That's how they do it in Asimov's world, the robots are so omnipresent that after a time they ceased making the distinction between men and robots.
Why The Huge Gap Between TMP & WOK?
- Thread starter DeepSpaceYorks
- Start date
That's how they do it in Asimov's world, the robots are so omnipresent that after a time they ceased making the distinction between men and robots.
Asimov did "The Feeling of Power" on that subject (human computers).
Yes, I remember that one. They've used computer for so long that they can no longer count. I don't think that qualifies as human computer. People relearn how to count. That's pretty much it. I think that story was sort of a cautionary tale.
No (mouse over to read):
They started thinking up military applications of human computers.
Yes, I've blocked that part out. Maybe because it's so unrealistic. Come on! In the future, human computers beating electronic computers? That's ridiculous. Asimov wasn't always a visionary.
I always thought it was intended as allegorical, rather than literal. On the allegorical level, it's about a reversal of the process of mechanization. First, machines displace people, because machines are cheaper and more efficient. Then, there's the subsequent reversal in which humans replace machines, because humans are cheaper and more efficient. It's not about the superiority of people over machines, but rather about human life being worth less than a machine. It is a cautionary tale of progress beyond mechanization. Very dystopian and disturbing. At least, that's how I always read it.
I've just said that it was a cautionary tale and you said no. Now you're saying it's a cautionary tale again? Make up your mind.
No, I didn't say that. You said that it wasn't about human computers; I disagreed. That's what my "No" meant.
But you're right, it was a cautionary tale.
Ok. I think the details are not as important as the message.
Boy do I know that. I've been world building since 2008, changed the premise about four times, and finally getting some decent first drafts knocked out. It's work.
Yeah, my own, main original SF universe evolved in a similar way. It started off as daydreams set in the Trek universe a century after TOS (an idea still 7 years ahead of its time), but within a few months I found that limiting and changed it to an original universe. But it was still basically a Trek clone with lots of humanoid aliens and the like. Over time, I changed more and more. First, I came up with a backstory where the humanoid aliens were all the descendants of lost human colonies that had been cut off from Earth after a cataclysm and recontacted after evolving into distinct "alien" societies (yet this all somehow happened in less than 400 years). Then I ditched the humanoids altogether and started designing more exotic aliens, which was a lot more fun as well as more scientifically plausible. And my story ideas shifted away from starship exploration to more distinctive premises set in various different eras. And I ended up with a universe that's almost completely different from how it started -- and I've reworked its history and geography and the like multiple times since then. Not to mention that what I conceived for the universe and what I've actually sold have been rather different. I put so much effort into creating distinct alien biologies and psychologies and cultures, and yet to date only one of my published works in that universe has featured sapient aliens, way back in my first published story 18 years ago (although I've just sold a second at long last).
I'm one of these nerds that wants his solar systems as accurate as possible, and I've generated spread sheets full of planetary data, using that to build models in Celestia, and putting my worlds 33,000 lightyears away to avoid using real places, in some indeterminate future where technology and civilizations have risen and fell. After watching a show on the Earth, I thought a planet like the early Earth in its rainfall era would make an interesting setting. Put it in orbit around a main sequence red giant, with a 40 year year, and a 20 hour day, where people still live on an 24 hour cycle. The challenge is never referencing Earth calendars and keeping up with day and night. If it weren't for spreadsheets. . . Or the internet.
In the 90s, I read a lot of Analog and Heavy Metal, throw in some Alastair Reynolds, and some Ghost in the Shell, and that's the general idea of my tone.
In the 90s, I read a lot of Analog and Heavy Metal, throw in some Alastair Reynolds, and some Ghost in the Shell, and that's the general idea of my tone.
I think what's bothered me most of all is all the great adventures that could have happened post TMP. The movie ends on such an up and positive note, I want that sense of wonder to continue and thrive. However, it's swept away immediately by the next film. Not that WOK is bad it's a great film but the untapped potential of the post TMP universe is squandered in my opinion.
I've long felt the same thing.
I understand that TMP is a summing up of what could have been phase II.
Well, the crew is pretty much the same (Alia And Decker were supposed to be part of it).
As Warped9 says though, it is an oversimplification. 
TMP is the 'pilot episode' of Phase II jury rigged for purpose as a motion picture, yes. But in context of the ending of TMP and the promise of potential adventures ahead, nothing in Phase II is truly representative of where they could've gone. Phase II did not feature Leonard Nimoy as Spock, and it did feature Deckerand Ilia, two characters who are MIA at the end of TMP. By the very nature of these differences, Phase II in the form that we understand it was being developed could not have followed TMP. At the very least extensive rewrites would've been required, possibly to the point of changing the nature of what Phase II was going to turn out like.
Even in its TV show format the Phase II version of the script used in TMP is quite startling in its differences, bourne of its nature as a TV pilot rather than a movie, even putting aside the roster of crew being slightly different.
TMP is the 'pilot episode' of Phase II jury rigged for purpose as a motion picture, yes. But in context of the ending of TMP and the promise of potential adventures ahead, nothing in Phase II is truly representative of where they could've gone. Phase II did not feature Leonard Nimoy as Spock, and it did feature Deckerand Ilia, two characters who are MIA at the end of TMP. By the very nature of these differences, Phase II in the form that we understand it was being developed could not have followed TMP. At the very least extensive rewrites would've been required, possibly to the point of changing the nature of what Phase II was going to turn out like.
Even in its TV show format the Phase II version of the script used in TMP is quite startling in its differences, bourne of its nature as a TV pilot rather than a movie, even putting aside the roster of crew being slightly different.
There is the short-lived Marvel comic that was set post-TMP, and the newspaper comic strip from the same era, but neither was all that good.
I've said before, I really wish Filmation had done a second animated Trek series in 1980. They did other revivals -- e.g. The New Adventures of Batman in '77 and The New Fat Albert Show in '79 -- so it was something they could've actually done. And by '79-'80, their techniques had improved. Their animation looked better (with more use of rotoscoped character animation and innovative special effects), their music was richer and lusher, and they had some interesting writers on staff in the early '80s, including Michael Reaves and Marc Scott Zicree -- and, a couple of years later, Diane Duane and Paul Dini. A post-TMP Filmation animated series could've expanded on the TMP era, developed the nonhuman background crew, and made the animated side of ST a bigger and more respected piece of the whole. And there's no reason why it theoretically couldn't have happened. I wish I lived in the parallel timeline where it had happened.
As Warped9 says though, it is an oversimplification.
TMP is the 'pilot episode' of Phase II jury rigged for purpose as a motion picture, yes. But in context of the ending of TMP and the promise of potential adventures ahead, nothing in Phase II is truly representative of where they could've gone. Phase II did not feature Leonard Nimoy as Spock, and it did feature Deckerand Ilia, two characters who are MIA at the end of TMP. By the very nature of these differences, Phase II in the form that we understand it was being developed could not have followed TMP. At the very least extensive rewrites would've been required, possibly to the point of changing the nature of what Phase II was going to turn out like.
Even in its TV show format the Phase II version of the script used in TMP is quite startling in its differences, bourne of its nature as a TV pilot rather than a movie, even putting aside the roster of crew being slightly different.
I was just saying that TMP is the closest thing to Phase II that we ever saw.
