Khan's Books and other KHAN questions/puzzles
- Thread starter david g
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It was almost certainly included in the set because it was huge and impressive-looking - something you'd expect Khan to read. The actual title was never meant to be seen by the viewers.
As for an in-universe explanation, maybe it was intended for use as part of the ship's original mission, before the supermen used the ship as an escape vessel.
As for an in-universe explanation, maybe it was intended for use as part of the ship's original mission, before the supermen used the ship as an escape vessel.
I don't know - I'd like to think I'm fairly smart, and it sure fooled me the first time.
It's a simple trick, which are the easiest to get away with when nobody's expecting any tricks.
Plus, recall that Khan's ego is his weakness - he was sure he was superior and he was also sure that he had won. So hearing the literal words from Spock confirm it didn't make him suspicious, it only satisifed him further.
It's a simple trick, which are the easiest to get away with when nobody's expecting any tricks.
Plus, recall that Khan's ego is his weakness - he was sure he was superior and he was also sure that he had won. So hearing the literal words from Spock confirm it didn't make him suspicious, it only satisifed him further.
For the same reason that the Reliant's computer password was a lousy 5-digit number. Apparently codebreaking is a dead art in the Trekverse.
It was the 80s, folks.
The same way he didn't stop to think that in space, a ship might not stay on the same "level", but might be above or below you.
Spock spoke of Khan as being 'intelligent, but given to two-dimensional thinking'.
He may have been smart, but life takes more than smarts. It takes experience.
They tricked him, plain and simple.
Not really.
Each of those numbers may have been connected to a complex mathmatical formula that gets changed every week, and as a result the numbers can't be used on their own. Maybe you have to send them from another Starfleet ship that's also using the code of the week. Maybe even only another Starfleet captain would have some key portion of it, leaving the rest useless. (And Khan wouldn't have known to ask Terrell, since he hadn't even thought to figure out how to override such a transmitted command to Reliant's systems.)
Trekker's fix-it syndrome strikes again!
Not really.
Each of those numbers may have been connected to a complex mathmatical formula that gets changed every week, and as a result the numbers can't be used on their own. Maybe you have to send them from another Starfleet ship that's also using the code of the week. Maybe even only another Starfleet captain would have some key portion of it, leaving the rest useless. (And Khan wouldn't have known to ask Terrell, since he hadn't even thought to figure out how to override such a transmitted command to Reliant's systems.)
Trekker's fix-it syndrome strikes again!
Would taking over a quarter of the world count as experience?
I like Wraith of Khan but it's a film that you don't want to think about too hard.
Damn now I'm going to have to watch it again and get 'something in my eye' at the end..
I liketo think of the "two-dimensional thinking" as actually a limitation of the genetic engineering. Maybe he wasn't quite such an improvement on the human race as he thought.
Lulz, I could watch STII forever.
Thing is, that's still a five-digit key. Maybe that is only the key needed to get to the Real Key, but that still means anyone who knows the five-digit key has control of the starship. If they're an important part of an algorithm that generates a longer key, again, there's a mere 10,000 combinations to try out and any starship can control any other starship in the Fleet. It's only five digits of information.Not really.
Each of those numbers may have been connected to a complex mathmatical formula that gets changed every week, and as a result the numbers can't be used on their own. Maybe you have to send them from another Starfleet ship that's also using the code of the week. Maybe even only another Starfleet captain would have some key portion of it, leaving the rest useless. (And Khan wouldn't have known to ask Terrell, since he hadn't even thought to figure out how to override such a transmitted command to Reliant's systems.)
Trekker's fix-it syndrome strikes again!
(Worse: since the digits don't seem to be reentered, based on how they were punched in, it's not even a full 10,000 combinations. How many it is I leave as an exercise for the reader.)
There are some possible saves, of course; for one, we don't know that every starship has a five-digit code. It's a bit of a lucky break if the Reliant has the shortest prefix code in the Fleet, but it'd be unfilmable if it had a twenty-digit code too. A twenty-digit code wouldn't be much more secure, but it would sound more plausible; it would also have people laughing at a moment that's supposed to be tense. They have to balance it being a code at all with it being something the audience won't lose patience with.
As for hours-will-seem-like-days ... yeah, it's a dumb code, but occasionally that works, particularly against a person so intelligent he's sure he can't be fooled. Stage magicians and psychics rely on this much more than you'd think.
Where they missed with the line is when Kirk gets back aboard and notes things not working, Spock fails to say it was the ``best we could do in two days''.
I don't see why we have to argue that it is a "password" at all.
I mean, my telephone number has only ten digits, four of which are an operator-related sequence everybody can guess. It's not intended to keep people from contacting me, it's intended to help people contact me. I feel perfectly secure "behind" this number, because even though anybody can access me through it, nobody can use that access for serious harm.
Similarly, the code of the Reliant would be there to help Starfleet contact that ship's computer, not to stop such an action. Any steps to prevent hostile access would be taken either after the ship had been dialed, and/or already at the stage where dialing into the Starfleet intership network was first attempted, not through a futile attempt of "cryptographing the phonebook". Kirk, in explaning this to Saavik, would just simplify a bit.
Huh? Why would he speak in code to Kirk? It was Khan they were trying to fool.
Timo Saloniemi
I mean, my telephone number has only ten digits, four of which are an operator-related sequence everybody can guess. It's not intended to keep people from contacting me, it's intended to help people contact me. I feel perfectly secure "behind" this number, because even though anybody can access me through it, nobody can use that access for serious harm.
Similarly, the code of the Reliant would be there to help Starfleet contact that ship's computer, not to stop such an action. Any steps to prevent hostile access would be taken either after the ship had been dialed, and/or already at the stage where dialing into the Starfleet intership network was first attempted, not through a futile attempt of "cryptographing the phonebook". Kirk, in explaning this to Saavik, would just simplify a bit.
Huh? Why would he speak in code to Kirk? It was Khan they were trying to fool.
Timo Saloniemi
Anyone got a closeup screenshot of this big book? I sort of remember seeing an enormous encyclopedia-like volume on the Botany Bay bookshelf in the movie around the time Chekov sees the seatbelt inscription, but I don't feel like putting in the DVD and spending half and hour looking for the specific shot.
http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/twok/ch3/twok0100.jpg
I think I may actually have that same edition of Moby-Dick.
I think I may actually have that same edition of Moby-Dick.
So ... you're ... a genetically engineered superman?
And, man, think how Ceti Alpha VI must stink if you're a reader. Seven books in the world that aren't regulations, and two of them are different editions of the same book.
No, I just frequent the same library book sales that they do.
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