# "Alien" nitpick: How did it get so big?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [January 23, 2005, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267 "2005-01-23T17:32:25Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@Pushkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pushkin)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/21 "2005-01-23T20:26:15Z")
If it did have a super metabolism that made it grow quite quickly (and then presumably) died quickly too, it might give credance to the fan fiction that has it as a genetic weapon of some sort. Let it grow, eat some people, then die off so the invading forces can simply stroll right into town again.
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/22 "2005-01-23T21:18:32Z")
> [@Finagle](#):
>
> One of my least favorite movie cliches is shape changing that completely ignores physics, e.g. The Faculty in which an alien manifested as a teenage girl morphs into a beast with the size and mass of a John Deere tractor.
Odo on _Deep Space Nine_ did that all the time. Once he morphed into a rat – an ordinary, rat-sized rat – with no explanation of where his extra mass went.
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### Author:  [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/23 "2005-01-23T21:23:44Z")
I’ve noticed some mushroom funguses can basically appear over night. How do they grow so big, so fast, without taking in anything but, basically, water?
I found this:
> [@](#):
>
> Plants and animals grow through cell division - to get bigger they have to produce more cells. Cell division is relatively slow and requires a lot of energy. The mushroom body also grows by cell division. However, the mushroom fruit does not grow by cell division. Just about as soon as it starts to develop, a mushroom has almost the same number of cells that the mature mushroom will have. The mushroom increases in size through cell ENLARGEMENT! This means that the cells can balloon up very rapidly. Very little energy is required, basically the cells just enlarge with water. So a mushroom can increase in size as fast as water can be pumped into its cells. Almost overnight a mushroom can go from a pin head to a large mushroom.
So I’m thinking the chest burster isn’t so much _dense_, but is composed of extremely small cells, which balloon up as soon as it’s “born.” Aliens do like warm, humid environments, maybe they can absorb moisture directly from the air?
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### Author:  [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/24 "2005-01-23T21:24:53Z")
> [@Johnny Ecks](#):
>
> Also, the thing has metal teeth.
Maybe it’s different from the other flicks, but I just saw ‘Alien Vs Predator’ and the teeth seemed much more crystalline than metallic.
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### Author:  [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/25 "2005-01-23T21:27:03Z")
> [@Pushkin](#):
>
> If it did have a super metabolism that made it grow quite quickly (and then presumably) died quickly too, it might give credance to the fan fiction that has it as a genetic weapon of some sort. Let it grow, eat some people, then die off so the invading forces can simply stroll right into town again.
The extra mass still has to come from somewhere.
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### Author:  [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/26 "2005-01-23T21:35:04Z")
Obviously, if the extra mass must come from somewhere, then it DID come from somewhere. Conclusion from the non-nitpicker: Fucker ate somethin’.
Think of things this way… just because they never show anyone taking a shit, does that mean that nobody shits? No, it just means it’d be uninteresting.
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### Author:  [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/27 "2005-01-23T21:41:21Z")
You guys are completely forgetting the room where all the water was on Nostromo. It was dripping everywhere, and there were lots of chains hanging down. That’s where the alien was hiding out when it had it’s first meal(s).
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### Author:  [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/28 "2005-01-23T21:46:19Z")
Yeah, for such expensive starships, they let a lot of their limited resources go to waste, don’t they? The argument could be made that the xeno caused the leaks, although Brett (I think it was him) didn’t seem all that alarmed to see the mess…
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### Author:  [@Snooooopy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snooooopy)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/29 "2005-01-23T22:00:45Z")
The alien obviously ate its Wheaties.
Or, more precisely, it stuffed a box of Wheaties into a person and then ate that person.
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### Author:  [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/30 "2005-01-23T23:22:28Z")
> [@Revtim](#):
>
> Maybe it’s different from the other flicks, but I just saw ‘Alien Vs Predator’ and the teeth seemed much more crystalline than metallic.
What? I’ve never heard of that movie. Granted, I’d love them to make one. It sound so promising. Even the guy who did the Mortal Kombat couldn’t screw a sure thing like that up.
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### Author:  [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/31 "2005-01-23T23:24:02Z")
> [@SPOOFE](#):
>
> Yeah, for such expensive starships, they let a lot of their limited resources go to waste, don’t they? The argument could be made that the xeno caused the leaks, although Brett (I think it was him) didn’t seem all that alarmed to see the mess…
I remember reading that the wanted the ship to looked “Lived in” and that the crew of the nostromo were basically supposed to be interstellar truckers.
That and a clean, brightly lit ship isn’t nearly as scary as one that has a lot of stuff hanging down.
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### Author:  [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/32 "2005-01-23T23:24:43Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#):
>
> Then it would have weighed too much for its host to be so oblivious to its presence, prior to the chest-bursting scene.
