Maximum speed of the NuEnterprise

[Ryan8bit]

Why? A black hole is a black hole, like a star is a star. The added technobabble doesn't add anything to the 75% of us who have no idea what a "ring singularity" is, and it becomes an auditory distraction even for those of us that do.

Technobabble belongs in the background, not as a major story element.

I disagree. If you're going to make science fiction, eventually you might have to use some terms of science. If the word singularity is too much for the fragile audience to handle, then they should just call it something else. But that's a very disappointing appeal to the lowest common denominator.

I think the 2D disk concept works better cinematically

I don't think there's a huge difference cinematically, especially if the director frames it right.

That's not "stability" though.

That's why I clarified what I meant.

wormholes cannot form anywhere except in the event horizon of black holes

Not necessarily, and especially not in the context of previous Star Trek.

 

[Pauln6]

I've noticed that Stargate Universe seems to use what sounds like plausible science and technobabble. I happen to like the show but a lot of people find it slow going, presumably with not enough explosions, insta-promotions, and red matter. However, SGU gets around the science issue by using the military commander as the plot device to say, 'Explain that to me in English.' The explanations are usually quite palatable.

Although the style of the show is quite different to NuTrek, as far as the science goes, I can't see anything incompatible with Star Trek. A paragraph of scientifically accurate explanation is as effective as a paragraph of flim flam and the former might help to educate more ignorant audience members.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Why? A black hole is a black hole, like a star is a star. The added technobabble doesn't add anything to the 75% of us who have no idea what a "ring singularity" is, and it becomes an auditory distraction even for those of us that do.

Technobabble belongs in the background, not as a major story element.

I disagree. If you're going to make science fiction, eventually you might have to use some terms of science. If the word singularity is too much for the fragile audience to handle, then they should just call it something else.

But they DID use the word "singularity" and "black hole," both of which the audience generally understands. What they didn't do was go into the specific physical details about how and why a black hole--specifically, black holes created by red matter--would be able to swallow a planet or allow for time travel.

The main reason for this is, even in the film, it's made clear that none of the characters--not even Spock--really understand how these artificial black holes work; 23rd century science probably has an at best vague knowledge of the existence let alone properties of red matter (which I still think is probably strange matter with a less dopy name). The exchange between Spock and McCoy directly implies that the process that created that black hole is WAY beyond current technology or even current understanding of physics. In short, they didn't explain what type of singularity or what type of black hole because they honestly didn't know.

Besides which, I don't think it would make any difference cinematically or dramatically to have Spock and Bones rambling on about the supposed properties of "a Type-3 Kerr-Newman Singularity, with a high enough angular velocity might allow the spontaneous generation of charged exotic particles which..." etc etc.

But that's a very disappointing appeal to the lowest common denominator.

What's common about it? If I wanted to watch a physics lesson about the properties of black holes, I'd turn to the Discovery Channel. But technobabble doesn't make for good science fiction, as the producers of Voyager found out the hard way.

wormholes cannot form anywhere except in the event horizon of black holes

Not necessarily, and especially not in the context of previous Star Trek.[/QUOTE]
In the context of previous trek--with the incredibly dubious exception of Voyager--all wormholes were stated to have several features in common with black holes: a singularity, and event horizon, and an accretion disk. They also had the property of not really being visible unless something was passing through them at that exact moment.

The thing is, until STXI the term "black hole" was considered an anachronism and the concept was instead described as "quantum singularity." Here even in Trek it's clear the two refer to the same general concept and form under the same conditions.

As for wormholes NOT forming in conjunction with a black hole... to even call that a hypothetical is probably being generous.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

I've noticed that Stargate Universe seems to use what sounds like plausible science and technobabble. I happen to like the show but a lot of people find it slow going, presumably with not enough explosions, insta-promotions, and red matter. However, SGU gets around the science issue by using the military commander as the plot device to say, 'Explain that to me in English.' The explanations are usually quite palatable.

That's the one thing Stargate has always had going for it: good control of story elements and rarely went too far up its ass pretending to be "clever" with scientific fixes to problems. Not that this ever made it watchable to me, but I haven't seen SGU yet...

Although the style of the show is quite different to NuTrek, as far as the science goes, I can't see anything incompatible with Star Trek. A paragraph of scientifically accurate explanation is as effective as a paragraph of flim flam and the former might help to educate more ignorant audience members.

This assumes that audience members 1) require an education or 2) desire an education, neither of which is the responsibility or the purpose of Star Trek, which is supposed to ENTERTAIN its audience, not shame them into reading more science books.

