How widespread do you think transporter technology is?

[Timo]

Both DS9 and VOY had Earth-based episodes that featured tunnel entrances around San Francisco with "Trans Francisco" transit system signs.

So, transporter stations built conveniently underground so as not to disturb the historical cityscape.

In the TOS movie era, Starfleet apparently ran a small-scale transporter facility known as the "Old City Station", one of the "all stations" in the town, and aka "the worst duty station in town". This might indicate that transporters aren't in widespread civilian use at the time, or Starfleet wouldn't bother with such low-capacity antiquities. Unless Starfleet's stations were the only ones with the flexible surface-to-orbit capabilities, while the civilians had their A-to-B-around-Earth facilities elsewhere...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[plynch]

I suspect transporter use is rare, because of course, it destroys the soul and connot reconstitute it at the beam-in site.

 

[AstroSmurf]

I have a thought on this. Maybe... just maybe... transporters are used for long distance travel only.

I would assume that, since the transporter uses a large amount of power, beaming someone across town would not be all that cost effective. So, to maintain an efficient power utilization standard, locomotive transportation is necessary at a local level.

Or in other words, you want to go across town you take the anti-grav tram. You want to go from San Francisco to New Orleans, you take the transporter. However, emergency services could utilize there own private local transporter systems.

I would also like to point out that a transporter beam would have to be bounced-off a satellite to send anything more than a few hundred miles, similar to today's broadcast communications. The curvature of the earth would prevent direct beaming. So with that in mind, I think that Earth's government would be required to maintain the transport hubs and satellite network. Can you imagine the mess things would be in and the number of accidents caused by unintentional network overloads if the system wasn't controlled? The planet would also be overrun with swarms of private transport satellites in orbit too. The 23rd and 24th Centuries would be plagued by transporter traffic jams if a governing party wasn't set-up to oversee and maintain the system.

 

[stavrosg]

Transporters use an awuful lot of energy for one person; I'd imagine that people have limited access to them (remember, Sisko used nearly all his month's credits in one week, and as a SF Cadett, he might also have more than a typical civilian). We don't see many road vehicles around, but there could be an extensive subway system in big towns, Maglev trains should be much more efficient for mass intra-continent transit and some form of air travel for the really big distances.

No, Transporters are too complex and dangerous for every day use. I don't think they would be so widespread, even in the 24th century.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Both DS9 and VOY had Earth-based episodes that featured tunnel entrances around San Francisco with "Trans Francisco" transit system signs.

So, transporter stations built conveniently underground so as not to disturb the historical cityscape.

I think they were more likely underground tram stations that didn't disturb the historical cityscape.


It probably had routes that ran across the Golden Gate Bridge.
http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/_...s/0/02/Trans-Francisco_Logo,_Non_sequitur.jpg

 

[Timo]

(remember, Sisko used nearly all his month's credits in one week, and as a SF Cadett, he might also have more than a typical civilian).

He wasn't a civilian at all, he was a soldier in training. Which might mean that his "credits" had nothing to do with transporting, and everything to do with his military training, an important part of which would be to wean him from his family. Quite possibly a civilian would have unlimited access to a transporter.

..since the transporter uses a large amount of power...

Why do people think this? In the 24th century, people quite literally cook their coffee with a transporter! They use it for entertainment, too, as holodeck technology is apparently based on it just like replicator technology is. Transporter is the primary way of doing just about anything in that century. It can't be very power-hungry, then - certainly not prohibitively power-hungry. After all, it has beaten the conventional toaster in the art of making warm sandwiches.

The transporter may require some power to run. But so does an elevator, and people use those every day.

I would also like to point out that a transporter beam would have to be bounced-off a satellite to send anything more than a few hundred miles, similar to today's broadcast communications.

So the obvious solution would be to go cable.

It does seem that (Starfleet) transporter beams are line-of-sight only, with a limitation of penetrating at most two kilometers of ordinary rock. Yet at the same time, transporter beams somehow manage to get out of the transporter room and through the heavily shielded hull of a starship or a space station. Backstage techspeak describes dedicated emitters on the outer surface of the hull, meaning that the transporter signal travels along a cable of some sort from the transporter pad to that emitter. Earth could simply have (carefully isolated and protected) cables that span continents.

