Biggest 'Why don't they...' in Trek

[Arpy]

^ to name but a few.

Re phasers/torpedoes: don't be such apologists. They often SHOULD have used higher settings or even wide beam stun settings...hell TOS Enteprise fired stun phaser from orbit. And when you're attacking an enemy ship about to destroy you, yeah, you go for the full uber-nuke setting. Not talking targeted attacks on weaker ships here. And I doubt the Klingons or Jem-Hadar would be as hesitant to use them.

No there are lots of places Trek has gone the Flash Gordon pew pew weapons way.

 

[Finn]

The spores in TOS "This Side of Paradise" fix all medical problems. Sure, they are a bit of a mind control, but we know how to stop the mind control now. So we could “infect” injured people with the spores in a controlled environment, let the spores heal their body, then cure them of the spores.

The water on Scalos in TOS “Wink of an Eye” could speed up regular people to super-human speeds. And there was a ready antidote. So, why not have some Scalosian water (and antidote) around for emergencies when you need to move quickly?

Probably has serious side effects.

The food on the planet in TOS "Plato's Stepchildren" was able to give normal humans instant telekinetics. Why didn’t they develop that more?

They weren't Humans
.

Drug-based Fountain of Youth in TNG "Too Short
a Season"

Why would they? It killed Jameson.

Fountain of Youth by transporter (ie ability to “de-age” anyone just based on their transporter trace/DNA scan) in TNG "Unnatural Selection"

It would be pushing it, but it may have to do with the illness Pulaski had. It might not work on someone who's already old. I'm guessing a Doctor with a medical tricorder would be able to tell that Pulaski isn't as old as she looks.

Ability to transfer consciousness into a machine in TOS “What Are Little Girls Made Of?”, TOS “I, Mudd”, TOS “Return to Tomorrow”, TNG "The Schizoid Man", TNG “Brothers”, and sortof VGR “The Thaw”

You cited several episodes here. No reason for them to use that plot more...

Dimensional shifting transporter in TNG “The High Ground”. Sure, it killed people, but it could still be used to send supplies/bombs without problem

Why was it dangerous to people? It may have an effect on inanimate objects as well...

Metaphasic shielding in TNG "Suspicions" and TNG "Descent, Part II"

How do you know it wasn't used again...? They don't have to say "metaphasic" every time they use it.

Phasing cloak in TNG "Pegasus"

It's Illegal...

Trilithium star bombs in ST:Generations and DS9 "By Inferno's Light"

Why would they?

Computer ports in people's heads in DS9 "A Simple Investigation" and DS9 "Honor Among Thieves"

Why would they??

 

[Mojochi]

Why do they need to run warp engines constantly to travel? In Space, momentum is such that a burst of the engines to attain their desired speed should propel them indefinitely, or until gravitational forces from passing stellar objects effects their speed, at which time they can compensate

The Enterprise should be more like a sailing vessel than a locomotion one, as I see it

 

[MacLeod]

^With regards to Warp Drive, without they would still be bound by the laws of physics in that nothing can go faster than the speed of light.

As for the Warp Core itself, no doubt as well as providing power to the warp drive it also provides power to the rest of the ship.

 

[Deimos Anomaly]

The warp core needs to constantly maintain the warp bubble I think.

Warp FTL travel is non newtonian... based on our understanding of the concept, I think the drive needs to continually maintain compressed spacetime (or an uphill of warped space) behind the ship and rarefied spacetime (a downhill of warped space) ahead of it.

Or something like that...

 

[loki41872]

The Borg never seemed to be the least bit concerned about Starfleet personnel beaming onto their ships at will with weapons.

Why didn't they just beam a photon torpedo into the center of every Borg Cube they encountered, and call it a day?

Also, we've seen what happens when there's a Warp Core breech. When the Borg attacked Earth (both times) nobody EVER thought to sacrifice one starship by rigging the warp core to blow, setting a collision course, and beaming off the crew?

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Why didn't they just beam a photon torpedo into the center of every Borg Cube they encountered, and call it a day?

The Borg can repair damage like that.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

Why didn't they just beam a photon torpedo into the center of every Borg Cube they encountered, and call it a day?

The Borg can repair damage like that.

The one time in VOY they did do that, the Borg vessel was smaller than Voyager, so they were completely destroyed.

 

[scotpens]

The food on the planet in TOS "Plato's Stepchildren" was able to give normal humans instant telekinetics. Why didn’t they develop that more?

They weren't Humans

I suggest you re-watch the episode.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ Maybe the substance from Plato's Stepchildren is toxic if taken in quantities that are too large. The people on the planet adapted to it, but Kirk and company could not. I'd buy that explanation.

Or, it could be for the same reason Alexander refused to take it: They don't want to become like the Platonians. Having power like that is inherently corrupting. If it went into wide use, there'd be a lot more people acting like the Platonians, and no one wants that.

