I don't know I accept Lucas explanation for the force but still liked the mystical approach, and I'm a bit torn on it.
Do you think paranormal activity (that can't be explained by science) still goes on in Star Trek?
- Thread starter The Rock
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But that's the point -- it's a Western bias to see a physical explanation and a mystical explanation as incompatible. Lucas's portrayal of the Force is rooted in Eastern philosophy, in which the physical and mystical can be one and the same thing. There is no conflict.
Also, a lot of people mistakenly think that midi-chlorians create the Force. What The Phantom Menace actually said was that they connect to it. We were originally told that all living things are connected to the Force. TPM just added another layer to that and explained how we're connected to it. It's not as different as people think. It's just more detailed.
Yeah I can roll with that. Just I like the way it was presented better in the original trilogy, but the added information we get in TPM is fine.
Honestly, the more I read Lucas' idea the more I am appreciative of what he was trying to do. The blending of the physical and the mystical is something I long find fascinating in different works, and the Force was just another layer within it to expand the lore.
Now, how it was implanted is a whole other story
Now, how it was implanted is a whole other story
That was what I meant when I said that that was how you want to end an adventure--an explanation is given, and the last bit of dialog was along the lines of "there is no 'super' natural." You might even have something fool a Q just to push things and make it interesting.
You can't prove a negative. The most you can say is that something hasn't been explained yet, or that its explanation is unknown to a particular group. It's impossible to prove, and reckless to assume, that it can never be explained by anyone.
If fact--that would be a great last few lines in an adventure. Just keep it a mystery early on.
There'll always be people, even in the future, who'll still believe in ghosts and supernatural creatures. I mean, there are still people who believe that today - even with our current level of reason, science and understanding of how the universe works.
People believe in all sorts of things. It has no bearing on their actual existence.
"Your eyes can deceive you. Don't trust them." --Obi-wan
Yes. That's my point.
But why is it worth bringing up? The thread isn't asking whether people would believe in such things, it's asking whether they'd actually exist within the Trek universe. My point is that those are two unrelated questions.
I'll never forget the day I was with the cast and crew of a student production in a small black box theatre at college. There was a sudden draft of cold air; the director half-screamed and was convinced it meant there was a ghost.
The door was open to the hallway. I looked down the hall. Someone had propped open the door to outside. It was winter.
People jump to weird conclusions sometimes.
Chill out, forum police.
This is a perfectly natural and predictable evolution of the discussion. We don't need you telling people what they can and cannot post. @Nyotarules and I will handle it if/when necessary.
This is not a helpful response.
There are some fictional universes where non-scientific phenomenon exist, and Star Trek is not one of them.
But tangents can lead to fruitful brainstorms in their own right. Okay, it helps if one is really entrenched in the topic at hand but it's possible the tangent brought up can eclipse the progenitor... like how some TV and movie spinoffs outdo their progenitors.
That aside, you're right - there is a distinction and it's easy to blur lines.
In the Star Trek universe, as with any sci-fi/fantasy genre, anything could be possible -- if the audience can believe it.
I'll have to think about that and maybe I'm misinterpreting... but I might wager (albeit 3 Quatloos, not much) that few TOS episodes like Charlie X disprove that; Charlie had powers that are equatable to magic and were not given scientific backing. Just paranormal ones. People who love the story had to buy into the notions told (and a lot of them/us probably liked The Twilight Zone as well since there's the occasional overlap in tone and feel, too). Counter to Charlie was Trelane, who was said to have machinery but Kirk destroys it but Trelane still continues unabated. (part of Trelane's game, perhaps? Another machine elsewhere shrouded from their sensor decides, or he's also as incorporeal for x reason(s) that Charlie was/were.
Not just those two as one was using the other as story inspiration; the Organians are glowing balls of light that took their ancestral humanoid
It's always implied in Star Trek that it's not magic, it's science we don't understand. Those glowing sentient balls aren't made up of etherealness or spirit, they're made up of energy.
In TNG episodes involving the Traveler and Haven confirm that spacetime is actually spacetimethought, and that's why people can be telepathic or telekinetic and probably how creatures like Q can exist. But that's not magic, it's science that's advanced enough to look like magic to humans. It can be measured and needs to be powered. Citing Transfigurations, it's probably the case that that's what ascension is, when corporeal beings gain the ability to fully tap into the thought component of spacetime.
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That's true enough. I'm clearly a strong advocate for science over belief and have little regard for people's superstitions, but if there's a conversation to be had about unscientific beliefs in the Trek universe, then okay, I'm willing to listen. I prefer to think that most Federation citizens are well enough educated not to fall prey to superstition and fraudulent mysticism, though there are various cultures that have strong religious beliefs, like the Klingons. And the Bajorans, of course, but their faith is based on a provably real phenomenon, so it doesn't quite fit the category.
Then again, in Trek, the Ancient Greeks' religion was based on real aliens, as were the Mesoamericans' religions (Kukulkan), Chakotay's people's faith (the Sky Spirits), and others. It could be that a lot of Trek-universe religions were actually inspired by advanced intelligences, which brings them back into the realm of the physically real, which isn't useful if we're trying for a tangent into belief in the unreal.
So what's left for people in the Federation to be superstitious about? Gods and devils -- real, at least sometimes. Psi powers -- real. Disembodied souls and astral projection -- real, at least sometimes. Aliens from outer space -- real. Time travel and alternate realities -- real. Even creationism is real after a fashion. What else is there? The Flat Universe Society?
The scientific backing was that they were natural abilities of the Thasians, a highly evolved alien species, who endowed Charlie with their own powers so that he could survive on their world. It was a common trope in the SF of the era that humanoid evolution would eventually lead to superior mental abilities indistinguishable from magic and transcendence of the flesh, as seen with many Trek races (Thasians, Organians, Zetarians, eventually Q), and in other SF like The Outer Limits' "The Sixth Finger."
And as I mentioned before, the original intent behind the word "paranormal" was to mean "explainable by science not yet discovered," not "forever beyond science." At the time of TOS, it was widely believed that psychic powers were a real scientific phenomenon that had not yet been understood, and this was generally taken as read in the science fiction of the era. Calling something telepathy rather than magic was taken as a scientific explanation, since it was assumed that telepathy was something we would eventually understand. Ditto for attributing it to alien abilities, since aliens could theoretically do anything.
That was explained. "This time my instrumentality is unbreakable... And did you really think that was the only medium of instrumentality at my command?" Trelane said outright that he was just using a different, stronger machine.
Santa Claus!
Any sufficiently advanced technology can look like magic... or in the case of this discussion, paranormal or supernatural.
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