Combine Consoles - More Medical Connections?

[586FAC75]

Just a quick post, I noticed the images on Combine Control Consoles HL2, yet in HL2 Ep1 these images changed slightly which made me notice them more.

Now, I have no background or education in identifying these kind of things, but they look biological...malignant growths...

Reminded me of the Overwatch PA System which relies heavily on medical terminology.

Anyone else noticed anything else in a similar vein?

 

[586FAC75]

Would help if I attached examples...

 

[Polaris]

Probably not, reactor control can't be connected with medical equipment. Combine maybe using some sort of advanced biotechnology in their computers (like DNA computing).

 

[Acepilotf14]

Well, what about the combine Advisor? he ahs to be kept alive. Medical stuff could be appliable.

 

[Jintor]

It is possible that Combine systems merely identify everything as living, so the citadel dying is like a tumor or something.

 

[Asknoone]

Interesting stuff.

 

[W4d5Y]

Nah, Combine aren't really the people who trust biotechnologies, rather they'd create cyborgs, so why would they have to rely on stuff like Bioengengineering in order to controle a reactor...pft

 

[Polaris]

Nah, Combine aren't really the people who trust biotechnologies, rather they'd create cyborgs, so why would they have to rely on stuff like Bioengengineering in order to controle a reactor...pft

Maybe because DNA molecules, have the potential to perform calculations many times faster than the world's most powerful human-built computers.

 

[Przemek]

We are just a few years away from DNA computers. And when I say 'few years', I mean like a maximum of five. Trust me on that

 

[comoxer]

We are just a few years away from DNA computers. And when I say 'few years', I mean like a maximum of five. Trust me on that

so in say 5 years ill some sort of nucleic acid flowing through my pc, cool :cheese:

 

[586FAC75]

The images supplied are from the panels at the Citadel reactor, however all "Combine Maintenance Access Command Modules" have these biological images, for example;

1.
2.

Both screenshots taken at Nova Prospekt.

And Przemek is right on the subject of DNA Computing as this very recent New Scientist article shows.

 

[gusIII]

What if the "package" is somekind of DNA or something like that? :O

 

[Jintor]

Nah, Combine aren't really the people who trust biotechnologies, rather they'd create cyborgs, so why would they have to rely on stuff like Bioengengineering in order to controle a reactor...pft

I would say maybe they treat everything as if it were alive, up to and including a city - that's why you hear the scum screaming Outbreak at you every couple of seconds.

 

[heer0]

I think the consoles are just in some sort of symbolic language we cannot understand. A language of colors, pictures and symbols, maybe extraterrestrial, or xen...why should they display something that looks like a living tissue? No reason.

PS: And besides, Alyx could read those consoles, so they must be some sort of alphabet on them, not just showing entrails of unknown origin

 

[Darkside55]

It is possible that Combine systems merely identify everything as living, so the citadel dying is like a tumor or something.

It's not a tumor!

Looking at these, an idea just popped into my head. Anyone ever seen the show, "Threshold?" In the show there's an alien signal that, when you look at it, it's just a weird spiral design, but it's actually a mathematic equation. (Interestingly enough, it's medical/biologically related; it's an encryption of a DNA strand) These circular patterns could be representations of data, condensed into the 2D form on the screen.

 

[bigburpco]

Huh, never thought of it that way.