A relay satellite system might tie the Moon and Earth to a joint transporter network, though. At least we know from "First Duty" that transporters on Mimas can grab a pilot from the Titan flight range and whisk him to safety; the distance between those two Saturnian moons is greater than that between Earth and Luna at all times.

No, Transporters are too complex and dangerous for every day use. I don't think they would be so widespread, even in the 24th century.

Yet LaForge in "Realm of Fear" insists that they are the very safest way to travel. And this from a guy who indeed steps into a transporter basically every day.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Aaron McGuire]

..since the transporter uses a large amount of power...

Why do people think this? In the 24th century, people quite literally cook their coffee with a transporter! They use it for entertainment, too, as holodeck technology is apparently based on it just like replicator technology is. Transporter is the primary way of doing just about anything in that century. It can't be very power-hungry, then - certainly not prohibitively power-hungry. After all, it has beaten the conventional toaster in the art of making warm sandwiches.

The transporter may require some power to run. But so does an elevator, and people use those every day.

Holodecks and replicators (and cargo transporters) do not work at the quantum resolution levels that personnel transporters do. None of the other devices would require the power levels that high-res transporting would.

Aaron McGuire

 

[Smellincoffee]

I would imagine transporter use varies with the culture and region: population distribution is the most important factor to consider. Current mass transportation system like rail lines and airport terminals are dealing with hundreds of people at any given time, so that's another element to factor in.

Isaac Asimov once wrote an interesting story about transporters, which he called "Doors" but which I'll prefer to as portals to avoid confusion. The portals were energy fields the size and shape of doors, and they were controlled by computers -- programmed with the coordinates of other portals. When a child needed to get to school, he used the computer to tell the portal to access his classroom's portal, and when the field activated he could step in and voila! He's in his classroom. At the end of the afternoon, the classroom portal cycled through the kids' portal addresses and they stepped through one at a time. The child's parents also used their home portal to get to their places of work and business.

Maybe that's how it could work, and the larger transporters we see onscreen are used for multiple individuals at a time and cargo to locations that aren't (and possibly can't be) preset.

 

[Timo]

Holodecks and replicators (and cargo transporters) do not work at the quantum resolution levels that personnel transporters do. None of the other devices would require the power levels that high-res transporting would.

Why should resolution have anything to do with power?

Besides, a replicator needs to have very high resolution indeed in order to create foodstuffs that not only are non-poisonous but also taste good. It's highly unlikely that this resolution could be one iota lower than the one used for moving live humans around; the chemistry of nutrition is that complex.

Note that our heroes or villains have never shied away from transporting due to power concerns. Indeed, on spacecraft with failing power, the transporter is considered a valid (and again the primary!) evacuation system, as seen in e.g. "Day of Honor" or "Penumbra". And let's not forget how the Klingon BoP in ST4:TVH managed to stay cloaked and run her transporters when in dire power problems - proving once and for all that neither of those systems requires massive amounts of power, not in comparison with what is routinely available in the 23rd and 24th centuries.

Really, the whole idea that our Trek heroes would feel the need to conserve power is absurd on the face of the basic concept of the show - that man has learned to travel between stars, to redo planets and even stars to his liking, to transcend the limitations of his physical body. Power in Trek is abundant and free of cost (or ecological consequence), and won't stop people from commuting by using the most convenient technology available. It might well be the transporter.

It might of course be something else altogether, too. The basic issue remains that we haven't seen enough of civilian life to tell. All we know is that people in the 24th century walk a lot, and use the transporter a lot, and that vehicular travel is seldom if ever discussed unless the destination lies across an interplanetary or interstellar gulf.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[T'Girl]

Transporters use an awuful lot of energy for one person Transporters use an awuful lot of energy for one person

And let's not forget how the Klingon BoP in ST4:TVH managed to stay cloaked and run her transporters when in dire power problems - proving once and for all that neither of those systems requires massive amounts of power, not in comparison with what is routinely available in the 23rd and 24th centuries.

