I'm watching the ep where Anne comes to Paris, and she wants Duncan to put a coat on even thought he can't catch a cold, and he replies, 'we can catch colds, just not die of them.' I don't ever remember knowing that they could get any sort of illness?
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This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-03 11:43 am (UTC)From:Yeesh. Can of worms....
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-03 12:04 pm (UTC)From:And it is open...I can't get it closed!!! *sits on lid*
I'm sitting in an epidemiology course, for chrissakes, and I'm a vet...aaarghh!
Could a mortal catch it off an immortal even though the immortal doesn't have symptoms? In basic biological sense, first, I'm sure they could carry infectios disease passively (if it's that kind of disease organism that survives in the environment). As to the disease organisms that'd require hosts to replicate - well, that'd depend exactly on whether they do get sick but recuperate faster, get sick occasionally (with organisms of high virulence/pathogenicity) or don't get sick at all. Respectively, it'd translate into "yes, they'd carry and replicate diseas without showing it much", "yes, they'd do it in some cases", and "no, they'd only act as passive carriers of contagion".
What about something ultimately lethal like AIDS - same diff as above, I'd say. But I think considering they're supposed to be like mortals in most aspect, I'd go with the idea that they just have much stronger immune systems and some genetic makeup dictating eithermuch faster cell turnover and/or lack of cell death. *grins* Ya know, a bit like cancer cells? that are just cells that don't have that part of gnetic command/info that tells acell to die at a proper time.
I actually have a plot idea hatching for a fic evolving around the use of immortals as organ/blood donors and why is that a bad idea, but god knows if it's ever going to get flesh on bones...
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-03 06:37 pm (UTC)From:I actually have a plot idea hatching for a fic evolving around the use of immortals as organ/blood donors and why is that a bad idea, but god knows if it's ever going to get flesh on bones...
*blink* ooooh, shiny.. eek, the possibilities.. some very very scary.. GAH! *gets the anti-bunny spray*
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-03 12:11 pm (UTC)From:Also, isn't pretty much canon that immortals can have mental illness? Considering a lot of mental illness can be at least partly contributed to internal chemical imbalance, that'd make it 'yes, they can aquire severe chronic illnesses'. Or is any mental illness in an immortal by default only psychological? (also, would it be physiologically possible?)
*plainitive* now see what's happened...I'm using coffee breaks to discuss immortal physiology *grins*
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-03 12:13 pm (UTC)From:Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-03 07:57 pm (UTC)From:The poison/violent death question! I remember it being discussed on a list many years ago, and of course, no one could agree. I mean, what exactly is a violent death? Some poisons have pretty 'violent' reactions. How about falling asleep and drowning in the bathtub? Or an overdose of sleeping pills? I'm pretty sure that death by an illness won't trigger immortality. I've actually used the 'dying of a terminal illness, but it needs to be a violent death' premise in a fic, and I was fairly certain that was canon when I wrote it. Hope so, cus otherwise, Methos stabbed someone in the heart for no reason :) Ah, he'll get over it...
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-03 09:40 pm (UTC)From:But why wouldn't death by disease "trigger" Immortality? Don't you have the Immortal pre-presence no matter what? How would how you die affect that?
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-03 10:20 pm (UTC)From:Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-03 11:25 pm (UTC)From:Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-04 12:53 am (UTC)From:Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-04 02:08 am (UTC)From:I was toying with the idea of 'Immortality' being made possible by an (super) over active thymus lymph (situated in the base of the neck and an important part of a human's immune system) I always thought that Kalas's neck injury was a bit suspect, but if you factor in the thymus gland (which is placed in the same approximate spot as the scar) you could go with the idea that the thymus gland had been damaged, and wasn't up to par when it healed the wound.
Then there is that 'moment of death' theory in which the brain does a last minute check on all the body's systems when it has been a dealt a death blow (And I sound like I'm describing DATA, don't I?) to see if it can repair it.
999,999,999 times out of a 1,000,000,000 this doesn't help but there is that lucky one...
In other words, theory number two is: A latent gene becoming active, triggered by a body death experience? (I was never convinced that Immortals truly died, I mean, did anyone ever check for brain death?)
Yes, I know these are the ramblings of insanity. I can't help myself!
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-04 09:55 am (UTC)From:Also, re: Kalas neck wound and a bit off the tangent - have you ever considered that it not healing might have had a psychiological background? I mean, in people, 'having faith' in something plays a rather substantial part as an additional factor, also in recuperation sense. We tend to use only quite small part of our brain resources conciously. So, lets stipulate that immies have a bit larger resources *g* and some of them have learned to use them (Cassandra, Connor, Ramirez, Kantos...etc) in one area or another; but majority is not really aware of the power of their, lets say subconcious, and operate only in the constraints of their previous mortal life preconceptions (and not at a level of a mortal who'd developed oneself in that area either). So basically, what I was trying to say with that rambling was that perhaps Kalas neck wound won't heal because he believes it can't, hasn't gotten over that horrible moment when he almost died. Would an immortal who didn't believe he'd revive stay dead longer? Would this partly explain why younder immortals are supposedly dead longer (is this canon or fanon, btw?)? Would there be a difference in 'staying dead time' if an immortal had a enough time (enough seconds) to realize it's going to happen and just get into the mindset of reviving *g* as opposed to a suddden deat where he'd not even get what happened? (the analogy being that if in a split second you see the punch coming and know you're going to fall, you will more likely fall with less damage and get up faster than when it takes you by surprise).
Hmmm...would the difference between 'died of illness/slow poison, did not become an immie' and 'died of violent/more sudden cause, became an immie' have something to do with the internal acceptance of death as an inevitable outcome in the first case and not in teh second? Basically, would a pre-immie who stubbornly refuses to believe in dying, be more likel to become immortal?
*shuffles feet shamefaced* Sorry for lenghty theory rambles...it's just that I'm still away on a course - which means brain activated by study+nothing to do on lunchbreak.
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-05 02:07 am (UTC)From:I think that the whole first death issue will never be totally resolved, primarily because of the origin question. They're all foundlings after all...and I have a few theories on that too:-)
Don't apologise for the school=active brain thing, I know exactly where you're coming from! I've just finished a college year (mature student) and suddenly find my brain twitching from inactivity. That, plus the fact that I've just indulged in a major DVD spree (including Highlander), has my brain coming up with all sorts of stuff :-)
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-04 09:57 am (UTC)From:And I do wonder wheher this in canon is something someone has tested, or is it just 'known', like 'there can be only one', meaning it can be another 'folk wisdom', not necessarily true?
Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-05 02:09 am (UTC)From:Re: This makes me wonder...
Date: 2006-06-04 06:41 pm (UTC)From: