Oxygen

**Seive**

When Neo first awakes in the real world and breaks through the goo, I'm assuming he had some form of breathing/feeding tube while submerged. Since the skies were scorched, there would virtualy be no plant life, thus no new source of Oxygen. Now when he first awakes and removes his breathing/feeding tube, (That's what I'm assuming it is.), you see him take in a deep breath of.. air? Wouldn't he have suffocated due to the lack of Oxygen in the surrounding area? One arguement was brought up to me by a friend, "Well, the machines could have produced artificial oxygen for the surrounding area." Well my counter to this is, would this truly be beneficial if the same effect could have been produced more efficiently through a breathing tube of sorts? Another friend of mine argued that we "breathed" the fluid within our pods similar to what occurs at birth.. Um.. As far as I know, we don't really breath any of the fluid within the womb before birth, though some of it is swallowed in the process of birth on occassion... Another argued that Zion produced their own oxygen, and this is true, but as far as I know, wouldn't most of it disperse and leave the area due to diffusion? As far as I know, Zion wasn't air tight.

Questions? Comments?

cshank

There are still plants on Earth, as well as animal life. If anything, the darkening of the skies would cause the earth to revert to a semi-jungleish atmosphere.

(Also, the only plants that exist are weeds and shrubs and stuff, and only then in areas that were untouched by the war.) So there is oxygen, just not enough to probably support 6.8 Billion humans at the same time. The machines also probably pump some out from their manufacotires for the humans inside the pods too.

WGAnubis1

The machines created Zion to be a part of the cycle, so its easy to assume that the machines made the planet atleast surviveable for humans outside of the pod.

**Illyria22**

The clouds probably don't cover the entire planet. Plankton in the ocean is probably still making oxygen.

Illyria

WGAnubis1

Illyria22 wrote:

The clouds probably don't cover the entire planet. Plankton in the ocean is probably still making oxygen.

Illyria

No they would have to in order to ensure that the machines were completely cut off from the sun, otherwise a machine mind would be able to calulate when and where a break in the clouds would be.

Dodge_THIS

dnllln wrote:
Since the skies were scorched, there would virtualy be no plant life, thus no new source of Oxygen.

Right, no new source of oxygen. But the atmosphere was already saturated with oxygen prior to the darkening of the skies. With the sudden death of plant/animal life due to having no sunlight, all the oxygen in the atmosphere basically went unused, with the exception of the few humans that were either put into the Matrix or were living in Zion.

As for Zion itself, although I doubt it is air tight, I don't see any reason for oxygen to not be there as well. Plus Councilor Hamman mentioned something to Neo in Reloaded about their machines cleaning the air & water, so if the machines in Zion can do this, I'm sure "the" machines can do it on the surface as well, in case the o2 levels drop.

PS. Tell your friend that babies in the womb do not breath the fluid in their lungs, they get their oxygen through the umbilical cord. :smileyvery-happy:

Message Edited by digitize on 05-09-2006 10:05 AM
Message edited by Dodge_THIS on 05/09/2006 06:05:36.

**Seive**

Thank you for all the responses guys. =) It's been bugging me since I first rewatched the movies three days ago.

**Tefnut**

Great idea about the plankton, Illyria. I never even thought of that before.... which, I know... isn't saying much, but still....

Uljhar Quamlas

cshank wrote:

There are still plants on Earth, as well as animal life.

actually, i don't think there are... unless it's something you read in one of the comics or something like that which i missed. so far as the movies go, there's nothing out there living at all. nothing really could, anyway, from the storms that occur and the lack of sunlight fueling the food chain.

WGAnubis wrote:

Illyria22 wrote:

The clouds probably don't cover the entire planet. Plankton in the ocean is probably still making oxygen.
Illyria

No they would have to in order to ensure that the machines were completely cut off from the sun, otherwise a machine mind would be able to calulate when and where a break in the clouds would be.

are there ever any breaks in the storms? like anubis said, it seems more logical that there couldn't be, for them to really have done what they did to stop the machines from gaining power though solar energy.

this doesn't mean it can't be the same type of thing with the plankton, though, only that it would be produced through farming. i think various algae are the greatest (by percentage) producers of oxygen, aren't they? it's been a while since i studied such things. regardless, if that's so, it seems to follow they could continue to be, but cultivated in a more orderly, efficient way, as you'd assume the machine species would. all it would take is a form of light for photosynthesis, which could be powered by the energy gained from the matrix... the cycle of life of our present world. well, you know. our present matrix universe world.

-uljhar

**Fractor**

There can't be any plants because they need light for photosynthesis to make oxygen. If there are places in the world that still have a clear sky then maybe there are plants producing oxygen there and it disperses itself out evenly but if not then the oxygen hanging around from before the war is the only supply left so maybe it is a matter of time until it runs out.

cshank

Er, first comic on the whatisthematrix site. It's about the feast of bread. It shows how plants and stuff are surviving.

steppenrazor

Not all plant life needs (or even likes) direct sun light. Some forms of plant life like thier sun light obsucred, shadey, cloudly what have you. So in all likely hood thier would still be some forms of normal plant life. maybe not much, but thier would be some.

with most if not nearly all animal life gone, thier not enough oxygen being removed to depleate the oxygen in the air. And plant life is not the only source of Oxygen, thier Oxygen in rocks and such like. A volcaino could ton a few billion tons of Oxygen into the air. (along with bad stuff too..)

Plus the Machines could make a machine to create O2, after all the source of thier "food" needs oxygen.

Updater

Psh its a science fiction movie, ask too many questions and ya ruin it SMILEY

The clouds probably dont cover the whole earth, if they do, that would block the sun causing plants to die. Soon after, animals and humans would die without food and air.

Skill

Also note how in the second to last scene in the matrix reloaded, everyone leaves the ship without having any sort of protection. There is no getting around having oxygen on the planet... as well as nitrogen

**Illyria22**

Either there are still enough plants out there to produce oxygen, the Machines are generating it, or it's not being depleted because there's so little animal life out there breathing it.

Illyria