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Okay so we all know adamantium is supposed cut through anything, however Emma's diamond form has been described to be impenetrable...Could Wolverine slice through her diamond skin?
No because Wolverine isn't capable of putting the strength that would be required behind the claws to do any damage now if you gave the hulk some adamantium claws he'd be able to slice and dice her
No because Wolverine isn't capable of putting the strength that would be required behind the claws to do any damage now if you gave the hulk some adamantium claws he'd be able to slice and dice her
That's ridiculous. If that were the case I'm sure there'd be a thread explaining why in immense detail. (Sarcasm :P)
Diamonds can be easily broken. That's how ladies (and rap stars) get to wear lot of pretty cut diamonds. Adamantium would easily be able to slice through diamond.
No because Wolverine isn't capable of putting the strength that would be required behind the claws to do any damage now if you gave the hulk some adamantium claws he'd be able to slice and dice her
mmmm i believe he would be able to. Wolverine is capable of lifting around 2 tons worth of weight and has already been seen cutting through the "impenetrable"
@Kallarkz: Wolverine isn't magical though, steel is harder than wood but you still can't cut down an oak tree with a Ginsu knife
lol my point was that we could spend all day discussing why some things are not possible in a completely fictional world. And it is semi difficult to assume exactly what a super humanly strong person who has the most sharpest and unbreakable type of metal in his universe is actually able to do.
Okay so we all know adamantium is supposed cut through anything, however Emma's diamond form has been described to be impenetrable...Could Wolverine slice through her diamond skin?
You use a lot of different terminology from piercing, to cutting, to penetration, to slicing... although the principles are related, they're technically different things. However, let's just address the first thing... do you mean fictionally or scientifically?
If driven purely by fiction then either outcome is possible. It is whatever the writer thinks the story demands. Some writers present Wolverine as being incapable of penetrating Colossus' organic steel- scratching at best- whereas others present his claws as lightsabers which glide through anything with ease. So that's an unsatisfying answer but if following fiction either result is possible.
If following scientific principles of cutting and materials, the general idea is probably "No, unless..."
Starting with adamantium, all that we know about it is that it is infinitely "strong" which means it has infinite durability, tensile strength, hardness, etc while having impossibly low brittleness, ductility, etc. The question is whether any of these properties actually translate- directly- into cutting ability? I think your intuition should tell you, "No." If I provide you with a steel baseball bat and ask you to slice through a mighty oak with it, the task would not be one of simple slicing, correct? It doesn't matter that- compared to the oak- the steel bat is infinitely harder, stronger, less brittle, etc. than the wood fibers. Certainly shape matters... but not so much that you get the smooth animated ninja-like slice either. If we converted the steel bat into a steel axe or a steel sword you still wouldn't be able to slice through the oak with one stroke.
What cutting comes down to, primarily, is pressure. The wedge shape of the blade focuses pressure into a fine enough point to break the molecular bonds of the slicing material... typically, through "breaking" (so the material is compressed beyond its elastic strength and thus the material snaps) which is why something like a rubber tire will resist cutting pressure better than a piece of wood, despite the latter being harder / stiffer / stronger. The shape of the blade- the sharper it is- allows pressure to be focused to a more narrow point, and the materials its made of allow that point to be preserved through the cutting process. I could make a sharper axe "blade" out of wood, but since it is no harder than the trees it hopes to fell, the blade would dull quickly and the cutting advantage quickly lost.
Applying this to Logan and Emma, Logan's claws can only be so sharp as they're formed around bone protrusions and there's no such thing as molecule-thin bone claws. Frankly any real world bone claw is going to be pretty damn thick for a knife... but lets pretend the actual blades taper away from the bone for maximum sharpness (you'd get limited cutting penetration once you reached the flare of the bone, but for the sake of argument) and are only a molecule thick at the tips. You'd have the "perfect" knife, but that doesn't ensure perfect ninja-like cutting. Those blades would be encountering the hardest and least compressible substance known to man. Given that cutting works by compression and the breaking of bonds, basically, Logan's claws would bounce right off.
Hm, I'm running out of time, so let me quickly cover the two other relevant properties... brittleness and sheering strength. Despite diamond's high hardness, it is actually more brittle than other substances... it also has a sheering strength that can be over-come. In theory, Logan could chip away at Emma by punching through and exploiting the brittleness of diamond... or by slowly sawing away at her (the friction coefficients of diamond and, likely, adamantium don't really make this that much of a better strategy, but supposing you could create a score that exploits the crystalline matrix you could snap a piece off afterwards?)... or simply apply enough force to shatter her. The problem here is that Emma is not just diamond but organic diamond and- as Morrison willed it- has taken blunt force blows similar to Colossus without cracking. That suggests that organic diamond is far less brittle than what we'd expect from a normal diamond.
In any case, if I were writing it- and the story demanded a more scientific approach rather than a fantastic one- I'd err on the side of Logan being unable to seriously injure Emma.
I think that should be somewhat intuitive too. If you experiment at home with a large block of glass and a hard ceramic knife (or a really hard steel knife, but doubt you'd be able to match the glass in hardness) you'd have a similar match-up with slightly less extraordinary materials. If you tried to press the knife through, obviously nothing would happen. If you tried slicing, you might be able to score the glass but it wouldn't go deep. If you tried using the knife as a hammer, you might break it... or jabbed with force you might chip... but never would you get a ninja-like slice.
Okay so we all know adamantium is supposed cut through anything, however Emma's diamond form has been described to be impenetrable...Could Wolverine slice through her diamond skin?
Applying this to Logan and Emma, Logan's claws can only be so sharp as they're formed around bone protrusions and there's no such thing as molecule-thin bone claws.