Well, maybe that crew member was naturally heavy-hearted.
He did _look_ like a sad fuck.
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### Author:  [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapioca_Dextrin)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/33 "2005-01-23T23:32:49Z")
You also have to wonder how John Hurt managed to live so long with a baby alien the size of a pussy cat living in his chest cavity.
Next up, how _exactly_ did the bugs from Starship Troopers… well, how did they do anything, really?
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### Author:  [@Pushkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pushkin)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/34 "2005-01-23T23:43:44Z")
> [@astro](#):
>
> You guys are completely forgetting the room where all the water was on Nostromo. It was dripping everywhere, and there were lots of chains hanging down. That’s where the alien was hiding out when it had it’s first meal(s).
The Director’s Cut/Special Edition had a scene put back in where Ripley saw the crew cocooned on the way to the escape pod. Was that crewman (who was sent to get the cat) there or eaten?
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### Author:  [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)
#### Post date: [January 23, 2005, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/35 "2005-01-23T23:53:48Z")
> [@Tapioca Dextrin](#):
>
> Next up, how _exactly_ did the bugs from Starship Troopers… well, how did they do anything, really?
True . . . I think the reason we never see land-dwelling arthropods above a certain size (say, that of a tarantula) in real life is that the cube-square law makes an exoskeletal anatomy impractical for animals above that size, although I’m not clear on why that should be.
(BTW: One of the things that bugged (I know, I know) me most about the film adaptation of _Starship Troopers_ is that in Heinlein’s novel, it was clear from the start that the Arachnids were a sentient species. They used spaceships and nuclear weapons, not giant rocks launched out of the butt of a giant bug; and they **did** take prisoners in war, that was a crucial plot point.)
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### Author:  [@Khampelf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khampelf)
#### Post date: [January 24, 2005, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/36 "2005-01-24T00:18:12Z")
> [@astro](#):
>
> You guys are completely forgetting the room where all the water was on Nostromo. It was dripping everywhere, and there were lots of chains hanging down. That’s where the alien was hiding out when it had it’s first meal(s).
I think between this, and the fungus theory, we have some Plot Patch [sup]TM[/sup]. Brett gets snatched not too far from the area where all the water was dripping down. The Cat sized chest burster could have absorbed water and used that mass to metamorph into something big enough to grab a human. It had grown, and was just waiting for someone to come to it.
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### Author:  [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)
#### Post date: [January 24, 2005, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/37 "2005-01-24T00:28:50Z")
I seem to recall reading somewhere that someone (a scriptwriter, even?) suggested that the Xenomorphs were silicon based, and ate metals to grow.
Which reminds me…do we ever actually see the aliens _eat_ a person, after killing/capturing them? Even the chestbursters might only require hosts for heat and moisture.
Of course, knowing how adaptable the aliens are, maybe they can eat metal _or_ flesh, depending on what’s available.
The [Colonial Marines Technical Manual](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0061053430/qid=1106526746/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-1160428-7519352?v=glance&s=books) has a nice section at the end, which is a transcript of Weyland-Yutani scientists trying to figure out the Xenomorphs’ biochemistry. (Including confusion on how the first one could have grown so fast. One of them figures that even after eating the crew and all the supplies, it couldn’t have grown to more than the size of a dog—and that the Nostromo’s crew must have been overestimating the alien’s size in panic!)
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### Author:  [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)
#### Post date: [January 24, 2005, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/38 "2005-01-24T00:29:13Z")
> [@HPL](#):
>
> What? I’ve never heard of that movie. Granted, I’d love them to make one. It sound so promising. Even the guy who did the Mortal Kombat couldn’t screw a sure thing like that up.
::snort::
\*Aliens \* is better, I think anyway.
And I’ll say it again cause I always get such varied reactions: I liked Aliens 4!
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### Author:  [@stegon66](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stegon66)
#### Post date: [January 24, 2005, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/39 "2005-01-24T01:31:18Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Think of things this way… just because they never show anyone taking a shit, does that mean that nobody shits? No, it just means it’d be uninteresting.
Just FYI: Wim Wenders did show a guy taking a shit in his film _Kings of the Road_. Not so much uninteresting as just plain gross. 😃 Wim, the movie was long enough, you couldn’t have trimmed that part out?
Maybe the Alien ate shit? 😃
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### Author:  [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)
#### Post date: [January 24, 2005, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/alien-nitpick-how-did-it-get-so-big/286267/40 "2005-01-24T01:44:39Z")
> [@](#):
>
> And I’ll say it again cause I always get such varied reactions: I liked Aliens 4!
You, sir or madam, need to be CULLED from the herd!!
(Jus’ kidding. Or am I…? :D)
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