Of course, "paragraph of explanation" works really well in a novel, where everything is in written form anyway. This doesn't work very well on screen, because actors are required to be something much more than mere narrators/mouthpieces, paragraph of dialog doesn't go over very well unless it says something meaningful to the plot or the characters. In this case, "black hole" and "singularity" and "really advanced technology" is sufficient to get the point across, and is sufficiently scientifically plausible. Believe it or not, "I have no idea how the fuck that happened" is usually a more satisfying explanation "I believe that happened because the quantum singularity's subspace resonance amplitude was on a Brahms-Newman Wavelength that allowed it to establish temporal synchronization with another similar event at a different point in our space time continuum."

 

[Pauln6]

This assumes that audience members 1) require an education or 2) desire an education, neither of which is the responsibility or the purpose of Star Trek, which is supposed to ENTERTAIN its audience, not shame them into reading more science books.

Of course, "paragraph of explanation" works really well in a novel, where everything is in written form anyway. This doesn't work very well on screen, because actors are required to be something much more than mere narrators/mouthpieces, paragraph of dialog doesn't go over very well unless it says something meaningful to the plot or the characters. In this case, "black hole" and "singularity" and "really advanced technology" is sufficient to get the point across, and is sufficiently scientifically plausible. Believe it or not, "I have no idea how the fuck that happened" is usually a more satisfying explanation "I believe that happened because the quantum singularity's subspace resonance amplitude was on a Brahms-Newman Wavelength that allowed it to establish temporal synchronization with another similar event at a different point in our space time continuum."

I'm in no position to criticise pedantry! Paragraph of dialogue was indeed the phrase I intended.

Trek often has paragraphs of dialogue to explain things. Scotty's inane blathering about the transporter being one example. The purpose of the dialogue is as important as its content.

Personally, I'm happy with using black holes as wormholes - I don't mind them bending the known laws of physics for the plot as long as it makes some kind of internal sense. I'm far less happy with the vagueness of supernova science , the idiocy of the romulans, and the uselessness of a singularity as a defence against a supernova, when it sends radiation in a 360 degree radius over a very large distance at no more than the speed of light because these explanations don't seem to make sense as presented.

I'm also less happy with speed of plot and with arbitrary (and massive) alterations to the range of Trek transporters because they are bending the laws of TREK physics. I'm less happy with the way the sigularity was portrayed at the end of the film when the Enterprise was sitting right next to it.

Scotty's dialogue on the planet was an attempt by the writers to establish his credentials as a transporter expert, which is fine but in my view it would have been better to keep the Enterprise (relatively) nearby instead of massively increasing the potential transporter range and opening up a can of worms that was never opened in the space of 100 years of the future Trek timeline.

If Spock had transported Kirk to Scotty's brig, the Enterprise would not have had a 4+ hour start at Warp 4 and would have been within a more plausible range, we would not have the ludicrous scenario of Spock sitting logically in a cave around a campfire (fuelled by seemingly non-existant wood) into which Kirk conveniently stumbles.

My own, perhaps unpopular, view is that human ignorance leads to poverty, population explosions, collapse in fish stocks, erosion, pollution, destruction of the world's forests, and thousands of species on the brink of extinction solely due to human activity. I don't care if people WANT to be educated. They NEED to be educated. If you can cloak that education amongst popular entertainment so much the better.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Scotty's dialogue on the planet was an attempt by the writers to establish his credentials as a transporter expert, which is fine but in my view it would have been better to keep the Enterprise (relatively) nearby instead of massively increasing the potential transporter range and opening up a can of worms that was never opened in the space of 100 years of the future Trek timeline.

Not to be a dork about this, but this problem has actually shown up twice in Trek history. Most obviously, Scotty's "transwarp beaming" appears to be the exact same trick as Daimon Bok's long-range transporter gadget. Less obviously, Data and Psycho Boy beaming aboard Tin Man from nearly the other side of the solar system from a heavily-damaged Enterprise.

If Spock had transported Kirk to Scotty's brig, the Enterprise would not have had a 4+ hour start at Warp 4 and would have been within a more plausible range, we would not have the ludicrous scenario of Spock sitting logically in a cave around a campfire (fuelled by seemingly non-existant wood) into which Kirk conveniently stumbles.

Considering Scotty was not even aware Enterprise had entered orbit, didn't realize anyone else was on the planet, didn't notice the Narada entering or leaving orbital space and didn't get Kirk's distress signal at any time in the day and a half it took him to walk to the outpost, the clear implication is that Scotty had been effectively marooned here almost as abruptly as Kirk (if you asked him, he would probably say "Brig? I haven't got communication gear, quarters, medical supplies... I don't even have a toilet! I crap in a manhole cover at the end of the hall! Did you bring any toilet paper, by any chance?")