Once again. Applying "real world" material to Wolverines fictional metal and the unusual way it bonded to his bones does not help much. I don't really think Marvel had "can Adamantium be applied to real life situations" in mind when they created it. There are properties to it that cannot be compared to a kitchen knife. We have seen Wolverines bone claws without the Adamantium and they are very jagged and bumpy but when the Adamantium is applied to it they become smooth and sharp. lol we can accept magical hammers and green power rings and yet this fictional metal is always compared to real life things for some unknown reason.
I cant remember what issue it took place, but Storm and Emma throw down and at the end Storm threatens (or states) that she can generate enough force behind for winds to drive straw through Emma's Diamond Form like nails through a board and Emma seemingly agrees. Going off from that I'd say that yes Wolverine "should" be able to cut through her. I'm actually shocked though that this confrontation has never happened on panel :S
It is sometimes called Antarctic vibranium. In this form, it possesses the ability to break down other metals through the vibrations it gives off, reducing them to a liquid or near liquid-like state.
Anyway, I still remember she has been hurt be some vibranium weapon in comics.
1: Diamonds are extremely hard, but they are NOT unbreakable.... Xerox-Kitty pointed that out... The diamonds that people wear STARTED as PARTS Of larger diamonds but they were 'broken' off...
2: Most diamonds have SEVERAL points at which, if struck at the right angle with enough force, they will split or even shatter. Diamond cutters strike these points to split diamonds. If they do it wrong, the diamond shatters and is ruined. VERY LITTLE FORCE IS REQUIRED to split a diamond when striking one of these points.
3: Emma has at least ONE weak point. I believe it's in one of her 3rd or 4th vertebra. This is where she was shot when she shattered into a gazillion (I'm exaggerating) pieces.
4: Diamonds can be split/shattered/cut with NORMAL STEEL.... Since Adamantium is infinitely harder than normal steel it would be MORE THAN equal to the task of cutting/splitting/shattering a diamond.
5: Adimantium is the HARDEST SUBSTANCE IN THE MARVEL UNIVERSE. By default, it is harder than diamonds...
So, can Wolverine's claws cut through Emma's diamond skin?
- If he hits her "flaw", ABSOLUTELY. He could easily shatter her IF he hit her flaw... That point can't even be debated. Not much force is required to split or shatter a diamond if you hit a flaw or weak point. Also, ordinary steel will do... Wolverine hit's hard, and adamantium is harder than steel.
- If he hits somewhere OTHER than her flaw? It's entirely possible, but then how likely is it? That depends entirely on the writers. Emma is BULLET PROOF in diamond form, however, she's never been hit by an adamantium tipped bullet. Can Logan hit as hard as a bullet? I don't "think" so, but I could be wrong... My best guess is that, if Logan struck Emma enough times, at the same point, then he could eventually break through even if he's not hitting her 'flaw', but I do not think he could do it with one or two simple strikes...
1: Diamonds are extremely hard, but they are NOT unbreakable.... Xerox-Kitty pointed that out... The diamonds that people wear STARTED as PARTS Of larger diamonds but they were 'broken' off...
2: Most diamonds have SEVERAL points at which, if struck at the right angle with enough force, they will split or even shatter. Diamond cutters strike these points to split diamonds. If they do it wrong, the diamond shatters and is ruined. VERY LITTLE FORCE IS REQUIRED to split a diamond when striking one of these points.
3: Emma has at least ONE weak point. I believe it's in one of her 3rd or 4th vertebra. This is where she was shot when she shattered into a gazillion (I'm exaggerating) pieces.
4: Diamonds can be split/shattered/cut with NORMAL STEEL.... Since Adamantium is infinitely harder than normal steel it would be MORE THAN equal to the task of cutting/splitting/shattering a diamond.
5: Adimantium is the HARDEST SUBSTANCE IN THE MARVEL UNIVERSE. By default, it is harder than diamonds...
So, can Wolverine's claws cut through Emma's diamond skin?
- If he hits her "flaw", ABSOLUTELY. He could easily shatter her IF he hit her flaw... That point can't even be debated. Not much force is required to split or shatter a diamond if you hit a flaw or weak point. Also, ordinary steel will do... Wolverine hit's hard, and adamantium is harder than steel.
- If he hits somewhere OTHER than her flaw? It's entirely possible, but then how likely is it? That depends entirely on the writers. Emma is BULLET PROOF in diamond form, however, she's never been hit by an adamantium tipped bullet. Can Logan hit as hard as a bullet? I don't "think" so, but I could be wrong... My best guess is that, if Logan struck Emma enough times, at the same point, then he could eventually break through even if he's not hitting her 'flaw', but I do not think he could do it with one or two simple strikes...
@Gambler: "Diamonds are hard but they are not Unbreakable, they can be cut, they can be carved, and, if you find the proper stress point and apply sufficient force.....they can be shattered"
@Gambler: "Diamonds are hard but they are not Unbreakable, they can be cut, they can be carved, and, if you find the proper stress point and apply sufficient force.....they can be shattered" Nuff said
Real Life Diamonds yes. But we're talking "Comicbook logic" here. Emma Frost's diamond form is a mutant ability/superpower that defies the laws of real life diamond applications. Emma has "a" shatter point, a flaw, when she transforms. Its unknown just how much damage she can actually withstand (assuming her shatter point isnt hit) but she's slated as being near invulnerable. Either way I was one of the people saying Wolverine "should" be able to cut her so I'm not sure what the "Nuff Said" is for :P
The way I look at it is a saw can cut through a tree but force and friction have to be applied in order for that to happen. My thinking is yes adamantium can cut diamonds but not without a lot of force and effort and IMO Wolverine if not strong enough to do more than scratch Emma. Now give a adamantium blade to Juggernaut, Colossus or even Ms Marvel and yes I think Emma would be sliced and diced.
Diamonds can be easily broken. That's how ladies (and rap stars) get to wear lot of pretty cut diamonds. Adamantium would easily be able to slice through diamond.
