Computers on board Starfleet vessels are quite primitive compared to on board computers such as HAL 9000 . At their best, they can decipher requests such as "Computer, delete that last sentence" and utter things such as "That crewman is no longer on board this vessel". Even real life computers will be capable of this within a decade or so (by some estimates). Even computers such as HAL 9000 are likely to be available within a few decades. So, in a genre where intelligent computers are abound, why this strange absence? Did the Federation run into some Battlestar-Galactica-like problem with AI in the past and decide to keep on board computers decentralized? But if that is the case, how can one explain Data and highly intelligent holographic characters? The technology and programming constructs clearly exist, yet Starfleet vessels continue to be manned by hundreds of people standing in front of consoles. Answer TOS-era, the Federation has a bad track record with AI: ...

When I was younger (lets go with probably about 20 years ago), I read a f/sf book that I've been looking for ever since, but I can't for the life of me rediscover it. It centers around a boy who is rescued from (I believe) a flood, by aliens, who take him to a sort of a domed colony, populated by other humans saved from disaster. The setting in this domed colony is more or less suburban, but there are robots that are considered caretakers, that keep it running, etc. (and actually, it turns out that the robots are the only ones left, and that their creators are not extant). Over the course of the book, the boy travels to similar domed colonies that house other alien species. In one, he comes across (this is a little fuzzy in my memory here) a fruit that enables transmogrification, which is used in an alien ritual of some sort. The only other detail I can recall is that at the climax of the book, this fruit is used to become one of the robots' creators, in order to break into...

According to canon, was there any off world fame to go along with Anakin's feats of building his own Podracer, being the only human to successfully Podrace, and being the the only human to win the Boonta Eve Classic? Answer Within the main (Disney) canon, there are no further mentions of the podrace. That being said, the official novelisation for Revenge of the Sith gives us some additional info about our Jedi heroes. Apparently they've become quite famous. It's certainly possible that this includes knowledge of Anakin's early racing prowess: Younglings across the galaxy know their names, know everything about them, follow their exploits as though they are sports heroes instead of warriors in a desperate battle to save civilization. Even grown-ups are not immune; it’s not uncommon for an exasperated parent to ask, when faced with offspring who have just tried to pull off one of the spectacularly dangerous bits of foolishness that are the stockin-trade of high-spirit...

The Weasley twins told Harry that the password to the map was: "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good". But how could THEY have known it? It's not exactly LOTR's Moria door with "12345" level of security—you do not have a plaintext password hint (or any). Answer JKR answered this in one of the interviews. AFAIR, the process in her mind was, quite surprisingly, not unlike real life hacking (you probe and poke around and change the attack based on system feedback to your trial-and-error attempts). From " MuggleNet and The Leaky Cauldron interview Joanne Kathleen Rowling " July 16, 2005: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince publication day Edinburgh, Scotland - Part Three. MA: How did they figure out how to work the map? JKR: Don't you - well. This is how I explained it to myself at the time, and this does sound glib. Don't you think it would be quite a Fred and Georgeish thing to say in jest, and then see this thing transform? MA: Y...

Minor ' A Dance with Dragons ' spoilers ahead. While crossing the Rhoyne, the Shy Maid encounters some trouble in the ruins of Chroyane. Just before the attack of the living slaves (to Greyscale), the Stone Men, something rather odd happens. 'The Bridge of Dream,' said Tyrion. 'Inconceivable,' said Haldon Halfmaester. 'We’ve left the bridge behind. Rivers only run one way' A Dance with Dragons, Tyrion V I haven't the foggiest what happened here. From my reading the Shy Maid ends up passing the Bridge of Dream twice, is it known how and why this happens? Answer This scene is a remnant of a larger chapter than GRRM excised from the book. It's meant to be spooky and confusing, and is almost certainly the result of magical interference. During the trip down the river, Tyrion thinks about a mysterious creature called The Shrouded Lord. In the novel, we never see this person, and Tyrion starts thinking of him as a symbolic representation of his fat...