My own, perhaps unpopular, view is that human ignorance leads to poverty, population explosions, collapse in fish stocks, erosion, pollution, destruction of the world's forests, and thousands of species on the brink of extinction solely due to human activity. I don't care if people WANT to be educated. They NEED to be educated.

And bombarding audiences with abbreviated barely-accurate monologs about the theorized properties of black holes accomplishes this how?

Seriously, explain this to me. How exactly would more people knowing about black holes lead to a reduction of poverty, a lowered population, a recovery of fish stocks, less erosion (huh?), less pollution, less deforestation, fewer species going extinct? What's the connection there? I mean, we're not talking about a pithy lecture about the evils of whaling cleverly disguised as a tour of Seaworld, we're talking about an astrophysical phenomenon that scientists know almost nothing about, that no human being alive today will EVER see with their own eyes, that is responsible for exactly NONE of the world's current problems.

I'm in no position to criticize pedantry either, but I'm in even less of a position to glorify it. Maybe you want Star Trek to get all preachy and up its own ass with educational tidbits designed to enlighten the rest of us ignorant masses (I'm lookin at you, "The Voyage Home") but at the end of the day it's still an entertainment franchise, not a PBS special.

 

[JarodRussell]

Seriously, explain this to me. How exactly would more people knowing about black holes lead to a reduction of poverty, a lowered population, a recovery of fish stocks, less erosion (huh?), less pollution, less deforestation, fewer species going extinct? What's the connection there? I mean, we're not talking about a pithy lecture about the evils of whaling cleverly disguised as a tour of Seaworld, we're talking about an astrophysical phenomenon that scientists know almost nothing about, that no human being alive today will EVER see with their own eyes, that is responsible for exactly NONE of the world's current problems.

I think the connection is that he made the jump from "knowledge about black holes" to "general need for education", but you didn't jump with him.

 

[Pauln6]

Not to be a dork about this, but this problem has actually shown up twice in Trek history. Most obviously, Scotty's "transwarp beaming" appears to be the exact same trick as Daimon Bok's long-range transporter gadget. Less obviously, Data and Psycho Boy beaming aboard Tin Man from nearly the other side of the solar system from a heavily-damaged Enterprise.

I'm not a fan of those plot devices either but at least Bok was using alien tech, while Tin Man was probably transporting a few million KM (e.g. Neptune is 4.4 million KM from the Sun). In defence of NuTrek at Warp 4 the ship would only have been about 450 billion km away from Delta Vega. However, at that speed it would take months to reach the fleet (which was too far away to help Vulcan even at maximum warp), but it isn't clear why Spock thought that limping to a rendevous was better than concentrating on getting communications going to get the fleet to come to them...

Considering Scotty was not even aware Enterprise had entered orbit, didn't realize anyone else was on the planet, didn't notice the Narada entering or leaving orbital space and didn't get Kirk's distress signal at any time in the day and a half it took him to walk to the outpost, the clear implication is that Scotty had been effectively marooned here almost as abruptly as Kirk (if you asked him, he would probably say "Brig? I haven't got communication gear, quarters, medical supplies... I don't even have a toilet! I crap in a manhole cover at the end of the hall! Did you bring any toilet paper, by any chance?")

True, but ludicrous writing! Scotty must have sensors, communications, life support etc. Starfleet communications gear monitors emergency channels automatically (intimated when the life pod recommends that Kirk should wait to be rescued). It unfathomable that Scotty was unaware of Vulcan's distress call when it had time to reach Earth and it's bonkers that he or his sensors failed to notice the planet next door imploding. These systems are largely computerised - Scotty wouldn't have to be using them manually for them to do their job.

If I were to try and improve the science and logic of the plot, I'd change Scotty's role slightly too. When Kirk is beamed down (with Janice Rand as his bodyguard) he encounters Spock and Scotty who have been working on modifying the transporters hoping that Spock can beam onto the Narada as it leaves orbit. When Kirk arrives, Spock has his epiphany and melds with Kirk as in the movie. He then persuades Rand to release Kirk from custody and they adjust their plan to beam onto the Enterprise instead. We have hardware modification over a longer period (as opposed to a miraculous 'formula'), we avoid the convolution of stumbling across Spock in a cave, and we have a brief role for one of the recurring female characters that was left out. Power demands mean that the defence perimeter had to be taken down so we can still have a CGI beast attack scene as well. Rand can beam them up, foreshadowing her future role as a transporter chief (hopefully with better resuts).

And bombarding audiences with abbreviated barely-accurate monologs about the theorized properties of black holes accomplishes this how?

