Just read something that made me rethink my whole story idea

Dakota Ellis · 2026-03-12T12:10:07.395625+00:00

Was researching for a sci-fi prompt about a lost colony. Found a study from the University of Chicago. It said a generation ship would need at least 98 people to survive a 6,300-year trip. That's way smaller than I thought. It changes the whole dynamic of isolation I was going for. Anyone else have a fact that totally flipped their plot?

jordanhill7mo ago

Ran into the same thing with a submarine story. Ended up leaning harder into the social pressure cooker angle, which worked better anyway.

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betty_butler737mo ago

Honestly, the inbreeding math would be brutal.

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caleb_thomas857mo ago

My fantasy novel's logistics fell apart when I looked up how much a dragon would actually need to eat. The math was not on my side!

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