In the TNG episode Descent , Data plays a game of poker on the Holodeck with Stephen Hawking (who played himself on the show), Albert Einstein, and Isaac Newton. Have there been any other cameo appearances by real-life people playing themselves in the Star Trek universe? Answer From: TvTropes "AsHimself" trope article Stephen Hawking appeared as a hologram of himself in Star Trek: The Next Generation. He played poker with Data, Sir Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein. Notably, he is the only person to play himself (or a simulacrum of himself) in any episode of Star Trek.

I know Wizards can't apparate where they want on the Earth, except if they are very powerful but what about a house-elf ? Their magic is different so I was wondering if they can apparate wherever they want or if they have a limit too.

In the Alien films the Xenomorphs presented have a very alien physiology. One of these features is acidic blood, much to the dismay of several characters in the film. Why would a creature benefit from having such acidic blood? Is it purely for defence or does it have another purpose? Answer A theory states that the acidity is there to provide a charge: or to quote: Essentially, the Alien is able to operate without otherwise essential functions because it does not possess them, deriving its energy instead from a powerful bio- electrical charge generated within its body by means of acidic reaction. The Alien's "blood" is, in fact, a component of a powerful biological "battery". from the Alien FUZION RPG conversion http://www.serenadawn.com/Alien-TheCollectedEssays.htm

I'm trying to keep this spoiler free-ish, just in case. Disregarding the prequel trilogy not holding many surprises when the saga is watched in release order (such as spoiling the major reveal in The Empire Strikes Back ), when taken in chronological order, is the viewer intended to know the true identity of Palpatine? I remember watching The Phantom Menace at release and it seemed the movie took pains to keep the characters separate. At the same time, it was obvious to me given the actor is the same in both trilogies. Incidentally, I think I can count on one hand the number of times in The Clone Wars that any hint was given as to Sidious' civilian alter ego. Is there word from Lucas that this was intentional? Answer Yes and no. The blurb on the back of the DVD cover certainly suggests that it wasn't a big secret... "Obi-Wan Kenobi, the wise old Jedi from the original series, is a determined young apprentice and Palpatine, well known as the evil Emperor, is an am...

Hogwarts was built a long time ago, and centaurs seem unlikely to suddenly turn up in a forest next to a wizard school when almost all of them despise wizards. Having established that the centaurs have (probably) always been there, why did the founders build Hogwarts right next to a host of hostile centaurs? It seems unlikely that the feud between centaurs and wizards (or at least general hostility) is a recent development. Answer There aren't really too many other places they could go. Centaurs, as magical creatures, need to live somewhere well away from Muggles so as not to break the International Statute of Secrecy. They are also fairly secretive creatures with no great love of witches and wizards either. The Forbidden Forest, which was isolated and impossible for Muggles to reach, really was a perfect location. Hogwarts exists partly to give a home to magical creatures like centaurs for whom a natural habitat would otherwise be hard to find. The grounds of Hogwarts function p...

I vaguely remember reading a young-adult book about a group of kids. The kids turned out to be aliens, and the one identifying mark they had was that their blood was silver (or something else)? I think the kids also have powers. I vaguely remember a cover that had a gaping mouth and something that looked like they were supposed to be sound waves coming from it. Does anyone know what this is? Answer Was it the Mindwarp series by Chris Archer? The main characters all have silver blood and super-powers, which manifest on their 13 birthday and lead to entertaining hijinks .

The only organised physical activity in the Harry Potter books seems to be the Quidditch Cup. The teams for that are very small (even assuming a reserve for every position, there only 14 players per house times 4 houses - that's not a lot of students). Aside from flying lessons with Madam Hooch, which seem to only happen in first year ( To what extent are flying lessons provided at Hogwarts? ) - is there any other activity for students who don't make it onto the Quidditch team? Do they just give up? Are training sessions provided by Madam Hooch to help people train for try-outs? Is there a B-league that's never shown? Do they play any other sports, or have PE lessons, or is running away from fellow students' curses considered sufficient exercise? I've read the books and never found any reference to non-Quidditch-Cup exercise, but perhaps there is something from an interview or Pottermore that touches on this - any suggestions? Answer The best example of a sport en...

