String theory in HL2 - Games

Mossman at Black Mesa East - "[i]We think we have the combines' string-based portals figured out. Kleiner thinks that they might be using Calabi-Yau models similar to ours.[/i]" ... STRING THEORY! I'll be honest, I'm a terrible listener. Instead of listening to exactly what the characters are saying, I'm always off crowbaring a prop or trying to glitch through, looking for the fastest way possible to get some combine slaying action. Little did I know that possibly one of the biggest pieces of the puzzle were repeated to me over and over again. Recently, while playing Synergy with my friend, I actually jumped out of my chair when I listened to the actual dialogues for the first time in BM:E and Dark Energy, as opposed to just dismissing it in my head as "science crap". So having said that, I actually realized something cool about the combine. If you pay attention at the very last battle of HL2 (between you and Breen), you hear him say "Once this singularity collapses, I'll be far away from here". Or something along those lines. This could actually explain why the combine look so... human-like. The combine aren't really teleporting to earth from far away. They are actually inside the very fabric of the Earth's matter. Instead of thinking of them as coming "to" the Earth, think of them as coming "out of" the Earth. What's spookier is that the Combine could just be an analogous realm to humans, or maybe even the Earth itself in a different time, However, I think that this has already been discussed. As for GMan, I still don't know... :D So yeah... Valve - very meta, as always. Still, interesting stuff... I hope I'm not the only one who's so extra-late on this epiphany...

This should go in the HL2 discussion: [url]http://facepunch.com/showthread.php?t=1260955[/url] Not that I'm trying to be a backseat moderator or anything, but you should consider PM'ing a moderator to see if he can merge this with the HL2 thread.

[QUOTE=KD007;43993533]This could actually explain why the combine look so... human-like.[/QUOTE] [img]http://static1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20090604205310/half-life/en/images/4/41/Advisor_hl2_model.jpg[/img] not seeing it

[QUOTE=KD007;43993533]This could actually explain why the combine look so... human-like. The combine aren't really teleporting to earth from far away. They are actually inside the very fabric of the Earth's matter. Instead of thinking of them as coming "to" the Earth, think of them as coming "out of" the Earth. What's spookier is that the Combine could just be an analogous realm to humans, or maybe even the Earth itself in a different time, However, I think that this has already been discussed. As for GMan, I still don't know... :D[/QUOTE] Or you know... they could just be fucking converted human soldier grunts? Did you even pay attention in Nova Prospekt? I guess not since you dismissed half the dialogue as "science crap".

i could be wrong on this but i'm fairly certain any 'string theory' that the combine use is their advanced technology reason they are able to incredibly quickly/instantaneously travel such great distances - whether through space (general distance, not just outerspace)/time (as seen when the teleportation from nova prospekt took weeks for the 'outside' world)/dimensions, and do it with incredibly precise accuracy.

[QUOTE=Pernoccuous;43993779]i could be wrong on this but i'm fairly certain any 'string theory' that the combine use is their advanced technology reason they get around the fact that space is very, very, very big - while doing so incredibly quickly - and with such precise accuracy. (or dimension hopping)[/QUOTE] You are on the right page. According to string theory, there are possibilities that certain spaces (or spacetimes, if you are into Einstein) could be positioned with respect to each other in multiple configurations at once. At least that's the way it looks to us from our dimensionality. [QUOTE=SM0K3 B4N4N4;43993739]Or you know... they could just be fucking converted human soldier grunts? Did you even pay attention in Nova Prospekt? I guess not since you dismissed half the dialogue as "science crap".[/QUOTE] I always thought It was just the metrocops who got converted. In any case, the post before yours said the exact same thing, only in a nicer and funnier manner.

[QUOTE=KD007;43993825]You are on the right page. According to string theory, there are possibilities that certain spaces (or spacetimes, if you are into Einstein) could be positioned with respect to each other in multiple configurations at once. At least that's the way it looks to us from our dimensionality. I always thought It was just the metrocops who got converted. In any case, the post before yours said the exact same thing, only in a nicer and funnier manner.[/QUOTE] The metrocops were regular people who voluntered for the service, while Overwatch are forcibly altered humans. Neither of the two are actual aliens.

[QUOTE=Pernoccuous;43993779]i could be wrong on this but i'm fairly certain any 'string theory' that the combine use is their advanced technology reason they are able to incredibly/instantaneously travel such great distances - whether through space (general distance, not just outerspace)/time (as seen when the teleportation from nova prospekt took weeks for the 'outside' world)/dimensions, and do it with incredibly precise accuracy.[/QUOTE] Yeah, they could use some of the 7 higher dimensions described in M-theory, maybe altered them a bit so that they could actually fit something bigger than 1 dimension through, and at the same time, because the dimensions are on such a small scale (quarks and strings) they would also be able to place their portals with stunning precision.

[QUOTE=SM0K3 B4N4N4;43993928]Yeah, they could use some of the 7 higher dimensions described in M-theory, maybe altered them a bit so that they could actually fit something bigger than 1 dimension through, and at the same time, because the dimensions are on such a small scale (quarks and strings) they would also be able to place their portals with stunning precision.[/QUOTE] If M theory supposes 11 dimensions, and combines/people seem to exist in only 4 (as far as we can see for combines), why the need to alter them?

[QUOTE=KD007;43994258]If M theory supposes 11 dimensions, and combines/people seem to exist in only 4 (as far as we can see for combines), why the need to alter them?[/QUOTE] :suicide:

are you just spouting science shit you just learned or something the game isn't that scientifically complex(ie doesnt try to be accurate with science that often). speculation is cool but no need to apply realistic scientific principles to everything in it.