SCOTT: "My transporter power's down to minimal. I've got to bring you in one at a time." ... that's from TVH.

During that movie the transporter is used for a few short range beamings. Scotty beams four people away from (and presumable to) a hospital in the San Francisco mission district, a distance of about four miles. And Scotty also beams Chekov and Uhura on to a aircraft carrier at Alameda NAS, distance about sixteen miles. The Klingon transporter uses so much of the available power that Scotty is ultimately unable to beam both Uhura and Chekov away from the carrier, even at that comparatively short distance.

 

[Pauln6]

Personnel transporters have to reconstitute a living being, with bio-electricity still functioning, so that's why they are more complex and take more energy, I think.

The shows are very fuzzy on transporter use but in the 23rd century they clearly were not used willy nilly so I think power consumption must be a real concern. The existence of transporter credits in Sisko's youth also suggests either that transporter equipment is not kept in people's homes but in transporter stations and that they are popular enough that they need to be rationed. Again, this suggests that energy consumption is a concern.

In TMP we see lots of work bees and crew in the cargo bay moving cargo containers around. Now, one could argue that the only reason they were doing that was because transporters were not working properly but the ship specs show that it has numerous work bees for removing emptying cargo pods. If transporters could be used for everything they could just beam the cargo from its pod to the cargo transporter and vice versa. I don't think that doing so is standard practice.

In 24th century, they can replenish their dilithium crystals and they seem to have free use of replicators (in my view credits make more sense) so energy consumption seems less of a concern. This reflects the conscious decision to make 24th century beyond the scrabble for scarce resources and therefore in theory transporters could be used for popping to the corner shop.

Personally I always felt that removing the need to strive for resources stripped out the most obvious reason for conflict and gives no encouragement to the modern audience to preserve resources so I prefer 23rd century economics.

 

[JarodRussell]

Holodecks and replicators (and cargo transporters) do not work at the quantum resolution levels that personnel transporters do. None of the other devices would require the power levels that high-res transporting would.

Why should resolution have anything to do with power?

Because it has everything to do with it, I guess.



But then again, you can't lower the resolution of a transporter or a replicator, what the hell should that mean? That only every second atom gets scanned and the rest interpolated? Now that would be highly unpleasant, I guess. Okay, for replicators, that might even work.

 

[Sector 7]

I'd say that only beaming between two transporter platforms is allowed.

Not sure about that. Im pretty sure Sisko said he used to appear in the dining room each night, and that place certainly didnt seem to have a transporter. Surely the guy doing the transport would just make sure it was in a place that was free of other objects, just like when they beam down to planets.

I have appeared at restaurants and functions for decades without using a transporter. More likely, Sisko transported to a nearby transporter station then walked to his dad's restaurant, where he made his nightly appearance.

Earthside, transporters would probably use a receiving pad. This would be for safety and accuracy, as well as security. I do not believe every home has a transporter pad, nor that people beam into their living room without a receiving pad. For military use, yes, a receiving pad is not necessary. "Risk is our business" is the Redshirt Motto.

 

[T'Girl]

I have appeared at restaurants and functions for decades without using a transporter. More likely, Sisko transported to a nearby transporter station then walked to his dad's restaurant, where he made his nightly appearance.

SISKO:
I remember, Jake, I wasn't much older than you when I left for San Francisco to go to Starfleet Academy.

For the first few days, I was so homesick that I'd go back to my house in New Orleans every night for dinner.

I'd materialize in my living room at six thirty every night and take my seat at the table

just like I had come down the stairs.

 

[EmperorTiberius]

Holodecks and replicators (and cargo transporters) do not work at the quantum resolution levels that personnel transporters do. None of the other devices would require the power levels that high-res transporting would.

Why should resolution have anything to do with power?

Besides, a replicator needs to have very high resolution indeed in order to create foodstuffs that not only are non-poisonous but also taste good. It's highly unlikely that this resolution could be one iota lower than the one used for moving live humans around; the chemistry of nutrition is that complex.

