Spoilers A list of bad scientific errors in Discovery

[ISS_Einstein]

If you're doing a reboot, then yes. If you're just playing to the past, then you might as well give the people who are paying what they want. Star Trek really isn't science fiction anymore, it is its own thing with its own rules.

The thing is, I've always thought you could do both - wonder and realism.

I've sometimes seen the choice between realism and wonder presented as a dichotomy. But looking at say that Stargate SG1, which was not perfect, but used natural wonder to it's advantage (i.e. the imperfect but wonderful black hole episode, or the engineering solutions to their war with the Goa'uld), I don't see why you can't have wondrous sci-fi and also keep most things fairly realistic. I really don't. That is why I wonder why the writers actually need to 'ignore the majority of science ficiton'.

Deep time, the potential age of some of the civilizations out there, are themselves a wonder, without the need for embellishment. Things like the actual engineering of thrusters to attach to an asteroid and prevent collision can be presented as interesting enough.

 

[BillJ]

Deep time, the potential age of some of the civilizations out there, are themselves a wonder, without the need for embellishment. Things like the actual engineering of thrusters to attach to an asteroid and prevent collision can be presented as interesting enough.

But that really isn't "Star Trek".

 

[Alan Roi]

Yes I've made this point before - It's pointless comparing Trek to modern science fiction because it deliberately ignores most of that stuff and always has.

FYI, Jules Verne invented the 'Hard' Science Fiction Genre about 150 years ago, so adhering to scientific principles when writing science fiction is hardly strictly a modern phenomena.

 

[Alan Roi]

The thing is, I've always thought you could do both - wonder and realiI don't see why you can't have wondrous sci-fi and also keep most things fairly realistic. I really don't. That is why I wonder why the writers actually need to 'ignore the majority of science fiction'.

The subgenre called Hard Science Fiction, which is what you are describing here is not now nor has ever been "the majority of science fiction."

 

[Alan Roi]

How come they can make a radio out of a coconut but can't fix the hole in the boat?

That is a brilliant metaphor for overspecialization in the modern age and the same reason why if you hand a hairdresser a couple of sticks, they will turn them into a pair of scissors instead of suing them to make fire and marketers will be concerned over whether or not people want said 'fire' to be fitted nasaly..

 

[ISS_Einstein]

If you're doing a reboot, then yes. If you're just playing to the past, then you might as well give the people who are paying what they want. Star Trek really isn't science fiction anymore, it is its own thing with its own rules.

Out of interest, here is my feelings on the placement of Trek:

*Harder space opera*
|
|- Revelation Space, Tau Zero, Red Mars, Rendezvous with Rama, The Martian
|
|- The Expanse
|
|- Foundation
|
|- Babylon 5, Star Trek, Stargate SG1, Firefly, Mass Effect, Dune, Warhammer 40,000, Farscape
|
|- Star Wars
|
|- Doctor Who, Space 1999
|
|- Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, John Carter of Mars, Flash Gordon
|
*Softer space opera*

Using the Wikipedia definitions as a guideline....

• - Hard Science Fiction deals with "an emphasis on scientific accuracy"
• - Soft Science Fiction deals with either "soft sciences" or are simply "not scientifically accurate"

I put most TV sci-fi about middle of the scale, as they arn't quite rayguns-and-martians 50s stuff, but also arn't as hard as Reynolds and co.

EDIT: - needless to say, I think these things are relative.

 

[ISS_Einstein]

The subgenre called Hard Science Fiction, which is what you are describing here is not now nor has ever been "the majority of science fiction."

I was responding to someone's comment that Star Trek ignores the majority of science fiction, not talking about hard sci-fi.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

TNG was full of magic rocks, magic endless-metal-pockets, and psychotic breaks, was it? News to me.

Not sure why you limited it to only TNG when he said all of Star Trek, or why you're selectively leaving out the Star Trek films he suggested that don't fit your narrative, but yes, I do believe it featured examples of all of those, or similar.

I mean, Q is just a space god wizard who can create nearly anything or go anywhere with a snap of his fingers, without even needing an Infinity Gauntlet (suck it, Thanos). Yes, any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic, but why can't that apply to Disco to a certain extent as well? If you can buy transporters and replicators, why can't you buy a combination of transporters and replicators materializing that asteroid grabber device in the shuttle bay from a smaller device?

Anyway, let's judge the show on it's own merits shall we?

Except you're explicitly not doing that. You're trying to establish that Discovery is objectively worse than the majority of Trek in terms of scientific accuracy (see below), and then dismissing any examples that don't back up your claim (see above).

If you had simply been using this thread as a teaching tool about science then that could have been cool. But as an attempt to dunk on the show for not being scientifically accurate in a franchise full of such inaccuracies, it's kind of weak sauce.

Let's face it, this is a whole new level of scientific illiteracy, compared to the majority of Trek. Even in TOS, people generally used the correct SI units, proposed logical theories of why shit was happening, etc.

Except when they suddenly flew to the "edge" of the galaxy overnight and then had to pass through a giant barrier surrounding it. Or hundreds of other examples from later episodes.