Looking for the name of a book series I read in middle school, 2001-2004 roughly. All I can remember about it was that there were a handful of teenagers who somehow ended up on an alien planet that they eventually found out to be a ship. They have to fight for survival against multiple different enemies, I think one of the kids could communicate with part of the ship telepathically. Some of the aliens were either blue or I think even transparent. There really isn't too much to work off of, but I figured someone might know what it is.

What was the first science fiction story to mention that the Moon has a lower surface gravity than the Earth? I'm sure that was mentioned many times in science fiction before the Space Age began in 1957. Did the movie Destination Moon (1950) mention the lower lunar surface gravity? What about Heinlein's Rocket Ship Galileo (1947)? What about Maza of the Moon (1929,1930) by Otis Adelbert Kline? What about the children's fantasy Dr. Doolittle on the Moon (1928) by Hugh Lofting? What about The Moon Maid (1926) by Edgar Rice Burroughs, who did mention the lower surface gravity of Mars in A Princess of Mars (1912). What about The First men in the Moon (1900,1901) by H.G. Wells? What about From the Earth to the Moon (1865) by Jules Verne?

Are there either examples, or a mention of this having happened, of students permanently transferring from one magical school to another in Potterverse? Canon only please (books/JKR/Pottermore). Please note that I am only asking about transfers , e.g. you must already be studying in one school. Therefore an example of Malfoys considering sending Draco to Durmstrang is not in scope, since that happened before he attended Hogwarts. Also, guest-studying during Tri-Wizard doesn't count as it wasn't permanent. Also, if the answer is a "no", please provide evidence (other than "well I read the books before and I don't remember a single case like that", unless you have eidetic memory) from entire canon .

In her answer to another question , Slytherincess mentioned this from a chat with JK Rowling : From a web chat: Jaclyn: Did Lily ever have feelings back for Snape? J.K. Rowling: Yes. She might even have grown to love him romantically (she certainly loved him as a friend) if he had not loved Dark Magic so much , and been drawn to such loathesome people and acts. SOURCE: http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/2007/7/30/j-k-rowling-web-chat-transcript ... :) What is it that drew Snape so strongly to Dark Magic™ that JK says he loves it? The other dark wizard's seem to have a fixation on power, and merely use Dark Magic as a means to an end. Even their favouring purebloods is, in part a play for power over the 'less powerful' mudbloods. So why is/was Snape in love with Dark Magic? Answer JK Rowling has gone some way towards addressing this in an interview (emphasis mine): Nithya: Lily detested mulciber,averyif snape really loved her,why didnt he sacrifice their company for her ...

There is a story of a planet with no one in charge. Everyone just does favors or obligations for each other. What is it called?

As realized in the second half of A Storm of Swords and early in Season 4 of the TV series, Littlefinger conspires to kill Joffrey at his wedding to Margaery. Afterwards, he discusses this with Sansa: "Why should I wish him dead?" Littlefinger shrugged. "I had no motive ... Sometimes the best way to baffle [your foes] is to make moves that have no purpose, or even seem to work against you." But is Littlefinger being entirely truthful? Surely he had some motivation for the plot, beyond just confusing his opponents? Answer It's very hard to come up with why Littlefinger does anything, since he's very private with his true intentions. All we can come up with are a few guesses. As I see it, there are only two reasons Littlefinger might do anything: to advance his power and political position, and for pure personal reasons. Political Agenda Littlefinger lost the hand of the love of his life because his name had no power behind it, and ever since he has been wor...

