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Majority of tie-in literature bad?

SpaceLama said:
One thing that really diverges between Trek and modern science fiction literature, is that transhumanism, or technological singularities, are almost ubiquitous in modern literary sci-fi. Compare Iain M Banks 'Culture' novels or Alistair Reynolds 'Revelation Space' novels, to Star Trek, as persistent space opera settings. Some stand alone episodes and books have touched upon some of those concepts, but broadly speaking, the Federation is averse to extreme post-human(oid)-ism.
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If that's what you're looking for save yourself the trouble and turn around now. It will never happen unless it ends badly and it reinforces the PURE-BRED BASELINE HUMANS RAHRAHRAH mentality.
 
SpaceLama said:
One thing that really diverges between Trek and modern science fiction literature, is that transhumanism, or technological singularities, are almost ubiquitous in modern literary sci-fi.
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Sometimes too much so. It's a fad these days, true, but it isn't always handled credibly or effectively. Some writers get so immersed in writing about posthuman AI entities that they forget about creating characters the audience can identify with or care about. Some treat the Singularity as an essentially mystical transcendence, "the Rapture for geeks" as Ken McLeod calls it, without really thinking through the technological and sociological factors that might impede such a change, or without realizing that progress is never experienced universally by the whole human race. There are still hundreds of millions of people today living at a subsistence-agriculture level just as their ancestors thousands of years ago did.

So yes, it is true that ST's grounding in a '60s TV franchise grounded in turn in '40s pulp-SF concepts can be limiting. But the Singularity/posthumanism fad has its own limitations and credibility failures.
 
Sxottlan said:
Sci said:
You need to read A Singular Destiny and Losing the Peace, because you have no fucking clue what you're talking about.
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Well, I've read A Singular Destiny and that doesn't change my take on the choice of damage done. I'm reading Losing the Peace next, so it would appear I at least have half a fucking clue.

Since you quoted my entire post, you'll have to point out where exactly I pissed in your bowl of cornflakes.
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You're essentially complaining that the damage seen in Destiny is somehow meaningless and without consequence, yet you say this in spite of having read one entire book that's all about the consequences of the invasion and having another one coming up in the queue.

It's a irrational statement. You can't claim that the violence is without consequence when there are two entire books all about its consequences.
 
Christopher said:
SpaceLama said:
One thing that really diverges between Trek and modern science fiction literature, is that transhumanism, or technological singularities, are almost ubiquitous in modern literary sci-fi.
Click to expand...

Sometimes too much so. It's a fad these days, true, but it isn't always handled credibly or effectively. Some writers get so immersed in writing about posthuman AI entities that they forget about creating characters the audience can identify with or care about. Some treat the Singularity as an essentially mystical transcendence, "the Rapture for geeks" as Ken McLeod calls it, without really thinking through the technological and sociological factors that might impede such a change, or without realizing that progress is never experienced universally by the whole human race. There are still hundreds of millions of people today living at a subsistence-agriculture level just as their ancestors thousands of years ago did.

So yes, it is true that ST's grounding in a '60s TV franchise grounded in turn in '40s pulp-SF concepts can be limiting. But the Singularity/posthumanism fad has its own limitations and credibility failures.
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Well, plus you could argue that the Borg are a pretty thorough examination of post-human-ism, just a really creepy version thereof.
 
Thrawn said:
Well, plus you could argue that the Borg are a pretty thorough examination of post-human-ism, just a really creepy version thereof.
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Sort of, but not really.

The Borg have aspects of post-human existence, but it's like they got to the edge of biological existence and stopped evolving.

The Borg are, in some respects, a worst-case scenario, with the Darwinian imperatives for survival still hardwired into a technological framework.

What's funny is that, twenty years ago, the Borg were ahead of the curve. Verner Vinge had just started talking about posthumanism. Hans Moravec' Mind Children had just come out. The idea of the Borg as a potential future for humanity -- one that might not be avoidable -- was part of the moment's zeitgeist.

Now, the Borg feel rather... retro, in the way that 1980s cyberpunk feels retro now.
 
^Heck, I thought the Borg felt retro from the beginning, though more in a design sense. Even back in the late '80s, the idea of cyborgs being people with big, clunky metal and plastic pieces stuck on their bodies looked crude and silly to me. And once FC retconned nanotechnology into the Borg concept, it made the big clunky pieces even sillier. The Borg should've been sleek, fast, advanced, looking like a coherent whole that was halfway between organic and technological rather than just a human body with mechanical bits stuck on.

And the Borg are definitely not an exploration of posthumanism -- more a pre-emptive rejection of it. Posthuman literature embraces and explores the possibilities of human technological enhancement, while the Borg represented a more traditionalist view of technology as an evil that could overwhelm and destroy our humanity if we let it. ST tends to default to the attitude that normal, baseline humanity is the ideal and any artificial enhancement thereof, whether by genetics or cybernetics, is a threat. (Although ST is inconsistent about this, since it's never condemned "enhancing" the human genome by interbreeding with aliens. However, human-alien hybrids tend to be coded as nonhuman, so there's still an implicit assumption that you have to be "pure" to be truly human.) Transhuman and posthuman literature tends to take the opposite view: that human enhancement is desirable or at least inevitable, that it will simply redefine our humanity rather than destroying it.
 
