Relevence of name "Half-Life"

Maybe Gabe Newell was eating the cerial Life and realised that it was only half full.

Maybe Gabe Newell was eating the cerial Life and realised that it was only half full.

mo0ksi

I lol'd. But no.

They seem to have picked "scientific" names since Freeman is in that line of work. There's also Blue Shift.

In the half life series, what the relevence of the name? i didn't play the first one, so a I may be missing something very obvious, but if i'm correct (correct me if i'm not) a half life is the time it takes a element to degrade to half it's origonal weight. but what does the name have to do with the series? with_teeth26

Half of it's original radioactivity, not weight.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Half_life

It even has the Lambda symbol!

The half-life of an element is how long it takes to lose it's radioactivity and become another elementnapp123

That has no relevance to the name of the game though, my first post should have been /thread.

The half-life of an element is how long it takes to lose it's radioactivity and become another elementnapp123

Half-life is the time for an element to lose half it's radioactivity. Let's say the half-life of a bar of uranium (Those things go boom you know) is of 1 hour (it's actually MUCH longer than that but to make things simple I chose an hour, I don't know the real number anyway)

Radioactivity (Compared to 0Hours) Hours past 0Hours

1______________________________0

.5_____________________________ 1

.25____________________________ 2

.125___________________________3

etc.____________________________ etc.

And supposedly goes on forever (Unless it was nuked or destroyed by the invading aliens of Crysis or captured by the Combine)

P.S. Half-Life 1 has two expansions with scientifique names: Blue-Shift and Opposing Fronts, I don't think those are made by Valve though. If you want to know whats a Blue-Shift, don't ask (reverse Psychologie there eh?), open your Internet Browser and google it. If your too lazy, forget about it.

half-life: (n) haf-lahyf

1. Physics.the time required for one half the atoms of a given amount of a radioactive substance to disintegrate.

2. Pharmacology.the time required for the activity of a substance taken into the body to lose one half its initial effectiveness.

3. Informal.a brief period during which something flourishes before dying out.

4. Amazingness. a product so revolutionary nearly every gamer has heard of it, experienced it, or died trying to do one of the former.

No one has answered his question except for me. He asked what the relevance of Half Life was to the name of the game, not what a half life is. As I said, they were sitting around a conference thinking of names, Half Life was thrown out, it sounded cool,they chose it. They acknowledged that there's no relevance. It was in a magazine before Half Life 2 came out some years ago.Hot_Potato

OK... would you like a medal?

half-life: (n) haf-lahyf

1. Physics.the time required for one half the atoms of a given amount of a radioactive substance to disintegrate.

2. Pharmacology.the time required for the activity of a substance taken into the body to lose one half its initial effectiveness.

3. Informal.a brief period during which something flourishes before dying out.

4. Amazingness. a product so revolutionary nearly every gamer has heard of it, experienced it, or died trying to do one of the former.

krazyorange

The Informal one seems like the closest :P

[QUOTE="krazyorange"]

half-life: (n) haf-lahyf

1. Physics.the time required for one half the atoms of a given amount of a radioactive substance to disintegrate.

2. Pharmacology.the time required for the activity of a substance taken into the body to lose one half its initial effectiveness.

3. Informal.a brief period during which something flourishes before dying out.

4. Amazingness. a product so revolutionary nearly every gamer has heard of it, experienced it, or died trying to do one of the former.

AnotherKill

The Informal one seems like the closest :P

yessssssssssss

No one has answered his question except for me. He asked what the relevance of Half Life was to the name of the game, not what a half life is. As I said, they were sitting around a conference thinking of names, Half Life was thrown out, it sounded cool,they chose it. They acknowledged that there's no relevance. It was in a magazine before Half Life 2 came out some years ago.Hot_Potato

Good point, sorry. But Opposing Fronts and Blue Shift do have a little relevance to the game content, eh?

From some half-life fansite:

The term "half-life" is a cultural currency: say half-life and people think of one thing first (in the population): nuclear disaster - half-life being the measurement of how long it takes for half a given mass of a radioactive isotope to decay into a stable form. That ominous overtone offsets other present uses for half-life neatly, including understanding lost histories through radioactive decay (usually carbon dating), medical cures that kill only slightly less than they heal, and so on. Everything to do with half-life - in our culture - is a mixed message, a dilemma, and usually it opposes science and technology against "humanities". That cultural background really speaks rather well to the state of affairs at Black Mesa, even if it wasn't precisely nuclear experimentation that went awry. It's a title that means a lot to people, and communciates a lot about the moral and ethical tensions of the game as a work of art in its own right, while consuming only eight letters (or just the one in Greek...).