The answer to my question “There were either twelve sexes or none.” explains that there were actually either five sexes or none. I remember being confused at the time how DNA (or similar genetic material) would work with multiple sexes, but where did the twelve come from? Is it possible that in the intervening years I mixed it up with twelve-stranded DNA-like genetic material from the Cheela on Dragon's Egg ? Answer There is no mention of twelve-stranded DNA in the book. Cheela biology is described in some technical detail: The cheela biophysicists would not determine the genetic coding mechanism for the cheela for dozens of generations, but when they did, both they and the humans would be surprised at how different it was. Because of the high temperatures on the neutron star that attempted to disrupt everything into random chaos, and the all-pervasive magnetic field that lined everything up along the magnetic field lines, the cheela genetic structure was a triply-redundant lin...

When Han mentions Kylo Ren to Leia, she openly professes her desire to try to get her son back. It seems likely that Leia would have more luck here than Han, since Kylo Ren shows a very strong disdain for his father. So why did she send Han off to confront Kylo, and not try to do so herself?

Apparently Klingons, or at least Worf, hate to bathe. Does this mean that Worf stinks to high heaven? Or do Klingons consider using the sonic shower/washing at the sink to be acceptable, whereas literal bathing in a tub is not? Answer Klingons do appear to possess an odour that some humans and aliens find offensive. In DS9: Trials and Tribble-ations , Darvin (unaware that Worf is Klingon) describes them as: " foul-smelling barbarians" Bashir and O'Brien defend him by reassuring him that he doesn't smell bad: O'BRIEN : Don't take it personally, Worf. BASHIR : I rather like the way you smell . O'BRIEN : Kind of a... peaty, earthy aroma . BASHIR : With just a touch of lilac. Soren certainly seems to finds lursa's breath quite unpleasant in 'Generations' The novelisation describes it in more detail : The aging ship groaned and shuddered unceasingly -- and stunk of warm, wet animal, making him long for the pristine, silent corridors of the ...

In The Watchmen movie, during the scene where The Comedian and Nite Owl are clearing a group of protesters the Nite Owl says: "What the hell happened to us, what happened to the American dream?" The comedian replies: "What happened to the American dream... It came true, You're looking at it" Can someone elaborate on this? What did he mean? Answer Essentially, it's an expression of his nihilism. We tend to think of the "American Dream" in terms of helping others, supporting Truth, Justice, and the American way. But fears such as the Cold War mean that the majority of citizens support the government in squashing those who speak against the current regime. To borrow one explanation of the quote : The unintended consequence of liberty is that eventually society becomes so free that even the slightest infringement on liberty is seen as an aggregious (sic) affront to freedom. Machiavelli knew that the only way one could avoid civil unrest entirely wa...

In light of the comments discussions for " Data being intimate with Tasha Yar - why was Data built with this capability? " involving Captain Picard and Borg Queen, a question popped into my mind: Do Borg even have sexual reproduction ? Answer According to Seven of Nine in Voyager "Revulsion", Borg reproduce by assimilation only - likely due to efficiency reasons. As Borg, we had no need for seduction, no time for single-cell fertilization. We saw a species we wanted, and we assimilated it. Ref: Memory Alpha, Borg - Sexual Reproduction

I can remember this story's plot very vividly, but not the author or title. I read it in an American, English-language paperback anthology with an extraterrestrial theme, in the very late 80's or early-mid 90's, but the story itself may be older. I don't think it was too much older, though, because some of the science in it seems modern. The story begins with a small group of human colonists who have settled a new planet. Previous surveys of the planet show there are very few large mammals, only rat-like creatures locally and deer-like creatures that live further away, and the colony's biologist suspects there was a recent environmental catastrophe that caused mass extinctions. The colonists plant their crops, but the fields are ravaged by a digging rabbit-like animal that showed up nowhere on the surveys. The biologist doesn't have an explanation, but agrees to decant the dog embryos and force-grow them to adulthood. This seems to work for a while, the dogs gua...

