UBBFriend: Email This Page to Someone!
  The StakeHouse
  Mythos and Morality (BBC)
  Do Buffy vampires have a pulse?

Post New Topic  Post A Reply
profile | register | preferences | faq | search

next newest topic | next oldest topic
Author Topic:   Do Buffy vampires have a pulse?
Connavar
Scooby Gang Member
posted 21-04-2000 07:58 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Connavar   Click Here to Email Connavar     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
There is more to this question than simply this,but I thought I would get this bit straight before I make a complete dick of myself!

In BTVS and Angel, do the vamps have an actual pulse as in their undead blood still being pumped around the body?

IP: Logged

Bathory
Scooby Gang Member
posted 21-04-2000 09:19 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Bathory     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
If vampires need to be staked thru the heart, their heart must be pumping blood which in turn means you must have a pulse.
Yeh or Neh? Too complex!

IP: Logged

AxB
Scooby Gang Member
posted 21-04-2000 10:18 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for AxB   Click Here to Email AxB     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
In my Dungeons n Dragons phase, we had a huge argument about whether you could damage a skeleton (a la Harryhausen) using arrows, spears or other thrusting weapons, when they would just harmlessly pass through the body.. eventually we concluded that disrupting the magical / telekinetic aura that gave the Skeleton animation was the key to 'killing' the creature, rather than smashing the bones themselves. So in those terms, Vampires don't neccesarily have pulses, because they aren't neccesarily animated through muscular movements.

Not that this is that relevant to BtVS versions....

IP: Logged

MonSTeR
Scooby Gang Member
posted 21-04-2000 10:47 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for MonSTeR   Click Here to Email MonSTeR     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
Vox and I were having a lil discussion as to the Livinginess of Vamps in BtVS and there are so many little holes in the mythos its incredible. My guess is that in an episode where a vampire is written as having no pulse it has no pulse and in an episode where it has a pulse it's cos that episode's script says so. I can't find any more logical answers to the whole dead/alive stuff.

Professor MonSTeR lectures on metaphysiology at MonSTeRHeiM University and is completely out of his furry little mind

IP: Logged

Sushi
Watcher
posted 21-04-2000 10:50 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Sushi   Click Here to Email Sushi     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
A long time ago in a galaxy far away, before people realised there's more to that squishy grey lump inside a skull than filler, the heart was considered the seat of consciousness. A vampire was a dead thing which somehow retained a consciousness. Therefore, the way to make them push up daisies properly was to physically do in the thing that had to be holding something it shouldn't. In addition, if a body were still full of blood {settled though it may be} someone *had* to have a pulse, right? This isn't the whole story, admittedly, but it's a rough overview. I like to call this the, "If we think it moves let's poke it with a stick" theory of vampire extermination.

IP: Logged

Cordelia's_Red_Panties
Scooby Gang Member
posted 22-04-2000 11:32 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Cordelia's_Red_Panties   Click Here to Email Cordelia's_Red_Panties     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
Without saying too much, in an episode of Angel a vamp is checked for a pulse and none is found.

IP: Logged

yally
Scooby Gang Member
posted 22-04-2000 01:20 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for yally   Click Here to Email yally     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
MonSTeR is right, it depends on what is convenient 4 the episode. Sometimes its a big thing that vampires don't have a pulse. But sometimes poison/tranquilizers work on vampires, which need 2 be transported around the body 2 work (?)

IP: Logged

Joe
Scooby Gang Member
posted 23-04-2000 11:26 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Joe   Click Here to Email Joe     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by yally:
MonSTeR is right, it depends on what is convenient 4 the episode. Sometimes its a big thing that vampires don't have a pulse. But sometimes poison/tranquilizers work on vampires, which need 2 be transported around the body 2 work (?)

Depends. Some poisons work on the nervous system, instantly.

IP: Logged

MonSTeR
Scooby Gang Member
posted 23-04-2000 02:16 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for MonSTeR   Click Here to Email MonSTeR     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
Yeah but is that nervous system alive or not? What is it that makes a Vampire get up and walk around. Is it physiological or is it Demonic ?

Ie would a conventional neurotoxin work on a Vampire?

IP: Logged

Vox
Scooby Gang Member
posted 24-04-2000 10:26 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Vox   Click Here to Email Vox     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Connavar:
In BTVS and Angel, do the vamps have an actual pulse as in their undead blood still being pumped around the body?