The event you were talking about with Storm and Emma Frost, when they were fighting that's exactly what Storm said to Emma and it wasn't Straw's, she already used them against Emma in that same fight and they didn't work, it was a Steel Pole.
@Gambler: "Diamonds are hard but they are not Unbreakable, they can be cut, they can be carved, and, if you find the proper stress point and apply sufficient force.....they can be shattered" Nuff said
Real Life Diamonds yes. But we're talking "Comicbook logic" here. Emma Frost's diamond form is a mutant ability/superpower that defies the laws of real life diamond applications. Emma has "a" shatter point, a flaw, when she transforms. Its unknown just how much damage she can actually withstand (assuming her shatter point isnt hit) but she's slated as being near invulnerable. Either way I was one of the people saying Wolverine "should" be able to cut her so I'm not sure what the "Nuff Said" is for :P
You know, this is an EXCELLENT point... Her diamond form isn't ordinary diamond, but rather, it's ORGANIC diamond... (Although, organic carbon diamonds would have an extremely similar composition to gasoline or crude oil...But it's comic books so let's ignore that.) Much in the same way that Colussus doesn't switch to a 'steel' form, but rather, an 'organic steel' form which is (according to Marvel) MUCH stronger than regular steel...
I think it's only logical to apply the same concept to Emma's 'organic' diamond form. Thus, her organic diamond form is MUCH stronger than regular diamonds....
However, since we've already seen her shattered by a regular bullet, AND since we know adamantium is the strongest substance in the Marvel universe, I still think Wolverine could eventually cut / shatter her....
1: Diamonds are extremely hard, but they are NOT unbreakable.... Xerox-Kitty pointed that out... The diamonds that people wear STARTED as PARTS Of larger diamonds but they were 'broken' off...
2: Most diamonds have SEVERAL points at which, if struck at the right angle with enough force, they will split or even shatter. Diamond cutters strike these points to split diamonds. If they do it wrong, the diamond shatters and is ruined. VERY LITTLE FORCE IS REQUIRED to split a diamond when striking one of these points.
3: Emma has at least ONE weak point. I believe it's in one of her 3rd or 4th vertebra. This is where she was shot when she shattered into a gazillion (I'm exaggerating) pieces.
4: Diamonds can be split/shattered/cut with NORMAL STEEL.... Since Adamantium is infinitely harder than normal steel it would be MORE THAN equal to the task of cutting/splitting/shattering a diamond.
5: Adimantium is the HARDEST SUBSTANCE IN THE MARVEL UNIVERSE. By default, it is harder than diamonds...
So, can Wolverine's claws cut through Emma's diamond skin?
- If he hits her "flaw", ABSOLUTELY. He could easily shatter her IF he hit her flaw... That point can't even be debated. Not much force is required to split or shatter a diamond if you hit a flaw or weak point. Also, ordinary steel will do... Wolverine hit's hard, and adamantium is harder than steel.
- If he hits somewhere OTHER than her flaw? It's entirely possible, but then how likely is it? That depends entirely on the writers. Emma is BULLET PROOF in diamond form, however, she's never been hit by an adamantium tipped bullet. Can Logan hit as hard as a bullet? I don't "think" so, but I could be wrong... My best guess is that, if Logan struck Emma enough times, at the same point, then he could eventually break through even if he's not hitting her 'flaw', but I do not think he could do it with one or two simple strikes...
I think the trouble with your analysis is that it is one sided. You're focusing entirely on the fragility of diamond rather than the requirements of cutting. Infinitely hard does not mean infinite ease of cutting. If I put a block of soft copper 4 inches thick (roughly the thickness of a human limb- although, generally 8 inches of penetration is necessary to be deemed routinely lethal) over my door as "armor" and gave you a knife made of the hardest steel- even "infinitely" hard steel... how would you fare against that door? Not well at all. Certainly not in a combat-relevant way. Imagine if that door was moving and striking back, rather than sitting still to be chipped away at. Hardness has no effect on cutting ability EXCEPT in order to preserve the shape of the cutting tool whilst under pressure... but assuming Wolverine can only exert humanoid levels of force, he's no better off with Adamantium claws than he is with the hardest substances known to man (because he's not going to be providing any additional force to deform the blade anyways).
That is to say Wolverine's cutting potential is not improved if the HRC (Rockwell Hardness scale) is infinite... let's say organic diamond is HRC 100 and Adamantium is HRC 1^10000... his cutting potential remains unchanged if we gave him a Weapon X grade diamond knife with an HRC of 1000. Hardness is basically irrelevant since Wolverine can "only" hit with- let's say- two tons of cutting pressure either way.
The other things that you focus on seem to depart from the original question. Yes, diamonds can shatter, split, or break... and under highly specific situations be cut.... but the OP is presenting a combat-like situation where Wolverine is trying to use his claws martially. To get that ninja-like cut, that thrusting plunge, etc. Not to simply club Emma with his claws. Wolverine would literally be better off with a sledgehammer to exploit the diamond weaknesses you're talking about than using his claws, since they deal with sheering forces and flaws. To get the cut, you'd have to compress a layer of the diamond enough that its molecular bonds break, all while the layers below it resist such pressure... and even when a layer breaks, the next layer will resist because: 1) Organic diamond has proven tougher than normal diamond (given the blows Emma routinely takes); and 2) The inclusion of flaws actually creates a stronger diamond on the whole because artificial cracks or cuts STOP at imperfect fault lines rather than continuing through the entire diamond (yes, the diamond will be weaker at the fault itself, but those can be mitigated by other faults).