Note that our heroes or villains have never shied away from transporting due to power concerns. Indeed, on spacecraft with failing power, the transporter is considered a valid (and again the primary!) evacuation system, as seen in e.g. "Day of Honor" or "Penumbra". And let's not forget how the Klingon BoP in ST4:TVH managed to stay cloaked and run her transporters when in dire power problems - proving once and for all that neither of those systems requires massive amounts of power, not in comparison with what is routinely available in the 23rd and 24th centuries.

Really, the whole idea that our Trek heroes would feel the need to conserve power is absurd on the face of the basic concept of the show - that man has learned to travel between stars, to redo planets and even stars to his liking, to transcend the limitations of his physical body. Power in Trek is abundant and free of cost (or ecological consequence), and won't stop people from commuting by using the most convenient technology available. It might well be the transporter.

It might of course be something else altogether, too. The basic issue remains that we haven't seen enough of civilian life to tell. All we know is that people in the 24th century walk a lot, and use the transporter a lot, and that vehicular travel is seldom if ever discussed unless the destination lies across an interplanetary or interstellar gulf.

Timo Saloniemi

In one episode, Geordi replicates 500 rubik's cubes, and it takes him several hours and the ship had to drop out of freakin' warp! It gives you a good idea about the amount of energy needed to transport humans. Somehow, I don't see 9 billion humans using transporters as an everyday convenience.

Personnel transporters have to reconstitute a living being, with bio-electricity still functioning, so that's why they are more complex and take more energy, I think.

The shows are very fuzzy on transporter use but in the 23rd century they clearly were not used willy nilly so I think power consumption must be a real concern. The existence of transporter credits in Sisko's youth also suggests either that transporter equipment is not kept in people's homes but in transporter stations and that they are popular enough that they need to be rationed. Again, this suggests that energy consumption is a concern.

In TMP we see lots of work bees and crew in the cargo bay moving cargo containers around. Now, one could argue that the only reason they were doing that was because transporters were not working properly but the ship specs show that it has numerous work bees for removing emptying cargo pods. If transporters could be used for everything they could just beam the cargo from its pod to the cargo transporter and vice versa. I don't think that doing so is standard practice.

In 24th century, they can replenish their dilithium crystals and they seem to have free use of replicators (in my view credits make more sense) so energy consumption seems less of a concern. This reflects the conscious decision to make 24th century beyond the scrabble for scarce resources and therefore in theory transporters could be used for popping to the corner shop.

Personally I always felt that removing the need to strive for resources stripped out the most obvious reason for conflict and gives no encouragement to the modern audience to preserve resources so I prefer 23rd century economics.

I agree that the rationing shows limited availability. Perhaps there is a station in every city, but only Starfleet starship officers can use them with impunity.

Someone mentioned security, and I agree that personal transporters, even if they were affordable, would be prohibited. I can also envision transporter inhibitors everywhere if that happened

Remember the episode family where Picard walks to his brother's house. Ferengi don't seem to beam around either, they walk in the rain. So do the Romulans and Klingons perhaps?

 

[T'Girl]

Someone mentioned security, and I agree that personal transporters, even if they were affordable, would be prohibited. I can also envision transporter inhibitors everywhere if that happened

Your personal transporter, whether in your home or business, would be tied in to a system. You could only transport to locations that you would be permitted in to, it would not be like the console on the Enterprise where the target destination possibilities would be unlimited.

I could simply beam into my parents home, but you could not. You would have to obtain permission first (a phone call is always nice). If you don't have entry rights the transporter system likely would not even dematerialize you. It would make no difference if you coming from a personal or a public pad. The transporter inhibitors would be built into the system, plus there would be transporter inhibitors that are devices that sits in your house or business generating a field of some kind.