 

[DaveyNY]

Scientific Accuracy, has never been the reason why I watch and enjoy Star Trek.

It's interesting when it is included in some way, shape or form, but it's not the end-all, be-all reason for my attachment to this franchise.

 

[BillJ]

Out of interest, here is my feelings on the placement of Trek:

|- Babylon 5, Star Trek, Stargate SG1, Firefly, Mass Effect, Dune, Warhammer 40,000, Farscape
|
|- Star Wars

I put Star Trek and Star Wars on the same level.

 

[ISS_Einstein]

@BillJ - I would mainly put Star Wars lower due to having an explicit magic system, but mostly they are equal - Star Wars can be just as hard as the other middle ones, and mostly is.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Ah, nothing like a good old fashioned LECTURE to start the day.

 

[Alan Roi]

Out of interest, here is my feelings on the placement of Trek:

*Harder space opera*
|
|- Revelation Space, Tau Zero, Red Mars, Rendezvous with Rama, The Martian
|
|- The Expanse
|
|- Foundation
|
|- Babylon 5, Star Trek, Stargate SG1, Firefly, Mass Effect, Dune, Warhammer 40,000, Farscape
|
|- Star Wars
|
|- Doctor Who, Space 1999
|
|- Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, John Carter of Mars, Flash Gordon
|
*Softer space opera*

Using the Wikipedia definitions as a guideline....

• - Hard Science Fiction deals with "an emphasis on scientific accuracy"
• - Soft Science Fiction deals with either "soft sciences" or are simply "not scientifically accurate"

I put most TV sci-fi about middle of the scale, as they arn't quite rayguns-and-martians 50s stuff, but also arn't as hard as Reynolds and co.

EDIT: - needless to say, I think these things are relative.

IMHO, there's a whole lot ambiguity in your middle section though. Heck, many aspects of Space 1999 (Moonbase Alpha and most of its actual tech was near HARD when compared to anything in Star Trek even if the aliens, alien worlds and civilizations they encounter could run the gamut from Hard SF to straight fantasy from one episode to the next)

 

[EnderAKH]

Can we agree that in the era of The Expanse, Trek should be getting more believable, not less?

No? I'm not looking for hard science fiction from Star Trek. Like.. at all.

 

[Alan Roi]

Ah, nothing like a good old fashioned LECTURE to start the day.

Absolutely, gets those gears turning.

 

[ISS_Einstein]

Except you're explicitly not doing that. You're trying to establish that Discovery is objectively worse than the majority of Trek in terms of scientific accuracy (see below), and then dismissing any examples that don't back up your claim (see above).

Actually, when writing it initially, my post originally refrained from doing that - in the hope that people would just list examples (but I knew it wouldn't be the case - and yes, I was making a silent point either way) - but in the end I couldn't resist pointing out that the exposition was much clearer in the past shows, for example, as I think thats quite important - they really do run shit exposition off at light speed in this one.

Anyway, I haven't replied more to you more thoroughly, because you went down the route of meme posting i.e. 'obsessive nerd', and all the usual stuff, although I know it was likely tongue-in-cheek. I have seen that you are a pretty nice guy watching these forums, so I know it's just an exasperated expression born of your strong opinion, but I'm gonna leave it there, because I don't wanna get into personal stuff.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Absolutely, gets those gears turning.

The squeaky wheel gets the Geeksplaining!

 

[ISS_Einstein]

IMHO, there's a whole lot ambiguity in your middle section though. Heck, many aspects of Space 1999 (Moonbase Alpha and most of its actual tech was near HARD when compared to anything in Star Trek even if the aliens, alien worlds and civilizations they encounter could run the gamut from Hard SF to straight fantasy from one episode to the next)

I'm interested to see how you would list them - I guess I put Space 1999 lower because of things like how the Moon seems to be both travelling at sub-luminal speeds - and also FTL - but it was a common thing before the 90s for shows to just ignore distances.

 

[Alan Roi]

I'm interested to see how you would list them - I guess I put Space 1999 lower because of thinks like how the Moon seems to be both travelling at sub-luminal speeds - and also FTL - but it was a common think before the 90s for shows to just ignore distances.

The moon was directed through wormholes in space through the action s of extremely powerful entities as was explained in the series, not unlike those found in Star Trek and Bablyon 5. The inhabitants of Moonbase Alpha were pretty much restricted to what was projected we'd have available to us 25 years from 1974. I'd put Babylon 5 and Stargate Harder because they actually expended an effort where it came to real-world physics over Star Trek in many instances.

There was actually a Hard Science Fiction series made in the 80s on BBC while Doctor Who was on hiatus and it is available to watch on Youtube currently. It is called Star Cops and is pretty unique because it has pretty much zero non scientific elements in it, and just about every single prognostication it made from 1987 has either come to pass or is looking like it will.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

As for the actual lecture itself, I mean question, I'd have to say this:

Yeah, DSC is probably scientifically inaccurate. SO THE FUCK WHAT?

If it means an entertaining episode, I say hell yeah, inaccurate the shit out of it! Screw science, most of us are in this for the plot.