In any case, the question isn't "Does Emma have a flaw?" Because, if it were, it would be completely irrelevant whether Wolverine was there or not. Bullets are typically LEAD not steel and don't use principles of hardness or strength to do their work, so mentioning Adamantium would be irrelevant if exploiting the flaw was the OP's goal (since, any force will do). So the OP clearly isn't concerned with the weak point, but with the relative strengths of the materials we should be looking at cutting, slicing, and piercing- combat-styled claw usage. Logan might get through with sawing, but sawing doesn't typically occur in combat so it's not relevant either.
So again, the question isn't, "How do we get diamond jewelry?" or "Does Emma have a weakpoint?" but more likely, "Can Wolverine's claws cut Emma in a combat-styled situation?" And for the latter, under a scientific approach, I think the answer tends to be, "No."
Okay so we all know adamantium is supposed cut through anything, however Emma's diamond form has been described to be impenetrable...Could Wolverine slice through her diamond skin?
Applying this to Logan and Emma, Logan's claws can only be so sharp as they're formed around bone protrusions and there's no such thing as molecule-thin bone claws.
Once again. Applying "real world" material to Wolverines fictional metal and the unusual way it bonded to his bones does not help much. I don't really think Marvel had "can Adamantium be applied to real life situations" in mind when they created it. There are properties to it that cannot be compared to a kitchen knife. We have seen Wolverines bone claws without the Adamantium and they are very jagged and bumpy but when the Adamantium is applied to it they become smooth and sharp. lol we can accept magical hammers and green power rings and yet this fictional metal is always compared to real life things for some unknown reason. I did like your analysis though. Thanks
I think I covered your objections. In the first case, I said fiction dictates the result, but since that's unsatisfyingly arbitrary I said "IF you apply science" then you can apply my hypos. I covered the shape issue by giving Wolvie a "perfect" molecular edge in my hypo, defying what we actually see and just common sense (no matter what alloy Adamantium is composed of, it isn't going to be lower on the periodic table than carbon, so it can't be "infinitely" sharp, but I gave it that benefit of the doubt regardless).
You're equivocating two different objections by saying there's acceptance of magic in some realms but not in others, but that objection was addressed under the first "the result will be dictated by fiction" analysis... the specific analysis which you're addressing was a scientific analysis after moving on from the fiction.
That said, if you want deeper fictional analysis, I suppose we can give some guidelines to help predict that result as well (but again, it is dictated primarily by the demands of the story and since Wolvie and Emma coming to blows of a lethal nature is so extraordinary, it's difficult to predict the demands of that storyline). In terms of fiction you have to ask yourself "What function does each power/property serve the character and story?"
For Wolverine, the claws are primarily offensive. Their purpose is to give a scrapper a weapon. The material selection is meant to do a couple things... 1) Give Wolvie the "best" of something to improve his standing; 2) Lower maintenance issues (so no concerns about breakage, dulling, etc); 3) Prey on the misconception than hardness = cutting power; and the ancillary 4) Make Wolverine relevant because if he can "cut anything" rather than just "cut realistically" he can actually scrap with Sentinels rather than just scratch them as would be realistic (or, get them torn and ripped from his forearm in the attempt to pierce / cut their thick metal hides, since the tensile strength of ligaments is surely weaker than steel).
For Emma, the diamond form is defense. Their purpose is to preserve a character on the field of combat. The material selection is meant to do a couple of things... 1) Give Emma a unique look; 2) Ape Colossus' abilities; 3) Prey on the misconception that diamonds are unbreakable.
So, in writing, when these two principles collide, which one is going to win out? The lethal or maiming offensive abilities of one versus the character preservation of another? I think it should be obvious that 9 times out of 10 a main character's defensive abilities will keep them in the book for story's sake rather than having them beheaded, maimed, disfigured, or dismembered. If the writer's choice is to have Wolvie's claws bounce off like they have bounced off Colossus' skin versus removing a limb or life from Emma... the first case is probably a much stronger one. With regards to piercing- which everyone seems to survive and never leaves any permanent scar or harm- I suppose that could be possible as a trope... but what does it matter if Wolvie can pierce Emma only in a situation where she's not going to die and be fine shortly afterwards?
But again, this is all under the mushy fictional bit which can go however the writer likes. I'm pretty sure that even Wolvie die-hards routinely provide times where his cutting power is not a frictionless glide... for example, a common Wolvie trope is him using his claws to climb, slow his dissent, or spear / grab onto something... and while that might work with claws held perpendicular to the cutting surface, it rarely is actually drawn that way (whether in his recent anime or in his own book). So the claws resist cutting when it suits the writing. So if it's the matter of preserving the life of another popular main character, I imagine that most times resisting the cut will suit the writing in that case.
@shadow death: Except the question isn't whether diamond can be cut under some circumstance, the question is whether organic diamond could be cut by Wolvie's claws in combat (as opposed to a clinical) situation.
Focusing on just the flaw of the material to be cut isn't the full picture, you also need to look at the mechanics of cutting.
If I gave you a diamond knife and asked you to cut into a tank or slice the barrel in two, despite the hardness of the knife do you think you'd be able to do it? Just because diamond- or tank steel- could be cut, doesn't mean the hardness of the cutting implement allows you to suddenly glide through the material effortlessly as you'd want to do in combat. A diamond knife- despite being incredibly hard- is mostly going to bounce off the side of a tank or the barrel.
Now if you laid Emma down on a table, gave Wolverine a jeweler's loop to look for flaws, and set up precise strikes he might be able to find a point to exploit the sheering force of diamond, but he's never going to cut through in a combat-relevant sense. Hardness only aids in cutting so much- frankly, not much at all, really.
As for the actual mechanics of diamond "cutting"... nearly every diamond cut (when not broken along an edge) is not a combat-styled cut but actually a grinding or sawing type motion involving the tediously slow removal of material. Nowhere in the world are diamonds being sliced in two. So just because a diamond can be "cut" in this fashion doesn't mean Wolverine can exploit the same mechanism in combat.
