Question about Micro-gravity

[olimar]

After 700 years in space, the humans are extremely obese and frighteningly weak. Advances in medicine seem to be able to keep them relatively healthy and make them live longer.

Now, imagine if Wall-E didn't stow away on the probe ship. EVE would've arrived to the captain, GO-4 would've blown up the plant in the pod, and things would've returned to "normal."

As the humans stayed on there for many more centuries, what would happen? Would they keep getting fatter, blobbier, and weaker, or would they eventually die?

I imagine that if the humans got too fat, they wouldn't fit in the hover chairs...

[hopper]

good question, an even better question is how did they manage to survive on earth? woudnt they have been crushed under their own weight uppon landing like beached whales?

[Norwesterner]

The WALL•E team at Pixar actually researched this issue in developing the film, even consulting with a NASA physiologist. You can read an explanation in the book, "The Art of WALL•E".

Basically, humans would have continued to devolve into blobs. Actually, the film's initial concept for the humans was to present them as gelatinous blobs with faces, and reveal at the end of the film — in a PLANET OF THE APES like moment — that they had once been human. However, this was apparently considered to darken the storyline a bit too much. But, according to "The Art of WALL•E", the humans presented in the film were less devolved than they would have been in real life under those circumstances.

[bkim]

Sept 6, 2008 21:48:37 GMT -5 Norwesterner said:

Actually, the film's initial concept for the humans was to present them as gelatinous blobs with faces, and reveal at the end of the film — in a PLANET OF THE APES like moment — that they had once been human. However, this was apparently considered to darken the storyline a bit too much. But, according to "The Art of WALL•E", the humans presented in the film were less devolved than they would have been in real life under those circumstances.

Now that would have been an interesting twist. Reminds me a bit of The Time Machine, personally. Less devolved? Wow.

I actually get the feeling that the human race would not have lasted much longer under those conditions. Can you imagine what happened to the humans on the other ships that left the Earth as they continued to devolve?

[levelhead]

I was actually a bit surprised to hear the CEO refer to "microgravity." The term literally means near-zero gravity, or freefall. Clearly, that wasn't what was happening on the Axiom.

How do we know? From trajectories. Remember the Repair Ward, and the tennis balls being swatted back and forth? They arced and bounced in a way that seemed to be within a normal gravitational field.

The same with WALL·E himself -- when the ship he was on was suddenly included in the Axiom's gravitational field, he fell down the side and rolled to a stop in a manner indistinguishable from his own planet's gravity. (I don't count the virtual tennis and golf robots in use on the Lido deck as evidence; they could have operated in special gravitational fields for the game.)

But let's say that the gravity is reduced -- say, 80% or so of Earth normal. Then we can accept "microgravity" as a sloppy bit of slang.

The humans, though, seemed to suffer most from a complete lack of physical activity. Spending all day hooked up to those chairs (and I'll assume there are no separate restrooms, by ... process of elimination) they have simply no reason to develop physically.

I don't think they've "devolved" per say; Captain McCrae's own predecessors establish that only half-a-dozen or so generations have passed.

Instead, they've been raised from birth with no physical activity -- and any of us might look like that under those circumstances.

This also gives them a better chance to survive back on Earth than if they were really in microgravity; had that been true, even their lungs would have collapsed on Earth.

They face a completely different problem: half a dozen generations in the "no foreign contaminants" environment of the Axiom will hardly prepare them for the million generations of bacteria that have evolved in their absence.

D-FIB and company will have much to do.

===|==============/ Level Head

[bkim]

Well, you know, all of this discussion about microgravity is kind of made pointless by the fact that the humans should not have been sliding down the Lido Deck as the ship "tilted." The ship produced its own gravitational field that should have always been acting in a perpendicular direction to the plane of the deck. And if we all remember back to our Physics classes, work done by a force equals W = Fxcos(θ), but perpendicular paths indicates that θ = 90°, so W = 0, and no work can possibly be done on the individuals to give them any acceleration or displacement over a distance x. But now we're nitpicking.

[vanessajoyce]

And if we all remember back to our Physics classes, work done by a force equals W = Fxcos(è), but perpendicular paths indicates that è = 90°, so W = 0, and no work can possibly be done on the individuals to give them any acceleration or displacement over a distance x. But now we're nitpicking.

Uh . . . oh, yeah . . . I remember that.

And that's why I'm bowing out of this thread . . . way over my head!

[MidgardDragon]

Umm...yeah, physics, uh, how 'bout that Newton fella? *goes away*

[Castoro Chiaro]

Yeah, it did bug me a little that there was obviously artificial gravity, but Shelby referred to there being "micro gravity". It was obviously enough to hold down a large Probe ship, so it had to be pretty strong.

But, alas, I too have little knowledge regarding physics. I agree with the 80% of Earth's gravity theory.

[olimar]

I don't know much about physics, but here's my guess.

The Ship has it's own gravitational field. That's obvious.

I assumed that microgravity meant that in Space, even with near complete gravity, microgravity would still have a small affect. Over a long period of time, and lots of laziness, microgravity has successfully made every Axiom passenger obese.

Now, that might not make any sense. Does anybody know if it does?

[Khodhum]

Oh, fine, if everyone else is gonna be scared away by a little mechanics, I guess I have to post here...

Yes, they are not in a uniform gravitational field (well, not that the Earth's is uniform either, but it's a good approximation for most everyday scales). Out in space, there is no "down", so nothing should fall, or slide, or anything to that effect. However, when the Axiom tilted, there would have been a force on the people while it was in the process of tilting...it might have flung them off their hoverchairs, assuming the tilt was fast enough. But as soon as the Axiom stopped tilting, everything would have returned to normal.

Unless the Axiom had...what do they call them in Star Trek? Inertial something-or-others? Or what if the artificial gravitational field somehow extended all the way outside the Axiom? Then there would be a "down", and so the sliding people would be a legit concept.

But microgravity...you're right, levelhead. They appear to be operating in a gravitational field that's somewhere in the ballpark of the Earth's in terms of strength. And if that's the case, they shouldn't lose their bones. If the field were slightly weaker than Earth's, however (slight enough for us not to be able to distinguish a difference in trajectory), then maybe after a sufficient length of time bone loss would occur. The rate of bone loss is more of a biology question, though, which is outside my range of knowledge.

[hopper]

Sept 9, 2008 10:42:56 GMT -5 Castoro Chiaro said:

Yeah, it did bug me a little that there was obviously artificial gravity, but Shelby referred to there being "micro gravity". It was obviously enough to hold down a large Probe ship, so it had to be pretty strong.

But, alas, I too have little knowledge regarding physics. I agree with the 80% of Earth's gravity theory.

actually no it doesnt have to be THAT strong to hold a probe ship.. the moon's gravity is 1/6th earth but it held the lunar lander quite nicely, and living even in 1/3 or 1/6th gravety would be bad for the human race
as mentioned before the big hole is how they somehow manage to land on earth after livng in a reduced gravity without being crushed by thier own weight

[Khodhum]

My only guess is that the gravity is reduced enough to induce bone loss, but not reduced enough for there to be significant adverse effects upon returning to Earth. I don't know if such a gravity level is possible, though.