brain and its nervous system. At one point it spoke about the struggle of scientists to understand the connections between the millions of nerves located in the brain. They said tracking and pathing them is a difficult task, hence why it's taking long for science to understand how the brain actually works. But it also said something else: That one scientist came up with the idea to turn the process into an online game of sorts. There was supposedly a website anyone could access, where they would be presented with images of brain scans. The person's job is to draw lines across what they see as neurons, in order to establish the connections. The computers can't translate / generate them alone, which is why people need to do it manually... but there's so many nerves that it takes a huge amount of people to get it done. So does this game still exist? Did it complete its purpose, did the idea prove to be a failure, or is it still running at this day and open to contributors? I'd like to make myself more useful, especially to science... so if it's still there and being used by the scientists, maybe I can give it a shot whenever I have time for it.

A few days ago I took a better look at how neurons communicate with each other, how a brain network looks like, and what an action potential is. Although some people did a good job at explaining how signals are transmitted across neurons, fully understanding it all is still proving a rather difficult task, as the system is more complex than I initially thought. Until seeing an in-depth explanation, I used to think neutons are connected by a plain conductive material (similar to wires) through which electrons travel, rather than being a chemical process. I know I was wrong now. But there's still one thing I'm confused about: Why? More precisely, why did evolution "prefer" this system? It would seem that neurons sending electrons to each other directly (like electronics) would be both simpler and quicker. Using sodium and potassium, waiting for various gates to open / close and activate / deactivate, etc. feels like something more comlex than needed. But in evolution, something usually happens for a good reason... so this means I'm failing to understand why the existing system is best. Why is the current mechanism of neurons / nerves / muscles, using chemicals and action potentials, better than neurons simply being conductive materials that sent electrons across to each other? Why wouldn't have the other way worked out, and allowed a brain as functional to evolve (first)? Could it allow one at all actually?

I'm currently still looking to find more help with this. Until then, I can't help thinking about it whenever I get the chance, and trying to find even more parts that make sense. Although I might seem like a mad man rambling crazy stories, I'd like to keep posting ideas I'm still getting on this, if that is okay. A week ago, I was thinking about light and the speed of light. I was intrigued to hear one particular thing I didn't know about; That light isn't just the only particle able travel at its speed, but is also forced to do so. Light particles were said to "be born, live, and die traveling at the speed of light", never able to slow down. I thought to apply my dimensional perspective to this, and started wondering about the nature of mass itself. After all, we know what weight and gravity are... but what is the actual subatomic process that causes an object to be heavy if we think about it? I ended up with an idea... which is nothing more than a thought and not presented as fact, but which I felt would be constructive to post about. Einstein's theory of space and time proves that the faster something travels through space, the slower it moves through time in relation to other objects. If I understood right, that's because the object converts its motion through time into motion through space. Almost as if by default, every particle "needs" to travel at a fixed speed, and is only able to change which direction that speed is in. The first thing that raised a question for me was: Why is something heavy more difficult to change the velocity of... while at the other extreme, something very light (like a photon) cannot contain its motion at all? Now suppose I am right, and the dimension above time contains all possible time lines in existence. What if the same principle applies to 5th dimensional movement? What if, the more probabilities a group of entities have, the harder it is to move them through space and time, due to them moving faster through time lines and therefore resisting? In the case of light, photons might have fewer components that fight each other to go in different directions, not creating enough probability and therefore not slowing down the particle. How could that be? Well, let's work with the essence of particles... quarks. In my model, an individual quark or group of quarks tens to go toward a fixed direction at the maximum possible speed. However, when two quarks or groups "stick" to each other (such as to form a particle), they pull on one another and tend to go toward different directions. One quark might be trying to go up, while another that's stuck to it is trying to move down. At that moment, neither of the two quarks can have a fixed trajectory through time / space any more. That creates probability... one quark winning over the other every now and then. The more quarks you add to the "pile", the more probability you get for the entity they compose... as each might slightly push on the object by a minuscule amount, more or less than the other ones at any given moment. If this probability means 5th dimensional movement, the resulting object trades its motion through space and time to satisfy the probabilities of all its particles at each given moment. Therefore, we see the object as both harder to push, as well as time passing more slowly for it and everything in its gravitational field. Now: If we have two quarks or particles which want to go into different directions (at the speed of light) pulling on one another, neither of the two quarks / particles get to fulfill their "destiny" of constantly traveling at the speed of light. This implies tension building up, and energy being redirected. What if gravity is actually this force, manifesting as pressure against the fabric of spacetime? If a bunch of quarks / particles push up while another bunch push down, the tension between them might tend to suck the fabric of spacetime inside like a carpet... till it's eventually too much and a black hole is formed. Again, this is not something I'm presenting as fact, and is a system I'm actually unsure of. I'm only presenting ideas which I believe to at least make some sense, in hope of getting thinkers who might have not looked at it the same way to consider this model. I'm certain time lines themselves exist and compose the dimension above time, and that 4D / 5D geometry could help explain some incredible things... including bringing the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics together. That's primarily why I'm focusing on this, within my limited understanding and lack of mathematical skills. Also, please let me know if there are any known scientific facts I might have missed, that could be both in favor or against this view.