Seriously, explain this to me. How exactly would more people knowing about black holes lead to a reduction of poverty, a lowered population, a recovery of fish stocks, less erosion (huh?), less pollution, less deforestation, fewer species going extinct? What's the connection there? I mean, we're not talking about a pithy lecture about the evils of whaling cleverly disguised as a tour of Seaworld, we're talking about an astrophysical phenomenon that scientists know almost nothing about, that no human being alive today will EVER see with their own eyes, that is responsible for exactly NONE of the world's current problems.

I'm in no position to criticize pedantry either, but I'm in even less of a position to glorify it. Maybe you want Star Trek to get all preachy and up its own ass with educational tidbits designed to enlighten the rest of us ignorant masses (I'm lookin at you, "The Voyage Home") but at the end of the day it's still an entertainment franchise, not a PBS special.

Trek has a long history of allegorical stories using real world issues with a sci fi spin. I don't think higher standards of accuracy would hurt the franchise. The stories aren't limited to stellar phenomena either (war, border disputes, humanitarian crises, conservation, pollution etc) but I would still hope that a story set in space would try to portray space science as accurately as possible...

 

[Ryan8bit]

But they DID use the word "singularity" and "black hole," both of which the audience generally understands.

Then you're arguing in a circle. All I said was that they should have called it a ring singularity. They don't have to overload with details or be insanely wordy about things.

I'm also guessing that 90% of the people who saw this movie have no idea what a singularity is and that a roughly equal number don't really know what a black hole is either. A lot of people think it's an actual hole, and this movie sorta reinforces that.

What's common about it? If I wanted to watch a physics lesson about the properties of black holes, I'd turn to the Discovery Channel. But technobabble doesn't make for good science fiction, as the producers of Voyager found out the hard way.

It doesn't have to be a physics lesson to be scientifically accurate. And it doesn't have to be technobabble either. Although if you're going to deal with high concept science, you probably should get some terminology relating to it.

Imagine you had a show about computer programmers. Let's say, the movie Hackers. Of course they're going to throw in all sorts of lingo and terminology in because that's to be expected for what they're doing. Crime investigation shows do this, medical dramas do it, and still a good portion of the audience remains oblivious to what the terms mean so long as they get the gist of the story.

all wormholes were stated to have several features in common with black holes: a singularity, and event horizon, and an accretion disk. They also had the property of not really being visible unless something was passing through them at that exact moment.

And while they may share certain properties, they still aren't the same in that an event horizon isn't inescapable and creating what we see as a black hole. That's the biggest differentiation, at least in Trek.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

True, but ludicrous writing! Scotty must have sensors, communications, life support etc.

Must he? Kirk would have used his communications rig to contact Earth if that had been the case.

I think the implication here is that, even though the location is different, it's still the same remote semi-automated lithium cracking station as in TOS, and as such Scotty's only contact with the outside universe would be regular calls from supply ships that are supposed to keep him stocked and operational at regular intervals. Apparently the supply ships DON'T, hence Scotty's only working shuttle is basically rusting out in a half-assed hangar that also doubles as his sleeping quarters and bunk.

Starfleet communications gear monitors emergency channels automatically (intimated when the life pod recommends that Kirk should wait to be rescued). It unfathomable that Scotty was unaware of Vulcan's distress call when it had time to reach Earth and it's bonkers that he or his sensors failed to notice the planet next door imploding. These systems are largely computerised - Scotty wouldn't have to be using them manually for them to do their job.

That's exactly my point. For the automated system to have informed Scotty of ANY of these things, the system would have to be, you know, functional. As it stands, it seems like he's stuck on a ground based outpost that Starfleet has actually abandoned simply because the posting hasn't been struck from the registers yet and it was a good place to stick him without violating regulations.

If I were to try and improve the science and logic of the plot, I'd change Scotty's role slightly too. When Kirk is beamed down (with Janice Rand as his bodyguard) he encounters Spock and Scotty who have been working on modifying the transporters hoping that Spock can beam onto the Narada as it leaves orbit. When Kirk arrives, Spock has his epiphany and melds with Kirk as in the movie. He then persuades Rand to release Kirk from custody and they adjust their plan to beam onto the Enterprise instead. We have hardware modification over a longer period (as opposed to a miraculous 'formula'), we avoid the convolution of stumbling across Spock in a cave, and we have a brief role for one of the recurring female characters that was left out. Power demands mean that the defence perimeter had to be taken down so we can still have a CGI beast attack scene as well. Rand can beam them up, foreshadowing her future role as a transporter chief (hopefully with better resuts).

Which all would have been good, except it would have required an extra forty five minutes at minimum to introduce Rand as a viable character, and longer still to explain why Scotty didn't use his communications rig to send a warning to Earth, the fleet in the Laurentian System, or to warn the approaching Starfleet about the gigantic Romulan death machine that just passed by.

