The Measure of a Man is the best TNG episode, but there is a glaring flaw in it

I hate to make a thread like this. The Measure of a Man is the single greatest TNG episode in history. I absolutely love everything about it. In fact, it is the only TNG episode that has made my eyes water. It's that damn good.

However, there does exist a glaring flaw in the episode, as it pertains to poker. Data claimed that he had taken the time to absorb and familiarize himself with every poker book available in the ship's database.

It is completely inexplicable why the computer would not reveal to Data the concept of a bluff. Ok, I understand that computers aren't capable of bluffing. Even today we don't have the technology to make a computer that can bluff. But that being said, the bluff is an extremely basic and fundamental element of the game of poker. Surely if Data had absorbed all relevant knowledge about the game that it would have been revealed to him that poker is a game that involves the concept of lies and deception. And if Data did in fact read every book about poker, then obviously he should have learned the science behind bluffing.

I understand that the episode is meant to show the distinction between artificial intelligence and actual intelligence, but the point I am making is that a bluff is actually a very simple and basic concept in the game of poker, one that would have been well documented by the computers on the ship.

I only point this out as something of interest, not to start an argument. I feel bad making this post. But I had to.

 

How could you?! Either the computer failed to provide enough information on bluffs or Data failed to properly research the information provided.

In "Peak Performance" Data researched the game of Stratigema but he still lost the first game to the Zakdorian strategist.

 

Even if Data knows what a bluff is, it doesn't mean he can DO it.

 

Actually, we do have computers that can beat the best Poker players now.

It depends whether Data only looked at books on poker rules or books on poker strategy. While it makes sense that Data may have absorbed all the rules of Poker and then not understand the bluffing aspect of the game, I agree it seems odd that he could have read a wealth of information on poker strategy and then been surprised when Riker bluffed.

 

Computers have mastered "the bluff" techniques even now, let alone in the 24th century. That's one of the fundamental flaws of StarTrek is that A.I. is shown to be highly primitive and in some ways we've already surpassed it today, which doesn't make any sense since TNG takes place three centuries into the future.

 

Also Star Trek's padds seem less high tech than our smartphones. It's amazing just how far off shows about future technology can be.

Data can do a lot of things modern computers can't do, and can't do a lot of things modern computers can do. Like, a modern computer can beat a good player in poker, but Data can approach a game he's never seen before and figure out the winning strategy (Without a human feeding in the point value of each state).

A computer can think about something really well but can't decide on its own how to think about it.

 

It's possible he knew about bluffing, but hadn't sufficiently counted on how impactful its significance would be on playing the game. Face it, people deceive in different ways. I've always found it interesting just how well Data did at fleecing Frederick LaRouque & Joe Falling Hawk, in Time's Arrow. Clearly, the 24th century poker players that Data plays with are no chumps if card sharks from the Old West are easy marks for him

Besides, that's really not the glaring flaw in The Measure of a Man. The real flaw is that Data could've spent 2 decades in Starfleet, served in several posts, risen to the rank of Lt. Cmdr, been awarded some of the highest citations in Starfleet, been posted as 2nd officer of the Federation flagship, & STILL have some ambiguity regarding his legal status as an individual.

I mean hell... Maddox doesn't even look 40. How could he have been the sole voice of opposition to Data's enrollment in the academy a couple dozen years earlier? He'd have to have been barely a teenager, but I think those dates all fell into place more so after this episode, which is some really wonderful drama otherwise, even if the premise flies in the face of the reality of the being the episode is about and his current station in life. You let a little slide, so a good episode can get made

 

I think there's just a fundamental problem with AI personified in human form. That being our "mental cadence" as humans is far, far slower than AI. Data could card count easily and with all the knowledge gleaned from everything written about poker, he'd always fold when he realized his odds were very low, and always win when odds were strong in his favor. But what kind of bothers me is realizing that when an android like Data is talking to you, his mind is essentially thinking and considering many other things aside from the conversation. His vocal enunciation is purposefully slowed to match human cadence. So the communication you experience with Data is an illusion. You don't necessarily have his undivided attention. Unless Data puts himself into "human conversation" mode, whereby his processor is slowed down to match the thought process speed of a human being.

