A perfect example of conventional game play in our subforum.
The OP implies that more advanced = smaller. Tribble puncher attempts to appeal to the reality criterion in making reference to computer that we have today and (implicitly) the trends we have seen in computing for decades.
It is a bit unlikely that the Trek 24th century computers have anything to do with today's computer technology
Timo's opening move is a claim of disanalogy. If future computers won't have
"anything" to do with today's computers, then we cannot reasonably guess that computers will continue to get smaller and smaller.
Timo argues that there is too much uncertainty about the future to positively invoke this criterion. He follows with examples of major shifts in past technologies. Basically he is arguing -
there have been big changes in the past, so it is likely that there will be big changes in the future.
Big changes are unpredictable changes, paradigm shifts, game changers. What this implies is that we must accept that we are in a state of ignorance about future technologies. The upshot, however, is that this severely constricts discussion using the reality criterion. If Timo is right, we can't really interrogate Star Treknology in terms of what we know about the world (because the future might always be surprisingly different).
NOTE: Timo is also working under the reality criterion here. He makes reference to real historical examples to make the prediction that we will most likely NOT be able to predict the future.
- the underlying principles of both computing and the physical phenomena enabling that computing could be just as different as, say, a computer of today is from an abacus. We don't have any particular reason to think that Trek computers would be using the currently fundamental binary expression of data, for example.
The discontinuity between the abacus and the modern computer (reference to reality as proof discontinuity) problematizes even the assumption that future computers will be binary systems.
What comes next is the inevitable weak plausibility argument. It is weak (not pejoratively!), in part, because it is wholly negative in nature.
By Timo's own reasoning he cannot reasonably project future technologies either. What he can do, however, is spin a few "just so" stories to establish the plausibility paradigm shifting technological changes.
Also, distributed computing may have fallen in disfavor with the introduction of those fancy subspace fields that allow the computing to happen faster-than-light (TNG Tech Manual p.49). There simply wouldn't be any point in pursuing the currently fashionable ideas of parallel processing when you get so much more power from centralizing everything and then encasing it in this magic field.
Here we get a reference to an off-screen source (a tech manual produced for fans) and speculations about subspace computing. That is, it
could make sense to have a big mainframe in this situation.
That Tribble cannot appeal to the reality criterion to project future trends in miniaturization (e.g., no access to Moore's Law) and that, according to one speculative argument the show's arrangement could be plausible, Star Trek is (again) vindicated.
Timo closes with another historical example which shows the discontinuities between leap in technologies.
One might as well ask why the masts of modern warships are such puny things - shouldn't they be huge, to support all the necessary sails?
Timo Saloniemi
In essence, Timo turns the reality criterion on its head. He uses it to argue that you cannot use it to make reasonable guesses about the future.
If he is right, however, if we should be respectfully silent about the mysteries of the future, then we cannot adjudicate the plausibility of Star Treknology either way.
This results in a significant asymmetry in Treknology discussions. That is, there is nothing, under the reality criterion (as it is argued by Timo) that would count as a falsification or disconfirmation of Star Treknology. The future is, after all, terribly mysterious. And this is a conversation killer. No matter what objection is raised, one can always appeal to divine mystery (i.e., the future).
On the other hand, if we do allow that we can make reasonable projections under the reality criterion, then it is painfully obvious that some Star Treknologies are already out of date. As Star Trek ages, this will only get worse. Our conversations can only end in this scenario, with a shrug, and the admonition that it's only a show.
No one seriously argues on behalf of the technology of Buck Rogers serials, but Trekkies still rail against the passage of time. The rear guard action is to turn reality criterion against itself on the grounds that the future is truly unknowable (So anything goes!).
Between the Scylla of aging Treknology and the Charybdis of divine future mysteries, both of which are conversation killers because they either set the bar too high or too low (respectively), there are alternative criteria we might explore.
