Master Dex

Ok, I cheated. Only Thursday night and I watched episode 10, but I like this one. I'll wait a day or so to post my stuff though. Big character episode, Ray mostly. I don't know if I have much to say for the science bit in this episode, so that may be a bit dry. Either way, I'll get to my review tomorrow.

Yeah, there can be only one Max.

Yeah, I've been saying it for months.

Ok, I just watched it. I'm not going to review every aspect, especially the Alice Holiday stuff because people did that already and all. I was thinking a lot about Pete's musing as questions about spiritia. I'm not going to talk about sound energy since we aren't there yet so I'll cover spiritia based only on the observed stuff so far. Now I am not a neurologist so can only say so much. It is a proven fact that music can change someone's mood. Here it seems to me that when the vamps were stealing Alice's spiritia she was getting more and more depressed to the point she didn't even feel like standing. Had that been pushed further I imagine a person would let themselves stop breathing and just die. Spiritia isn't a life force per say as we can live without it but without it we might not care to live. In this aspect spiritia kind of becomes a term with no clear definition. Now to go back on the brain chemistry bit, when certain songs are heard (there are also many other stimuli for this as well), our brain can emit various chemicals like horomones that can change how we feel, making us feel better or worse (music making you feel worse is a rarity and depends on your mood and tastes). It seems to me when spiritia is drained, the Protodeviln are robbing our brains of the ability to secrete these chemicals that can makes us feel better or even to feel anything. This is why the worst of those drained end up in catatonic states. They aren't dead, they have just lost the will to continue living. It isn't Fire Bomber's music necessarily that is helping them, but the reason their music works is because Basara strives to sing from his heart and not just to what is popular. That makes the difference here, even if it might not sell well initially. So in a sense what the protodeviln are feeding off isn't our life, but our brain chemistry, emotions, perhaps the nature of the soul. Of course we cannot yet quantify what exactly the soul is (like I said until we get to the subject of sound energy later I'm not going to cover that). I think that is why it is so hard to get a clear idea of just what spiritia is. I think to the protodeviln, it is just something they know they need and they can see we have it. They are from another universe where physics are different and they are energy (I know the show says another dimension but if you know the difference between universes and dimensions what I say really does make more sense). Here they are physical, and they don't know how to keep themselves alive or better yet, how keep their bodies working. So they noticed the difference others had and stole the difference. The fact that they have the ability to measure spiritia is more of a necessity than anything. They developed technology to do what they needed. What they are measuring is probably about the chemicals in the brain are affecting the body and all that. Now, I still want to mention the rain bit. They do have plants on board the ship, so they need rain. Obviously they have a reservoir of water, perhaps split into base elements and compressed as gas (water as a liquid is an incompressible fluid, splitting into gas to compress would make transportation easier). This water is also their drinking water, and every other use of water (remember my commentary on the resort ship's water supply?). The rain is mostly to keep up the plant life, and to resemble realistic Earth conditions. Any of the rain water not absorbed by plant life is probably drained through, cleaned, filtered, and reused for other water needs. Also I should note, that means even the water is finite. While you could stop places to find more water, more than likely they are recycling a lot of stuff. Some people balk at the idea of astronauts on the International Space Station recycling their urine and filtering the water out, but it does result in perfectly clean water. Whether you want to think of it or not, this is most likely happening. Though I imagine most people on the colony don't even realize it.

That makes sense, it also explains why NUNs had a lot of red tape issues with getting things done in Frontier. That is why they started contracting SMS to do work. NUNs was clearly held back by civilian oversight with what it could do anymore, so SMS was able to fill in the role of quick military action for a cheaper price than the regular military as SMS was paid both by their contractor and Mr. Bilrer's company which started them.

I wasn't going to talk about sound energy until they actually brought it up in the show, and that is a bit of a ways off. I do have quite a bit to say though. Also in Frontier those were just 'fold boosters' (they has to add fold as a prefix to everything in that show, I didn't like that). They basically applified the small fold waves that Ranka was apparently creating when she sang. The Vajra were in space, they couldn't hear her, they were sensing the fold vibrations she made. The boosters just amplified those vibrations. It could be theorized that the whole fold waves Ranka emitted was some new form of sound energy that permeated super dimensional space, but that is a bit of a stretch with no evidence to back it up. We know she generated them because she got the V type infection whilst in the womb. I still haven't watched episode 9, sorry. I'll talk about some spiritia stuff next post though, there is a bit I can say on that as well.

This seems very unrelated to Fire Bomber or Fukuyama.

I've heard of that maneuver, it is full of several inconsistencies but the basic idea you are mentioning is correct. Mostly the big problem is that the nuke's EMP effected them. Electromagnetic pulses can't happen in the vacuum of space where there is no magnetic field. In orbit of a planet you do have the field of the planet itself but planetary magnetic fields are very weak and in a high altitude like orbit the gamma rays from the nuke will disperse quickly and generate little to no magnetic field. However this has nothing to do with the topic, the fact remains: ramming is generally a last ditch move.

