Richard's Animorphs Forum

Animorphs Section => Animorphs Forum Classic => Topic started by: esplin on August 23, 2008, 04:10:09 PM

Title: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: esplin on August 23, 2008, 04:10:09 PM
and use that DNA at a later time?
I dont think this has been mentioned before and I dont think the books ever touched on this with the exception of Tobais, but in his case he was a bird when he acquired his human self in the past.

Could you acquire yourself, or freeze some of your blood perhaps and wait until your older to morph your younger self?

Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: wotw2112 on August 23, 2008, 04:20:53 PM
No.  I doubt you could acquire yourself while you're in a trance.  And you already have your own DNA inside your body.  Just as I doubt you could acquire the same animal twice I doubt you could acquire yourself.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: musicman88 on August 23, 2008, 04:51:38 PM
I think it could be possible.  Your DNA changes when you age so it would be different from when you were younger.  I never really thought about it.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Starsword on August 23, 2008, 04:59:26 PM
Well, so long as you can in fact morph from blood as book 19 mentions, I do not see why it wouldn't be possible. It would just mean you have a younger starting point for your morph.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: morfowt on August 23, 2008, 05:05:36 PM
Well, so long as you can in fact morph from blood as book 19 mentions, I do not see why it wouldn't be possible. It would just mean you have a younger starting point for your morph.
uh...book 18, and there still a little debate on how that's possible.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Starsword on August 23, 2008, 05:07:43 PM
Yeah, book 18, whatever, but if the author says its possible, who am I to disagree with the universe she created
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: morfowt on August 23, 2008, 05:11:06 PM
she's already wrote plenty of mistakes...
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Phoenix004 on August 23, 2008, 05:13:42 PM
Acquiring from blood alone was sketchy at best, and that was from a completely different person. Acquiring yourself, even from an old blood sample seems unlikely to be possible. However, there would be nothing to stop an Animorph who was about to die of old age morphing a young person or animal and extending his/her lifetime. If Andalite scientists could then figure out how to give morphing power to a nothlit, you would basically become immortal.

However (back to the topic) Rachel did technically acquire and morph herself in #32 when she was split in two.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Gafrash on August 23, 2008, 07:01:58 PM
This topic dropped me dead from laaaaaughing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Starsword on August 23, 2008, 09:26:13 PM
Theoretically, Tobias did acquire himself anyhow. It was a younger version of himself, but nonetheless.... Although I doubt you could acquire yourself directly, that would just be dumb anyway, but I dunno, if you did that would you be a nothlit.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: esplin on August 28, 2008, 02:55:21 PM
yeah it was just a thought and rachel did do that thing in number 32...
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Liz on August 29, 2008, 12:12:06 AM
Theoretically, Tobias did acquire himself anyhow. It was a younger version of himself, but nonetheless.... Although I doubt you could acquire yourself directly, that would just be dumb anyway, but I dunno, if you did that would you be a nothlit.

That's an interesting thought.  I guess maybe if for some reason you wanted to get rid of your morphing ability you could do that.

But then again, how would you be able to tell the difference between being in morph and out of morph? xD
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Nateosaurus on August 29, 2008, 06:44:17 AM
Thats just crazy.. acquiring yourself.

Its YOUR DNA IN THE FIRST PLACE... so yea...

I understand how Tobias did it, that made more sense... and same with Rachel... but if Marco or someone said "hey, i'm gonna try and acquire myself"... its just weird..
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: morfowt on August 29, 2008, 08:18:54 AM
I don't see how it's possible to acquire yourself. you need to concentrate to acquire, but the acquiring process puts you in a trance, so you can't concentrate. the only way you can acquire your own dna, is if it's not the same body.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: crystalclear on August 01, 2010, 11:06:19 PM
Identical DNA not from the same body? Is it possible for a pair of identical twins to acquire each other, perhaps to stay young forever? ;D
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: goom on August 02, 2010, 12:38:20 AM
I think it could be possible.  Your DNA changes when you age

but at the time you'd be acquiring the same-aged DNA.
i don't think it'd work.

Identical DNA not from the same body? Is it possible for a pair of identical twins to acquire each other, perhaps to stay young forever? ;D

and yeah i've thought of that :)
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Enki on August 02, 2010, 06:51:30 AM
Why is the blood thing an issue? Every cell in your body has a copy of your entire DNA strand in it, so it should be possible to acquire someone from their blood, hair, spit, skin cells, etc. Much like how forensic scientists can ID a person from the DNA found in such specimens.