In instances of weapons and explosives, the sensors would pick up the explosives either prior to dematerialized or while you're in the matter stream, you would be re-routed into a room with a locked door and your explosives routed into a different chamber with unusually thick walls. Weapons on the other hand would depend on the type and where you're going, all kinds of weapons, lasers, phasers, so forth, seem to be generally available to civilians in the series, it almost unusual for people NOT to have them. If you want to go somewhere like the court house, again no dematerialization.

 

[Timo]

In one episode, Geordi replicates 500 rubik's cubes, and it takes him several hours and the ship had to drop out of freakin' warp!

Since this never happened, it's equally good proof that transporting actually generates energy, plus free mint chokolates for every transportee.

Because it has everything to do with it, I guess.

Bad guess. Computing power might be affected by resolution, but there's no inherent reason why transporting a kilogram of stuff would be more power-expensive in terms of raw watts when done "accurately" than when done "coarsely".

Personnel transporters have to reconstitute a living being, with bio-electricity still functioning, so that's why they are more complex and take more energy, I think.

That a living creature would be the pinnacle of complexity is probably a false assumption. And in any case, living creatures, while complex, are also relatively robust; a complex microelectronics circuit today would have to be duplicated more carefully than a corresponding rodent brain or whatnot in order to remain functional.

Getting foodstuffs right is a highly complex task where there is little room for error, because anything may become deadly poison if a few atoms are misplaced. Replicators might "cheat" on the issue by providing great numbers of identical, certified-good molecules instead of the complex mixture found in "real" food - but they would still have to get those molecules right down to the minutest detail to prevent the crew from dying of food poisoning or worse.

"Lowering of resolution" would probably mean averaging, which works fine if you know what you are averaging. If you happen to average your steak so that the carcinogens get over-represented, you're in trouble just as much as if you averaged over a human brain and got an undifferentiated mass of poorly connected nerve cells - you've failed in your replication task. But if you know how to average "right", you can probably replicate or transport a hammer or a cucumber just fine at "low resolution".

Your personal transporter, whether in your home or business, would be tied in to a system. You could only transport to locations that you would be permitted in to, it would not be like the console on the Enterprise where the target destination possibilities would be unlimited.

Sounds probable. Although of course one could override safeties and otherwise pervert the hardware if one really put one's mind into it; remember the Klingons in "Visionary" turning a food replicator into an offensive transporter (and also conveniently canonically establishing that replicators and transporters are related tech, at long-awaited last).

Earth would probably be teeming with transporters that are theoretically capable of privacy violation or mass destruction. That they aren't used for such purposes probably speaks more about the general nature of Earth's population and its attitudes towards common well-being and the law than it does about anti-crime measures and law enforcement.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[JarodRussell]

Because it has everything to do with it, I guess.

Bad guess. Computing power might be affected by resolution, but there's no inherent reason why transporting a kilogram of stuff would be more power-expensive in terms of raw watts when done "accurately" than when done "coarsely".

Computing power is not energy?

And since we still haven't agree on what "lower resolution" means, that's pointless.

Denny Crane

 

[Timo]

Computing power is not energy?

Why would it be?

Real life already proves that idea meaningless. To compute, say, a thousand multiplications, you may spend a few calories and a bit of pencil graphite; or you may spend a thousand watts on an ENIAC; or you may spend a picowatt on a modern IC processor. Or, if you choose, you may spend ten thousand times the entire energy content of the universe, by performing the multiplications by using universes as pearls in an abacus. There is no connection whatsoever between the number of computations done and the power expended, and no "minimum energy" required for making one computation.

In short, computing power is utterly and fundamentally unrelated to power, except in the ill-formulated English language where the two concepts happen to share five letters.

And since we still haven't agree on what "lower resolution" means, that's pointless.

All of this is pointless because transporters don't exist. But regardless of the definition of "lower resolution", the computational task of tracking the particles to be transported or replicated is not a linear or even monotonic function of the power used, and probably no function of it at all. After all, computing is not a task related to the use of power.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[JarodRussell]

There is no connection whatsoever between the number of computations done and the power expended

In short, computing power is utterly and fundamentally unrelated to power

After all, computing is not a task related to the use of power.

I suggest you look that up again.