Thank you for clarifying. Sounds like I was quite off with my initial understanding, where I thought the brain would experience electro magnetic disruption the same way an electronic device does. Thinking better now, it would probably be quite a problem if I would have been right. For instance, it would mean that solar storms throughout history would have caused people and animals to black out, reducing the chances of survival for many beings. While in today's society, magnets and electromagnets would have to be treated as hazardous materials, as even walking past one would cause strange effects. So it's good that the brain and body are more secure from magnetic fields. Although this is a little different compared to the original question, I was wondering one more thing: What would still happen if electrical signals could be sucked out of a biological body before they reach their destination? For example if a person touched a device which has the ability to suck all and any electric current that gets in touch with it... the opposite of electrocution in a sense, or the effect of grounding. I don't know if such a device exists in reality, but what would it theoretically be like if not.

As it's known, the brain is a biological electric device. It operates using weak electrical signals... which is how it stores information, makes connections and sense out of things, activates certain muscles, and everything else involved. The more a part of the brain is solicited, the more neural activity can be seen there, making it clear how relevant electric signals are in any conscious process. With this understanding, I've been wondering about a less common possibility; Can strong electromagnetic fields disrupt the brain, as they disrupt any electrical device? For example, could an EMP weapon knock someone unconscious, cause loss of memory, unwilling / uncontrolled muscle activity, or even have dangarous and life threatening results? What form of interaction or phenomenons can disrupt or drain electricity in the body and brain, and what results does such have exactly? I heard of EMP attacks being used to break electrical machinery, but not of it happening to living beings. Since the brain and other body parts work with electricity however, I don't see why it couldn't. I assume this could scramble all signals in the brain, leading to the person seeing / hearing / feeling radom things and twitching uncontrollably. Or cause signals to not reach their destination... temporarily leaving the person paralyzed, causing loss of memory, or bringing the person unconscious. More dangerously though, maybe this could cause permanent amnesya too, in case permanent neural connections are also scrambled? On a joking note, this could be used to create a new gun for the police force; The wireless taser Or why not the ideal house alarm, which knocks any burglar unconscious when detecting motion.

Thank you. That's pretty useful and complete... at least in describing the little known at this stage. The fact that music triggers areas of the brain involved in creating pleasure or sorrow makes sense, although how and why that happens is the interesting thing. I imagined it might be a feature that randomly appeared during the evolution of humans from apes. Yet it feels like there's more than that somehow, and that it might have a precise purpose or be the result of crucial brain functionality. One article said "it might have given an evolutionary advantage". Although I can't easily imagine how that could be, it does sound possible. Perhaps music could cheer up and motivate people, making them better at hunting or offering them better senses and reflexes, therefore increasing chances of survival?

