Sometimes A Great Notion (411)

[BobBot]

Then as a medical physicist you know that the radiation it takes to kill a human being is much less than what it takes to kill off simpler organisms such as plants and especially bacteria. People are easy to kill. That's why you have a job.

And the greatest biomass on earth is actually bacteria- in the soil. Where it's shielded from radiation- and this blast didn't even kill off all the plants on the surface.

I should point out that medical physicists involved in radiation use it to save life and diagnose (and treat) pathology. Irradiating a population does kill a certain percentage, and it's up to doctors/dentists etc to decide if someone should be irradiated.

The soil wouldn't necessarily be an effective near-surface shield from radiation though, as the gamma rays in the initial blast would penetrate into the soil (many factors are involved in how the depth/dose curve would appear). More importantly though is the fallout. That is, any radioactive material that is not consumed in the nuclear blast is scattered over a wide are. This falls to the ground (for example, in rain) and is incorporated into soil, rivers etc. How much radiation is scattered this way depends on the type, efficiency and the elemental isotopes (and their mass) of the bombs.

Again, we don't know the conditions the bones were exposed to, but it is reasonable to assume that they were kept cold, possibly even frozen. This is because nuclear holocaust could have triggered a mini ice age as the dust from explosions blocks out the sun and increases planetary albedo. And the cast are all seen wearing jackets.

[Matt G]

1. The moment when everyone was waiting for Roslin to say something. Ouch!

2. I did actually laugh when Dee shot herself, it just didn't register that she's commited suicide.

3. Everyone's fracked in the head here.

4. Best guess says the original Kara travelled back in time 2000 years and that her appearance somehow changed history, making her a thirteenth Cylon. Fact is, we've never had a clue what sort of time period BSG is set in Earthwise.

5. Ellen if the the final Cylon.

OK, theory at this point. At some point in our future, humanity gets caught up in a massive war. Five humans were able to avoid the fate of the rest of humanity and were able to ressurect themselves into artificial bodies.

They're not the final Five, they're the first Five!

That's all I can come up with at the moment.

[Skydiver]

what if....when she fell into that planet starbuck went back in time and her appearance is what triggered the war?

[Jeffala]

what if....when she fell into that planet starbuck went back in time and her appearance is what triggered the war?

I wonder if her beacon would still transmit after that long of a time.


(It's possible, I guess. The beacon that carried the disease that killed the Cylons was still transmitting after at least "a couple hundred years" and as many as 3,000+ years.)

[ToasterOnFire]

I could have sworn someone involved in BSG said that the show would not use many of the elements so typical in SF - no aliens, no time travel, no AUs.

I may be thinking of EJO's comment (joke?) that he would leave the show if they ever started doing the above, but I thought a PTB also confirmed that.

[rarocks24]

I could have sworn someone involved in BSG said that the show would not use many of the elements so typical in SF - no aliens, no time travel, no AUs.

I may be thinking of EJO's comment (joke?) that he would leave the show if they ever started doing the above, but I thought a PTB also confirmed that.

Doesn't matter. The show was ending. They could do whatever.

[Wayston]

the bones weren't necessarily on the surface for 2000 years, they could have dug them up and then you see them exposed in the scene...

[Skydiver]

i remember that they were buried, but even buried, bones decay, just slower than they do when exposed to wind and rain

[Jeffala]

I guess the easiest way to explain this away is to say that human-form Cylons don't decay at the same rate as regular humans.

[ha'tak_]

I must say I did not like the episode

[peragrin]

I could have sworn someone involved in BSG said that the show would not use many of the elements so typical in SF - no aliens, no time travel, no AUs.

I may be thinking of EJO's comment (joke?) that he would leave the show if they ever started doing the above, but I thought a PTB also confirmed that.

EJO's comment was if he ever sees someone in a rubber costume he is leaving.

So far no rubber aliens. Time travel is also a probably no no. Besides BSG rarely focuses on the tech, So if they figure out that Kara got shot through a wormhole, was reborn and shot back to the nebula in a different wormhole where at a different rate of time, it will be a one line event maybe two and it's over.

in fact it will take less time than you spent reading the previous paragraph.

[avidffan]

heres my thoughts on this episode

theyre both random what if ideas

1. extinct humans created the cylons then they became the only form of life in the bsg universe
and they created the humans as a way to evole having reached the limits of technology
and were betrayed by them
the 13th tribe is really the frist tribe
and all the mystery was to keep the 12 tribes from ever learning the truth
that cylons created them

2. "happened before and will happen again" is a reference to the ancient cylon/human plan to perfect the two races into one ultimate being
and much like the matrix when things dont work out the cylons destroy the humans saving only genetic material to repopulate some other system with them and restart the whole thing over and over again
the 12 models being copies of the origianl 12 cylons and humans who came up with the plan
5 being the next step along their path
7 being one step below the 5
so everytime it begins again the cylons have evolved a little bit more
remeber machines do literally have forever to get it right

just a couple of really random thoughts

and on a side note
can the loop ever start again since ty killed helen
or will this be the final time and the end of the bsg univers for good?

[HAL2100]

1. Regardless of the story or genre, there always has to be certain degree of suspension of disbelief on the audiences part. Why can't 90% of the posters here just accept that the scenes depicted represent a war-torn world devastated by a nuclear war 2000 years after the event? Why can't they be taken at face-value as depicted without dissecting them down to minutiae?

2. As to Starbuck, who the hell knows? The facts are...
- She was somehow transported from the nebula to Earth
- She was familiar with the supernova due to some intervention by someone.

I personally think that within the 13th Colony there were no '12' models. They all had a variety of shapes, sizes, skin colors and whatnot as demonstrated by the flashbacks. With that I still think that Starbuck is a 13th model that the original 7 were never programmed to know about in keeping with the coincidence that there are 12 Colonies and 12 Cylons, which isn't correct because there are 13 Colonies.

[HAL2100]

It may very well be that the powers that be (those responsible for sending the five to the colonies) were striving to 'perfect' humanity by crossing man and machine and that their attempts keep ending in failure.

Keep in mind that Hera (and by default Tyrol's child) have been described as the shape of things to come.

Maybe the 13th tribe was looking for a practical means to immortality by crossing man and machine in such a way that a person's consciousness could be downloaded into a new body.

Assuming that everything originated at Kobol, its possible that a rift developed between the 12 tribes and the 13th which resulted in everyone leaving Kobol and the 13th going their own way. The 13th managed to cross man and machine and down the road realized the consequences and sent the Five back in an attempt to save all that the 13 tribe had been.

[treefrog]

Starbuck cannot be a cylon, cylon-hybrid, or any part-cylon or it would be highly inconsistent with the storyline up to now. My vote is that Starbuck is a clone of herself. Remember when she was on Caprica and had some surgical procedure done. . .

Starbuck crashlands, and a new Starbuck emerges in a new Viper -- conveniently with no recollection of getting there or coming back. The question becomes who is pulling the strings, leading the humans around and creating these events? Has to be a Cylon splinter cell or some higher order of Cylon (perhaps the original 12 Cylons/charters of the 12 colonies, as I kinda dig that idea.) I believe it is Cylon driven. Remember, . . . "They Have a Plan."

I am still waiting on how they work in the hybrid children . . .

I agree that the writers will not ruin a good show now with wormholes and time travel.

I waiting on pins and needles. . . . .