General Trek Questions and Observations
- Thread starter The Old Mixer
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O'Brien throws his shoulder out kayaking at least once. I seem to remember a young woman in TNG sickbay with a swimming injury, although not sure if that was a real pool or holodeck.
I think a swimming injury could occur in either place. Maybe you couldn't drown in a holodeck, because the computer would detect that your life was in danger and just vanish the water. But just a strain type injury could happen.
Was her hair wet? That would suggest a real pool, since holographic water would cease to exist outside the holodeck.
Was her hair wet? That would suggest a real pool, since holographic water would cease to exist outside the holodeck.
Yup, the very first appearance of the holodeck shows that people who get wet inside it are still wet when they walk out the door.
I mean the pilot episode had Wesley mention that the ship had a pool.
But I just looked it up on memory alpha, the injured woman in TNG (Kristin, apparently) was apparently swimming and cliff diving in the holodeck.
How on earth cliff diving should be possible in the rather smallish holodeck we see is anybody's guess. But the show very seldomly bothered to consider the limitations the holodeck should have
But I just looked it up on memory alpha, the injured woman in TNG (Kristin, apparently) was apparently swimming and cliff diving in the holodeck.
How on earth cliff diving should be possible in the rather smallish holodeck we see is anybody's guess. But the show very seldomly bothered to consider the limitations the holodeck should have
Cliff diving should be nominally easy as an illusion from the holodeck, which has probably advanced control over its own gravitational forces.
I think the holodeck only gradually started to become aware it shouldn't be able to manifest matter outside of the holodeck. In Encounter at Farpoint it was still oblivious to it, happily letting Wesley leave dripping wet. Then, in the Big Goodbye it came to that realization for the first time (probably as a result of Picard and Data telling it so), though the effect was by no means immediate
The hard-and-software definitely had become capable of coping with the 'no matter outside the holodeck!' expected of it in real time the moment Picard tosses a holo-book out of the holodeck (even though that corridor really was still on the holodeck, the holodeck had to convince Picard & co it was the outside world).
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It's not hard to guess. Variable gravity.
Yep, same reason Torres was able to do an orbital dive in the VOY ep where she goes all death-wishy over the rest of the Maquis back home getting slaughtered by the Dominion.
Computer builds a holo-"diving board" in the terrain that gets you some elevation. You jump. Computer uses the artificial gravity to essentially put you in a floating state but generates wind effects (via forcefields) and noise around you whilst updating the scenery to make you seem to be falling.
Yep, and it's worth mentioning/clarifying that the whole concept of relative elevation in the holodeck is generally artificial. Two people might be standing side by side on the holodeck and yet perceive that one of them is 100 meters higher up than the other. If you start climbing the ladder to that holo-diving board you mention, you needn't go up very far above the deck level, as the computer can shift the virtual ground downward from your perspective and in your space for each rung you climb.
Absolutely, but I put the elevation bit in as you can't fully "jump" off the actual floor into a dive, so the deck would need to have an initial area of drop below you (created by the act of you walking up a simulated ladder or up an incline to a "cliff" or just lifting you up with forcefields whilst creating the illusion you're in a plane/shuttle...)., But yes, you'd only need an actual drop of about a meter (the holodecks are two storeys tall so no problem) and then the simulated environment could convince you you were higher up.
And if you're about to jump while (unknowingly) standing on the floor of the deck, it'll probably just float you up quickly in the process of simulating the dive.
How would the holodeck cope if a number of people brought a real inflexible measuring rod (except at the joints) (from outside the holodeck) with them and tried to extend it to a distance larger than the diameter of the holodeck, all the while having observers guard each section of it so that the holodeck could pull no tricks there?
^Well, I could imagine it becoming a kind of sport. As the holodecks get better and better at fooling people (for example by making them believe they're really far apart even though they're on the same small holodeck), trying to find a way to "break" the illusion after al, just to see if they can. Similar to how nowadays, some people try to 'break' a computer game just for fun by trying certain actions with game characters in places the game programmers never accounted for. This, of course, would only be a very first iteration.
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It would extend it past the doorway (if feasible), but hide the open doorway behind illusion while giving a fake illusory rod for the section guards to see while shifting them wherever.
If the rod is longer than the diameter of the holodeck-plus-distance-to-the-corridor-wall, then you'll poke the wall and be unable to extend it further.
...but the holodeck might find a way to steal the rod from you, making you think you're still holding onto it while shifting or transporting it away, and the rod will go for as long as it is.
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