Also, your DNA does NOT change when you age, only how each gene is expressed changes (ie, some are turned on or off). The only time DNA undergoes any kind of significant change is during the creation of sex cells, and of course, that's only in those particular cells. Unless of course, you happen to be hanging around high levels of radiation  :P

As far as whether or not you can acquire yourself, I don't see why that wouldn't be possible. The acquired DNA is encapsulated and stored in the blood, right? So acquiring DNA from another animal is sort of like downloading a .zip file from another computer, while acquiring yourself would just be like making a .zip out of data you already had stored on your computer.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Terenia on August 02, 2010, 07:33:20 AM
Identical DNA not from the same body? Is it possible for a pair of identical twins to acquire each other, perhaps to stay young forever? ;D

Actually, this is a situation two of my fanfiction/rpg characters find themselves in. They're identical twins and one has a morph of the other. But it's a bit more convoluted than that. :D


I don't see why you couldn't acquire yourself, unless the Andalites put in some sort of safeguard against it for some reason. It could be very convenient, at the very least. Although it would suck if you forgot you were in morph and became a nothlit of yourself unintentionally. :P
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: cams on August 02, 2010, 08:08:12 AM
But then again, how would you be able to tell the difference between being in morph and out of morph? xD
Er... You'd be able to use thought speak while you are in morph of yourself?

Would there be the gross morphing process? Would you be able to tell if you're in mid-morph, or finished morphing, or if you even began morphing at all?
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: phenom64 on August 02, 2010, 08:16:04 AM
Dosn't seem really nesscitary, you still are youreslf.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: MoppingBear on August 02, 2010, 10:06:58 AM

Also, your DNA does NOT change when you age, only how each gene is expressed changes (ie, some are turned on or off). The only time DNA undergoes any kind of significant change is during the creation of sex cells, and of course, that's only in those particular cells. Unless of course, you happen to be hanging around high levels of radiation  :P


eh technically it does, every time cells divide, your telomeres (junk dna) gets a little shorter.  its thought to me one of the main causes of aging, telomeres run out and the division process starts eating up actual used dna.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: delta on August 02, 2010, 01:24:49 PM
DNA does change a little bit when you age because the telomeres shorten (replication is an ineffective process). I assume that's how you can morph the same age. Also, DNA methylation would probably cause some of the DNA to be shut down.

One thing that I didn't like about 18 where they tried to acquire the blood is that... in humans, red blood cells actually do not have DNA in them. >_>; it's untrue for some other animals though, i think. So to acquire anything from blood, your morphing powers would have to detect the DNA in the white blood cells or skin cells still attached.

well, back to the main topic, i'm sure that you could acquire yourself at a young age, then "morph" that DNA from when you were younger... mainly based on telomere shortening.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Kotetsu1442 on August 02, 2010, 09:27:34 PM
Yeah, book 18, whatever, but if the author says its possible, who am I to disagree with the universe she created
Acquiring from blood alone was sketchy at best, and that was from a completely different person...
Why is the blood thing an issue? Every cell in your body has a copy of your entire DNA strand in it, so it should be possible to acquire someone from their blood, hair, spit, skin cells, etc. Much like how forensic scientists can ID a person from the DNA found in such specimens.
The thing is, as Phoenix implied even though KA has AX state explicitly that it is possible to acquire from a blood sample alone, this is only stated the once then never even alluded to again; on the other hand it is repeated on multiple occasion that you cannot acquire from something dead, even immediately after it dies, so it doesn't make sense to be able to acquire from blood samples alone (really, they never actually ended up acquiring from blood, so it could have been easily written around by having their plan be to "spy on the security around the unconscious Hewlett Aldershot" then get Z-space-nabbed as flies).



Identical DNA not from the same body? Is it possible for a pair of identical twins to acquire each other, perhaps to stay young forever? ;D

Actually, this is a situation two of my fanfiction/rpg characters find themselves in. They're identical twins and one has a morph of the other. But it's a bit more convoluted than that. :D


I don't see why you couldn't acquire yourself, unless the Andalites put in some sort of safeguard against it for some reason. It could be very convenient, at the very least. Although it would suck if you forgot you were in morph and became a nothlit of yourself unintentionally. :P

I agree that it should be possible in this way, unless there is intentionally something built in the technology to prevent it as Terenia says. But I'm still not clear on how that would let you stay young forever. Could you clarify, crystalclear?
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: goom on August 03, 2010, 01:48:10 AM
Would you be able to tell if you're in mid-morph

i'd thought of that.
if you could acquire yourself, you could morph a few seconds in to thought-speak.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Liz on August 03, 2010, 06:36:50 PM
But then again, how would you be able to tell the difference between being in morph and out of morph? xD
Er... You'd be able to use thought speak while you are in morph of yourself?

True, I'd forgotten about that.  Wow, this is an old thread!

