Outcast Plothole? (or future spoiler? )

[ciannwn]

EDIT: And those news articles you quoted are unfortunately wrong in many details, as are most articles about anything to do with space. I wish they hired reporters who had at least a basic idea about the field they were writing about. I'm not asking for doctorates here. Just some basic knowledge.

The first article I quoted came from the 'Windows to the Universe' website. The 'About Us' page says at the bottom -

About Windows To The Universe

University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR).

The site staff includes a number of scientists with the title of Dr. One is a specialist in the physics of comet interiors and evolution. Another 'has been active in space plasma physics and aeronomy concentrating on processes that couple the atmosphere and ionosphe with near-Earth space. (Pardon?) As one of the site's purposes is to be a teaching resource for schools I hope they know what they're talking about.

The quote I used mentioned Uganda. As the BBC news article was about an Ugandan woman's back garden I thought they might possibly be related.

[RepliVeggie]

I don't remember where I heard it but I was pretty sure it was mentioned that the Asurans couldn't replicate. If they could why don't they just make their ships and cities out of nanites that would be invulnerable?

I am going to have to do some digging. (Never mind I remember now. Them not making ships out of nanites just makes no sense now. They should know they would be unstoppable.)



Also about reentry. I thought it was basically how fast reentry is. The faster you are going the more friction. Just burning up on reentry.

[PG15]

They make their ships the normal way as that's what the Lantians once did, and they like copying their parents.

[RepliVeggie]

They make their ships the normal way as that's what the Lantians once did, and they like copying their parents.

If that's the case. Let's hope Weir's knowledge doesn't lead her faction to create nanites based ships.

[Liam Kincaid]

If that's the case. Let's hope Weir's knowledge doesn't lead her faction to create nanites based ships.

You mean like Fifth and Carter ( a nanite based "ship" ) ?

[MechaThor]

Asurans can't replicate either. It just made no sense that the bullets harmed him. No sense that Ronons energy gun harmed him too.

No the Asurans can replicate, and yes weapons would hurt the Earth Replicator! Hell Ronons gun, still affects the Aurans, but not as much!

This Earth Rep however has programmed NOT TO REPLICATE, Hence why when he got hit by bullets his skin did not re-heal into human like flesh, instead it stayed as metal.

Did not not listern to the characters?

[mizzoueng]

No the Asurans can replicate, and yes weapons would hurt the Earth Replicator! Hell Ronons gun, still affects the Aurans, but not as much!

This Earth Rep however has programmed NOT TO REPLICATE, Hence why when he got hit by bullets his skin did not re-heal into human like flesh, instead it stayed as metal.

Did not not listern to the characters?

Okay, watch any old episode with us shooting at a human form replicator (HFR). Our bullets PASS THROUGH. They do NOT impact, blast off a chunk, and then replicate to heal the wound.

Nanites are molecular sized machines that can control their distances between each other on that level. HFR's could control the density of their bodies to either be very sand-like (hence bullets pass through) or very very dense (RepliCarters sword arm). This has NOTHING to do with replicating, just management of nanite location.

The explanation of "he can't replicate" does NOT explain why we could damage him with shotguns. If they would have said "he cannot control the nanites, he functions have been limited to just walking and talking" then it would have been plausable, but it was obvious he could control the nanite functions as he was able to adjust the frequency of the nanites so he wasn't trackable.

If he was able to do this (as was Ava since she never showed up on the sensor), then he should have been able to adjust the molecular bonds between the nanites.

Is it a plothole? Possibly, I just think it was a F*&^ up. The producers and editors should know that there is this thing called Wikipedia and the Omnipedia, they could easily go on there and refresh their memory about the HRF's to see exactly how this "explanation" would work and see if it would be plausable.

I know someone will say "its just a show", but if the show does not follow its written history, then whats to stop them from saying "oh, lets say the wraith really don't need to feed on humans, lets show them cooking a space cow and having t-bones, we'll just say that the retrovirus spread through the gate network when an infected wraith got shot going through the wormhole".

[Alipeeps]

The replicator should have been able to turn the "silver spots" back to flesh colored.

Another point to bear in mind here is that, unlike the Asurans, the replicator's clothes weren't made of nanites; his body was nanites but he wore standard clothes... therefore he couldn't "heal" the holes in his clothes where the shot hit him. And pretty much if you're running for your life and getting shot the cr*p out of, probably the last thing on your mind is making sure the bits of your body underneath the holes in your clothes are flesh-coloured as opposed to silver.

