More Ideas to Follow

I've been thinking about Terraforming recently. Been looking into it a bit to learn what the challenges are and where such tech might be at. Mostly I just feel dumb looking at the information provided, but I still pose my own questions. For example, could you slowly expand an atmosphere? Like, build a small, sealed greenhouse on another planet, filling it with plants that would fill said greenhouse with oxygen and basically setting up what is needed for humans to live on it. Then over time have the green house expand and expand as more trees and other plants are added and as it slowly spreads across the planet the atmosphere gets bigger and more gases that are needed for life fill the air above the planet. On that same level, have we managed to create weather in contained spaces? Perhaps we create a miniature earth where we replicate conditions that would create types of weather, including an artificial sun and things like that. Could that produce weather in an enclosed place? I'm basically wondering if a water cycle could be restarted on a planet like Mars, to go with the growing atmosphere and the trees. So that you could have less dependence on a watering system and if it came time to just open the greenhouse to let the atmosphere out onto the planet proper, a weather system would be practically in place.
Could a space elevator be built anywhere on the world if the conditions were right? Said conditions are things like planes and weather not destroying it. Could a space elevator be built at one of the poles? Or since our planet doesn't spin that way, would the anchor in space not work? I know we currently don't have anything that could make up such a space elevator, material wise, but I like to think of things to come. If we managed to build a space elevator, we could build bigger ships and space stations easier. We wouldn't be spending fuel to get fuel into space, which limits how much fuel the ship could carry anyway. With a space elevator all the fuel could ride on it up into orbit, and be put to use in ships that are built in outer space. We wouldn't have as much in the way of weight limitations and we could possibly build colony ships or deep space exploration ships. We could be exploring the galaxy in no time. Especially if what I hear about a near FTL drive is even remotely possible. Some scientists seem to be coming up with ideas about how to reach the speed by distorting the space in front of the ship, which would move space around the matter of the vehicle, which seems to be the problem with reaching light speed. I'm probably getting everything wrong, but this is mostly stream of consciousness and I don't really want to go looking for the facts right now.
Can sound itself disrupt air? I've always really loved the idea of sonic weapons that aren't just sound, they can strike targets and move them. Or in a different application, be used to move the subject that fires it. I figure if sound could disrupt the air, it could probably have a physical presence enough to move objects.
I still want to learn about fire fighting techniques for wild fires and fires in hard to reach places like mountains and ravines. It seems like so many of the methods are simply, let it burn itself out and hope it doesn't catch something else on fire. That seems inefficient. I watch videos of the planes and helicopters dropping water and fire retardant and it looks like it gets too spread out to really help affect the fire. One of my previous ideas I've modified. It's less a fire truck on spindly legs, and more of a support vehicle now. It doesn't fight the fire itself, but more of a troop transport. High temperature resistant hull and when the firefight gets literally too hot for the fighters to stand, they can retreat inside until it's safer or even pull out. Inside would be benches on either side for them to sit, masks, oxygen tanks, other supplies that may get damaged or lost or otherwise need to be replaced. The shell would still be armored for falling trees or other debris, but it's not a tank to fight the flames anymore, more like an armored car.

Oblivious to the Outside, Flourishing on the Inside

Can energy be destroyed over time or lose its potency? For example, I have seen many anime and video game examples of attacks that just seem to keep going unless they strike something. If this energy were fired off into space, would it continue on forever if it never struck anything, or would it lose strength over time as it gained distance from its point of origin? Would it matter what the energy was supposedly made of? Just from Pokemon, I can pull three different kinds. Hyper Beam, Ice Beam, and Solarbeam. Obviously that last one is probably made of light. Would a laser keep going or could it lose strength? I wonder because I thought about the beam attacks in several anime being shot into space, many of them devastating in strength. If they struck another planet after traveling who knows how many light years, would it still be just as strong and do damage to that planet?

Can lightning strike something that won't conduct it in the least? Such as a pole of rubber? What if the pole of rubber was the tallest thing around? Would it try to strike it and then go lower for a target it can hit? Can a lightning bolt be divided or hit multiple targets at the same time? Why is it we don't try to farm lightning for our electrical needs?

On that note, how do solar cells and solar energy work? Do hurricanes and tornadoes do anything beneficial for nature, or are they purely destructive forces? The only thing they do to benefit nature, and it's a bit cynical, is to rid the planet of humans, who do the most damage to nature. If they were to be disrupted so they don't cause damage, would that screw up some big atmospheric pattern?

On a similar note, how do back burns work? That might not be the right term, but setting a fire so it consumes a previous fire and they burn themselves out. I'm now wondering if you could do something similar to that with an earthquake. Probably not, but if you had enough warning...?

How are forest fires fought? They always seem (at least where I live) to be in really hard areas to get vehicles and even to climb on foot, especially with all the gear a firefighter would need to wear just to stay alive. The planes and helicopters dropping chemicals and water on the fires just seems inefficient. I just wonder if there could be a better way to do it. Of course, my idea involves hercules beetle mechs armed with cannons firing mud and water and a chainsaw horn designed to cut through trees that have fallen over, or to remove fuel from the path of a fire. The horn can also grasp, able to pick up and move trees that may have gotten in the way. Six legs help it keep balance even on steep slopes, while the pilots are safe inside the armored cockpit. The biggest problem I see is energy concerns, and then of course, having water to fuel the cannons and create the mud. You'd need pretty big tanks just to carry that. I'd like to know if there were a way to steal energy from the fire you'd be facing and turn that into fuel for the beetles, but I'd have no idea how to accomplish that. Would the beetles be able to move quickly enough to actually fight the fire, or would they end up having to be used to contain the fire at areas fire trucks and other vehicles can't reach?

Another idea I had for resisting forest fires involves merely protecting the homes and buildings threatened by the blazes. Would there be a way to magnetize dirt and have it rise into the air to create a wall of dirt and earth, blocking the progress of flames? The reason I suggest just for protecting buildings is that the energy costs would probably be fairly high. If that weren't a concern, perhaps you could circle an ongoing fire with the dirt, activate it so the fire doesn't spread, and then you have the fire just burn itself out. Acres of forest and habitats for people and animals could be saved with something like that. Alternately, if we could figure out force fields and not just have them be science fiction, you could probably use those instead. I'd just be worried about a spark escaping through something most forms of media suggest can only hinder physical forms. The dirt would be scorched, but it couldn't catch on fire either.

So much I want to learn, and all of this the result of a few thoughts driving home from work.