We discovered high warp speeds damage the environment in 1994-equivalent, there initially is some alarm and regulations/suggestions and hope to do more with others, then the suggestions are routinely frequently ignored rather than problem fixed or mitigated as there are just a lot more pressing problems for at least the next 7+ years.
Is 24th Century Trek a bad, or good, analogy to climate change?
- Thread starter suarezguy
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I appreciate the message "Force of Nature" was trying to deliver. I low-key don't appreciate that it was quietly swept under the rug afterwards. Unfortunately, that's also just like Real Life. We all know that gasoline-powered cars pollute the environment, but most of us drive them, and we need to get from Point A to Point B, so we just fill up the tank and go about on our way.
Now that I'm typing this, I think there was a missed opportunity in Discovery. When they jumped to the 32nd Century, we could've seen not just The Burn, but also what 800 years of more "damage to the environment" would bring to The Galaxy. It's a way they could've gone.
Now that I'm typing this, I think there was a missed opportunity in Discovery. When they jumped to the 32nd Century, we could've seen not just The Burn, but also what 800 years of more "damage to the environment" would bring to The Galaxy. It's a way they could've gone.
But the Federation wasn't the first on the scene. There had been interstellar civilizations hundreds of thousands, millions, tens of millions of years, before them in the same region. Why would they have been the first to 'pollute' the environment?
Sad thing is that they could have cleared the issue with some dialogue on Voyager, when Tom and the ill-fated Stadi are looking at Voyager.
TOM: "Those look like retracting nacelles."
STADI: "Right. They allow Voyager to create a variable geometry warp field. No damage to subspace."
Problem addressed, Trek geeks satisfied, have a nice day.
TOM: "Those look like retracting nacelles."
STADI: "Right. They allow Voyager to create a variable geometry warp field. No damage to subspace."
Problem addressed, Trek geeks satisfied, have a nice day.
FAN #1: Hmm...looks like next week's episode is going to be a play on climate change...
FAN #2: Aw, man. I guess I can skip that episode.
FAN #2: Aw, man. I guess I can skip that episode.
I think it was a case that the pollution really didn't get bad until the Federation came along with its very dirty warp engines. Previous civilizations either didn't travel the region much, or had FTL propulsion systems that were less harmful to subspace than warp drives.
^Perhaps .... or perhaps subspace slowly repairs itself over long stretches of time. Too slowly to be noticed within the 'lifetime' of the Federation, but noticeable over those millions of years I talked about.
If it doesn't, either it would be one of those reasons you mention, or I would have expected the Federation to have 'inherited' a badly degraded /polluted region in the first place
If it doesn't, either it would be one of those reasons you mention, or I would have expected the Federation to have 'inherited' a badly degraded /polluted region in the first place
That episode played up an analogy, using constructs based in fiction rather than in proven reality.
Later episodes promptly said "you're authorized to exceed the speed limit", throw in a third nacelle, have nacelles angle up and down (albeit slowly rather than a bird flapping insanely), and it was all forgotten about anyway. So regardless if the analogy was good or not, the makers didn't care - partly because it pretty much would kill the franchise if all the species hit the brakes, noting their methods of propulsion may be completely harmless in every conventional sense.
They could easily tell the trope of ecological issues via more conventional methods: Visiting a planet that has a lot of smog. The allegory is already infinitely more effective than the "Force of Nature" episode was trying to do, though in fairness it's not impossible to sell an allegory by using a focal point completely different - which may have been the intent of the episode, to not be so direct and/or heavyhanded.
Later episodes promptly said "you're authorized to exceed the speed limit", throw in a third nacelle, have nacelles angle up and down (albeit slowly rather than a bird flapping insanely), and it was all forgotten about anyway. So regardless if the analogy was good or not, the makers didn't care - partly because it pretty much would kill the franchise if all the species hit the brakes, noting their methods of propulsion may be completely harmless in every conventional sense.
They could easily tell the trope of ecological issues via more conventional methods: Visiting a planet that has a lot of smog. The allegory is already infinitely more effective than the "Force of Nature" episode was trying to do, though in fairness it's not impossible to sell an allegory by using a focal point completely different - which may have been the intent of the episode, to not be so direct and/or heavyhanded.