Of course there are a thousand different ways it COULD have been done (we've been saying this about Star Trek since 1965). Mainly what we're discussing is what was actually done and what it means to the story.

Trek has a long history of allegorical stories using real world issues with a sci fi spin. I don't think higher standards of accuracy would hurt the franchise.

But it wouldn't help either. Better allegories I'm all in favor of, but BETTER SCIENCE is just nitpicking. If the phenomenon of the week accomplishes the plot goals without drawing undue attention to itself, so much the better; the focus of the story should be the story itself, not the technical details that make it tick.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

But they DID use the word "singularity" and "black hole," both of which the audience generally understands.

Then you're arguing in a circle. All I said was that they should have called it a ring singularity.

Why? It doesn't change the effect that the black hole has on the planet, while at the same time it adds the plot complications of having to explain 1) what a ring singularity is 2) why this makes a difference and 3) how the Enterprise crew know it's a ring singularity as opposed to, say, a point singularity or a multi-dimensional object of some kind.

None of which adds anything to the plot; once "it's a singularity; it's eating the planet" is established, the rest is just technobabble.

ETA: There is, in fact, precedence for this, in at least two instances involving black holes. The most famous of these comes in 2001/2010, the movie versions which featured the raw visual effects of both the Monolith's "stargate" function and, in the second film, the implosion of jupiter to form a small star. Neither of these incidents is explained in the film, though both are explained in some detail in the novelizations. The lack of explanation in 2010 is probably omitted for brevity, but mainly it's because the scene as depicted is one of extreme drama in tension where alot of scientific exposition would spoil the mood: in the novel, they were literally sitting around a telescope for hours at a time trying to figure out what the hell was happening, where as in the film the collapse is depicted as happening in a matter of minutes, and Leonov barely escapes in one piece.

Second example comes from Michael Crichton's "Sphere." The novel has Ted and Harry sitting over a table literally hammering out Einstein field equations to try and figure out how an American space craft could have possible emerged through a black hole without being destroyed. They actually deal with exactly the same objections you raised: ring singularity, can't pass through the center (tidal forces tear you apart), and come up with something alot like Trekian "slingshot maneuver" time travel. The MOVIE, however, reduces this entire discussion to a half dozen lines of dialog, sans equations, which presents the exact same information without any of the attached jargon. Strangely, the discussion in the film almost mirrors the discussion in STXI: short of details, straight to the point.

I guess what I'm saying is it has never been a habit of filmmakers--especially in science fiction--to overtly insert technical discussions into what are supposed to be theatrical performances. This works perfectly well in novels, where the pace can be slower and more deliberate, but even Blade Runner omitted alot of the more sophisticated discussions about how androids function.

I'm also guessing that 90% of the people who saw this movie have no idea what a singularity is and that a roughly equal number don't really know what a black hole is either.

I tell you it's more like 60% (and nearly all of them know what a black hole is). What they probably don't know are the details and a more sophisticated knowledge about the concept, which is to be expected; most people don't know how machineguns work either, even though everyone knows what machineguns are. Yet in any given action movie dialog usually refers to "machinegun" or "rifle" or even "assault rifle," and there's rarely much discussion about muzzle energy or the caliber size of the weapon's cartridge or the weight of its powder charge. And though probably 90% of your audience doesn't know a "railgun" is, the concept reduces easily enough to "big fucking gun" to require little other explanation in, say, Transformers 2.

It doesn't have to be a physics lesson to be scientifically accurate. And it doesn't have to be technobabble either. Although if you're going to deal with high concept science, you probably should get some terminology relating to it.

Exactly my point. Star Trek isn't about high concept science. Star Trek is mainly built around CHARACTERS. Since science alone is not the center of Trek storytelling, that black holes are a subject studied by scientists does not mean they must be depicted with the utmost scientific accuracy.

Imagine you had a show about computer programmers. Let's say, the movie Hackers. Of course they're going to throw in all sorts of lingo and terminology in because that's to be expected for what they're doing. Crime investigation shows do this, medical dramas do it, and still a good portion of the audience remains oblivious to what the terms mean so long as they get the gist of the story.

All very good examples. Because as you of all people should know, ALL of these movies/TV shows do an absolutely fucking horrible job of accurately depicting the scientific concepts they showcase. CSI and spinoffs is probably the worst offender by far.

