What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer?

Discussion in 'Star Trek - The Original & Animated Series' started by Shaka Zulu, Apr 9, 2013.

  1. Shaka Zulu

    Shaka Zulu Commodore Commodore

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    ...Yes, they say he will be taken someplace to get help, but was he held responsible for what happened? Was he even tried for his role in what happened? And where was he sent to be rehabilitated? What did he do after his rehab stint?
     
  2. BillJ

    BillJ The King of Kings Premium Member

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    Likely spent the rest of his days at the Federation Funny Farm.
     
  3. AtoZ

    AtoZ Commander Red Shirt

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    To the Tantalus colony for a visit with Simon Van Gelder and perhaps a spell in "the chair".
     
  4. Greg Cox

    Greg Cox Admiral Premium Member

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    My understanding is that he was transformed into . . . Blacula! :)
     
  5. Dale Sams

    Dale Sams Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    Well they named an institute after him, so he couldn't have been too discredited.
     
  6. GSchnitzer

    GSchnitzer Co-Executive Producer In Memoriam

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    He went on to become the King of Cartoons.

    "Let the cartoon...begin!"
     
  7. TREK_GOD_1

    TREK_GOD_1 Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    What a journey! He must have used the Enterprise's "lightspeed breakway factor," ended up in the 1790s, where he was vampirized by Dracula! Curious how he had no memory of his life as a 23rd century man when released from his coffin in 1972! ;)
     
  8. ryan123450

    ryan123450 Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    It's official. Scream, Blacula, Scream is now part of the Trek Canon.
     
  9. ZapBrannigan

    ZapBrannigan Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    Rather than hook the M-5 unit up to the Enterprise and give it "varchully unlimited power!", Starfleet should have tested M-5 by linking it to another computer-- a virtual simulator that the M-5 thinks is the real deal. The Enterprise, outer space, and other starships would all be simulated in the virtual environment.

    Starfleet officers would log on and play the game as if they were on their real ships, and only M-5 wouldn't know it was a virtual environment. Then when the unit went crazy and started killing people, all the lessons could be learned and nobody really dies.
     
  10. plynch

    plynch Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    For NBC's lineup of must-not-see TV.

    I enjoy this ep. Always have.
     
  11. Melakon

    Melakon Admiral In Memoriam

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer


    Nobody in a 1968 television audience would have known what the hell they were talking about, because the first home gaming console didn't appear until 1972.

    Though I believe the military was using vector graphics for planning strategy at the time.
     
  12. ZapBrannigan

    ZapBrannigan Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    I agree, but I was making an in-universe comment, not a show-biz one. :bolian:
     
  13. Shaka Zulu

    Shaka Zulu Commodore Commodore

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    A very sensible plan that should have been carried out, but never was.

    My guess as to what happened to Daystrom is that he was 'rehabilitated', was able to get his life back on track, and came up with positronics, but died before he could implement it, leaving the work to a young acolyte, Noonien Soong, (who had already been working on this from another angle based on work from an ancestor).
     
  14. BillJ

    BillJ The King of Kings Premium Member

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    But we don't know whether this happened or not. I'm pretty sure Starfleet would've extensively tested the M-5 before putting it on a ship.
     
  15. ZapBrannigan

    ZapBrannigan Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    They did...

    Wesley:
    If the M-5 works under actual conditions as well as it has under simulated tests, it will mean a revolution in space technology as great as warp drive.

    But clearly M-5 knew it was working in a simulator. They should have caused M-5 to mistake the simulator for the real thing. Then it would have shown its true colors, its true engrams I mean, sooner.

    No, wait. They may well have let M-5 think the simulated tests were real, but within those sims, the unit was supposed to fire full phasers. And then aboard the Enterprise when told to play nice, it just refused to pull its punches-- this was a condition they never simulated. Interesting.

    Now Starfleet has to explain the deaths of over 500 spacemen in peacetime. That goes beyond mere courts-martial and into the realm of a government changing hands in the next election.
     
  16. Metryq

    Metryq Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    James P. Hogan addressed this in THE TWO FACES OF TOMORROW, a novel about the creation of the first "true" artificial intelligence. The story begins with an accident caused by a semi-intelligent computer performing an action that seemed like a good idea. The act was highly creative, but demonstrated a lack of "common sense" and judgment.

    The dilemma is that computers of the same sort run the rest of human civilization. Going back is out of the question—that would sacrifice the many advances, economy and very lives of far too many people. And continuing with the current generation of computers is untenable following the revealing accident.

    While trying to work out a solution, the reader is shown researchers working in the lab with a new generation AI that learns how to deal with the real world by working in a simulation driven by another computer. The problem is the same as the real world problem with the existing computers—reality is just too complicated to plot out in every facet. And putting a human in the loop to provide "judgment" defeats the purpose of using the computers to manage the volume of civilization's daily interactions.

    So the next generation AI is placed in charge of a new O'Neill-style space colony, a smaller yet suitably detailed proxy of the world. This should protect Earth in case the experiment gets out of hand, but the AI evolves far faster than anyone had imagined possible...
     
  17. Metryq

    Metryq Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    Fat Chance Productions presents: that happens only in simulations. In reality, the party in power that caused the debacle spins the whole thing in the media so that it becomes the fault of another political party that had nothing to do with it. Unlike M5, the guilty have no scruples to hamstring their ambitions.
     
  18. Marsden

    Marsden Commodore Commodore

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    They said they tested it, maybe they should have stranded it in the "recreation room"

    How would they find out about 500 deaths? We lost over 400 Vulcanians :vulcan: and a whole solar system to a germ, and then there's Nomad, they make this seem minor. Pluse this thing was a top secret, I'm sure the survivors would have been under orders of silence.

    I don't think it's minor, just saying in that context, it might not seem as bad as it does to us. Also, this was actually Starfleet's fault rather than a space monster, so it would hurt, but I think the Federation Council, as I understand it, wouldn't be harmed but a bunch of admirals and a certain commodore would be in trouble. I think that's why Bob ended govenor of that backwater planet.
     
  19. Timo

    Timo Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    The point seemed rather to be that M-5 never had a clear idea of where it was working... It treated a simulation (the wargames) as reality. This suggests a childishly narrow worldview, while testing should already have pitted the computer against a wide variety of situations. Did none of those test scenarios deal with concepts like "untruth", "bluff", "accounting for human error" and "erring on the side of caution"?

    Wesley might simply be saying that M-5 had handled the mechanistic routines of starship command well enough, and the wargames (plus the lead-in planetary survey mission) were the first time the computer faced complications. But that doesn't make sense from today's point of view, because odd complications should be more easily tested virtually than physically, and it's those that M-5 would realistically have learned to handle before entering the wargames, rather than things like tactics or power distribution.

    From today's vantage point, it looks as if M-5 really was a splendid success originally, meeting all the criteria in rigorous testing - and simply snapped later on. Unfortunately, the snapping happened at a rather crucial moment, but we don't need to assume that the circumstances of that moment had anything to do with the snapping. M-5 might simply have been doomed to remain sane for a limited period of time only, by design and default, what with being burdened with the memory engrams of a snapping-prone man.

    Timo Saloniemi
     
  20. Marsden

    Marsden Commodore Commodore

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    Re: What REALLY happened to Dr. Daystrom after 'The Ulitimate Computer

    Yes, and perhaps it never had so much power at it's disposal in previous testing. Maybe it's "brain" was too overloaded and then the defect set in, it may have continued for years at that lower power and been fine with no noticable problems, but when that extra power got into it's system it was like a drug and couldn't get enough and wanted more.