The "Combine" just take races from other planets and turn them into these killing machines. I don't think anyone knows what the Combine's original race was.

The Combine as themselves, are those slug like creatures, everything else you face in the series are races and beings they have manipulated and manufactured into pretty much their military work force. Striders are a hybrid combination of a race the Combine have adapted and infused with cybernetics, hence the massive wang cannon and such. Then there is the gun ship, drop ship and those unused mortar synths you see in the citadel, all the same sketch. Races they enslaved and adapted for their own needs. If you pay enough attention to the details, especially from the Vortigaunts you could make sense that is what they've done and are currently in the process of doing with humans, which makes sense considering Combine ground troops are human hybrids with Combine tech infused into them. The Combine ain't human, they are more an inter-space parasite feeding their forces off other races and taking all the resources from those races (sucking up the oceans is one big example, this is explained ingame and in the book raising the bar). The Combine do come from a different universe but not in the way you think it, their teleport system in really simple terms is based on the string theory of using it to travel between dimensions to get to another position in same dimension as what you started in. Think of Xen in this example being one of those dimensions that is quite commonly easy to travel to, what Kleiner discovered was instead of having to directly access another dimension to get to another, you could instead jump around it or in the sense they put it ingame, slingshot around it like how a space probe uses a planets gravity to gain more momentum then returning towards its original source but at a different position. Its all speculation and science fiction in the end but really, it's just technobabble written to sound good using technological terms to just enforce that case. If you took any of this to a real scientist they'll likely just look at you with a strange look. Shorthand of this: [B]SCIENCE FICTION YEAH![/B]

[QUOTE=Reagy;44000020]Think of Xen in this example being one of those dimensions that is quite commonly easy to travel to, what Kleiner discovered was instead of having to directly access another dimension to get to another, you could instead jump around it or in the sense they put it ingame, slingshot around it like how a space probe uses a planets gravity to gain more momentum then returning towards its original source but at a different position.[/QUOTE] Xen is the void between dimensions; The world that fills the cracks; The border between the actual dimensions. Hence why it's called the "Borderworld".

[QUOTE=Karmal Khan;44000336]Xen is the void between dimensions; The world that fills the cracks; The border between the actual dimensions. Hence why it's called the "Borderworld".[/QUOTE] Oh I was under the impression it was considered another dimension in its self. Guess not. :v:

[QUOTE=Reagy;44000462]Oh I was under the impression it was considered another dimension in its self. Guess not. :v:[/QUOTE] It's one of the reasons that it's not a whole "entity" rather than a bunch of different pieces in one area

[QUOTE=KD007;43993533] Or something along those lines. This could actually explain why the combine look so... human-like. The combine aren't really teleporting to earth from far away. [b]They are actually inside the very fabric of the Earth's matter. Instead of thinking of them as coming "to" the Earth, think of them as coming "out of" the Earth. [/b]What's spookier is that the Combine could just be an analogous realm to humans, or maybe even the Earth itself in a different time, However, I think that this has already been discussed. As for GMan, I still don't know... :D [/QUOTE] That's not how string theory works. And even if it was from 'earthly matter' it would not make them 'earth like' it would just mean their matter came from stuff on earth. In a way it's like how we're all from stardust. But most of us don't resemble stars.

While they could never put in the kind of hardcore science a layman (or game developer) would understand, it is fun to speculate regarding the words they do put in. OP, in case you missed them, here are some other real concepts that half life uses as plot devices (late? sure, but OP seems to have just tuned in): Anti-mass Spectrometry: Not technically a real thing, but Mass Spectrometry is - its a technique of finding the mass of a particle by ionizing it and examining the spectra of light that come off. Presumably, anti-mass spectroscopy would be similar, except with examining the anti-mass (possibly related to antimatter content, which might explain the huge amounts of energy released from the Xen Crystal during the Cascade) Resonance Cascade: Also not a real thing, but it makes sense in the context half life puts it in. Resonance is when a system oscillates a bunch at certain frequencies, and a cascade in chemistry is a series of reactions. One can assume, then, that a resonance cascade would be an uncontrollable series of high-intensity oscillations of something, probably to do with the anti-mass mentioned before. Zero-point Energy: (As in, a Zero Point Energy Field Manipulator) A real concept, but not quite gravity gun material. Wikipedia describes it as "the lowest possible energy that a quantum mechanical physical system may have," going on to say that "all quantum mechanical systems undergo fluctuations even in their ground state and have an associated zero-point energy." Later in the article, it mentions that these energy perturbations could exert gravitational force - I'm guessing this is where Valve extrapolated the possibility of a device that could manipulate these to form gravity fields acting in a tightly controlled area. Interestingly enough, it seems some folks at Pixar also picked up on this - Syndrome in The Incredibles uses a gadget with a similar purpose that also has "Zero Point Energy" in the title. I think there was another one that I'd looked into earlier, but I can't remember what it is now. Ah well, three is a good number.

[QUOTE=Reagy;44000020]The Combine as themselves, are those slug like creatures[/QUOTE] "The Combine" is the name of the empire, not any species in the empire. The Advisors are just called Advisors.

[QUOTE=SM0K3 B4N4N4;43994693]:suicide:[/QUOTE] do it [editline]22nd February 2014[/editline] naw that was a mean joke i take it back

[QUOTE=DONOTWANT;44002781]"The Combine" is the name of the empire, not any species in the empire. The Advisors are just called Advisors.[/QUOTE] Basically, the "combining" of races to create this empire. Probably not even the real name of it, it could be just a nickname given by the humans.