No, BtVS vampires don't have a pulse. Nor do they have a heartbeat. Though they have blood in their veins it isn't pumped around their body. They can be affected by chemicals however which implies that those chemicals can get around the body, since we have no information on how that works I choose to call it their 'demon diffusion'.

The demon essence within every vampire would presumably not be affected by any poisons at all, however the host body itself would remain vulnerable to what it was when it was alive. Therefore vampires can be poisoned, tranquilised and electrocuted (implying that they use their neural system). None of the above could kill the vampire, in the same way that machine gunning it down wouldn't kill it, however the demon essence cannot make the body do that which it is physically incapable of doing. If you destroy the muscles in a vampire's leg then he would not be able to control it.

As to vampire's power source I see three different alternatives:

1) They manage to get whatever energy they need from the blood they injest, which would make their metabolisms pretty damn efficient.

2) They run on an internal sort of demonic battery which energises them.

3) They use the resources stored within the body and slowly hollow it out from the inside. This might explain why all vampires turn to dust, their bodies are only held together by whatever mystical force holds the demon essence in residence, but it would not explain why newborns collapse into dust as quickly as the centuries old vampires.

IP: Logged

MonSTeR
Scooby Gang Member
posted 24-04-2000 10:48 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for MonSTeR   Click Here to Email MonSTeR     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
I'm going to have to go with some sort of "demonic powerplant" that runs on blood as a fuel. I think whatever energy they run on can't be energy as we in the conventional world recognise it, but rather some sort of mystical/magical "energy" or "life force" etc. that is contained within the blood rather than any chemical constituent of it.

The lack of a pulse indicates no traditional life function to the body, pretty much ruling out a traditional metabolism as a way of generating energy, (which comes back to the not needing oxygen thing ) and the stored energy bit just doesn't sit well with me for centuries old beings, plus if they were to use the body would they still need to feed?

IP: Logged

Connavar
Scooby Gang Member
posted 25-04-2000 06:17 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Connavar   Click Here to Email Connavar     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
OK then,seeing as everyone is still undecided on this(but with valid arguements for both sides,think about this..
When Angel lost his soul again by finding 'True Happiness' with Buffy,wouldn't a pulse have been sort of essential physically at that point ?

Also eating food seems to be a bit hit and miss too as far as vamps go as some do and some only do when 'cured' of there vampirism

IP: Logged

Vox
Scooby Gang Member
posted 26-04-2000 11:41 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Vox   Click Here to Email Vox     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
Okay <rolls up sleeves>, Sex Ed. 666 ~

This is an excerpt from the comments on stina's 'The TRUTH about vampire sex' article hosted at Above the Law http://www.geocities.com/voxsententia/abovethelaw/index.html

"A somewhat more personal problem
bebesho 4/2/00
...How does a male vampire have an erection? If he does not have warm blood of his own to make this happen? I mean he has no sperm because he is DEAD..so this brings the obvious up..how does he have intercourse?...

justjo 29/1/00
...I think the issue here is a conflict between Anne Ricean vampire lore (which was quite traditional and probably hitherto accepted by most of us, who probably had a background in Vampire fiction pre-Buffy?) and Whedon vampire lore which seems to bend to fit plot lines quite often. In Queen of the Damned, Lestat notices his organ still functions even though he is quite detatched from the event (especially as the context is non-sexual)...

Vox 5/2/00
Vampires do have blood in their veins (as in Becoming II where Angelus used his own blood on his hand to pull the sword from Acathla), this blood however is dead. It does not circulate (vampires have no heart-beat ergo no way to pump it around the body). Of course Joss hasn't mentioned how Buffyverse vampires might achieve an erection, but in the world of Vampire: The Masquerade vampires can 'will' the blood to engorge the penis (though in that universe there is little incentive as they take no pleasure from intercourse) perhaps in a similar manner that men can to a limited extent.

The question this leads onto is exactly whether or not Angel achieved any sort of orgasm. As you said he doesn't have sperm but semen is only consists partially of sperm. One thing that might be relevant to his moment of happiness is that he did not lose his soul at the moment of orgasm, rather they had finished and he was lying asleep (perhaps in that moment of perfect contentment) when it happened."