^Well, I still thought it was an extremely blatant and in-the-face analogy. And I thought the episode was heavy-handed as well.
Considering the whole thing was essentially resolved by being forgotten* I'd say it's a pretty bad analogy.
*Yes, I know, it was resolved with the warp 5 speed limit which did get referenced a few more times in TNG's seventh season but was ignored in the rest of the franchise. I know non canon sources say later Starfleet ships had special engines that could go above warp 5 without doing damage, and that supposedly explains Voyager's shifting warp nacelles, but these sources are as I said, non canon.
*Yes, I know, it was resolved with the warp 5 speed limit which did get referenced a few more times in TNG's seventh season but was ignored in the rest of the franchise. I know non canon sources say later Starfleet ships had special engines that could go above warp 5 without doing damage, and that supposedly explains Voyager's shifting warp nacelles, but these sources are as I said, non canon.
Yep. For all intents and purposes, Voyager has pivoting nacelles simply because she does. There's nothing onscreen about her warp engines being environmentally friendly.
I like Forces of Nature and the later idea that the adjustable nacelles were the first version of "subspace safe" warp engines for one simple reason: it hammers home that this is set in a future that compared to us in the present truly has it's shit together. They find out there's an environmental threat, waste no time denying it, have no trouble marshalling the political will to address it, put smart people on it, and within a few years have come up with a solution.
If only...
If only...
As for forgetting about it, I think it's really simple. This was just a 'message episode', but the consequences (everyone limited to warp 5 except in cases of extreme emergency) would have been far too inconvenient for the franchise as a whole, because you know beforehand many stories will face just such an emergency, and what's the added value of 'you may ignore the warp 5 limit for the duration of this mission' becoming just such a stock phrase as 'make it so' or 'engage'?
So the best they could have done was having some brief explanation that happily, a technical solution was developed relatively quickly and immediately employed on all ships OR simply ignore it. They seemed to have chosen the latter.
So the best they could have done was having some brief explanation that happily, a technical solution was developed relatively quickly and immediately employed on all ships OR simply ignore it. They seemed to have chosen the latter.
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Story of the franchise, and showing a general disrespect for the audience.
There were almost a dozen really dumb inconsistencies on Voyager that could have been cleared with seconds of dialogue. They didn't bother, clearly thinking we were too stupid to notice.
^ Well, at least it shows that Voyager wasn't the only show one to do so. After one or two episodes paying lip service to it in TNG, it seemed pretty much ignored over there as well.
To be fair, I can't find a single specific reference to a 'warp x' with x>5 in the remaining TNG episodes, unless either permission was given by a higher authority or it was in an alternate timeline or it was in the past/future (All Good Things), or it came about by something not in the crew's control (Emergence) but Picard does order 'maximum warp' a few times. It is however possible that that was understood to mean 'warp 5'.
I also think DS9 pretty much ignored this, though they had the excuse of a war going on most of the time.
To be fair, I can't find a single specific reference to a 'warp x' with x>5 in the remaining TNG episodes, unless either permission was given by a higher authority or it was in an alternate timeline or it was in the past/future (All Good Things), or it came about by something not in the crew's control (Emergence) but Picard does order 'maximum warp' a few times. It is however possible that that was understood to mean 'warp 5'.
I also think DS9 pretty much ignored this, though they had the excuse of a war going on most of the time.
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^ Yes, so that's one that would fall under one of the exceptions I give ('permission by a higher authority'). It's one of those few episodes I would consider paying lip service to the idea since it really doesn't affect the story at all, though a friendlier formulation would perhaps be that it's a continuity nod.
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Could have done an episode latter with them trying something to fix the problem but making it worse?
The writers had a hard enough time sticking to Warp 9+ as the top speed a ship should go. No way they were going to stick to Warp 5 for very long. It might be best to think that this was a problem that wasn't solved by any of our heroes or perhaps not even by anyone in Starfleet. The real world has plenty of crucial everyday inventions by unsung people. Most of us have to use a search engine to look up the inventors of things we can't live without today, and only if we have a specific need to do.
There was a narrow path that forced warp ships to move through the same area. Then too, it could be argued that the reason the path through the two radiation zones was because space was weak there to begin with.
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