Odd Questions that Don't Fit Anywhere Else...

This thread is the home for random, abstract questions that actually have some merit to them but aren't quite profound enough to deserve thier own thread. That does not mean it invites pointless, stupid, or entirely sarcastic questions, but hust strange ones.

WARNING: Once a question goes into this thread, there is no removing it. Even if we've gone 12 pages without mention of it, your question can randomly be brought back to the circle of attention. Consequently, dumb answers to said questions are also never out of the realm of scrutiny. Ever.
Rule of thumb for this thread: There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers.



I'll start. (P.S.- You need not format your questions like I have, though you may if you want.)



Question: If a shrink ray could be developed, could it be applied to a living organism, a human for sake of argument? And if it could, to what extent?

Reasons It Could Work: The shrinking would be entirely proportional. So all the body parts would be there in the same relation to each other.

Concerns Why It Wouldn't Work: Is there a point where you can't shrink a cell anymore, even proportionalty? And how small would you have to be before you couldn't breathe air molecules properly?

What would cause the universe to stop expanding rapidly? If the universe stops expanding at the rate it is there is a good chance that gravity will cause it to become a singularity (a point in space-time of infinite density and zero volume), ending the universe in a "big crunch."

Will the universe become so large that it doesn't necessarily have slow down it's expansion, but the gravitational pull becomes so great that it pulls everything into a singularity?

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Originally Posted by CatBus

What would cause the universe to stop expanding rapidly? If the universe stops expanding at the rate it is there is a good chance that gravity will cause it to become a singularity (a point in space-time of infinite density and zero volume), ending the universe in a "big crunch."

Will the universe become so large that it doesn't necessarily have slow down it's expansion, but the gravitational pull becomes so great that it pulls everything into a singularity?

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A bug in the space time continuum, if it's possible, would stop the universe from growing, maybe the big bang would repeat itself. That is beyond our reach, my friend, all I have for you is 7, 49, and 3 . . . which brings me to this question:

What would we see in a mirror if it had nothing to reflect? White is something, same with black, although it's no pigment or all pigment, it's still something . . . I'm talking about nothing.

^ that question got me an idea. But to answer your question, it would be black completely. Black is the absence of light.

What if you had a hollow spherical mirror. What would the inside look like (assuming nothing is in it, it has no holes, and it is lit)?

Bandaids are fleshtone color, but whose fleshtone? When was it decided that the color "nude" is a slightly dark peach color? If they made colors for various shades of skin, would that be considered racist? Is it racist to only have one shade?

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Originally Posted by Wolfsbane

Bandaids are fleshtone color, but whose fleshtone? When was it decided that the color "nude" is a slightly dark peach color? If they made colors for various shades of skin, would that be considered racist? Is it racist to only have one shade?

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uuuumm bandaids are sooo racist.... hehe

what wold happen if a bear attacked someone and that person hugged the bear? lol seriously though...

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Originally Posted by aorozco

what wold happen if a bear attacked someone and that person hugged the bear? lol seriously though...

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Unless the bear is very caring and realizes that he/she is inflicting much pain to a human then they will probably continue to attack.


When is a proper time to use a hyphen?

what is a hyphen.... lol. jk. like in words like smart-ass.

oh and how do they make the banana dance?????? :banana:

you-make a-banana-dance-by sticking .gif-at-the-end.

why cant we tickle ourselves?

because we know that we will stop when we want to. so it won't work.
(you can turn yourself on though.. lol duh...)

how does a fire extinguisher work?

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how does a fire extinguisher work?

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Uhmm... That's an odd question to view as an odd question... I'm not sure. But it might be nice to know in case 'The Blob' ever returns.

I wonder how one tiny little alteration at the beginning of all life might have changed the way we might stand today...

Like, imagine if for some reason a virus had killed out tons of amoeba and tiny little cellular creatures that began life underwater, and there were multiple sexes back then (more than just male and female).

Is it possible that there could have been tons of different kinds of genders?:eek:

Okay, it's stupid and far-fetched but it's kind of interesting to think about...

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Originally Posted by Dimethyltrip

I wonder how one tiny little alteration at the beginning of all life might have changed the way we might stand today...

Like, imagine if for some reason a virus had killed out tons of amoeba and tiny little cellular creatures that began life underwater, and there were multiple sexes back then (more than just male and female).

Is it possible that there could have been tons of different kinds of genders?:eek:

Okay, it's stupid and far-fetched but it's kind of interesting to think about...

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It's like thinking about when amphibians first appeared. Do you really think they all had 5 toes?

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Originally Posted by Dimethyltrip

I wonder how one tiny little alteration at the beginning of all life might have changed the way we might stand today...

Like, imagine if for some reason a virus had killed out tons of amoeba and tiny little cellular creatures that began life underwater, and there were multiple sexes back then (more than just male and female).

Is it possible that there could have been tons of different kinds of genders?:eek:

Okay, it's stupid and far-fetched but it's kind of interesting to think about...

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Who says every species has only two genders? Some are asexual, a species of lizard (I think) is all female (they make themselves pregnant), and another lizard (Uta stansburiana) has three different types of males and two types of females. There's also a species (I don't remember what exactly) that has 14 different genders.

It's possible that if an entire species of bacteria had died off, we might not even exist, or we would have many more differences than just gender.

I'm not sure if this is quite relevant to your question, but I think life started out as asexual. Sex came along when there was a need to mix up DNA, when predators and parasites started attacking.

my question would be, why did they start attacking....

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Originally Posted by aorozco

my question would be, why did they start attacking....

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Because they needed a new food source. It may have been easier to eat another organism than to feed off the heat and gas from thermal vents. The parasites may have come about by getting swallowed by a predator, but they had some gene that made them indigestable and were then spat out. The parasite-to-be was given a bit of protection from the outside world, and maybe even absorbed a little food while in there. From there, the roles of predator and prey developed. (Parasites are in the predator role.)

Just fyi... this is just my best guess. I'm not saying it's absolute truth or anything.

well i know that, but i mean if they had it so good before, why start attacking...... i know evolution and all that, but it's interesting...

It's not a conciouse decision, orozco. It's just... say one organism is born with an extra tail. It, (the bacterial type,) was doing fine with one tail. It didn't choose to be born with two tails. But it's second tail happens to make it swim faster. That makes it competative against the other bacteria. So more of them adapt to the enviroment, until lots of bacteria have two tails.

i know, that's why i mentioned evolution and all, but, nevermind. it's just weird...

okay here's another question, if you dream about not being able to sleep, why do you wake up tired?

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Originally Posted by aorozco

okay here's another question, if you dream about not being able to sleep, why do you wake up tired?

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Your dreams can have a strong affect on your emotional state. You can wake up crying or being mad at someone, and those emotions can follow you throughout the entire day. If you dream about not being able to sleep, your mind may truly believe that it had a restless night. Having a bad dream can also leave you feeling tired because your mind was unable to rest well.