@Mainline: I see your point but your convoluting a few things. So, let me try to respond to one point at a time.
The other things that you focus on seem to depart from the original question. Yes, diamonds can shatter, split, or break... and under highly specific situations be cut.... but the OP is presenting a combat-like situation where Wolverine is trying to use his claws martially. To get that ninja-like cut, that thrusting plunge, etc. Not to simply club Emma with his claws.
A combat situation between Logan, a skilled Samurai, and Emma.... In her diamond form, she cannot use her telepathy... Can Logan strike her virtually anywhere he chooses to? Absolutely,. He's one of the best warriors on the planet. When it comes to hand to hand combat, it's a no contest as to whether or not he can strike her, where he chooses to when he chooses to... She's a trained fighter but she is NO WHERE near his class... Not many people on earth (Marvel Universe) are... No insult to Emma....
The assumption that the hardness of the cutting device is irrelevant, is...at best...wrong... Why do you think diamond bit drills are even used? warm butter will not cut through rock... Butter is too soft. The hardness of the cutting device helps to ensure the cutting device isn't destroyed. It also ensures that the force of impact is not lost in deforming the cutting device.
If I put a block of soft copper 4 inches thick (roughly the thickness of a human limb- although, generally 8 inches of penetration is necessary to be deemed routinely lethal) over my door as "armor" and gave you a knife made of the hardest steel- even "infinitely" hard steel... how would you fare against that door?
Okay, so basically a 4 inch thick wall of copper over your door, correct? Wielding a knife that has a blade of infinitely hard steel, using only the strength of my arms can I cut through the door? Sure...In a few years maybe??? So, like you said, not very well...
However, that's not a good model of what happens when Wolverine uses his claws... He can transfer the entire force of a punch into his blade... I could not transfer the entire force of a punch into a knife. My hand is not strong enough. The knife would slip. There are different force vectors in the different situations so when you sum up the force vectors you get complete different answers...
Now, instead of a knife, put an Axe in my hand with that same steel, (and a sharp blade) and I'll cut through very quickly... With the knife, I can't put much force into the strike. Also, the knife is lite so the momentum is fairly low... But that is not the case with Wolverine. He can put most of the weight of his body into the strike...THAT is a significant amount of momentum/force concentrated into a VERY SMALL surface area... VERY DIFFERENT situation than the knife in my hand. So, your analogy doesn't work because me holding a knife doesn't physically model Wolverine's claws. I can't transfer force into a knife the way he can transfer force into his claws...
- Two objects impacting each other, is a classic problem in physics. You're looking at a collision and considering the transfer of momentum.... A fly flies into an elephant and hits at 100 mph... Does the elephant even feel it? No, the fly (assuming he doesn't smash and become goo on the skin of the elephant) bounces off. It is an inelastic collision and all of the energy is rebounded back to the fly... Of course, this has to do with the mass of the two objects.
-Now consider two objects of roughly equal mass, size, and shape. Like two baseballs... They collide what happens? Well, if one baseball is simply sitting still on the ground, then the momentum is transferred to the ball that was hit, and it rolls in the opposite direction, although the ball that was thrown is deflected and moves off in on a different vector.
-Now imagine that you have a BB with the same mass as the baseball.... The BB hits the baseball at 100 mph... What happens? I'd have to know the specifics of the mechanical properties of the BB and the baseball to be completely accurate, however.... The BB is applying a great deal of force on a relative small portion of the surface area of the baseball. There's a high probability that the BB will penetrate the surface of the baseball... Remember that Force by definition is Pressure / (surface area). Logan can put the pressure of a punch through his blade. Compare the force of a punch (using a fist) to the force delivered by the strike of his claw... F = P/A ... If the pressure for both the fist and the blade remains constant. The surface area of a good punch (the two knuckles of one's index and middle finger) is roughly 1 square inch? (rough guess). Now, the width of a sharp blade is on the order of microns.... I don't feel like doing the exact calculations at the moment, but the surface area for the blade is easily a thousand times SMALLER than for the fist. Which means the force delivered by the blade (or claw in this case) is easily a thousand times greater. Keep in mind this is a blade that absolutely CANNOT deform. The force MUST go into what is struck or back into to Wolverine...
-So now imagine that BB is made out of Adamantium... Can you see how the hardness of the BB is going to make a difference? It's possible that a BB made of soft metal will DEFORM when it impacts the baseball, which means some of the force goes into deforming the BB rather than transferring INTO the baseball... But if the BB is made of adamantium, there's absolutely NO chance that it can deform, so the force that did NOT go into deforming the BB either goes into the baseball, or it transfers back into the BB deflecting it....
Bullets are typically LEAD not steel and don't use principles of hardness or strength to do their work, so mentioning Adamantium would be irrelevant if exploiting the flaw was the OP's goal
I didn't realize that bullets were usually made of lead. And lead is softer than steel (which I think you were actually pointing out.) However, that does not mean the hardness of the material doesn't matter in this case. Bullets are INTENDED to deform on impact . They become wider and so as they spin through the flesh they do more damage... HOWEVER, there are times when a bullet must pierce ARMOR to do damage. Hence, ARMOR-PIERCING bullets. One of their key features is a "hardened steel-alloy" casing... The bullet is INTENTIONALLY made harder for the purpose of PIERCING armor... THAT alone tells us a great deal about how the "hardness" of Logan's blades is important in cutting/shattering Emma's diamond form...
I need to wrap this up so...
1: Wolverine could easily strike Emma on any point of her body that he wanted to... In diamond form she cannot use telepathy... She is not a warrior....
2: His blades are adamantium and absolutely CANNOT deform (except in the movies).
3: He can deliver a tremendous amount of force through his blade....
He hits her.... He hits hare VERY hard.... He hits where he MEANS to hit.... His blades will not deform....
