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The snakescale in Leon's bathtub
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The Loyalizer
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PostPosted: Wed Feb 04, 2009 11:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

It would stand to reason they eat and drink like we do. However their metabolisms might have been tweaked to process food better or go further on less food and water than an ordinary human could.

In the book they didn't eat, as evidenced by Pris's comment to Isidore about the cheese and wine being wasted on her.
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LA2019
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 05, 2009 9:00 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

They are "more" human then human but to pass along as humans they must act and do stuff humans do, as eating food..

I have a hard time beliving that they are made out of steel and look like "Terminators", they are flesh and blood just like you and me (or what was it that Holden said in the hospital scene ??)
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andy
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 05, 2009 10:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

If you have to use an "Empathy test" to separate them from being human, I would guess they are physically identical. They are genetic reproductions. So they should have all the same physical needs.

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Mr Webber
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 6:05 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The thing that always made me think that the replicants were a design of flesh and not machine were Rachaels tears.
It became clearer as i got older that the replicants were the high water mark of cloning technology, not robotic technology. Tyrells edge
on his competitors is the fact that he can fill the void of the replicants sudden existance with basic implant technologies, which of course he later advances.

With this he takes the role of replicants as organ providers to functioning beings capable of all forms of expliotation.
A similar principle for the animals may apply, Deckards owl "must be expensive" line stems from the fact that he knows the genes used to produce the replicant are extremely rare and are irreplacable ,not the way we would see an Aston Martin and think, "must be expensive"
Just my ramblings at an ungodly hour.
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clutch
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 10:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If they are flesh and blood clones, would replicants be able to reproduce? I'm assuming that it is impossible and not just something their makers 'turned off'. Otherwise, couldn't the animal populations be built back up from cloned species?
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andy
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 12:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

You can build up animal species if you had the forethought to save all their DNA and enough of a cross sample as to keep them from being inbred after the fact. You would also have to have a suitable habitat, and that is the main problem. The world had become inhospitable to man and beast. That is why so many people were leaving the earth. It is my theory that the Cities may have their own environmental controls, and the Rain could be a byproduct of the air scrubbers.

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phase pistol
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 2:19 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'm guessing the reproductive systems are turned off. From the perspective of the Tyrell corporation, it makes no sense to let their product give itself away for free. "Commerce is the goal at Tyrell."

Anyway, it's not clear what exactly Tyrell does to these poor beings. He "gifts them with a past" by implanting memories. He limits them to a four-year lifespan... but then it turns out it's not a choice, they just can't MAKE replicants that last longer than four years.

Possibly Tyrell is lying to Batty, or else being disingenuous. He describes processes that cannot work to extend Batty's own lifespan. But perhaps the techniques fail because Batty is designed to not be able to extend his lifespan... he's self-terminating. The lifespan is arbitrarily set, and it cannot be changed. There are hints that Rachael and Deckard's lifespan are unknown and may not be limited to four years.

My guess is that Tyrell has close to complete control over the replicants' genetic makeup. So either reproductive function is suppressed intentionally, or it just doesn't work due to some biological snafu, I'm pretty sure that replicants cannot reproduce.

Possibly though Racael and Deckard are designed to be able to reproduce. Consider:

They are the first members of a new model type.

They are "more human that human"... or at least more humane.

It's implied that the world is depopulated and a pretty awful place. Most people escaped to the "colonies". Those that remain, live in squalor.

Rachael and Deckard escape from the dismal, corrupted city, into a pure and uninhabited countryside. It could be that their reason to exist is to escape from this horrific system, and re-make a better world.

Or am I reading too much into it. Laughing

- k
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The Loyalizer
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 7:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The impression I got from Tyrell's explanantion to Roy is, they are unable to extend the lifespan of an existing replicant. "Our coding sequence cannot be revised once its been established." is what Tyrell tells him. It sounded to me like Tyrell experimented to see if it was possible, but life extension was ultimately not a viable process.

I'm inclined to believe that its impossible to extend their lives once they are generated and taken out of the clone tank. However, it suggests this is merely a commercial decision. Tyrell is merely being shrewd in his business, every four years you need a new model and his is top of the line. Kind of like how modern appliances wear out in a few years, and aren't cost effective to repair, its easier and cheaper to replace it with a new one.

As to the reproduction issue, if you can engineer an entire person down to their memories, it'd be a small matter to genetically engineer them to be sterile.