 

Nope, I gather from his exchange with Jenna in "In Theory" that he is never just having a conversation with you. It's always just a portion of computational tasks, but who's to say that it's any less valid in his case? If he can listen to & deconstruct numerous pieces of advanced musical composition, & still find a way to benefit from artistic expression, as we know he does, then how is that different from being able to converse while multitasking & still be able to benefit from the value of conversing?

As for his speech patterns & cadence etc... I'd say that given the difficulty he has with contractions, those aspects might be more autonomic than active tasks

 

Yes, in actuality, it doesn't necessarily mean he'd be giving you any less processing power than required, but it's the intention... what we're used to as human beings. Nobody likes having a conversation with someone who freely admits that the conversation is only a portion of what's on their mind, that they're thinking of other things in parallel.
The contraction thing is just a plot device, a stupid one IMHO. I mean, c'mon... the sophistication of a contraction is child's play compared to other language constructs. I don't see any sensible reason why Data could not use contractions. Makes no sense, really. The only thing I could see is if there was a programming constraint, something core to his linguistic programming where it was simply a rule in the firmware that he couldn't override. A Dr. Noonian Soong programming choice, for some personal reason.

 

Maybe Data is more human than we give him credit for. Maybe, like other humans, he absorbed the information but when it came time to use it he overlooked it

 

Ah yes, but it's Star Trek, & Data isn't Human. No one would ordinarily be comfortable having a conversation with someone who could read minds like a Betazoid either, but these people find a way to be ok with that, & I can imagine they'd find a way to be ok with Data's special nature when it comes to this aspect too. They are after all, in the business of seeking out & learning to relate to other lifeforms with other ways of existence

That's exactly how I see it. Soong didn't want him to have dreams right away, or feel emotions right away, or speak perfectly right away. We can actually retcon all those times we've caught Data using them, as if they are part of him shedding the constraint, like he eventually does with dreaming. Soong puts up some blocks for these things, and Data, over time, finds himself able to overcome them, as artificially implanted growth challenges

 

^ Yeah, I can see your point. Soong set up a growth path for him, realizing it's better for him to evolve rather than trying to endow Data with everything up front. Also, with human conversation, someone not fully engaged usually shows it. Data would have the processing power to make it appear he's fully engaged. Just don't ask him what else he's thinking about.

 

Yeah... that cost him a girlfriend lol

It was his attempt to correct the developmental problems he'd had with Lore maybe

 

Or notice if he's been bluffed.
The information about bluffing can tell you what it is, but can it tell you how to notice a bluff?

 

Exactly. Data being surprised he got bluffed should not be a surprise to us. It's just his clunker of a line immediately afterwards that makes this a problem:

That's a false statement in terms of what those books would have told Data, had he actually comprehended what he read.

As for the contractions thing, that never was a thing. There isn't a line in Star Trek saying Data doesn't, sorry, does not do contractions, much less a line saying he can't, sorry, cannot do them. He just talks formally when being himself (although he can imitate others and their language idiosyncracies at will), supposedly because that's how he was brought up (no matter whether "conventionally" or by Soong's clever programming tricks).

Timo Saloniemi

 

Well, I don't intent to run down the path of another lengthy debate, but it's worthwhile to point out these quotes from Data and Lore:

LORE: "Haven't you noticed how easily I handle human speech? I use their contractions. For example, I say "can't" or "isn't". You say "cannot" and "is not"."
Lore implies that he's more skilled than Data at human speech. And this dovetails with the point below.

Data speaking to Lal
DATA: You used a verbal contraction. You said "I've", not "I have". A skill my program has never mastered.
LAL: Then I will desist.
DATA: No. You have exceeded my abilities.

"You have exceeded my abilities." So clearly, he is announcing some kind of deficiency in his linguistic abilities that makes it difficult for him to master contractions -- and hence, does not use them.

This is a contradiction, because Data is capable of adjusting his own programming (he learns). And contractions aren't difficult to master. It's simply a matter of capturing the context for usage. And you experiment. Data has said some things that were odd in the past, he was corrected, and he learned from them. Obviously the show's producers weren't perfect and some contractions slipped into the mix across the seasons.
On a "subconscious level", it could very well be that Data chooses not to use them because he doesn't want to appear "more human" than he feels he truly is. That's my own rationale. Because his processing power handles things far more complicated than keeping track of when its best to use contractions.

 

All that can be handwaved away by examining Data's definition of "mastering".

Timo Saloniemi

 

Doesn't exactly mean that he can't do either!

 

In Time's Arrow he probably stacked the deck.