Sooo... I think he could definitely, eventually, break through.... But it's comic book physics, so it really could go either way....
@Timandm: Are you really an engineer? Because you missed a pretty obvious point... Wolverine himself is not inelastic.
I address your arguments not your bullet-points:
1. Again, the question is not of weak points. If it were, then Wolverine's claws would be irrelevant. The question is can he cut not "Can he hold her down and hit a weak spot?"
2. Cutting force is not improved by hardness beyond a certain point. I explained that in my posts above, you merely reiterated it. Maintaining the shape of the blade is irrelevant if you can't create force sufficient to deform the blade in the first place. A diamond knife- incapable of being deformed by a humanoid- despite being "infinitely less hard" than adamantium would provide no less cutting power than adamantium on a softer substance. This should be intuitive because whether you have a plastic knife or a steel knife you'd still easily cut through butter, but both would struggle with a rubber tire. Cutting mechanics are minimally affected by the hardness of the material, cutting practicality certainly is, which is why diamonds are routinely used to "cut" but even there the typical industrial use is a grinding or sawing motion not a slicing or cutting motion, because hardness provides minimal cutting advantage.
3. No one said it had to be a normal knife, use a push dagger for all I care, use a cybernetic implant, or fuse it to your bone. Despite the relative difference in hardness, a steel- or even diamond- knife is not going to fly through a 4-inch thing copper plate with any kind of combat viability. Additionally, I think you missed the fact that I comped Wolverine 2 tons of striking force exceeding human norms. There is not going to be a combat-worthy slice even at those levels of force.
4. You know that even if Wolverine's blades can't deform his ARM can, right? You're acting as if Wolverine is the Juggernaut, able to stay fixed in place in space and time absolutely, which is- of course- not true. Even if blades are perfectly inelastic, never deform, and refuse to accept any energy like an ideal Newton's Cradle, guess what, the rest of Wolvie's free-moving flesh and blood body will absorb and redirect such rebounded energy and whatever waste remains becomes heat, noise, light, and the like. An engineer would NOT miss such an obvious practical detail! So in the battle of energy absorption between Wolverine's flesh and blood, despite being strapped to a perfectly inelastic object, versus the lack of compression and deformation (necessary for combat cutting- not the sawing grind of diamond "cutting") of organic diamond, which is the obvious winner? And, of course, this is all assuming Emma is being sat on and not simply being pushed back by the force rather than testing the compression strength of her organic diamond.
5. Sigh. You're equivocating again. Yes, hardness matters where deformation overcomes the medium being cut. However, it's irrelevant if you've got a pressure release valve like the compressability of mutant flesh. Logan isn't a bullet in the air against a substantially softer material, HE is the softest and squishiest element of the physics experiment trailing behind an inelastic blade attempting to cut a object literally magnitudes harder than himself. Put another way, try and push a metal knife through and block of wood using a wet noodle. It doesn't matter if the knife is a hundred times harder than the wood... because the noodle is a hundred times softer than the wood, you won't be able to use it to create enough force to push the knife... without mushing the noodle.
@Timandm: Are you really an engineer? Because you missed a pretty obvious point... Wolverine himself is not inelastic.
I address your arguments not your bullet-points:
1. Again, the question is not of weak points. If it were, then Wolverine's claws would be irrelevant. The question is can he cut not "Can he hold her down and hit a weak spot?"
2. Cutting force is not improved by hardness beyond a certain point. I explained that in my posts above, you merely reiterated it. Maintaining the shape of the blade is irrelevant if you can't create force sufficient to deform the blade in the first place. A diamond knife- incapable of being deformed by a humanoid- despite being "infinitely less hard" than adamantium would provide no less cutting power than adamantium on a softer substance. This should be intuitive because whether you have a plastic knife or a steel knife you'd still easily cut through butter, but both would struggle with a rubber tire. Cutting mechanics are minimally affected by the hardness of the material, cutting practicality certainly is, which is why diamonds are routinely used to "cut" but even there the typical industrial use is a grinding or sawing motion not a slicing or cutting motion, because hardness provides minimal cutting advantage.
3. No one said it had to be a normal knife, use a push dagger for all I care, use a cybernetic implant, or fuse it to your bone. Despite the relative difference in hardness, a steel- or even diamond- knife is not going to fly through a 4-inch thing copper plate with any kind of combat viability. Additionally, I think you missed the fact that I comped Wolverine 2 tons of striking force exceeding human norms. There is not going to be a combat-worthy slice even at those levels of force.
4. You know that even if Wolverine's blades can't deform his ARM can, right? You're acting as if Wolverine is the Juggernaut, able to stay fixed in place in space and time absolutely, which is- of course- not true. Even if blades are perfectly inelastic, never deform, and refuse to accept any energy like an ideal Newton's Cradle, guess what, the rest of Wolvie's free-moving flesh and blood body will absorb and redirect such rebounded energy and whatever waste remains becomes heat, noise, light, and the like. An engineer would NOT miss such an obvious practical detail! So in the battle of energy absorption between Wolverine's flesh and blood, despite being strapped to a perfectly inelastic object, versus the lack of compression and deformation (necessary for combat cutting- not the sawing grind of diamond "cutting") of organic diamond, which is the obvious winner? And, of course, this is all assuming Emma is being sat on and not simply being pushed back by the force rather than testing the compression strength of her organic diamond.
5. Sigh. You're equivocating again. Yes, hardness matters where deformation overcomes the medium being cut. However, it's irrelevant if you've got a pressure release valve like the compressability of mutant flesh. Logan isn't a bullet in the air against a substantially softer material, HE is the softest and squishiest element of the physics experiment trailing behind an inelastic blade attempting to cut a object literally magnitudes harder than himself. Put another way, try and push a metal knife through and block of wood using a wet noodle. It doesn't matter if the knife is a hundred times harder than the wood... because the noodle is a hundred times softer than the wood, you won't be able to use it to create enough force to push the knife... without mushing the noodle.
