Posted on 01/20/2006 8:29:57 AM PST by isaiah55version11_0
Actually, it sounds to me like the Colonies were terraformed - whether by the colonists or someone else. Or were the 12 colonies on a single planet in the new BSG?
The colonoies appear to be twelve separate bodies - probably a mix of planets and moons in a stable multiple star system. It would be a very rare, if not unique, situation.
The human form cylons are anatomically identical to humans. Only by looking for certain chemical compounds not present in humans, but present in limited amounts in the cylons can they be differentiated. There is no hard drive in there and the biological cyclons appear to have been developed by their mechanical counterparts. Even the mechanical ones appear more cybernetic than mechanical. It seems the early cyclons perfected biological computing and the Colonials can't even make sense out of it. As to intelligence, there really isn't any to be had from a cylon. They are master manipulators, even under the most adverse circumstances, and will manipulate the interrogators like a puppeteer. The problems with them mind-f**king you are greater than any intelligence they have to offer. It also shows that Laura Rosilyn (sp?) is not someone to mess with. She saw how phsychologically damaging having them around can be. The pregnant Boomer seems to be the only one that has developed her own free will and has abandoned the cyclons for the sake of her child. This could, of course, be nothing but a long term ruse.
I guess you're right; certainly the script seems to work that way. But there are a lot of silly things - why do Cylons glow when they have sex? That's something you ought be able to find. How do they upload and download? There should be a wireless system in there (whoo-hooo! A direct link to the OS!) that you can find and play with.
Also, they seem to be stronger than humans of the same mass - their muscle tissue should be different. Apparently they don't have the same need to eat or drink we do (although the Leobon seemed to enjoy his meal... which Starbuck thought was wretched) - they must have an internal power plant. Looks to me like there are a lot of basic, internal differences that would ID 'em.
All of those things coulf be done via biological mechanisms. For example, strength is neuron as well as muscle dependent. Most people are far stronger than they realize, but their brain inhibits using that strength. If you weight train for the first time in your life, most of the gains come from overcoming this neurological inhibition. Only after that can you start to lift to gain muscle mass. About the glowing spine, that would also have a biological origin. It doesn't take a lot of a material to bioluminesce. Also, the Colonials would have to know it's there to look at it and the chemicals responsible may be the ones Baltar's test will detect. Wireless is simply radio communication. Again, it may not be a specific neurological structure, but the way their brains can generate a signal - a synchronicity of activity and not a dedicated transmitter. Once you get down to manipulating things on a cellular level, you can get away from the constraints of bulk technology. Biological cells can be thought of as natural nanotechnology. Eating and drinking, plus bas metabolism can also be controlled neurologically. The cyclons either turn off their hunger receptors or they ignore the inputs. Humans can be conditioned for this. THe cyclons merely know the biological mechanisms and can exploit them at will. THey are like humans, but can fully control their bodies in a way we could only dream of. But also look at what they don't have. They have no emotion - no passion. Only Boomer developed that as part of an experiment and love turned out to be the needed emotion for conception. Even another No 6 commented on what it must be like to feel passion. They are lacking that and they know it. That's what keeps them from being human and they are trying to overcome that gap.
First, their technology is far beyond the humans. Humans designed the first Cylons, but after that they got quite advanced. And remember Cylons aren't afraid of dying (kinda sounds like the Muslim terrorists), since they know they'll just be put in another body. Well, they weren't afraid since we know now that they are beyond range for resurrection. That might change things for future interrogations.
I don't think that their tech is better than human tech, or they would not have needed #6's built in back door. In individual confrontations, humans seem to do pretty well, even with obsolescent tech like the Galactica.
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