Creature Science explained

Odin

Odin

Carbon Dated and Proud
Admin
In the thread where I earlier reported about the Fallout science explained, JE posted a follow up when asked about the FEV mutations<blockquote>4 TIMES THE HELIXES = 4 TIMES THE ENZYMES.

You're trying to make sense of a virus that takes adult humans and does the following:

* Causes effectively instant gigantism. The entire skeleton, nervous system, all musculature, the cardiovascular system, digestive system... it all grows in such a way that height of the victim is increased to 150% of the original size and the overall volume is dramatically increased... but the body is still perfectly functional.
* Causes the victim's skin to become extraordinarily thick and resilient while reducing their ability to effectively perspirate. Total body volume increases at a faster rate than skin surface area. This is as true of super mutants as oranges.

The first is seriously implausible, and the second would "realistically" result in super mutants having heat strokes while they attempt to take over southern California. We overlook these things because super mutants would become pretty yawn-a-riffic if they were regular-sized or had to "rest" after a few rounds of fighting.

You can apply this to almost any of the weird creatures in Fallout. Even giant ants. An ant the size of a dog, with typical ant anatomy, wouldn't be able to function very well. We overlook this because giant ants and insects of all kinds are classic threats of 50s sci-fi.</blockquote>Not much to say about his except, Righto somthings shouldn't be explained..
Link: Thread on the IPLY boards
 
I agree, but I like "fake science". I like reading up about FEV in FO1 and FO2 and thinking "I don't know squat about biology or any of this other shit but that sounds real", regardless of whether it is or not. Things like RNA / DNA, half-cells potentially causing issues with reproduction etc...

JE is right, we don't need everything OMG perfect out of the science books, but just as long as there's some "kinda real sounding" explanation, then I'm happy. If however, they fall down to "This thingy here has some science stuff that just works cause it does" like FOBOS, then they can die. They can all die. Horribly even.
 
Was this really necessary for Bishop to point out, or was there yet again some inbred streak of piss on the IPLY forums that didn't know that Fallout's "science" is from a 50's sci-fi perspective?

EDIT: Dear god, there's some stupid people there. Eldar just won the "I just made myself look like a complete moron with this post" award.

With just a couple of seconds, they could have avoided looking like a idiot by checking Merriam-Webster or a number of other sources. Fora is the original latin usage for the plural of forum, originating from "foras", out of doors discussion locales. It is still observed and used in such a manner, considered to be a form of "proper" English, if you will. It is only the "accepted" form according to Eldar, likely because it is the most commonly recognized form by the...shall we say..."uneducated masses" across the Internet, more towards a vernacular structure since it's the common American dialect of English blunder of just adding an "s" to the end of a word for pluralization that is the real problem here. On that note, the proper form for helix plural is indeed "helices" and I share Bishop's amusement at "vertice" and "formulas". I especially like "vertice", since it follows the "American S Rule", but in reverse in taking a plural form and just removing the "s".

And people wonder why I don't regularly visit the moron magnet that is the IPLY fora... The idiots tend to aruge any old point without bothering to do the least bit of research.

"Look, mom! I can make words appear on this web site! Isn't that just COOL?!"

(On that note, I don't give a shit about comma rules with quotation marks since they look generally atrocious when having a quoted item and having to put the comma into it rather than following what should be a logical structure. It all reflects from the fact that when using quotation marks as an example, it really isn't anyone speaking. It must be the programmer in me. :))
 
Regional Dialect

Regional Dialect

Do you think there's something in the water, or tail (*) chasing part of the pervasive "group think"?

(*The wagging, fly swatting, appendage, most commonly "a tributary" to quadrupeds and arboreal apes. No M 17 content implied or intended, but feel free to ''brown bag'' your own spirits of association. )

4too
 
Um, I read and write Latin. More importantly, I read and write Attic Greek. Still more important is that I actually did make sure of my statement by checking M-W online beforehand.

The point isn't where we get the word. The point is that its accepted use is often quite different from its original use. In fact, while the majority of our words are derived from Greek or Latin, the meanings are often quite different.

*Eldar shaking his head in wonder*

Okay, now that I've had time to cool off, let me cut out my angry response for one a little less volatile. I was actually just giving Sawyer a hard time. I do that from time to time. It's true that I have usually used fora as a plural for forum. Still, I do tend to use forum and forums interchangeably. I've just learned that the language will change whether we rail against it or not. We're actually pretty lucky that English hasn't changed faster over the years.

The thing is, I just can't understand making such a broad assumption based on that post. Unless, of course, you thought I was being nasty to Sawyer. If I were, don't you think he's capable of defending himself? I took the fact that he didn't say anything about it to be a sign that he understood I was just goofing around.

Anyhow, I like this site and it wouldn't be very sporting of me to play reasonable at the Iplay boards and then come here and flame the administrator over a misunderstanding. I beg pardon.
 
Eldar said:
I was actually just giving Sawyer a hard time. I do that from time to time.
Click to expand...

Ah, I was going along the same lines, but I think I overdid it. ;) I was parodying a couple of the more pedantic there on the IPLY forums, but with a little of my own style thrown in.

Hey, I use "forums" most of the time, too. That way most of the internet trash can understand me, even if I have to work to understand some of their rather...unintelligible writings sometimes.
 
Yep, i use forums too at least while posting news, with time i understood that not only the english speaking viewers understood it better in general, don`t know why, but many guys from other languages were also more used to it.


And Eldar you do know Rosh started going to the Iplay boards a long time ago, long before you did right? But times have changed, now he feels he needs to stay away from there, like many, and that`s where i get in, trying to build bridges, showing what happens in there to the NMA visitors and regular posters and giving a bit of the input from this side, with a few alternative views from here.

Still Magena told me she still misses Rosh
 
Good God, you guys score off me all the time. :D *Eldar grins wryly and looks to see if anyone else saw him acting foolish* I can't believe how often that happens. Ugh. I've got to get over myself around here before I become the laughing stock of the NMA forums. Of course, that presumes I'm not the laughing stock now. hehehe.

So much for being the even headed type.

As far as getting folks to return to the Interplay boards, I'm for it. I think we could use more people with strong views. Well, maybe people with strong views and good arguments?

I have to say that this has quickly become my favorite board after Iplay. I used to go to Missy's but it's more of an off topic board. It's a great place, but I'm more for the RPG aspect.

I didn't say much about the science in that thread simply because I'm just not smart enough to know much about science. I like playing the science guy, but I couldn't explain a damned thing. I like the idea of keeping the science real, but not killing the story over it.
 
Eheheheh no you`re not. Missys place has been down many times in the last days isn`t it? Or is it from my side?


Edit: Everything ok regarding the fires at your area?

Edit2: You may think it`s a good idea, but Herve doesn`t, so i guess he wins...
 
I think you're better off fighting over different views than having a two minute discussion in which everyone agrees.

As for the fires, heh. They've burned down. All of our smoke went into the Arizona and Nevada. Ha ha ha. Now they hate us because they had to live with smoke. It was ugly, but now it's over. over 3,000 homes burned, 20 folks dead, hundreds of thousands of acres destroyed, and billions of dollars. Welcome to the golden state. :mrgreen:

Finally, as for Herve, he's such a remote fellow. I don't have the background to second guess him. I'm just hoping that Interplay sticks around long enough to get Fallout 3 out the door.

BTW Roshambo: I do feel like the horses ass. There's nothing worse than someone who can't take a joke. Worse yet, I've completely derailed this thread. :( Dammit.
 
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