1: When you have to be insulting to the person you're talking to or debating, you should ask yourself why you're making it personal... Have you noticed I have not insulted you?
2: Am I "really" an engineer? Well, Georgia Tech DID give me a Ph.D a couple of years after they gave me my Masters... Does this mean I'm an engineer? It means I was able to at least fool six people with PhDs in engineering, and convince them that I might know at least a LITTLE on the subject. Does this mean I won't misspell words or make typos that I fail to correct? If you THINK that, then you likely don't know that many engineers. Is YOUR degree in engineering by chance? My masters and Ph.D are in Bioengineering, my bachelors is in Chemistry (Summa Cum Laude) and I even bothered to get an A.S. in Electronic Engineering Technology before all that...
1. Again, the question is not of weak points. If it were, then Wolverine's claws would be irrelevant. The question is can he cut not "Can he hold her down and hit a weak spot?" Do you realize that Wolverine actually IS a Samurai? I wasn't being metaphorical. He really is. He's a trained soldier. He's a trained black ops specialist. He is LITERALLY one of the most dangerous warriors on the planet. Why would he even have to BOTHER holding her down? In hand to hand combat, Emma wouldn't even be much of a challenge for him. IF you really think he could not EASILY STRIKE HER with force and precision, then you really don't understand how good he is.... Emma, on the other hand, is about 28 years old... Joined the Hellfire club around the age of 18... Had NO combat training prior to that and we don't know that she had much training at all until she joined the X-Men. Even if she DID train rigorously for the past ten years, does that put her anywhere NEAR the same class as Logan? NO... no way... not even close... With Telepathy, she wins.... In a hand to hand confrontation with Logan, it's no contest.
2. Cutting force is not improved by hardness beyond a certain point.
Your statement itself implies that cutting force IS improved by hardness... your statement "beyond a certain point" is at best qualitative. It DOES improve it.... THAT is the point... If you want to cut something hard, you need to USE something hard... Logan will have more success at cutting her diamond form with Adamantium claws, than he would have with steel claws.
If hardness didn't matter, then bullet manufacturers would not use STEEL TIPPED ALLOY to coat for the casings of ARMOR PIERCING bullets... Do you really not see a DIRECT analogy? Normal bullets for normally dressed people. STEEL TIPPED (HARDER) bullets for people wearing ARMOR.
This should be intuitive because whether you have a plastic knife or a steel knife you'd still easily cut through butter
Which supports my point. Plastic and steel are BOTH harder than butter... The cutting substance really needs to be harder than the thing it's cutting or piercing. Since Organic Diamond is likely harder than steel, the it would make sense that you'd need something harder than steel to cut the Organic Diamond. Also, your analogy uses a very soft substance to be cut, in which case there is a large difference between the hardness of the target and the blade. In this case, there will be no deformation of the blade.... Organic Diamond isn't soft...
I 'believe' your point is, once the cutting substance is sufficiently hard to cut the target, making it harder becomes less relevant. That's true... But here, we're dealing with a comic book form of Organic Diamond (not that there is a REAL form of Organic Diamond) and we're talking about whether or not Logan could cut/break that Organic Diamond. Since we do not know the EXACT hardness of material required to cut Organic Diamond, we can look at the extremes. Adamantium is the hardest substance in the Marvel Universe... So, if Organic Diamond CAN be cut or shattered, then Adamantium is definitely hard enough to do so...
Does that in and of itself mean Wolverine can cut Emma's Organic Diamond form? Absolutely not. Put an adamantium sword in the hands of a six year old kid and see if he could cut Emma open. Not likely.... So, the hardness of the blade only tells us that the blade is indeed hard enough for the task of cutting, not that Wolverine would be successful at it...
So...If we can at least agree that an adamantium blade is strong enough to cut Emma open, then the question becomes, "Can Wolverine strike with enough precision and force to cut Emma open?"
So, can he strike her with precision? Repeatedly? Absolutely. No doubt. He's been a trained warrior for more than a hundred years. Again, he's one of the best on the planet. She's no competition for him. Emma is one of my favorite characters, but physically she's simply not much of a match for Logan. And again, this is in the absence of her telepathy.
4. You know that even if Wolverine's blades can't deform his ARM can, right? Actually, no, it can't. The flesh around his skeleton can deform, absolutely... But his entire skeleton is fused with Adamantium, so it absolutely cannot deform... Although, to be fair, I'm assuming this based on the fact that it is the single hardest known substance in the Marvel Universe.
Additionally, I think you missed the fact that I comped Wolverine 2 tons of striking force exceeding human norms. There is not going to be a combat-worthy slice even at those levels of force.
Really? Two tons of force over how much surface area? If we assume Logan can 'punch' with 2000 lbs of force... AND we assume his punch is making contact with the two knuckles above the index and middle finger. THEN we can make a simply mathematical comparison of how much force is being delivered by a blade strike.
We'll keep this simple and use the formula Force = Pressure/Area Force = 2000 lbs Area = 1 square inch.
NOW, we replace the knuckles with the blade. Let's assume about 4 inches of the blade makes contact. Let's also assume it's a sharp blade but not the sharpest, and say that it is 20 microns wide. This is 0.0007874015748 inches wide by 4 inches long. The total surface area is 0.0031496 square inches.
Now that we have the pressure applied by the blade and the surface area making contact, we can calculate the force of the blade:
F = [2000 lbs/ square inch] / 0.0031496 square inches = 635,000 lbs of force.... Do you really think that isn't enough force to cut/shatter organic diamond?