The good news is alot of these shows pretty much revolve around the science first and the characters second, so they can get away with a huge portion of their dialog being obscure medical/forenstic technobabble. The thing you need to keep in mind is 90% of that technobabble is complete bullshit that bears at at most passing resemblance to reality and is intended strictly to entertain the audience. Star Trek (when it's in its element) goes a different route, focussing on characters and interpersonal conflicts first with science and technology as background scenery. When it tries to do the opposite of this, they call it "Star Trek: Voyager"

all wormholes were stated to have several features in common with black holes: a singularity, and event horizon, and an accretion disk. They also had the property of not really being visible unless something was passing through them at that exact moment.

And while they may share certain properties, they still aren't the same in that an event horizon isn't inescapable and creating what we see as a black hole.

I beg your pardon mister "though shalt not speak inaccurately of black holes," but "being inescapable" is not a property of event horizons. Futhermore, there is no differentiation in trek between wormholes and black holes because the latter term is never used to describe any phenomenon, with the singular exception of Q.

 

[Pauln6]

True, but ludicrous writing! Scotty must have sensors, communications, life support etc.

Must he? Kirk would have used his communications rig to contact Earth if that had been the case.

I think the implication here is that, even though the location is different, it's still the same remote semi-automated lithium cracking station as in TOS, and as such Scotty's only contact with the outside universe would be regular calls from supply ships that are supposed to keep him stocked and operational at regular intervals. Apparently the supply ships DON'T, hence Scotty's only working shuttle is basically rusting out in a half-assed hangar that also doubles as his sleeping quarters and bunk

For the automated system to have informed Scotty of ANY of these things, the system would have to be, you know, functional. As it stands, it seems like he's stuck on a ground based outpost that Starfleet has actually abandoned simply because the posting hasn't been struck from the registers yet and it was a good place to stick him without violating regulations.

I don't disagree with your interpretation of the story as seen. I'm simply arguing that the story as seen is ludicrous. An automated system must have some method of telling somebody that a fault has developed and are we saying that Scotty or Spock are incapable of modifying this system to send a message in time (Nero is heading to Earth at less than Warp 5 after all). The shuttle must have communications and sensors; if it had no sensors they couldn't have used the transporter.

Which all would have been good, except it would have required an extra forty five minutes at minimum to introduce Rand as a viable character, and longer still to explain why Scotty didn't use his communications rig to send a warning to Earth, the fleet in the Laurentian System, or to warn the approaching Starfleet about the gigantic Romulan death machine that just passed by.

Nah - Rand could just be a blonde on the bridge handing Pike Padds to approve who is then drafted in as a security guard by Spock. It took all of ten seconds to introduce Sulu and Chekov. Sending her down as security is no dafter than leaving Chekov in charge of the bridge, especially if she is one of the crewmen that helps restrain Kirk on the bridge when he is arrested. Plus Rand is a crack shot with a phaser after all (she can make hot coffee at ten paces).

I think that your questions about communications still stand as plot holes in the current story - Keenser was left on the base after Nero stopped jamming and should have warned the fleet and Earth. So should the Vulcan ships that escaped Nero (it seems inconceivable that no ships on the entire planet managed to use the planet itself as cover to take off and go to warp while the Narada was committed to mining the surface).

If Nero set off some kind of EMP device when he dropped off Spock to fry any equipment at the outpost (he does know how resourceful Spock can be), that would cover Scotty's equipment being in such disarray and would explain why Scotty and Spock had been working so hard to fix the transporter. You can even foreshadow Rand's work as a comms and transporter officer by having her help modify the system and leaving her behind with Keenser to try and fix the shattered communications system to send off a warning.

Better allegories I'm all in favor of, but BETTER SCIENCE is just nitpicking. If the phenomenon of the week accomplishes the plot goals without drawing undue attention to itself, so much the better; the focus of the story should be the story itself, not the technical details that make it tick.

If the inclusion of science is neutral then I think it's better to go with the version that has more educational value. I loved Professor Brian Cox's series, the Wonders of the Solar System (at least I think that's what it was called). He managed to simplify some pretty complex scientific issues for public consumption and the show was hugely popular as a result in the UK. People do want to know this stuff if it can be delivered in a way that is entertaining.

 

[Ryan8bit]

Why? It doesn't change the effect that the black hole has on the planet, while at the same time it adds the plot complications of having to explain 1) what a ring singularity is 2) why this makes a difference and 3) how the Enterprise crew know it's a ring singularity as opposed to, say, a point singularity or a multi-dimensional object of some kind.

None of which adds anything to the plot; once "it's a singularity; it's eating the planet" is established, the rest is just technobabble.

It was never about adding anything to any plot. It's about not pulling people out of the story. When there's bad logic, science, characterization, plot... it always pulls people out who know better.