That is the simple answer, I'll address this in more detail probably in my science bit when I do my review. I haven't watched it yet though. Circumstance foils me again. Soon though.

Yeah, I just got busy, start of the new semester at school and all. I'm sure I'll get around to the episode sometime this weekend.

Yes, despite all that and even Sketchley bringing up that bit from Nemesis (Star Trek loves the ram as a last resort maneuver believe it or not), the reality is ramming a spacecraft into another as an attack is unlikely to ever work. Space warfare is most likely going to be a long distance endeavor where weapons are being fired toward each other while the two craft can barely see the other. They'll have it on radar or sensors or whatever they have. There is no real stealth in space after all. Even if a ship did try a ramming move, because of the distance, the other guy is going to notice what is going on an move out of the way. I will note though that with the size of spacecraft and the velocities they'd carry, a ram such as those would have tremendous energy release, like nuclear bomb levels of energy or more. The two ships would probably vaporize. In Macross though this is still possible, it is in a long line of sci fi shows that doesn't bother with the correct scale (not that this is terrible though) and has the ships relatively close to each other when they fight. Makes it more dramatic, which is why it is done, and that is good enough for me.

Regardless of the circumstances of the punch tactic or how it was conceived, when it comes to ship warfare (both naval and the fictional space based) it is a fact that one of the best attacks of last resort is the ever effective ramming the enemy ship with yours. The Daedalus attack gets away with the fact that while that part of the ship is ramming, it is protected by a shield. Most times, ramming maneuvers are finite and leave both ships out of the equation.

Man I think you are a little too hung up about the dress. I don't think there was any design to other characters wearing similar clothes, lol.

Why Gamlin you dirty dirty boy!! Lol! As for the hard drives, yes you are absolutely correct. I was on a limited budget when I got mine though, that is why 320GB was economical for me. Had I more money, I would easily have gotten a Terabyte. As for the usable space, that is always because there is a percentage that is used to help the device function. I have about 295GB out of the full 320GB in actuality, but still enough for me.

Glad I could help then. Yeah, they aren't the cheapest things, but they will last. Price depends a lot on how much space you get. I got a 320GB external hard drive for about $90. Mine is also a portable drive, so that may have made it more expensive. I suggest MyBook or MyPassport, they are good hard drives (made by Western Digital, I prefer them). The MyBooks are larger and generally hold more (they have 1 Terabyte hard drives in that size now, that's 1000GB, crazy) so the cost is up. I originally planned to get a small 250GB drive, but they were out of that when I was buying and 320GB was the lowest and I was aiming to be economical, lol. It has been working out well though. I have DYRL, the first 20 episodes of Remastered M7, all of Macross Zero, all of Macross Frontier (BD rips with Thora subs in fact), a dozen episodes of Beast Wars and a few TF Animated episodes, a DVD rip of Serenity, and a digital copy of the new Star Trek. There is still a good amount of room on the drive. So I can say it is worth the price.

Pete... I was just joking about the VF-11s. Calm down man, lol. Anyway thanks for all the other input. I should warn you, CD's only have about 700MB of data on them, you won't get much more than two episodes of the remastered M7 on a disc with that. If your computer can burn DVDs you can get 5 to 6 episodes there since they hold 4.7GB on average. However you may not have that capability, but it is your choice anyway. I have the first 10 episodes of Frontier on two DVDs. I didn't continue burning the show because I got an external hard drive, which has just made everything so much easier. Sure I can't play it on my TV, but there are ways around that (I'm just too lazy to bother). Anyway, whatever works for you of course is best, I'm just telling you all the options. On to the next then.

Well true. One way to look at my mindset was that it may be a disc, but not necessarily what a CD is by current definition. Though they do work well enough as it is. I can see a fully digital format though (iTunes only being an example, there are far many other legal digital methods for buying music). As for the dress, I forgot to notice... let me check... ***time dilation*** Ah... I think I know what you're getting at, but truthfully there isn't enough detail shown of the dress to draw that many conclusions.

Ok then! I've finally gotten around to watching episode 8. First before I talk about things, while this hiatus was nice, we got crazy off topic during and that is partly my fault for bringing up some random things. So I should apologize for that. Now back to Macross 7. The sort of pseudo recap at the beginning doesn't cover very much. Anyway, Gamlin getting suspicious, but with good reason if you ask me. Mylene is trying to live two lives. She started seeing Gamlin so she could get specials deals for Fire Bomber but she rather not let Gamlin know about her affiliation with the band. To me this indicates even this early she has some interest in him, otherwise she wouldn't care if he knew about her being in the band. First Fire Bomber recording session in this episode. Wasn't that amazing. I blame Honey, most annoying character ever. He doesn't sound bad, but it seems like whoever animated him was purposely trying to make him look unrealistic even in the context of an anime! This is of course where we get that Galaxy Fight version of Planet Dance. I never really liked that version of it from Let's Fire really, but it seems the sound mixers in the episode didn't like it either. Despite it's overuse, the regular Planet Dance is better. At least in my opinion (of course there are far better versions of the song, but not from the show). I usually do a science bit, but.... well there wasn't really anything in this episode that stands out to me as worth mentioning. No scientific failings, or anything exceptional worth mentioning (save for another example of the unlimited VF-11 roster). So yeah... guess I'll leave it on that. Though I'd like to note that I chuckled seeing the recorders recording the music on CDs. I think by 2045 CDs will be phased out, but again this is an alternate universe with a main divergence point going back to 1999.