Well, certain rockets require about 360,000 lbs of force to launch... I'm not sure about the Space Shuttle but I wouldn't be surprised if it required more than a million points of force to launch. However, we have a pseudo measure of the amount of force required to shatter Emma if struck at her "flaw." She was shot. A bullet hit her, and we're led to believe it was a normal bullet. I 'think' bullets can strike with a force of around 500 lbs... I"m guessing, and I'm thinking of bullets from handguns; Emma was shot with a handgun.
So, (under all the assumptions we've made about the amount of Force Logan can punch with, and the surface area of his claws) Logan can strike with a force that is 1720 times greater than that of a bullet.... Note: if you reduce the amount of force he can punch with down to 200 lbs, his claws strike with a force of 63,500 lbs of force which is 172 times greater than the force of a bullet....
Now, I've done the math here and you can see it for yourself. I even reduced the amount of force you comped Logan with, down by a factor of 10. And even at that level, he still strikes 172 times harder than a bullet. And as you know, a punch with only 200 lbs of force, is a relative weak punch.
What makes this dramatic increase in force happen is the decrease in surface area from knuckles down to blade. ALSO, Logan's claws are a part of his skeletal system; they are an extension of his arm essential. So, ALL of the force generated by his arm, is focused through that very very small blade...
The math is simple, so there's really no debating whether or not he can strike with that much force... It's fairly obvious... Now, the question becomes, is 635,000 lbs of force, applied through a blade which absolutely cannot break, enough to cut or shatter organic diamond????
I think it is...
ADDITION: I was reading this (and finding many typos and what not) I realized that I actually did the calculations with HALF the force that you comped Logan with. I used ONE ton of force and you said TWO tons. My bad.... Well, simply DOUBLE the force up to 1,270,000 lbs of force... I REALLY think that would do it...
@Timandm: 1. I haven't insulted you, I've asked how can an engineer overlook the fact that Wolverine is not an inelastic object. 2. That's impressive, but shouldn't basic kinesthetics and practical engineering principles reveal that Wolverine is not a ball on Newton's Cradle but something that will undoubtedly give?
1. What does combat training have to do with his ability to cut? This isn't a Battle where you compare feats and skills, this is a simple inquiry into the practical cutting capabilities of Wolverine's claws versus Emma's diamond. Exploiting the flaw doesn't illuminate anything about that match-up when even a bullet can accomplish the same task, so clearly the question has nothing to do with weak points or skill levels. 2a. It'd be nice if you didn't truncate the qualifications. The "beyond a certain point" relates to the mechanical force applied. Wolverine cannot summon enough force to compress or deform diamond, much less adamantium, so the hardness of of adamantium is irrelevant to his cutting ability. I suppose you could- and do- say his cutting ability is superior to steel claws- which he could deform- but that's not relevant since he's not using steel claws. 2b. I'm sorry, but hours ago you didn't even know bullets were typically made of lead! You're missing a fundamental aspect to your hardness analysis... the hardness of the gun. The bullet isn't magically accelerated (barring something like a rail gun). After an explosion goes off in the chamber, the force works against the bullet and the steel of the gun to push the bullet out and towards the target. The penetration of the round is dictated by the speed, mass, the deformation of the bullet, and the material composing the target. Yes, items of greater hardness will see greater penetration given the same force. However, a certain amount of absolute force is necessary to drive the round and to penetrate the target irrespective of how hard the projectile is. My rounds could be diamond tipped, but if the rear chamber of my gun is made of taffy, the round will never achieve sufficient force to make it to the target, much less penetrate. With sufficient velocity, soft lead will punch through steel plate... but that demands a sufficiently strong steel chamber. Wolverine is NOT a sufficiently strong chamber, he's the taffy. 3a. Again, hardness ONLY preserves edge shape. If you have an infinitely hard bullet, it's not going to penetrate flesh if you have insufficient force to get it to the target or to overcome the target's elasticity, toughness, ductility, etc. Infinite hardness is irrelevant to cutting if you can't even cross that force threshold to begin with. By your logic, things as soft as lead would never be able to penetrate harder objects despite routinely doing so. Hardness is not relevant when talking about humanoid strength and diamond resistance to compression (once again, recall that diamond "cutting" is a sawing or grinding or breaking, not a martial-styled cut or slice). 3b. What does precision or telepathy have to do with anything? That's the Battles skill inquiry. We're discussion materials interaction. Force, however, absolutely IS the issue. 4a. I'm sorry but this is ridiculous, you realize by deformation I mean force absorption, right? That means Wolvie's elbows bend, his feet shift, his weight moves about, etc. The only thing providing rigidity or structure to any given position he has is his muscles, tendons, and the friction of his feet. Perhaps an elaborate position can be created where he relies entirely on the structure of his bones to be inelastic- such as lying on his back with his elbows to the ground and his claws pointed up- but that's hardly a practical combat stance. Moreover, even if Emma were to sit herself atop it, the result would push against her and her relative elasticity... against the air. Emma would be pushed back- as if on a bed of nails- not forced to say in position. There is no combat-relevant strike or slice that Logan can perform that is perfectly inelastic. The only way that could occur is if he had a flight, TK, or Juggernaut-like ability. 4b. Oye. You don't measure cutting force with PSI, it's based on the blade inclination where I've comped you a theoretical "perfect" blade of 0-degrees! Didn't you suspect something was wrong when you had Logan out-putting more force than a rocket? In any case, the compressive strength- again, the type of strength tested in order to initially make a cut- of diamond is around 440-445 GigaPascals. Magnitudes outside of Logan's range. Like a wet noodle trying to push a metal knife into a block of wood. Even if you use the ridiculous position from 4a, that compressive resistance would be more than enough to suspend Emma's weight in the air... she would not fall on and through Wolvie's claws, even braced against the ground, and in any other position she'd push his claws around.
Diamonds can withstand a lot, but adamantium was written to be stronger, so yes, he could cut her. If it came down to it though, she could just switch to her fleshy form and knock him out with a mental bolt.
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