I thought I remembered seeing someone taking pictures of Shep and Ronon when they pulled up to Jeannie's house during the episode Miller's Crossing.

They were. That's the whole point - Wallace kidnapped Jeannie to force Rodney to come back to Earth to look for her, so Wallace's mean were watching Jeannie's house when Rodney and Sheppard and Ronon arrived. And Ava, working for a subsidiary of Wallace's company, obviously managed to access those photos taken by Wallace's people.

The point here, as made before, is that this replicator behaves differently from the Asurans or Fifth's human form replicators because he is different. He has been created in a lab from scratch by people who have no knowledge of either the Asurans or Fifth's human form replicators and how they function - they've programmed him and his abilities themselves from scratch. He's something brand new, pretty much the only thing he has in common with other human form replicators is that he's made from nanites.

[wise one]

If that's the case. Let's hope Weir's knowledge doesn't lead her faction to create nanites based ships.

i think they would know much more than that like the fact of ascended beings making contact with her and the ori and replicators

they should really take that onboard and then they can take over the galaxy

[MechaThor]

Okay, watch any old episode with us shooting at a human form replicator (HFR). Our bullets PASS THROUGH. They do NOT impact, blast off a chunk, and then replicate to heal the wound.

Nanites are molecular sized machines that can control their distances between each other on that level. HFR's could control the density of their bodies to either be very sand-like (hence bullets pass through) or very very dense (RepliCarters sword arm). This has NOTHING to do with replicating, just management of nanite location.

The explanation of "he can't replicate" does NOT explain why we could damage him with shotguns. If they would have said "he cannot control the nanites, he functions have been limited to just walking and talking" then it would have been plausable, but it was obvious he could control the nanite functions as he was able to adjust the frequency of the nanites so he wasn't trackable.

If he was able to do this (as was Ava since she never showed up on the sensor), then he should have been able to adjust the molecular bonds between the nanites.

Is it a plothole? Possibly, I just think it was a F*&^ up. The producers and editors should know that there is this thing called Wikipedia and the Omnipedia, they could easily go on there and refresh their memory about the HRF's to see exactly how this "explanation" would work and see if it would be plausable.

I know someone will say "its just a show", but if the show does not follow its written history, then whats to stop them from saying "oh, lets say the wraith really don't need to feed on humans, lets show them cooking a space cow and having t-bones, we'll just say that the retrovirus spread through the gate network when an infected wraith got shot going through the wormhole".

In "Progeny" our bullets and Ronans gun affected the Asurans (only sligthly, but it still hurt them) It was the MW human forms which took 0 damaged from our guns.

As for your comparing the Nanatis to sand, Heres the think. If you shoot sand a bullet will go through (depending of the thickness, otherwise sandbags would be a rubbish defence)
When you shoot sand (nanties) some sand gets sprayed out of the impact point, while some of the sand (nanties) would get damged as the bullet passes through the replicator, Which is why the replicator was left with metal scars, where the bullets ripped through him, disrupting the nanaties and damging some, then since he cannot replicate and heal the wound, it just stayed as a metal scar.

Also changing the frequency of your nanatis is one thing, but controlling them to replicate and heal is another. Also as they said, he CANNOt replicate, they said nothing about the fact he can't change his nanties to avoid sensors, His makers most likly left that function in to help hide him.
If you disable your computers Firewall, then your computer gets attacked by a virus, your computer won't activate its firewall again by itself!

[Mitchell82]

In "Progeny" our bullets and Ronans gun affected the Asurans (only sligthly, but it still hurt them) It was the MW human forms which took 0 damaged from our guns.

As for your comparing the Nanatis to sand, Heres the think. If you shoot sand a bullet will go through (depending of the thickness, otherwise sandbags would be a rubbish defence)
When you shoot sand (nanties) some sand gets sprayed out of the impact point, while some of the sand (nanties) would get damged as the bullet passes through the replicator, Which is why the replicator was left with metal scars, where the bullets ripped through him, disrupting the nanaties and damging some, then since he cannot replicate and heal the wound, it just stayed as a metal scar.

Also changing the frequency of your nanatis is one thing, but controlling them to replicate and heal is another. Also as they said, he CANNOt replicate, they said nothing about the fact he can't change his nanties to avoid sensors, His makers most likly left that function in to help hide him.
If you disable your computers Firewall, then your computer gets attacked by a virus, your computer won't activate its firewall again by itself!

Nicely put.

[YutheGreat]

If he picked them up maybe he could melt it down and then repair himself. Replicator cells were damaged by the bullets and Thor said it takes many block working together to form new blocks for the old version replicators. I believe the nanites work in a simillar pattern. Also the human form replicators require Nuetronium to build themselves thats why he went after the shipment. He can't use simple materials like steel and others.