All of the ships seem to have offensive/defensive capabilities as secondary considerations. The galaxy seems to be loaded with fearsome enemies and the promise of even more powerful adversaries yet to be encountered. When a single Borg ship can wipe out an entire Federation fleet, I would expect the Federation to come up with a Battleship or Ship-Of-The-Line capable of delivering devastating firepower and multiple independent shield generators as defense. Something similar to the ship that the Dowd Kevin Uxbridge created in TNG 'The Survivors'. (The 'Husnock' ship fires) WORF: Shields down! Captain, they hit us with four hundred gigawatts of particle energy! PICARD: Damage? WORF: Superficial -- but I am having trouble reassembling the shields! (The Husnock ship fires again) WORF: Shields down! There is thermal damage to the hull! DATA: The warship is in possession of enormous energy reserves. It is capable of striking us with far more powerful bursts. WESLEY: They'r...

In her third year at Hogwarts, Hermione is given a time-turner so she can take more classes. Several of her classes are concurrent to each other, so she attends one class (for 1-2 hours) goes back in time, and attends a different class during the same time frame. But from an aging point of view, she should age 4 hours in relation to the 2 hours everyone else ages. How much older should Hermione be relative to everyone else after using the time-turner for an entire school year? Answer For those of you who aren't going to make it to the end of this post, it comes out to a week (plus half a day). It is not certain whether wizards using time turners "age" faster, but for the sake of the question let's assume so and see if we can quantify somewhat. According to the Harry Potter Wiki , there are 12 classes she could have been taking (7 core, 5 elective), and she signed up for all of them (Chamber of Secrets, first American edition, p.252). Assume she was allowed to take a...

Originally he was seen as a Lieutenant (2 full pips) but later he doesn't have any is referred to as an NCO with the rank of Chief Petty Officer (TNG s4 and DS9) So it wasn't because of his transfer because s4 of TNG already refers to him as Chief Petty Officer.

In the film The Matrix , why can't Morpheus, Trinity, etc. behave like the agents as Neo does? If they all knew the Matrix was not real, and Morpheus was the one who asked Neo to free his mind, why can't they free themselves like Neo does?

I've been searching the net in vain for a long time now and got nowhere, well until I found this site. Here is to hoping you can help me. Back when I was in Secondary school (UK) in the early 1990's I borrowed from the school library a fantasy style book. Now sadly I cannot remember much about it other than it had your typical "assembled group" of young boy/hero, a warrior, a magician etc etc. All I can remember of the book was when they fight the main villain/antagonist at the end the fight is desperate and the hero seems to think that his magician friend has been killed yet notices his hand twitching. Then a Demi-God appears who was summoned by the magician who was actually carving runes with his hand on the floor of the battle area. I may be remembering wrong but I think the magician had a twin brother, the boy had/met a girl companion with a possible romantic link developing. They travel to the enemies castle/cave/domain and attempt to battle him and as said the m...

In the first Harry Potter book, Molly is seen asking her children "what platform number is it again?" Heart hammering, Harry pushed his trolley after them. They stopped and so did he, just near enough to hear what they were saying. 'Now, what's the platform number?' said the boys' mother. 'Nine and three-quarters!' piped a small girl, also red-headed, who was holding her hand. 'Mum, can't I go...' 'You're not old enough, Ginny, now be quiet. All right, Percy, you go first.' (Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Chapter Six, "The Journey from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters") Why didn't she remember on her own? She would have been bringing kids there for the past 10 or so years, not to mention her own years at Hogwarts. Answer The way it’s described in the books makes it sound like it was just a question for Ginny to answer: “Now, what’s the platform number?” said the boys’ mother. “Nine and three-quarte...

The setting is a colony world, with intense volcanic activity and enormous lava pressures outside... magma flooding the underground city is a real threat, with magma-proof-doors between different sections of the city. The plot: the book opens with the central character in some kind of coffin-sized burrowing machine, making its way through kilometres of solid rock in search of something. This job is some kind of punishment. Later they find an old spaceship entombed in the solidified lava, and a hand-held particle weapon. The colony world may be named "Fury"? And there is another much nicer colony world later in the book, perhaps named "Haven"? There is a central library on Fury, which is being edited by the bad guys to obscure the true history of the colony. Towards the end of the book we find out that a televangelist controls the lovely green world of Haven, is arranging the deletions from the Library, and arranged for his colony ship to land on Haven while all the ...