My curiosity was mostly to understand the process. If I understood correctly last time, the reason wood burns is because heat decomposes its various molecules first, while the atoms of each require much higher temperatures to melt or gas themselves. But at the very end, each element composing that wood as well as the ash it results acts like all elements... and has a gas liquid and solid temperature of its own. Hoping that is indeed correct and I didn't miss anything else.

Nice! Still a nice thought even if it's not forever. Although trying to think of 100,000,000,000 years I lose any notion of time, as that's too long to even try comprehending... so in a sense it does feel like forever.

I remember hearing the term of "perpetual motion", used to describe people striving to find infinite energy. And I did hear that this is almost never possible. I have however heard about nuclear fusion + nuclear fission... which could be used together to convert the same material back and forth and gain energy. Of course, if something generates energy, it pays a "price" for it... so it too would probably not last forever, and the atoms involved break down somehow (radiation?) Maybe a more correct question would be: For how long can a solar system last? What composition and structure would the sun and planets need to have in order to live the longest?

Yes, Abiogenesis is the term for it, forgot to include that. I'll read that more in depth a bit later, thanks. And yeah, it makes sense for something even more simple than bacteria to have first existed... as bacteria is already complex compared to the first biological systems that must have probably first existed. I'm mostly curious as to what the natural phenomenons which lead to the DNA molecule and it being used to (re)produce such complex biological designs were. How could weather, vulcanism, etc. mix matter in such a way that it slowly got to living beings of this complexity? What could have been the precise steps, and each needed chemical reaction? Surely no one will know the exact procedure which took place here on Earth, but maybe complete and fully possible scenarios on how a planet can create life from nothing but random physics exist.

Evolution of life is a wonderful thing that fascinated me recently, and I've seen several documentaries and articles about it. I'm glad to have a better understanding of how it all works... how mutations in the DNA of a bacteria lead to larger and more complex life forms over millenia, while natural selection only allows the best designs to keep going. It all makes sense and seems to explain everything, yet there's one problem: No matter where this was discussed and no matter where I looked, I've never seen anyone trying to touch the basic pieces of the puzzle: What happened before that? How did the first bacteria, of the most simple structure and composition, came to be? We know it was all chemestry and physics, as well as random chance and the right thing happening at the right moment. Still, how can various chemical reactions lead to an entity which has a heart pumping a fluid through it, a brain which stores and decodes information, a DNA which tells that body how to use proteins, even a system which lets it reproduce a biological pattern stored in DNA? Sadly, the best I've seen on this matter was someone pointing at a pool of bubbling mud and saying "life started somewhere in here". Don't get me wrong... I know this is one of the hardest things for science to debunk, and I'm not blaming anyone for not having an answer. But at the same time, I feel there should be more we can say on the matter, and there should at least be multiple hypothesis as to what the exact process is. Scientists can already do fantastic experiments with particles, produce smart materials, go in space... yet no one can imagine the actual process which creates the basics of life? Here's my fuzzy and simplistic version of things, which I believe could be a starting point of sorts: In the beginning, Earth was a very violent place... bombarded by meteors, vulcanic reactions taking place everywhere, clouds of water and maybe other chemicals causing thunderstorms, etc. Somewhere in all this chaos, a set of substances got poured over one another and mixed, creating a material or properly shaped object that could convert a nearby resource into another. For example, a soft object soaked in acid could dissolve some minerals that touched and penetrated its surface, and release either a gas liquid or solid through an orifice (resulting from the accumulation of converted material trying to pop out of the object, similar to a vulcanic eruption). One point of interest: Converting a material implies using and / or producing energy... meaning that some such objects would require energy from the sun for the reaction to take place, while others would instead produce minuscule electric charges. Anyway, over the course of millions of years, nature and weather brought and occasionally encased various such structures together. Some kept functioning and producing their waste product, which others would then absorb and transform... creating a relationship between different types of converter molecules. Somewhere between these lines, in an enormous sea of probabilities, a complex system developed and persisted. It's possible that one such structure started producing DNA like molecules as a waste product, while chromosomes absorbed them and released a waste product of their own based on the shape of each molecule. How they all got aligned in such a precise order and reached such complex functionality is impossibe for me to try imagining now. But I'm hoping someone else might be able to elaborate on the possibilities... which is actually the question of this thread. Obviously, the truth is likely very far from my version of things, and this was just to point out some basic possibilities. Is there anything more than that known however?

