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Robots

I think the dates for the Encyclopedia Galactica rule out Galaxia, don't they? Anyway, Trevize based his Galaxia decision on the idea that Foundation's premise was flawed-- but that decision was itself flawed, based on incomplete information. I don't think Galaxia would work out.
Trevize based his decision on the fact that there may be somewhere in the universe an extraterrestrial intelligence that couldn't be predicted by Seldon's calculations. I don't see how you can ever rule out a possibility like that, unless you've colonized the entire universe, which wouldn't happen for many, many millennia.
 
I was looking at it the other way: That it was based on the premise of a humans-only galaxy. But very likely Gaia and Galaxia are only possible because the bacteria from Erythro in Nemesis has spread throughout the human population-- perhaps deliberately in order to take over the galaxy themselves. Asimov himself didn't like the idea of Galaxia and felt that he had painted himself into a corner, but that would be the perfect escape hatch.
 
I was looking at it the other way: That it was based on the premise of a humans-only galaxy. But very likely Gaia and Galaxia are only possible because the bacteria from Erythro in Nemesis has spread throughout the human population-- perhaps deliberately in order to take over the galaxy themselves. Asimov himself didn't like the idea of Galaxia and felt that he had painted himself into a corner, but that would be the perfect escape hatch.

I am sorry but Asimov never said anything about the bacteria from Erythro in relation to Galaxia, and not for lack of opportunity. So with all due respect, it's only your interpretation.

If not for his untimely death he would have found a way to continue this saga.
 
Perhaps some sort of semi-autonomous drone weapons that look really cool at the start of the series but turn out to be a really BAD idea at some point - which would possibly keep them from seeming like a continuity problem?
I don't think we should worry too much about continuity in this respect. Actual robots walking around the ship is one thing, but if we're talking about mechanisms with built-in AI, we can just handwave it and say it was always there, it just never came up in-story before.
 
Human lookalikes walking about would not be a contradiction in terms of tech level, as Mulhall in "Return to Tomorrow" is miffled that she can't build his own perfetly good 23rd century Federation androids but has to let the Sargonians build their own allegedly superior ones. Would that be a contradiction in terms of timeline, since we don't see those human lookalikes of Mulhall's walking about? Not really, since in TOS we see very little of the Federation, or indeed of Starfleet.

It's just that the spinoffs give us a broader view that suggests that robots of that sort went out of fashion after TOS, if they weren't out of fashion in TOS already - else they would have shown up somewhere, because we explicitly know they didn't become invisible (cloaking is eeevil) or perfectly humanlike (the concept freaks out 24th century people).

Unless they have a niche of their own off the usual camera view, that is. We never see actual infantry combat, not even in DS9. Perhaps Discovery is equipped for infantry combat, an art heavily reliant on robots?

Timo Saloniemi
 
Unless they have a niche of their own off the usual camera view, that is. We never see actual infantry combat, not even in DS9.
What about that ep where Nog got survivor guilt after his platoon was wiped out?
And there was another where Sisko and co. had to help a squad stand off against the Maquis.
 
The Siege of Ar-558 where Nog lost his leg in combat could be considered infantry combat. We even saw an infantry soldier(he had a jacket over his uniform) in the episode where Jake and Julian help out at the hospital during the brief Klingon/Federation war. He told Jake to hold him up, he wasn't gonna die with his face in the dirt. Those episodes were around the time of Saving Private Ryan and really resonated with me.
 
It's just that we didn't actually get to see the combat. In "The Siege of AR-558", the Starfleet fighting force has already been ground down to nothing much, in months upon months of fighting: all they have left is their rifles, plus eventually a few confiscated mines. Even if combat robots were standard gear at the time, those would probably be among the casualties at that stage of the fighting (why hold them in reserve, I mean?). In "Nor a Battle to the Strong", action has already ceased when Jake finds the wounded Lieutenant, and we can't tell if his platoon had any combat robots when they evacuated on that hopper of theirs.

It's possible that if Discovery features infantry action at all, it might be the other end of it, the deployment of combat-ready troops from the ship. That's where we could theoretically see fighting robots, v ehicles, indirect fire weaponry, the works. Or then not.

Timo Saloniemi
 
To do infantry deployment right, they'd need a ship with a massive transporter capable of mass troop transport. I'm imagining a mass deployment and an attack on the ship messes up the transporter and bam, 100 or more troops gone just like that. So the carrier would need traditional troop transport shuttles (massive or many of them) as a redundancy and have transporters capable of mass transport. Not to mention carrying 10-25K in manpower and gear. That's one big ship.
 
It also means you're not just a Navy anymore, so you need a different fleet and fleet command to handle the army/marines similar to Starship Troopers (without the jokes. Ok, a few of the jokes. I love that movie :)).
You also have no areas of story to explore when Admiral whatshername and General whathisname don't see eye to eye.

OR you OUTSOURCE your infantry needs to the Klingons in a joint mission that requires cold warriors to hold hands for awhile. hmmm.
 
So there are robots in the new show.....​
We can guess they are not Data type androids but what type?

when i first heard about the robot angle in DSC, the first thing that came to my mind was that this would be a *great* opportunity to follow up on a plotline from ENT. it'd be cool (IMO anyway) to see robots that are somehow based on the early cybernetics research of arik soong - that would be an excellent opportunity to see some of the earliest attempts at federation AI, perhaps work built upon later by ira graves and noonian soong. also, it'd be a great excuse for a guest appearance by brent, maybe as a 23rd-century soong, or as the voice of an arik-soong-type robot.
 
People still have very backwards ideas of what advanced robots might be like, but since they won't be 25th century robots, my suggestions for their capabilities are now moot...

While they will be more than likely be more advanced than robots were portrayed in TOS they will probably take steps to "handicap" them from what reality would likely produce in 2255.

Maybe something like this is what they are thinking of:

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Or a less militarized version of these:

IMG_20141003_054628_zps9necio3g.jpg
IMG_20141003_054657_zpsfmxhdmds.jpg


If it's an android, it may be more like this, than Data:

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My preference might be an android that is obviously an android, but more human-looking like this:

science-officer-0718_zpsmocmwacg.jpg


Ex-Machina_zps0cs9zzm0.jpg


Another option: They were looking to incorporate more "enhanced" CGI characters..they might do a "transformer" that they could animate and make look interesting as a vaguely useful set of tools, and then "de-animate" to save on budget.

RAMA
 
Would still prefer something non-humanoid, there is no reason to stay stuck in the guy-in-make up are of 'robots'. Between actual robotics, animatronics and CG effects anything could fill the 'reflection of humanity' role provider. Blade wolf in Metal Gear is an excellent example of that, rival, companion and commentator. The fact the character is a robot dog is quickly forgotten as the immersion of the universe allows it.
 
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