I have seem plenty of questions and posts about how could Superman (with all his powers) deal with XYZ , more or less having his Superpowers in the way of everyday routine for a normal human. Probably one of the most famous would be "Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex" which explains the problems Superman, due to his biology and superpowers, would face in a situation where one (mostly) loses control of processes that are not completely controllable take place. If I recall correctly, this is even explicitly mentioned in Superman Earth One . Anyone in care of a baby or toddler knows that at times babies or toddlers can be quite physical. At least, they are very physically demanding for parents! They are not yet able to communicate effectively, and thus their frustration may manifest not only by screaming, but by more physical behavior when they are upset (which can be quite often, even if it is for short periods of time). They might mistreat their toys, throw stuff away, resist to...

At the end of the Avengers: Endgame movie, old Steve Rogers passed down his mantle of Captain America to Sam Wilson. Why didn't he choose Bucky for this? Bucky seems more fit for the job as he is a super soldier. Answer Joe Russo explains it in the following interview. "It made sense that it was Sam," Joe Russo said. "I don't think that there were significant debates at all. Bucky is portrayed in the films as very damaged, and not necessarily the guy that you would want to trust with another weapon because he can always be corrupted. And Sam, if anyone matches Cap's integrity over the course of the last few films, it's Sam. From the time that they met on the mall in D.C. through the end of this film, and he just seemed like the logical choice in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. We don't have all of the context that the comics have, we can only bring completion to the stories that we've been telling and that seemed to make the most sense." Co...

This is basically all Revenge of the Sith spoilers, so read on at your own peril. The second to last scene of Revenge of the Sith features Darth Vader and the Emperor overseeing the construction of the first Death Star. Several things imply this takes place some time after the film's main narrative. The Star Destroyers have been remodeled. The Republic Navy has transitioned into the Imperial Navy and the officers have received new uniforms. Vader has gotten used to his armor and the Imperial officers have gotten used to Vader. How much time has passed? Edit: Some people are claiming my question is a duplicate of this one . However, all the linked question's answers state is that the Death Star was in construction during the Clone Wars. They do not mention any of the clues that this scene takes place at a later date, nor do they state when the scene actually takes place. Answer According to the film's junior novelisation , it appears to have been within a few days of ...

I was reading about Jedi mind tricks and am curious to know what happens to the mind of the subject afterward. On Wookieepedia it says: Should the trick succeed, he or she then agreed to whatever was being said to them without being able to think for themselves. Moments later, they would feel puzzled about their new opinion, but usually didn't feel like changing it back. So if a Jedi was to, say, trick someone into giving the Jedi money (or whatever), would the person later just think to himself, "I gave that Jedi 10 grand but whatever"? Of course we're ignoring the fact that Jedi shouldn't use these things for personal gain (and that they don't use USD). Answer The beauty of a mind trick is that the recipient is not aware of being tricked. Anyway, it wouldn't work otherwise. They think their change of mind is genuine and don't feel the need to re-question it. A example is Elan Sel'Sabagno , the drug dealer Obi-Wan mind-tricked to "go home a...

In Star Trek, it seems like they take forever to build ships. It takes months, if not years to make them. So why not just build gigantic replicators in space, then replicate the ship (excepting non-replicatable objects like the warp core)? This would presumably come with a huge energy cost, but would save massive amounts of time. Answer With regards whole ship replication, there are notes in the Next Generation Technical Manual . It states that replication of an entire ship would take too many resources/too much energy. The behind-screen notes say this is for dramatic effect as the viewer would care too little for the fate of the ship if they can just replicate a new one in minutes. From Construction Chronology (P17): Given the existence of matter replication devices (like the show's "food replicator" terminals), a very logical question is: "Why can't they just replicate entire starships?" The real reason is that such an ability would allow us to create en...