This is one of the things science will have a very hard time knowing with 100% certainty, and where the best bet seems like going with what makes most sense and fits most logics and observations. Myself, I'm a believer of the theory that black holes form new universes, and an universe ceases existing when all and any matter in it is absorbed by black holes. In other words, the big bang in one universe might be the moment when a collapsed star can no longer take it and becomes a black hole inside another universe. Each universe might then be the interior of a black hole. If this system is indeed correct, I personally believe it recurses infinitely, and each universe leads to other universes which do the same in turn.

Although this is a sad reminder, Earth and life on it will not be around forever. The most obvious reason is that a few billion years from now, the sun will have consumed itself. Apart from its disappearance removing the planet's only source of light, and releasing it from its orbit into an endless travel through space, the explosion the sun will cause during its death will turn all planets in the solar system to a crisp. And even if the sun wasn't a problem, there's the Earth's molten core. Eventually that will cool off too... meaning the Earth's tectonics will stop entirely, as well as the magnetic field surrounding it and protecting the surface from lethal radiation. So yeah, Earth and life that won't eventually go beyond it have their days pretty much counted. But I wonder: Is that the case for all and any galaxy, solar system and planet out there? Could there be planets that might theoretically live forever? By theoretically, I mean planets that shouldn't break down due to reasons internal to them or their solar system. In practice it's hard to imagine this happening, considering that any solar system would eventually face extrenal problems. Such as being hit by a black hole or supernova or something else that's lethal... while it's also not certain if and when the universe and time itself have an ending or reach a point where they disintegrate. Still, there are a few things that make me hope solar systems that could live forever might exist. Like I said, problem #1 with ours is that the sun will eventually burn out. It runs out of fuel because its nuclear reaction works one way, fusing hydrogen into helium (I hope I'm not mistaken about that). But what if another sun worked both ways, and fused one element into another then that element back into the first (nuclear fussion plus nuclear fission)? If its gravity is strong enough to make sure not a single particle escapes, the process could go on forever! Now in regard to its planets... well, unless space dust or anything that has mass slows them down in their orbit, they should theoretically keep going forever... not slowing down nor drifting further or closer to the sun. Otherwise, planets with a molten core like Earth will eventually have that core cool off... unless that core can replenish itself too although that's even harder to imagine. Still, the core cooling off shouldn't mean the planet dies, nor that all life on it disappears. Certainly it means that the climate and even orbit will radically change, but at the surface some things could still keep going as usual. If we're to get into the survival of life on such a planet however, there is one problem here: Could the absence of a magnetic feel keep the sun from ripping away the planet's atmosphere, oceans, and everything in gas and liquid form... so the planet will not have the same fate Mars did?

That makes sense, thanks for clearing it up. I probably should have researched how electric arcs work before asking, since the temperatures and necessary condisions seem to speak for themselves... and what you said clearly sounds like nothing even close to safe. So yeah, wireless charging via electric arc (which people and animals could touch without risk) is surely not an option.