I tell you it's more like 60% (and nearly all of them know what a black hole is). What they probably don't know are the details and a more sophisticated knowledge about the concept, which is to be expected; most people don't know how machineguns work either, even though everyone knows what machineguns are. Yet in any given action movie dialog usually refers to "machinegun" or "rifle" or even "assault rifle," and there's rarely much discussion about muzzle energy or the caliber size of the weapon's cartridge or the weight of its powder charge. And though probably 90% of your audience doesn't know a "railgun" is, the concept reduces easily enough to "big fucking gun" to require little other explanation in, say, Transformers 2.

The percent I came up with was arbitrary. It was just my way of saying most people don't know what a singularity is at all. And of black holes, a lot of people think they're really just a hole of some sort. They don't know at all how it works.

Your analogy to guns doesn't matter at all because those all have a precedent. They're a very tangible thing with known limits. Even with more exotic guns, they're just part of the same family of weapons where you pull the trigger, ammunition is fired, and people get hurt. It's nowhere near the complexity of a black hole, nor does it need an explanation. In fact, whatever anomaly they decide to use shouldn't need any explanation either as long as they say X does Y. The only time they need an explanation is for when they say X does Z, when we know in reality that X does not do Z.

Star Trek isn't about high concept science. Star Trek is mainly built around CHARACTERS.

I know it's not mainly about science, but it has often had a somewhat decent track record of not having ridiculously bad science. There are a few exceptions for sure, and usually they end up being the lambasted episodes because of how far fetched they are.

And just because it's about characters, plots, or allegories, doesn't negate the fact that the science can still make sense.

All very good examples. Because as you of all people should know, ALL of these movies/TV shows do an absolutely fucking horrible job of accurately depicting the scientific concepts they showcase. CSI and spinoffs is probably the worst offender by far.

I do know that, but that wasn't the point. I wasn't saying to look at those shows for scientific accuracy, but that they contain a sufficient amount of jargon, yet still remain fairly successful. This was a counter to your claim that any kind of technobabble will weigh a show down, even though what I originally suggested was very minute.

"being inescapable" is not a property of event horizons.

So are you saying that once things pass an event horizon that they can escape?

 

[Crazy Eddie]

I don't disagree with your interpretation of the story as seen. I'm simply arguing that the story as seen is ludicrous. An automated system must have some method of telling somebody that a fault has developed..

You started with "Scotty must have sensors and communications" and then went to "An automated system to run those sensors and communications must have some method of reporting..." There's an awful lot of "must have" going on here all based on surprisingly little that was actually seen of Delta Vega.

and are we saying that Scotty or Spock are incapable of modifying this system to send a message in time

There are only so many modifications you can make to a roomful of nothing.

The shuttle must have communications and sensors

Must it? How do you know?

if it had no sensors they couldn't have used the transporter.

I believe that's the "wearing a blindfold" part of Scotty's analogy. I doubt they could have beamed aboard the Enterprise UNLESS it was at warp; more likely he punched in some field equations for the ship's warp drive from memory and directly programmed the transporter beam to seek out that warp field and deposit Kirk and Scotty in an arbitrary section where Spock figured the engineering section would be.

Nah - Rand could just be a blonde on the bridge handing Pike Padds to approve who is then drafted in as a security guard by Spock.

This is why I said viable character. I would be kind of annoyed if Rand was reintroduced in the Trek reboot--once again--as "some blonde chick with a padd."

I think that your questions about communications still stand as plot holes in the current story - Keenser was left on the base after Nero stopped jamming and should have warned the fleet and Earth.

But he didn't, which necessarily means that he couldn't, because Delta Vega doesn't have a long range transmitter.

So should the Vulcan ships that escaped Nero

Why would they warn Earth? They didn't know anything about Nero, and those that did surely had no idea where he was going. Probably a few of them sent messages to Earth explaining that Vulcan had just been destroyed, which left Starfleet to wonder "What the hell just happened?"

Come to think of it, it might indeed be the case that the primary fleet from the Laurentian System was already recalled because of these warnings, and Kirk actually avoided a huge waste of time by skipping the rendezvous and heading straight to Earth (with the fleet still hours away by the time it was all said and done).

If Nero set off some kind of EMP device when he dropped off Spock to fry any equipment at the outpost (he does know how resourceful Spock can be), that would cover Scotty's equipment being in such disarray

Why would you need any other explanation other than "Delta Vega is a shithole posting on the ass end of the galaxy that doesn't even have a long range transmitter?"

If the inclusion of science is neutral then I think it's better to go with the version that has more educational value. I loved Professor Brian Cox's series, the Wonders of the Solar System (at least I think that's what it was called). He managed to simplify some pretty complex scientific issues for public consumption and the show was hugely popular as a result in the UK. People do want to know this stuff if it can be delivered in a way that is entertaining.