Well like I said, it takes a long time for radio waves to travel across space. They only move at the speed of light, if the alien world sending transmissions is 400 light years away, we won't hear it for 400 years. However there is a theoretical limit to radio transmissions where the single brakes down and can't be deciphered anymore. It is believed after a couple hundred light years our own TV singles will not be able to be understood anymore. What we and groups like SETI are looking for isn't really a clear message, just evidence of radio waves from another source even it it is unintelligible by the time it gets here. As for M7, I seriously wonder how many VF-11's M7 has... I mean we have figures I believe, but they never run out despite how many are destroyed in each episode. Regardless, you are right, it seems the size of the enemy isn't important as long as they are still doing the same spiritia draining plan. However defeating them as an enemy is where their size as a force comes into play. As for the Protodeviln themselves, the explanation seems to fit with the idea that they are from another universe where the laws of physics are different, so in this universe the need to steal spiritia is because conditions are different. Of course we only learn that later in the show, but I always wondered something. If living in our universe was so difficult for them that they had to go vampire on everyone, why did they come here? Sadly I don't think we'll ever know.

I'm not going to pick this apart because I'm not interested enough to do so and it is off topic, but you aren't entirely correct on all of that. I'll leave it there though. Aliens don't send us messages because we aren't worth the time as I said. I'll answer one part though: As for communication in space, actually most science fiction does cover this, it just isn't a focal point so they don't dwell on explaining it. They aren't using radio communication because it would take far too long, if you were on Earth and the guy you were sending a radio message to was around Proxima Centauri (closest star to our own), it would take 4 years for your message to get there, and another 4 years for you to get the reply. It isn't convenient. Now the communications in Sci-fi aren't real yet, but they do work around it. Star Trek has subspace communications, sending messages at faster than light. Star Wars has the Holonet, which uses hyperspace communications. Halo sends e-mail like messages through slipspace packet messages but they cannot send audio messages across slipspace (they use radios in the games only when near each other). Macross itself mentions fold space communications, not too sure how that works though. In my books I even generated a method based on my own custom designed FTL travel technology (that's right, I created my own form of faster than light travel, I went all out). I don't know if any of this actually works of course (probably not), but my point is, they are doing more than just radio transmission. Enough of this, we shouldn't be off topic anymore. I still haven't watched the episode though so..... yeah.... Let's get around to doing that....

I am a huge Michio Kaku fan, so seeing other people referencing him is just great. Technically though Type 1 just means we can utilize the energy of an entire planet, and Type 2 the energy of an entire star. While we are still at least 100 years from being a Type 1 civilization this doesn't really have any bearing on whether any alien intervention could happen. However it doesn't mean it is unlikely, because to an interstellar civilization, we would look so primitive that communication would be an excessive waste of time. Also despite many sci-fi plots about it, there isn't really enough of a good reason to want to invade or enslave us. It just isn't all that likely. The plot of Macross has a certain plausibility about it though, the ship crashed on our planet, the Zentradi thought we were allied with their enemy when they found it there, so they attacked. They only learned their mistake later. As far as being a Michio Kaku fan, I have full read Physics of the Impossible and am halfway through his best seller Hyperspace. I believe he is truly one of the best theoretical physicists alive today.

It is actually referencing the fact that what we don't understand and label as magic can be understood as a science if we learn enough. It's like if you went back in time to when they used bows and arrows and showed people a modern day gun. They wouldn't think of the gun as some futuristic weapon, that thing is so unlike anything they have seen before it can only be magic. However those people learned and evolved over time to become us, who understand the science of how guns work. Some theoretical technologies of the future, like faster than light travel, beam weapons, etc. seem like magical things to us. Even now though we are trying to find ways through science to see if anything of these things can be possible. It might surprise you how many science fiction technologies may truly be possible. The catch is it could take hundreds to thousands of years for us to make them happen (barring alien intervention like in Macross of course). The point of Arthur C. Clark's quote was that magic is nothing more than a science we have yet to understand and master. Oh, and if anyone didn't know or was curious, Arthur C. Clark is the man who wrote 2001: A Space Odyssey and its associated sequels (most people should a least know of the story, if they haven't read or seen the movie based on it).

I have nothing to say on this satanic discussion, but to Pete's line there: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clark.

I don't know about all the music from the game, but the theme song for Ultimate Frontier is Burning Fire, which is from the recent 15th anniversary Fire Bomber album Re.Fire. So it is sung by Yoshiki Fukuyama/Basara Nekki (with some parts by Chie Kajiura/Mylene Jenius). The song is considered a Fire Bomber song though, not any of Fukuyama's solo work, Fukuyama Band, or Hummingbird.

Somehow I just don't see it, lol.