Christopher said:
^Heck, I thought the Borg felt retro from the beginning, though more in a design sense. Even back in the late '80s, the idea of cyborgs being people with big, clunky metal and plastic pieces stuck on their bodies looked crude and silly to me. And once FC retconned nanotechnology into the Borg concept, it made the big clunky pieces even sillier. The Borg should've been sleek, fast, advanced, looking like a coherent whole that was halfway between organic and technological rather than just a human body with mechanical bits stuck on.

And the Borg are definitely not an exploration of posthumanism -- more a pre-emptive rejection of it. Posthuman literature embraces and explores the possibilities of human technological enhancement, while the Borg represented a more traditionalist view of technology as an evil that could overwhelm and destroy our humanity if we let it. ST tends to default to the attitude that normal, baseline humanity is the ideal and any artificial enhancement thereof, whether by genetics or cybernetics, is a threat. (Although ST is inconsistent about this, since it's never condemned "enhancing" the human genome by interbreeding with aliens. However, human-alien hybrids tend to be coded as nonhuman, so there's still an implicit assumption that you have to be "pure" to be truly human.) Transhuman and posthuman literature tends to take the opposite view: that human enhancement is desirable or at least inevitable, that it will simply redefine our humanity rather than destroying it.
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True enough; I stand corrected.

I do read a lot, especially Alastair Reynolds, that plays with those ideas really well, but I think Trek isn't the right place for it after so many years of the prevailing philosophy you mentioned.

Well, unless it's explored through contact with a new alien race that operates that way, which would be interesting. Freak everyone out with comparisons to the Borg and then turn out to be sympathetic.
 
I depicted the Manraloth in The Buried Age as an example of advanced transhumanism, a species that had modified itself so completely that the technology went right down to the subcellular level and it was pretty much impossible to define where biology ended and technology began, because they'd been integrated so thoroughly for so long that there no longer was a distinction. (This is where I think real technology is going to end up; lots of nanotech research these days involves using DNA, proteins, and the like.) The Caeliar in Destiny are a more fully posthuman, post-biological species, built entirely out of atomic-scale technology.

As for Federation characters comparing other cyborg species with the Borg, that's been done with the Choblik in Titan and to some extent with the Caeliar.
 
Christopher said:
I depicted the Manraloth in The Buried Age as an example of advanced transhumanism, a species that had modified itself so completely that the technology went right down to the subcellular level and it was pretty much impossible to define where biology ended and technology began, because they'd been integrated so thoroughly for so long that there no longer was a distinction. (This is where I think real technology is going to end up; lots of nanotech research these days involves using DNA, proteins, and the like.) The Caeliar in Destiny are a more fully posthuman, post-biological species, built entirely out of atomic-scale technology.

As for Federation characters comparing other cyborg species with the Borg, that's been done with the Choblik in Titan and to some extent with the Caeliar.
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All very true, but I was thinking about more of an intermediate stage, something like Reynolds's Demarchists. There've been plenty of aliens so technologically advanced that they're all but incomprehensible to us, but few that have integration with Borg-like technology, something we can understand and deal with, without any loss of cultural identity.

The Choblik are actually a great example, and I've really enjoyed what we've seen so far, but it's still just one character. I'd like to see the Choblik homeworld, really see how they work as a society.

I know, I know... demanding fans... :lol:

That said, I have absolutely loved the Caeliar and Manraloth cultures, and consider them two of the most fascinating species Trek has produced, so this isn't a complaint. Just a distinction.
 
Sci said:
You're essentially complaining that the damage seen in Destiny is somehow meaningless and without consequence, yet you say this in spite of having read one entire book that's all about the consequences of the invasion and having another one coming up in the queue.

It's a irrational statement. You can't claim that the violence is without consequence when there are two entire books all about its consequences.
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Never once said anything about consequence. That was all you. I'm saying the planets and races picked to be destroyed weren't any that I had any real attachment to. Therefore, I couldn't get all that broken up about it.
 
Sxottlan said:
Sci said:
You're essentially complaining that the damage seen in Destiny is somehow meaningless and without consequence, yet you say this in spite of having read one entire book that's all about the consequences of the invasion and having another one coming up in the queue.

It's a irrational statement. You can't claim that the violence is without consequence when there are two entire books all about its consequences.
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Never once said anything about consequence. That was all you. I'm saying the planets and races picked to be destroyed weren't any that I had any real attachment to. Therefore, I couldn't get all that broken up about it.
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What races and planets would you prefer? If Deneva, Risa, Coridan, Khitomer, Regulus, Yridia etc don't mean anything to you, which worlds do? What worlds would you care about? I'm guessing, the major, leading worlds. Well, the major planets of Trek are as follows: Earth, Vulcan, Andoria, Tellar (possibly), Bajor, Trill, Betazed, Qo'noS, Romulus, Cardassia, Ferenginar. That's it, really, in terms of supreme, alpha-status prominance. Four of these- Vulcan, Andoria, Tellar and Qo'noS- were hit hard, and require extensive rebuilding. Romulus is going to blow up in a few years :(, Bajor, Cardassia and Betazed already suffered brutal occupations, Trill nearly had a civil war...there is already enough trauma suffered by major worlds both within and outside "Destiny". Why destroy any of them outright? Again, there aren't really that many of them. If the beta-status worlds don't mean anything to you, then sure, "Destiny" won't have the same impact, but I don't think it was possible or useful for alpha-status worlds to be destroyed.
 
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For the life of me I will never understand why some people think killing off characters, in itself, adds depth to a piece of fiction.

There's plenty of mayhem in these books but this is Star TREK, not Star WARS.

Trek is always mayhem-appropriate.
 
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