On the subject of animals and their replication, I always had the impression that there were many degrees of quality in the product, and the higher end replications were more expensive and had a longer lifespan or were more realistic. For all we know, Abdul's snakes might look damn near like the real thing but only live for a few months, whereas Tyrell's owl might live as long as a real owl.
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Mr Webber
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 8:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Im fairly sure that all examples of successfull animal clones created in our timeline have been sterile, if this is natures ultimate control check or
just a limit of present technology would need to be confirmed.
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clutch
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 06, 2009 10:19 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

This is why I don't like the happy countryside ending. If this 'enchanted forest' is just a drive away, then why wouldn't everybody be headed that way? Seems like wildlife could survive there too. If not, perhaps Deckard and Rachel vegetarians? Smile
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 07, 2009 3:51 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If it was me, leaving flying cars, endless supplies of booze, French
cigarettes and pistols that shoot grenades behind to fossic in the forest for a rodent to chew on would not be an option.

BTW as i am typing the temp here is 47.8 Celcius. Thats the hottest day
on record here for nearly 200 years, transportation is in chaos, fires are ringing the city and birds are literally droping dead from the sky,
that 2019 LA rain would be kinda good around now.
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joberg
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 07, 2009 10:49 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The 4 year life span is built-in to make sure you don't acquire too much knowledge and start asking those pesky universal questions: why am I here, is there a God, etc.
If Deckard models of Blade Runners are produced every 4 years with the same memory implants, how would they know how many lives they have lived already? It's always "how can I be sure that I am and that my memories and experiences are really mine...is it possible that it's not my first time here"? Besides, the reproducing of Replicants would be extremely dangerous for society as whole, especially those trained in the art of colonizing Off-World planets; picture it Roy and Priss with children: SCARY!!!
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andy
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 07, 2009 2:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

offworld66 wrote:
If it was me, leaving flying cars, endless supplies of booze, French
cigarettes and pistols that shoot grenades behind to fossic in the forest for a rodent to chew on would not be an option.

BTW as i am typing the temp here is 47.8 Celcius. Thats the hottest day
on record here for nearly 200 years, transportation is in chaos, fires are ringing the city and birds are literally droping dead from the sky,
that 2019 LA rain would be kinda good around now.


Yikes! Sounds pretty Apocolyptic. Take care please.

As far as the Lifespan IIRC they were talking about that is was part the by product of the super abilities they had as well as a built in Obsolesence.

I kind of thought the stuff that requires a full grown adult to be made in a short time would also hinder the final lifespan. The fact that it was said to be exactly 4 years though would make me believe that it was intentional as well. It sounds like that it could have been a part of the manufacturing process that was designed in for multiple purposes. To speed up initial growth, increase funstion, and to open up the market for the next version.

I do also think that one of the big fears Tyrell had with them was their potential to become more fully human, with their emotions, as Bryant talks about. It would become very dificult to market "Slaves" and "washing machines" that you would have moral issues with tossing in the trash.

Again it is the market that is protected as well as the morality of said market.

Andy
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Mr Webber
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 07, 2009 3:20 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Andy wrote
Quote:
Yikes! Sounds pretty Apocolyptic. Take care please.


Cheers Andy,will try, 40 have lost their lives already with that figure
certain to rise.
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Gaff87
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 07, 2009 4:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Keep safe Tim.
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Nexus6
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 07, 2009 5:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hmm, Here's my 2¢ on some of the ideas I've read so far:

1. I don't think there is any metal in them at all. If there were, the VK would be pointless; just run suspects through a metal detector or put them near a huge electromagnet. So I think they are DEFINITELY flesh & blood, only manufactured flesh & blood. IMO, this would've allowed the genetic designers to make the bones stronger, the muscles more responsive, which would help account for their almost super-human strength.

2. I don't agree with the whole "clone" idea. The opening crawl SPECIFICALLY says that the Tyrell Corporation advanced ROBOT evolution into the "Nexus phase." It also says something about "a being virtually identical to a human;" wouldn't a clone be indistinguishable from a human?

3. I think their sex organs "work", since Pris was a "Basic Pleasure Model", HOWEVER, I think they were designed sterile. Although I wonder what the "Premium Pleasure Model" could do?

4. As for the 4-year lifespan, I never got the idea that they couldn't make them live longer, but that once they encoded the length, that it couldn't be modified in that particular replicant. See Bryant's dialogue about Tyrell Corp "building in a failsafe device." To me the whole "light that burns twice as bright" thing was Tyrell being patronizing. And I think Batty knew it. Wink
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clutch
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 07, 2009 10:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ah, forgot about the failsafe device.
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Futurepig
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PostPosted: Fri Sep 02, 2011 4:28 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Mr_Creepy wrote:
What's funny is that "real" snakes don't shed individual scales--guess Tyrell doesn't make them "more snake than snake" Wink


Maybe the designer intentionally programmed the snake to shed scales from time to time as "calling cards" for his business. That would also explain why he bothered embedding a serial number in them.
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