[QUOTE="Hot_Potato"]No one has answered his question except for me. He asked what the relevance of Half Life was to the name of the game, not what a half life is. As I said, they were sitting around a conference thinking of names, Half Life was thrown out, it sounded cool,they chose it. They acknowledged that there's no relevance. It was in a magazine before Half Life 2 came out some years ago.voodoothe2nd

Good point, sorry. But Opposing Fronts and Blue Shift do have a little relevance to the game content, eh?

Yup. Of all of them Opposing Force probably has the most relevance. Opposing Force is the equal but opposite reaction to any initial force, as stated in Newton's Third Law of Motion. In the context of the game, the Opposing Force is the HECU; the government reaction to the initial force that is the resonance cascade in Black Mesa.

Blue Shift is more a pun. Blue Shift is a phenomenon of Astronomy whereby the visible wavelengths shift towards blue in objects moving towards from the observer. Blue is obviously the colour of the Security Guard Uniforms, and Shift implying it is their time to do something.

[QUOTE="voodoothe2nd"]

[QUOTE="Hot_Potato"]No one has answered his question except for me. He asked what the relevance of Half Life was to the name of the game, not what a half life is. As I said, they were sitting around a conference thinking of names, Half Life was thrown out, it sounded cool,they chose it. They acknowledged that there's no relevance. It was in a magazine before Half Life 2 came out some years ago.Buffalo_Soulja

Good point, sorry. But Opposing Fronts and Blue Shift do have a little relevance to the game content, eh?

Yup. Of all of them Opposing Force probably has the most relevance. Opposing Force is the equal but opposite reaction to any initial force, as stated in Newton's Third Law of Motion. In the context of the game, the Opposing Force is the HECU; the government reaction to the initial force that is the resonance cascade in Black Mesa.

Blue Shift is more a pun. Blue Shift is a phenomenon of Astronomy whereby the visible wavelengths shift towards blue in objects moving towards from the observer. Blue is obviously the colour of the Security Guard Uniforms, and Shift implying it is their time to do something.

Ya, Ithink yo play as one ofthe guards in that version.

No one has answered his question except for me. He asked what the relevance of Half Life was to the name of the game, not what a half life is. As I said, they were sitting around a conference thinking of names, Half Life was thrown out, it sounded cool,they chose it. They acknowledged that there's no relevance. It was in a magazine before Half Life 2 came out some years ago.Hot_Potato

ANYWAYS, I read somewhere that civilization is like an element. Despite the fact that we'll degrade and get smaller, we will always survive

WOULD YOU LIKE A ****ING COOKIE? :| DivergeUnify

No harm in his pointing out that the average forum idiot doesn't take the time to read the OP before posting whatever the hell they feel like.

No one has answered his question except for me. He asked what the relevance of Half Life was to the name of the game, not what a half life is. As I said, they were sitting around a conference thinking of names, Half Life was thrown out, it sounded cool,they chose it. They acknowledged that there's no relevance. It was in a magazine before Half Life 2 came out some years ago.Hot_Potato

LOL most posters are giving definitions of the word "half-life" and giving detailed explanations with numbers.

In the half life series, what the relevence of the name? i didn't play the first one, so a I may be missing something very obvious, but if i'm correct (correct me if i'm not) a half life is the time it takes a element to degrade to half it's origonal weight. but what does the name have to do with the series? with_teeth26

So to put it shortly Gordon is living HALF of his LIFE !

[QUOTE="with_teeth26"]In the half life series, what the relevence of the name? i didn't play the first one, so a I may be missing something very obvious, but if i'm correct (correct me if i'm not) a half life is the time it takes a element to degrade to half it's origonal weight. but what does the name have to do with the series? beckoflight

So to put it shortly Gordon is living HALF of his LIFE !

Nice story but it's really much simpler then that. Like some other people have already said, the developers just chose the name because it sounds cool, basically. They said so in a interview once.

i think the actual half life of uranium is 5 years. i wouldn't quoue me on that though, i read that in a book made in the 60's. (on the beach) with_teeth26

Completely wrong, and it depends on the isotope :P

Also, to answer the question regarding what half life actually is, it's the time taken for half of the atoms in an isotope to decay to other compositions, but as the rate of decay is directly proportional to the amount of atoms present it's also the time taken for the radioactivity to reach half its original intensity.

Maybe they chose the name to spark this kind of discussion? :Pvoodoothe2nd

Probably.