Why didn't they just beam a photon torpedo into the center of every Borg Cube they encountered, and call it a day?

The Borg can repair damage like that.

The one time in VOY they did do that, the Borg vessel was smaller than Voyager, so they were completely destroyed.

In Q Who, the Borg cube was shown to repair damage very quickly.

 

[Finn]

The food on the planet in TOS "Plato's Stepchildren" was able to give normal humans instant telekinetics. Why didn’t they develop that more?

They weren't Humans

I suggest you re-watch the episode.

I was talking about the food. Kirk and Spock didn't do it by simply eating the food.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

^ Maybe the substance from Plato's Stepchildren is toxic if taken in quantities that are too large. The people on the planet adapted to it, but Kirk and company could not. I'd buy that explanation.

Or, it could be for the same reason Alexander refused to take it: They don't want to become like the Platonians. Having power like that is inherently corrupting. If it went into wide use, there'd be a lot more people acting like the Platonians, and no one wants that.

The Borg can repair damage like that.

The one time in VOY they did do that, the Borg vessel was smaller than Voyager, so they were completely destroyed.

In Q Who, the Borg cube was shown to repair damage very quickly.

In Q Who, that cube was MUCH bigger than the Enterprise D.

The episode where VOY beamed over a torpedo onto the small Borg scout vessel.

The said scout vessel was smaller than Voyager.

They were destroyed in 1 shot.

I think the main info you should take away from this is if you don't kill everything on a borg ship in 1 shot, they'll regenerate.

 

[T'Girl]

double post.

 

[T'Girl]

^ Maybe the substance from Plato's Stepchildren is toxic if taken in quantities that are too large. The people on the planet adapted to it, but Kirk and company could not. I'd buy that explanation.

Also the psychokinetic powers provided by the food might only work on (or around) the planet Platonius. Like Flint's immortality, move away from a certain planet, and the "gift" disappears.

 

[datalogan]

The water on Scalos in TOS “Wink of an Eye” could speed up regular people to super-human speeds. And there was a ready antidote. So, why not have some Scalosian water (and antidote) around for emergencies when you need to move quickly?

Probably has serious side effects.

The food on the planet in TOS "Plato's Stepchildren" was able to give normal humans instant telekinetics. Why didn’t they develop that more?

Dimensional shifting transporter in TNG “The High Ground”. Sure, it killed people, but it could still be used to send supplies/bombs without problem

Trilithium star bombs in ST:Generations and DS9 "By Inferno's Light"

Subspace weapons

Thaloron weapons

The fact that these things may/do have serious side effects would probably be reason enough to not use them during normal times. But what about serious emergencies / war? Situations where the only other probably outcome is your death anyway. I’d probably be willing to use some questionable methods in a terrible, one-sided war like the Dominion War.

Drug-based Fountain of Youth in TNG "Too Short a Season"

Why would they? It killed Jameson.

Jameson overdosed. Seems like it could have worked if he hadn’t taken both his supply AND his wife’s all at once. I figure somebody interested in de-aging would follow up on that. Still, it was difficult for Jameson to get ahold of, so probably not very easy to make/get. Which is a good enough reason to not see it again/much.

 

[datalogan]

A lot of these things weren’t done on the show just because the writers never thought about them.

Many were not done because the writers just wanted to get back to the status quo of the show and forget about the incredible thing that they accidentally revealed that our heroes could do in one episode that then made all future episodes much more difficult to write. [Transwarp long-distance beaming in 2009 Star Trek movie.]

And some of these were probably purposely not done by our heroes in episodes because they were suppose to represent a better version of humanity.

I’d probably be willing to use some questionable methods in a terrible, one-sided war like the Dominion War.

Maybe, but would our heroes (other than Sisko)?

 

[Arpy]

^ Right, because for the writers it isn't about continuity as much as concept. "What if" these characters had to face such and such a dilemma this week? Next week they're facing another dilemma and forget it that the problem discovered last week could be the solution used this week...we've moved on to another planet...science doesn't work here...it's the hajubaju particles in the lower troposphere negating the basic arithmetic of the situation.

 

[scotpens]

They weren't Humans

I suggest you re-watch the episode.

I was talking about the food. Kirk and Spock didn't do it by simply eating the food.

Well, yes, that's correct. McCoy injected Kirk and Spock with high doses of kironide, the substance in the Platonian food that produced psychokinetic powers. (Never mind how McCoy was able to synthesize large amounts of the stuff on such short notice.) But kironide and its effects were never seen or mentioned again.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I'm going with the explanation that long-term use of kironide is out of the question simply because nobody wants to become like the Platonians. Having that power is inherently corrupting. Nobody deserves that or should have access to it. So it is intentionally ignored. Kironide has no medical value that we can see - it doesn't heal wounds or cure disease (indeed, Parmen was going to die from a simple infection).

 

[datalogan]

I've never held to the belief that power inherently corrupts.