We know that Dumbledore knew about Horcruxes at least as early as Harry's parents' deaths (he stated to Snape that Voldemort would be back). And in Harry's 6th year, he knew that there were 7 for sure, from real Slughorn memory. At which point did he find out or at least have a good guess that there were >1? Answer Dumbledore had a good guess during Harry's second year, and confirmation, apparently, during Harry's fifth year that he was on the right track: Rosi: What does ‘in essence divided' mean? J.K. Rowling: Dumbledore suspected that the snake’s essence was divided – that it contained part of Voldemort’s soul, and that was why it was so very adept at doing his bidding. J.K. Rowling: This also explained why Harry, the last and unintended Horcrux, could see so clearly through the snake’s eyes, just as he regularly sees through Voldemort’s. J.K. Rowling: Dumbledore is thinking aloud here, edging towards the truth with the help of the Pensieve . LEAKY CA...

A someone who frequented King's Cross a great deal for commuting, one things always struck me as odd: Platforms 9 through 11 do not have the large pillars shown in the movie that is used for access to 9¾. Here's a picture of Platform 9: Did Rowling write the book having never seen the platforms themselves? Answer I don’t know if she’d seen them before, but the platforms don’t make sense because she mixed it up with Euston station. Interestingly, in an interview with the BBC in 2001 JK Rowling admits confusing Euston station with Kings Cross Station. “I wrote Platform 9 3/4 when I was living in Manchester, and I wrongly visualised the platforms, and I was actually thinking of Euston, so anyone who's actually been to the real platforms 9 and 10 in King's Cross will realise they don't bear a great resemblance to the platforms 9 and 10 as described in the book. So that's just me coming clean, there. I was in Manchester; I couldn't check.” In fact, even at Eust...

Just after Captain America's shield was introduced in Captain America: The First Avenger , Peggy Carter shot few bullets at it which created few minor distortions on it. [embedded content] From Adamantium page of Marvel.Wikia, Proto-Adamantium This is the original Adamantium created by Dr. MacLain. Proto-Adamantium is the official name for the metal that makes up Captain America's Shield . It has never been recreated and is the absolute most invulnerable item in all of existence . From Captain America's Shield page of Marvel.Wikia: The true shield was once slightly dented by an enraged Odinforce empowered Thor, using Mjolnir, but he later reconciled and pounded out the small dent. How were few bullets able to dent Captain America's shield then?

Did many of the Jedi fall to the dark side during the clone wars? As most of the Jedi didn't go on a lot of missions before the war. Then being thrusted into nonstop conflict, leading clones armies, befriending them and then watching them die.

A number of questions were raised in a discussion about Post Crisis Superman... We were wondering if he could destroy the Earth with his Heat Vision and it came to my attention that in one issue He was 200,000 miles in space away from the Earth and used Heat vision to instantly raise the temperature of the entire planet by several degrees (Even the back side that was untouched by the heat vision). The beam was large enough to cover the entire surface of the side of the planet that was facing him... So My question is this ... Can Post Crisis (Or New 52) Superman Destroy a planet with Heat Vision and are there any other instances that might suggest that he can? (It's actually pretty easy to find the illustration of this feat if you Google "Superman Heat Vision" BTW)

In the Deathly Hallows: "No, he's not dead," said McGonagall bitterly. "Unlike Dumbledore, he was still carrying a wand...and he seems to have learned a few tricks from his master." With a tinge of horror, Harry saw in the distance a huge, batlike shape flying through the darkness toward the perimeter wall. (DH pg 599/482) In the Goblet of Fire: “Maybe he didn’t want you to get there!” said Ron quickly. “Maybe - hang on - how fast d’you reckon he could’ve gotten down to the forest? D’you reckon he could’ve beaten you and Dumbledore there?” “Not unless he can turn himself into a bat or something,” said Harry. “Wouldn’t put it past him,” Ron muttered. So I always assumed Snape transformed into a bat when he jumped. Then I saw on this site and wikia that many people think he could fly like Voldemort. My question is: is there canonical proof that Snape could fly without metamorphosis?