[mizzoueng]

In "Progeny" our bullets and Ronans gun affected the Asurans (only sligthly, but it still hurt them) It was the MW human forms which took 0 damaged from our guns.

As for your comparing the Nanatis to sand, Heres the think. If you shoot sand a bullet will go through (depending of the thickness, otherwise sandbags would be a rubbish defence)
When you shoot sand (nanties) some sand gets sprayed out of the impact point, while some of the sand (nanties) would get damged as the bullet passes through the replicator, Which is why the replicator was left with metal scars, where the bullets ripped through him, disrupting the nanaties and damging some, then since he cannot replicate and heal the wound, it just stayed as a metal scar.

Also changing the frequency of your nanatis is one thing, but controlling them to replicate and heal is another. Also as they said, he CANNOt replicate, they said nothing about the fact he can't change his nanties to avoid sensors, His makers most likly left that function in to help hide him.
If you disable your computers Firewall, then your computer gets attacked by a virus, your computer won't activate its firewall again by itself!

True, but sandbags cannot control the distance between the grains. HFR's can. The whole principal behind the HFR got changed when it came to the Asurans. There should be no way that a bullet should be able to damage a molecule sized machine. If this was true then we could damage molecules in the air by shooting them. At the molecular level, an object the size of a bullet just grazes the nanites, it doesn't actually "hit" them.

Example, take a large perfectly sealed room, now pressurize it and place it in space (0 g effect). Fill that room with micro sized iron bb's. Now magnetically charge the bb's and hold them in a cube in the middle, while maintaining a perfect 1/2" between them. Now launch a basketball towards them. The basketball will impact the surface of the iron and cause the bb's to move away in a wave pattern. The positive and negative forces of the magnetic particles will cause the impacted ones to come together more densely but as soon as the bball is gone the same forces will make them go back to their original shape and distance.

This is how a nanite structure would operate. Anything impacting them would cause an immediate movement away from the object and they would adapt to the form of the foreign object.

The only time you might have the structure break and lose mass would be when the object exits the iron bb's cube. The surface tension would be disrupted as such that the magnetic forces could not maintain a sufficient bond to hold the lattice.

This example works well for Sheppards shotgun. It looked like he was using a buckshot with about 12 bearings per shot. This would be exactly like what I just explained. With sufficient surface area, the molecular bonds of the nanites could be disrupted enough, but ONLY on the opposite side of impact. Conventional bullets are cone shaped and are made to "push" material away from them and pass through objects.

Anyways, the writers and staff don't give a darn, so I'll just give up.

[grayjo]

True, but sandbags cannot control the distance between the grains. HFR's can. The whole principal behind the HFR got changed when it came to the Asurans. There should be no way that a bullet should be able to damage a molecule sized machine. If this was true then we could damage molecules in the air by shooting them. At the molecular level, an object the size of a bullet just grazes the nanites, it doesn't actually "hit" them.

Example, take a large perfectly sealed room, now pressurize it and place it in space (0 g effect). Fill that room with micro sized iron bb's. Now magnetically charge the bb's and hold them in a cube in the middle, while maintaining a perfect 1/2" between them. Now launch a basketball towards them. The basketball will impact the surface of the iron and cause the bb's to move away in a wave pattern. The positive and negative forces of the magnetic particles will cause the impacted ones to come together more densely but as soon as the bball is gone the same forces will make them go back to their original shape and distance.

This is how a nanite structure would operate. Anything impacting them would cause an immediate movement away from the object and they would adapt to the form of the foreign object.

The only time you might have the structure break and lose mass would be when the object exits the iron bb's cube. The surface tension would be disrupted as such that the magnetic forces could not maintain a sufficient bond to hold the lattice.

This example works well for Sheppards shotgun. It looked like he was using a buckshot with about 12 bearings per shot. This would be exactly like what I just explained. With sufficient surface area, the molecular bonds of the nanites could be disrupted enough, but ONLY on the opposite side of impact. Conventional bullets are cone shaped and are made to "push" material away from them and pass through objects.

Anyways, the writers and staff don't give a darn, so I'll just give up.

Unless, and here's the magic bullet (so to speak), the replicator was designed to be weak to bullets. Building a replicator that was invunerable would be idiotic at the testing phase, so build in a safety feature that means it can be stopped if neccisary.

All in all, the writers are canon. If something is amiss, we can assume it is because there is more than we are being told.