Questions

[boston100]

I know this was probably explained like a million times but i have a question on toa of water. How do toa of water controll protodermis in the mata nui robot? also would a toa of water have any countroll over ice? (and vice versa). Thanks

[bonesiii]

1) Protodermis has the ability to imitate various real-world substances, and raw liquid protodermis (as in the Silver Sea) imitates water. So the coding of the elemental power of Water "recognizes" both real water and "protowater" as under the Toa's control.

 

2) Only once it melts.

 

3) Toa of Ice can freeze existing water, since their element includes the fictional cold energy (which absorbs heat), and they can make either ice (water + cold energy) or just cold energy. They can also absorb cold energy from ice in order to enable it to melt faster (allowing heat to enter at a faster rate), producing liquid water (as long as they're not in an area with too little heat; it probably wouldn't work in Ko-Wahi for example).

Edited April 5, 2013 by bonesiii

[slifer3000]

Yes, bonesii, I have had that thought. Cold is just heat being absorbed, so would Tahu be very cold bc he is always emitting heat, and Kopaka be warm bc his element is the element of heat absorbing?

[Meta-Mind]

Yes, bonesii, I have had that thought. Cold is just heat being absorbed, so would Tahu be very cold bc he is always emitting heat, and Kopaka be warm bc his element is the element of heat absorbing?

Well, sort of. Toa of Fire are resistant to extreme heat, just as Toa of Ice are resistant to extreme cold. That might be a factor there, though it's more likely that it's just a "they're resistant to their own element" clause.

[bonesiii]

No, because the two cancel each other out. I normally don't go on in my explanation to bother including that part because it may seem overly technical. But there is an actually real equivalent in wave physics (as in sound waves for example, or water waves), where a negative wave, when it exactly meets a positive wave, will cancel out so that in that spot and at that time, neither seems to exist at all.

 

So, Tahu is producing Elemental Energy, and it's from that EE that his heat (and flammable materials) are made. EE is converted into heat. So he is not taking heat from himself. Neither is that heat swapping places with cold energy beyond him and bringing the cold into him. No, the heat cancels out any cold energy that is there.

 

The key here is that there aren't just two physics states, but three -- and this applies both for heat/cold and light/shadow:

 

1) Positive wave (heat and light, analogous to the high crest of an ocean wave)

 

2) Neutral lack of wave (natural darkness or coldness as in the real world -- a lack of positive, so a lack of heat energy, or a lack of light, as in a cast shadow)

 

3) Negative wave (cold energy and shadow energy, analogous to the low midpoint between two ocean waves; not just a lack).

 

So the key mistake that is often made is in assuming that if you take away heat, you automatically have cold energy present. Not necessarily. And this is where Bionicle physics get really confusing. But cool, and like I said, there is that real-world precedent in wave physics.

 

Therefore, Tahu emitting heat can either make a neutral area warm, or cancel out cold, making it neutral (and then, if he has enough EE, make even more heat to get above neutral). But this doesn't cause him to be cold, because any cold energy that is present there is being cancelled out.

 

Re: resistance -- that is easily explained as Tahu naturally, "automatically" moving excess heat energy away from his body, and Kopaka moving cold energy away from his body.

 

 

Another layer of complexity here is that for the negative-wave types (cold and shadow), they cannot produce heat from nothing. Neutral cold/dark is just as bad as negative cold/dark in some ways. If you go into outer space (intensely neutral cold; that is, an extreme lack of positive waves), you'll freeze to death as surely as if a Toa of Ice hit you with a powerful beam of cold energy. If Kopaka were in space and tried to absorb cold energy in order to heat himself up, that's a no go. There's no cold energy there to absorb.

 

However, normal situations on a planet, I see there as being a natural balance of some cold energy and some heat that will naturally "fill voids" either way. So on a planet, either Toa can absorb the one, and the opposite will tend to naturally come in and replace it, so they can indirectly warm or cool something. And... I could explain this part more clearly, but I'm out of time now, sorry... Hope this helps.