Talk:Virus

Why do we have viruses listed as energy? one of the only known instances we have of seeing one isolated in the story was when it was shown as a powder that takanuva inhaled - that doesn't sound like energy. (actually, sounds more like real-world anthrax...) Intelligence4 (talk) 21:56, 10 June 2017 (CET)

edit

on the most recent edit (this , in case someone makes another) - i added that analogy after the greg citation to clarify that the part i added wasn't part of what greg said. i didn't think that that would make it seem like greg had said my part of the analogy - can we put that back in? i think that makes a lot of sense. Intelligence4 (talk) 01:40, 17 June 2017 (CET)

Eh, per the summary I think it's best to leave it out. There's a difference between a dog infection infecting a human and a computer virus infecting a human. The first can sometimes occur given the right scenario (close contact, mutation, what have you). The second just... doesn't really make sense. I think the term "viruses" is sort of a misnomer given what we know, since they seem more like powerups or cheat codes instead. Or they can at least be interpreted that way given the info we have. Even if they are "viruses" in a traditional sense, AFAIK Greg hasn't indicated that, so I think if we add the other analogy in, we'd be implying something about their nature that hasn't been confirmed. -- Morris the Mata Nui Cow (talk) 02:51, 17 June 2017 (CET)

just as an aside for the record, close contact (or really anything else) won't cause a dog's virus to cause disease in a human - unless the virus has somehow evolved to be pathogenic in both species (highly unlikely and uncommon), it's simply not possible. technically, a mutation could do the trick, but then it wouldn't be the same virus anymore - something about either the DNA inside or the carrying protein coat would have changed significantly to allow that to happen, although they'd still be similar enough that they could be considered "related". think of the bird flu as an example - effects avian species, but mutated and spread to humans (and pigs too, i think - but i could be wrong about that).

more to the point, i think greg is wrong here. he made the malware analogy 10 years after viruses were introduced in the story, and about half a decade after his "official" involvement in the story ended with the story-line itself. there are several points in the story that make it pretty clear what a virus is in story, and literally none of them could be interpreted as a computer virus. a computer virus is a bunch of code that technically doesn't exist - the closest physical manifestation of them could be described as magnetic spots on a hard drive configured to behave a certain way. in bionicle, we've seen viruses be used to create animals (rahi) by exposure to energized protodermis, which would greatly point to them actually being bits of DNA, like an actual virus - and that's how real animals start too, as bits of DNA inside a single cell. we've also seen viruses in a powder form, and then seen them inhaled to have them take effect. this is a very real, (and problematic) method of infection with an actual virus.

due to the numerous examples of established canon contradicting with what greg said about the subject after the fact, i think we can conclude that he was wrong about his virus analogy - either a forgetcon type of thing, or him just being removed far enough in time from the writing of the story that he misinterpreted (for want of a better word) the original intentions of the whole virus thing. he may have wrote large parts of the story, but that doesn't mean that he's infallible, or that absolutely everything he says is concrete canon - after all, he himself said that if something he says contradicts something else he said or wrote, the prior thing takes precedence over the newer statement. Intelligence4 (talk) 05:01, 17 June 2017 (CET)

Ah I was getting a bit sloppy there, sorry about that. I was thinking of infections generally rather than viruses specifically. Bird flu's the sort of thing I was thinking of when I wrote the earlier post.

I'd be cool with removing the current analogy given its inconsistencies as you've pointed out, but I don't think we should replace it unless Greg gives some more clarification. If you (or anyone else) wants to bring the issue up with Greg, go for it! -- Morris the Mata Nui Cow (talk) 01:31, 18 June 2017 (CET)

yeah, it's kinda weird - even a bacterial infection from a dog won't bother a human, or vice versa - but if say your dog licked your friend's face while they were sick and then licked you, your dog would be fine, but you'd probably be not feeling too great the next day haha.

I'll agree with that. i'll probably bug him about it sometime in the future, but i'm super busy IRL right now haha. i don't think we had anything there before greg answered someone's question, so we're really not missing out on anything haha. i assume you have to have an account on the ttv message boards to ask him a question? Intelligence4 (talk) 03:42, 19 June 2017 (CET)

Yep you'd need an account. -- Morris the Mata Nui Cow (talk) 05:30, 19 June 2017 (CET)

if the reasoning for the trivia point is inconsistent/wrong, shouldn't we take down the whole trivia point? Intelligence4 (talk) 06:22, 19 June 2017 (CET)

Does this still apply to Hordika Venom? On that page, it says that neither Viruses nor Hordika Venom affect organic beings. -- Toa Jala ^Converse 05:01, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Era

Should this page (among others in the substances/energies category) really have years in the Era? ~ Wolk (talk) 15:04, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Targets

It should be added that viruses are not limited to just Biomechenical life forms. It affected Mata Nui a robot at the time and Kraata who are organic and even said to have genetic material. I am specifically referring to the Shadow Leeches made from Kraata. We know for certain that they were not created by Energized Proterdermis or the stuff that transformed Bohrok to become the Bohrok Kal since we have seen examples of Kraata mutated by those substances. And it is likely Hordika Venom was not involved since it was a long process that took trial and error which is something known to happen in things changed or created by viruses. Makuta of Mata Nui (talk) 08:03, 23 February 2020 (UTC)