That would actually come in handy, being able to thought-speak in your own form...
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: CounterInstinct on August 05, 2010, 01:46:42 AM
Wouldn't it be hard to demorph(or morph) tho? Since you have to concentrate on the image. And what if it is the same image?
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Coal Kropotkin on August 05, 2010, 06:22:52 AM
I think it'd be entirely possible, the only real problem I can think of is what Morf pointed out, you go into a trance when being acquired... But, if you can acquire from blood, then problem solved, or, even from maybe hair, spit, et cetera (as someone else pointed out), that way, you could morph your younger self when you were old and grey, and get an extra 30-40 years, or more if it was a young enough morph, and, if they can figure out how to give the morphing ability to nothlits, then, yeah, there's immortal-ness possibility.

Plus, you'd get to go through the rest of your (newly elongated) life with thought-speak! :D

And, personally, I believe the reason you can't acquire dead things is a safety feature the Andalites installed. I mean, honestly, if you developed the morphing power, wouldn't you install the same safe-guard? You wouldn't want people killing someone, and then morphing then... A whole new level of ID theft! Lol. Although, on the same hand, you could just acquire them and then kill them... Which would actually be more helpful... Considering it puts them in a trance... Alright, I'm getting WAY off topic. XD Stupid not sleeping for days....
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Visser19 on August 05, 2010, 01:25:39 PM
This is an old thread... oh well.

Imagine Marco, "I am now going to morph myself!" Concentrates, nothing happens. "Well, did it work???" ....

About the blood issue, (no pun intended) remember when they needed to morph a polar bear? I think it was, or maybe a seal, but they found a dead polar bear and it's blood. Why couldn't they have acquired it from that? Just because the bear was dead doesn't mean that it's cells were, it was still fresh if I recall. Another KASU?
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: Kotetsu1442 on August 05, 2010, 05:10:59 PM
This is an old thread... oh well.
About the blood issue, (no pun intended) remember when they needed to morph a polar bear? I think it was, or maybe a seal, but they found a dead polar bear and it's blood. Why couldn't they have acquired it from that? Just because the bear was dead doesn't mean that it's cells were, it was still fresh if I recall. Another KASU?
That's exactly what I just said; in one single case it is stated that blood is enough to acquire a morph, that is #18, The Decision; other than that it is stated on multiple occasions that a morph can only be acquired from a living creature (in the case you mentioned, they didn't explicitly state it, but that they ate some seal meat from a mother seal, but went to the trouble to catch the babies implied that they needed a living specimen). So it would seem that, for whatever reason, the morphing technology requires more than just individual living cells with DNA, but some more vital, holistic thing that can only come from a living source. In general, it makes more sense to accept that being able to acquire from a blood sample is the KASU, rather than that on multiple occasions they went to a good deal more trouble than necessary.
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: yunyun on August 08, 2010, 11:27:46 AM
Identical DNA not from the same body? Is it possible for a pair of identical twins to acquire each other, perhaps to stay young forever? ;D

you age even in morph like in the last book Tobias says(thought-speaks)to Marco<me,i'm old for a red-tail,you, you're not even old enough to drink> and i'm pretty sure did not Tobias acquire a old hawk
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: t0bias on August 20, 2010, 02:06:19 AM
but if Marco or someone said "hey, i'm gonna try and acquire myself"... its just weird..
[/quote]

i think marco would say that
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: yunyun on August 20, 2010, 08:53:32 AM
but if Marco or someone said "hey, i'm gonna try and acquire myself"... its just weird..

i think marco would say that
[/quote]

i think he just might
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: SuperBlue on August 20, 2010, 09:05:16 AM
Hmmm aquiring yourself to stay young?...Can you say "immortality"!? But that's probably something that Andalites thought about and got rid of while inventing the Morphing Cube
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: esplin on August 24, 2010, 09:14:13 AM
Hmmm aquiring yourself to stay young?...Can you say "immortality"!? But that's probably something that Andalites thought about and got rid of while inventing the Morphing Cube

You could morph your younger self when youre like 90 and just live a whole notha life.  Or go pick up hot young chicks for a last hoorah!
Title: Re: Can you acquire youself?
Post by: MoppingBear on August 24, 2010, 09:22:54 AM
Hmmm aquiring yourself to stay young?...Can you say "immortality"!? But that's probably something that Andalites thought about and got rid of while inventing the Morphing Cube

You can say it, but you wouldn't have it, you would at best double your lifespan.  Well, is it ever stated if their normal bodies age when they are in morph?  If not, I suppose you could morph younger self, demorph every 2 hours for 1 minute, and live longer that way, but it's pretty risky.