Woah... that is really awesome, and surprising for me at least! I didn't expect there to be any liquid that people could actually breathe, nor any other gas except helium. I did however imagine that, considering it has the same composition, oxygen would be breathable in both gas and liquid form... as long as temperature and pressure werent a problem. If liquid breathing does exist, it's of course most useful for medicine as well as science. I do admit that in my case, I was curious for the idea of a person being able to survive for at least several hours / days in a liquid without any diving gear, and I guess do that as an activity. For instance, imagine being able to sleep in an aquarium filled with such a liquid... which could perhaps be a very relaxing sleep being weightless and all. Or having pools where you don't just swim around, but can spend hours in underwater rooms where you may actually breathe safely. Although such things sounded like a scifi thought entirely, it's amazing if they actually are possible in reality! I wonder if such ideas were ever attempted as well actually.

Of course, I know about lightning. My question there was if any technology can create an electric arch (lightning blast) over distances of even < 1m, but which is safe for people to touch and it not lethal or painful. I do however imagine that no amount of technology can achieve such a thing.

Last week I got curious with liquid oxygen, and poked into video experiments with liquid air. For air to turn fluid, you do need an extremely low temperature, so we never see this occurring naturally on Earth. But I was curious about one thing: Could humans and animals theoretically breathe liquid oxygen like they do gas oxygen? From the perspective of chemical composition, would the lungs treat it the same way? Obviously, this is a theoretical question only. In practice no one could inhale liquid oxygen because the extremely cold temperature would freeze their lungs and cause instant death! But if somehow temperature itself wouldn't be a problem, and this factor was possible to eliminate... could a normal person breathe at the bottom of a sea composed of liquid oxygen? And would it be more or less efficient or pleasant than gas oxygen?

This is NOT fact and should not be taken as something certain. But from what I heard, cold air only becomes a problem to the lungs when it's so cold that it causes liquid to freeze inside the lungs. Sadly I don't remember more than that, but just thought to mention hearing about this in a documentary long ago.

This is one thing I was always curious about regarding the evolution of life and people. It's known that most things which define living beings descend from features that were essential for survival. We have limbs, eyes, ears, etc. because with them we could fight or escape predators (or be predators) and avoid dangerous environments. From a psychological point of view, we developed a language because it allowed us to work in teams and survive. Moving away from features essential to survival, people also developed activities / games / fun ways of passing the time, but which can also be explained as they satisfy certain features of the mind and body. For example, sport requires physical effort which in turn releases hormones related to positive feelings. Combining that with the joy of a victory, it makes sense from a biological perspective why sport existed since the earliest days of mankind. Or let's take art, which is a way for people to visualize scenarios which can't happen in their physical reality... a desire once again explainable by how the brain works. Yet there's one... which I can't understand how biology and the brain lead to, but which also doesn't feel like something learned; Music. It's an obvious fact... everyone likes music, and we couldn't imagine the world without it! Of different types and genres, by different artists, and for different messages it transmits. But unlike other things, it's hard to understand how this came to be. After all, music is just a precise arrangement of various overlapping sounds in a logical loop... with voice added on top in some cases. It also doesn't describe an actual place or object like drawn art, so it's not an efficient method of transmitting essential information. Somehow, the brain takes liking to translating those precise noise patterns, rather than finding it all a senseless sound. One could argue that our like for music might be taught. For example, the ancestors of humans would play the war drums to announce their people of an upcoming war. Not with the intent to compose music, but as a way of making noise to attract attention. From that, people could have later developed a liking for sorted beats. It sounds logical after all. But personally, I tend to disbelieve that. Primarily because no one is taught to like music. People like it simply because they like it... it's something which is part of them. Even if you take a man who lived isolated in a forest all his life and play him a nice song, he will enjoy it and not find it some gibberish noise. The official theory of evolution also ruled out the idea that learned experiences become part of the genetic code in offspring. Further more, it doesn't appear to be just a human thing either. I remember a cat expert confirming that symphonic music calms cats down and makes them feel happy. Yet to cats found in nature, nothing similar to symphonic music is ever heard, which could explain them associating the sound of a violin with a happy feeling... after all it's not that close to purring and meowing. So has anyone figured out how this works? What is it in our genes and the structure of the brain that makes us like music?