IP: Logged

Sushi
Watcher
posted 26-04-2000 08:01 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Sushi   Click Here to Email Sushi     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
To continue with this thread, what causes vampires to become aroused in the first place? Darla has become noticeably *ahem* interested, among others, so there must be some sort of hormonal involvement, too. If the body is dead, the endocrine system must be dead, too. Hence, the only feasible source of hormones is food.

A little scientific background: hormones are sterols, a class of lipid which includes vitamin D and cholesterol. They're stable, have a long lifespan, and can be stored in the body for fairly long periods of time. Whenever a human consumes anything containing hormones, whether they be plant-sourced like isoflavones or animal-sourced like oestrogen, there is a distinct effect.

Presumably, since hormones circulate in the blood, a vampire would be able to gain and store them {if only for a short time due to the nature of technically dead tissue} for later use. While this brings up the idea of undead atheriosclerosis, that's beside the point. Everyone has a certain amount of male and female hormones, hence no matter whom a vamp feeds on any hormones could eventually be used.

Erm... the approval letter from the INS just came so I'll cut this short. *bounces off to scan*

IP: Logged

MonSTeR
Scooby Gang Member
posted 26-04-2000 08:34 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for MonSTeR   Click Here to Email MonSTeR     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
Curious MonSTeR.

How can a steroid-hormone affect a dead thing cos without respiration ie in a dead cell, you're not going to have the neccescary ATP to produce the cyclic AMP used to mediate the responses?!?!?


IP: Logged

Antonius
Scooby Gang Member
posted 27-04-2000 01:07 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Antonius   Click Here to Email Antonius     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
Vampire's have not got a pulse. Remember when Doyle checked Angel's wrist to see if he was actually alive in i,w,r,y.

IP: Logged

Sushi
Watcher
posted 27-04-2000 06:56 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Sushi   Click Here to Email Sushi     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by MonSTeR:
Curious MonSTeR.

How can a steroid-hormone affect a dead thing cos without respiration ie in a dead cell, you're not going to have the neccescary ATP to produce the cyclic AMP used to mediate the responses?!?!?


That's one of the problems with the idea. To make this even more bizarre, I shall cite "The Princess Bride". When The Machine was set to maximum Wesley ended up *mostly* dead. He was still a little bit alive, similar to a stasis. Presumably, there would still be passive metabolism of some sort. To extend this to vampies, they may only be mostly dead. The body itself may be caught at the moment of death. Since different tissues die at different rates, blood may provide just enough oxygen and nutrients to keep, say, muscle tissue alive. The arrival of a demon would cause massive changes to the tissue itself {permanent, of course, seeing that Angel was demon-free for a time}. This may result in the body's ability to diffuse the nutrients without true bloodflow.

Or there's another possibility...

In Forever Knight, a vampire is commonly described as having no pulse when, in fact, the heart weakly beats once every ten minutes or so. Even if a person were to feel the faint pulse it could be attributed to imagination. This, combined with the anaerobic lifespan of muscle, bone, and connective tissues {several hours}, would leave a perfectly suitable opening for a modified metabolism including hormone use. This would also allow for ability to think assuming the brain and nerves have been altered by the transformation to retain oxygen and nutrients for a long enough time to live. Since the heart is composed of muscle and connective tissues it would live long enough to beat again ten minutes after the last beat. Admittedly, this means that a vampire isn't in fact dead. However, if a metabolism is altered that radically the state couldn't exactly be described as "alive" as no known living being as complex as a mammal can survive under those conditions and be in anything but deep hibernation. Hence, the term undead would be appropriate.

Okay, I'll shut up now and get some rest.

IP: Logged

STEFF
Scooby Gang Member
posted 28-04-2000 01:47 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for STEFF   Click Here to Email STEFF     Edit/Delete Message Reply w/Quote
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Connavar:


When Angel lost his soul again by finding 'True Happiness' with Buffy,wouldn't a pulse have been sort of essential physically at that point ?

and you'd be needing to know this.....why????


[This message has been edited by STEFF (edited 28-04-2000).]

IP: Logged

All times are GMT

next newest topic | next oldest topic

Administrative Options: Close Topic | Archive/Move | Delete Topic
Post New Topic  Post A Reply
Hop to:

Contact Us | BuffyUK.org

Powered by: Ultimate Bulletin Board, Version 5.43d
© Infopop Corporation (formerly Madrona Park, Inc.), 1998 - 2000.