I don't know whether this has been discussed before or not as animated aired before I joined and I know in fiction this subject was just used to exaggerate how much of a douche do wrong animated sentinel prime was but I was re-watching it recently and it got me thinking about whether in real life the passing on of intergalactic disease would be a problem and I am curious to here back from anyone here who comes from a scientific background or has descent knowledge on the subject. Say if we was able to make that massive jump in plausibility of metal based sentient alien life living on earth and added what we know of real science what do you think would be the likelihood of this being a problem? would us or them be most at risk of falling ill or dying from the transference of disease and/or infection? or would our differences or biology make the whole point mute? that is just the risk to them catching things from us humans, earth is an extremely varied place with all sorts of varied things harmless to us that could potentially be a shock to their system. I imagine a huge deciding factor could be the circumstances in which they came to earth and whether they crash landed here or had time to plan and scope the planet out before any kind of occupation or invasion was organised. Another aspect is biological weapons, I know us as a species has had success (poor use of the term I know) in creating weapons that attack us in this way so it stands to reason that if megatron did really want to stop using us as bait to get one over the autobots he would simply get soundwave or shockwave to take existing human studies in this area and cook up a quickly evolving plague using there advanced technology that would have us extinct in weeks. If we was to attempt to fight them in this way, how do you think it would fair against them? would it be our best possibly only chance of surviving their war? I know for reasons of it not being that exciting for fiction compared to action set pieces that this side has barely made much of an impact in the transformers world bar the example of sentinel prime in animated, environmental protection needed in beast wars, non harmful radiation exposure from contact with the transformers alluded to in the first movie and probably a handful of other references but I'm curious how this could play out in a more real world setting.
This is an interesting question that is unfortunately unanswerable. The crux of the issue is how would earth based bacteria and viruses affect a cybertronian. Since cybertronian biology is very unknown in fiction we can't come to any definitive conclusions. So the real answer is that it would come down to plot need. But if I ignore that answer and attempt to theorize, then I can come up with some ideas. In human history when two cultures meet for the first time there is an exchanging of diseases. This is often rather bad as the two sides have no defenses against them. Now when you add currently unknown extra terrestrial life things get trickier. In biology life is plausibly either carbon based or silicon based. Mass Effect did a very good job in showing that biology behaves differently with each other. So things COULD possibly affect the other but it probably wouldn't be very effective at what it is intending to do, which could be a good thing or a bad thing for person infected. So it's more plausible that things could affect other biological life but due to our current lack of any examples of life outside of earth. But cybertronians aren't biological in the true sense. Working under the assumtion they do not have cellar structures, biological bacteria and viruses likey wouldn't have the ability to do anything. Putting cold germs on a metal plate doesn't affect the metal plate. Likewise cybertronian diseases would likely not be effective against biological life. One simply wouldn't have the evolution necessary to affect the other. Now what I could see would be things like mold and similar colonies of single celled organisms. Even insects perhaps. Things that simply inhabit a cybertronian body instead of infecting it. A colony of ants for example could build structures in and made from parts of the cybertronian biology. Mice could chew through energon veins and build nests that damage internal systems. So I guess at the end of my textual brainstorming I've come to the conclusion that Sentinel had a valid reason to be concerned of biological life but not cause to be concerned of biological diseases.
Yes. Pathogens are a concern anytime you travel anywhere new. It was a concern in the New World, it was a concern when we went to the moon, and it will be a concern when the first person returns from Mars.
very interesting and thought inspiring subject here. i dont even know where to start thinking about it.
Potentially, yes. I know there are precedent for use of organic parts in computers. Star Trek: Voyager, the ships computer used a series of bioneural gel pacs that once got infected and the Doctor had to cure them to repair the ship. If Cybertronians were using something similar, then it's entirely possible that SP would have cause to be concerned. There's also danger from corrosion from various fluids that organic life tends to... emit. So yeah, I'd say it's not totally ridiculous for him to have been concerned. Although, in context, I think that was done more to show that Cybertronians in general have a prejudice towards organic life and that they have stereotypes not based in reality.
>Sentinel Prime ever being right. Well in all fairness the Cybertronian prejeduice and fair of organic life does actually hold weight in universe, I mean you saw what happened in on that organic planet that Optimus, Sentinel and Elita-1 went to in the flashback in Along Came a Spider and that space barnacle in When Nature Calls. Organics be whack man!
I would question what would be the dangers of the space faring Cybertronians bringing some as yet unknown bacterial spore to Earth. Or any other civilizations they visit. Cross contamination goes both ways.
Wow, good call, I didn't even think of that. That would certainly explain and legitimize his fear and actually implies a sort of PTSD from that truama.
Supposedly there was an awful experience between Malgus Cybertronians and Organics on the past which led to the ban on visiting organic worlds, and the fear we see on This Is Why I Hate Machines. I'd certainly have decontaminated Fanzone after he returned from Cybertron, since the planet has oxygen and very likely could've had some sort of pathogen that affects carbon-based life forms.
If we extend this In universe fear across the rest of the cast maybe this understandable prejudice could also be part of the motivation and justification for the actions of megatron. He and his decepticons could view us and other species on the edge of developing space travel technology and spreading out across the universe and endlessly multiplying, spreading infections and pollution wherever we go as an infestation or cancer in need of safely nipping in the bud and containing before it gets out of control while they still have the technological advantage. in the context of this it seems odd that most versions of bumblebee are constantly being best buddies with alien children.
Good question but I'm not sure how that would work. ON the other hand, I'd be curious as to if Cybertronians carried any virus' that affected humans.
Just had a thought on this subject that I had previously missed. In beast machines organic life was heavily infecting cybertron, even overriding and dominating its technological life there. That show was heavily weighted with a sort of hippy moral to it portraying the biological/natural life as the goodies and the exclusively technological life as villainous. If the in fiction war has claimed many planets and caused much suffering across the galaxy maybe megatron and rhinox/tankor were sort of the hero's of the piece from a certain point of view.
givens that in animated when they'd return from an organic planet they would be immediately sterilized, i dont think we'd be at any harm from anything coming out of their ships. the radiation from energon MIGHT have some side effect on a human, however, energon itself is know to be a clean source of energy. or the blood of a god of light. so the threat level there is low, the only issue if any emission coming the cybertronians themselves when using said energon. the next thing to consider, sterilization aside. these are beings that can freely go "naked" into space. id imagine that the vacuum of space, and the extreme temp fluctuations would make for a very hostile enviroment for any germ or bacteria. also consider the entry to our atmosphere, the extreme heat friction creates would burn off anything major too. (id imagine other wise space germs would be more common in real life.) as for the cybertronians themselves, well they are at risk. but not from us. they suffer the same risk on earth as they do any planet with an atmosphere: erosion on their metal bodies. however atmospheric damage might not be the first thing thatd come to mind and they blame the other living thing as doing something wrong. thats natural because you need to blame something that could have motives. even if not self aware theyd still want to blame say a plant, saying it was doing something to cause the break down. plus you cant, normally, see the atmosphere. if the gases were visible then blaming the fog or gases would take dominance over blaming the life forms ... unless your sentinel prime ... then you blame whatever you dont understand because youre ignorant like that.
