Gaping Hole of Troiyus

Discussion in 'Star Trek - The Original & Animated Series' started by Captain Shatner, Sep 6, 2012.

  1. Hartzilla2007

    Hartzilla2007 Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Actually one of the A Time To novels mentioned synthetic dilithium.

    Except they still need to stop for lithium crystals back then as well.

    Except in TUC they still had a number of people cooking stuff in the galley in fact someone was making what looked like mashed potatoes in the pot Valeris vaporized.
     
  2. Kemaiku

    Kemaiku Admiral Admiral

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    Bolding this time.
     
  3. Warped9

    Warped9 Admiral Admiral

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    They got so much wrong in the films I wouldn't take that too seriously. Besides in TMOST it's said that there is a place aboard where individuals can still prepare food by hand if they wish. That's probably what we saw.
     
  4. JarodRussell

    JarodRussell Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Some materials cannot be replicated. Latinum and dilithium are some examples.
     
  5. Warped9

    Warped9 Admiral Admiral

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    I don't have a problem with that otherwise you'd have an inexhaustible power source.
     
  6. Wingsley

    Wingsley Commodore Commodore

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    Year Three's other outstanding Klingon episode, "The Day of the Dove", may shed some light on the treknology of TOS. Consider this passage, which takes place after all phasers become swords and the Enterprise begins surging forward into deep space out of control:


    Of course, this is probably not the last word on this subject. I find it hard to fathom how starships that use matter-antimatter annihilation to exceed the speed of light, transporter to "beam down" to a planet's surface, and phased particle beams as weapons cannot muster at least some rudimentary level of replication/transmutation technology.
     
    Last edited: Sep 10, 2012
  7. Warped9

    Warped9 Admiral Admiral

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    That's not what I get from that. The phasers changed instantly into swords. They weren't broken down into basic elements first and then recycled into swords. The Feds could easily make swords if needed, but from raw materiel and not from already existing phasers turned instantaneously into swords. There's a difference.

    In "A Private Little War" Kirk asks Scotty to fabricate 100 flintlocks. Certainly such an antiquated weapon wouldn't be kept on hand aboard ship "just in case." In "Patterns Of Force" McCoy is provided with the uniform of a Gestapo doctor within minutes---another rare and unusual item. In "The Cloud Minders" the inference is the Enterprise can easily supply enough filter masks required for all the Troglytes. In "Return Of The Archons" and "A Private Little War" native clothing is provided before beaming down. None of those items would have been carried aboard "just in case."
     
  8. Hartzilla2007

    Hartzilla2007 Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Oh sorry.

    Stop, if it isn't onscreen it isn't canon.
     
  9. Navigator_NCC2120

    Navigator_NCC2120 Captain Captain

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    The warp drive was down at that point and they were running on impulse engines. So they were not using dilithium crystals.


    Courtesy of website: http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/35.htm


    Navigator NCC-2120 USS Entente
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  10. Navigator_NCC2120

    Navigator_NCC2120 Captain Captain

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    No, Scotty called them food processors.


    Courtesy of the website: http://www.chakoteya.net/StarTrek/42.htm


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  11. Wingsley

    Wingsley Commodore Commodore

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    But does all this add up to TOS-era Federation space vessels possessing replicator technology? Some sort of fabrication technology, for sure, but is it replicator technology?
     
  12. Warped9

    Warped9 Admiral Admiral

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    ^^ You're getting hung up on terminology rather than what we see being done. It's no different than being adamant that shuttlecraft are only sublight vehicles when the evidence onscreen is that they're quite capable of FTL flight.
     
  13. CorporalCaptain

    CorporalCaptain Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    I think it makes sense to posit something like replicators in TOS.

    Consider that "rooms filled with vacuum tubes" in the 1950's were computers, yet only 30 years later desktop computers based on transistors were being mass marketed.

    Imagine a few giant replicators on the TOS Enterprise (which are archaic when compared to the miniaturized TNG replicators) to do the heavy lifting of fabrication. Perhaps the food synthesizers are partially or even totally independent of the fabrication system, and instead more reliant on ecological waste reclamation. If the TOS "fabricators" are big and clunky, then they wouldn't necessarily be used for all the routine recycling tasks.
     
  14. Warped9

    Warped9 Admiral Admiral

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    Yes. And "archaic" is a relative term. Archaic comparative to TNG yet still highly advanced from our contemporary perspective. Today we can fabricate all manner of things, but it's a fairly slow and laborious exercise. Certainly we can't do it in minutes like they can in TOS.
     
  15. Timo

    Timo Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    The potential capabilities of Star Trek manufacturing technologies aren't that difficult to assess. We don't have to speculate when we can simply listen to the characters speak.

    In ENT, they told us how their food was (at least partially) manufactured from raw ingredients down to the protein level, but they also told us there were types of spares and materials they could not manufacture aboard no matter what. In TOS, they told us they can fabricate things like flintlocks or clothing or (at least certain kinds of) jewels but they also demonstrated they couldn't have dilithium or cooling pumps for old nuclear reactors whipped up that easily, if at all. In the TOS movies, they told us that making life out of lifelessness was a new and highly experimental arrow in their quiver. And in the VOY era, they told us that they can create life (or functioning neural tissue, at any rate) at the press of a button, but that they did not have replicators in the TOS movie era yet.

    We don't have any particular reason or authority to disbelieve them. We can only take what we see as absolute truth; what we hear as potentially modified truth; and what we infer as inconsequential and in all probability completely erroneous.

    Regarding the idea of getting dilithium at the push of a button in TOS, that's flat out because our heroes say it is. Getting it at the push of a button in TNG, though... LaForge says to Scotty that pushing a particular button will keep existing dilithium going in ways that weren't available in the TOS movie era yet. But he says nothing about how new dilithium is obtained in his era.

    Significantly, there isn't a single instance of canon Trek where a substance or structure would have been considered unreplicable per se. There are instances where it is considered impractical to replicate something - and there's "Night Terrors" where our heroes say they have lost the ability to synthesize elements, indicating they normally possess that ability. It would stand to reason, then, that dilithium could be replicated, at some unknown cost that the heroes may or may not be willing to pay. But none of this even remotely suggests that the TOS heroes would have had the option, too. And indeed the reference to them not having replicators heavily suggests that their manufacturing systems (by whatever name) left a lot to be desired in comparison with Janeway's - who, intriguingly enough, never ran into a dilithium shortage.

    Timo Saloniemi
     
  16. Ssosmcin

    Ssosmcin Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Oops. Thanks for catching that.

    Still no hole, though. :-)
     
  17. Ssosmcin

    Ssosmcin Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Kirk asks wow long would it take Scotty to reproduce a hundred flintlocks. Scotty seems nonplussed by the question, this alone could indicate this isn't that easy a request. They may be able to fabricate the materials, but it's apparent they aren't going to call up the computer and say "replicate a hundred flintlocks." There will probably be a team of engineers slapping these together.

    Regarding having Nazi uniforms on hand: "Patch historical computer into uniform section. I want McCoy outfitted as a Gestapo doctor Nazi Germany, old Earth date 1944. Make him a colonel." Could be replicator tech or just really super fast sewing machines.

    They still can't make dilithium crystals, though.
     
  18. CorporalCaptain

    CorporalCaptain Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Scotty being nonplussed could have also been because of the implications with respect to non-interference.
     
  19. Ssosmcin

    Ssosmcin Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Maybe, but it looked or felt more like a "you want me to do what now?" Not so much because of the Prime Directive (he knows who his boss is - he's used to it) but because he has a tough job ahead of him.
     
  20. Kemaiku

    Kemaiku Admiral Admiral

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    Dilithium is a moderating element, not a power source. Even in the episode Scotty's removal of the crystals was more akin to a control rod being removed, causing the reactor to stop.

    Antimatter still needs to be produced by large and dedicated machines deep in the ship at a cost to it's overall power, or done at intervals from raw space matter or a starbase.

    Energy has never been inexhaustible in Trek, which I agree is a good thing.