Sure, but again, science isn't the fulcrum of Star Trek, its characters are. Any scientific exposition you can add to the story should be done for that purpose and no other.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Why? It doesn't change the effect that the black hole has on the planet, while at the same time it adds the plot complications of having to explain 1) what a ring singularity is 2) why this makes a difference and 3) how the Enterprise crew know it's a ring singularity as opposed to, say, a point singularity or a multi-dimensional object of some kind.

None of which adds anything to the plot; once "it's a singularity; it's eating the planet" is established, the rest is just technobabble.

It was never about adding anything to any plot.

If it doesn't add anything, then why include it?

The percent I came up with was arbitrary. It was just my way of saying most people don't know what a singularity is at all. And of black holes, a lot of people think they're really just a hole of some sort. They don't know at all how it works.

Indeed. For the purposes of the story, they know all that they really need to know; if the audience knows that much, the writers have done their job. If for some reason the audience needs to know more, blame their science teachers.

In fact, whatever anomaly they decide to use shouldn't need any explanation either as long as they say X does Y. The only time they need an explanation is for when they say X does Z, when we know in reality that X does not do Z.

That's a double standard. I don't see you complaining whenever some character fires a bullet at the gas tank of a moving car, causing that car to erupt in a massive explosion, despite the fact that all scientific evidence suggests nothing of the sort would EVER occur strictly because of a bullet impact. To apply the same standard, you would have to substitute "9mm handgun" with "grenade launcher," but then we have to explain why the character just happens to be walking around with a grenade launcher in his pocket.

I know it's not mainly about science, but it has often had a somewhat decent track record of not having ridiculously bad science.

Since when? I think we jumped the shark of "ridiculously bad science" during the TOS years. Trek science since then has been sophisticated, exotic, colorful, thought provoking, even dramatic, but it has NEVER been realistic.

The only time the science gets lambasted for being "Bad" is when it is also stupid and unimaginative. For example: we forgive the whole "Mirror Universe" thing because it creates an interesting premise and situations for us to explore, despite the obvious logical flaws of how a universe with a completely different history could still have the exact same people in it (and their backgrounds aren't even the same; WTF?). We are not so forgiving of ENT's "Temporal Cold War," because some of the situations it generates and the questions it raises are silly and uninteresting.

As with all things, it isn't the concept Trek is known for, but the DELIVERY.

And just because it's about characters, plots, or allegories, doesn't negate the fact that the science can still make sense.

Sure it can. But even in Star Trek, it rarely does.

I do know that, but that wasn't the point. I wasn't saying to look at those shows for scientific accuracy, but that they contain a sufficient amount of jargon, yet still remain fairly successful.

That's because those shows are about the jargon. The characters who use the jargon are virtually interchangeable, so much so that CSI Las Vegas has gone through a half dozen caste members already without even slightly changing its original formula: the science, in the end, IS the real star of the show.

Star Trek doesn't work that way (at least, not when it's good).

This was a counter to your claim that any kind of technobabble will weigh a show down

My claim is that technobabble will weigh Star Trek down. CSI fans watch the show specifically see what kind of scientific magic will be used to catch the bad guys this week; they expect this, so they give the show a pass when some of its depictions strain credibility. Star Trek lives or dies first and foremost on the strength of its characters, so anything that draws attention AWAY from those characters tends to reduce the effect of the story.

So are you saying that once things pass an event horizon that they can escape?

Absolutely. Especially event horizons that do not form around black holes.

 

[Pauln6]

You started with "Scotty must have sensors and communications" and then went to "An automated system to run those sensors and communications must have some method of reporting..." There's an awful lot of "must have" going on here all based on surprisingly little that was actually seen of Delta Vega.

But he didn't, which necessarily means that he couldn't, because Delta Vega doesn't have a long range transmitter.

Why would you need any other explanation other than "Delta Vega is a shithole posting on the ass end of the galaxy that doesn't even have a long range transmitter?"

Lol - but if you insist on viewing what we see on screen in isolation rather than in the context of 40 years of established history and Trek Tech you also have to be consistent with what you see on screen. Historically, Starfleet outposts DO have communications and sensors - manned outposts even more so. We also know from the scenes we've seen with shuttles in the past that they do have communications and they do have sensors.

Using your own method of analysis and sticking to what we see on screen, we also know that they do have a long range transmitter in the shuttle if nowhere else, because they use it to transmit the transporter signal across billions of km to the Enterprise. This is what I mean when I talk about the movie maintaining the internal logic of the science that it is itself establishing.

I believe that long range communications are processed through a network of relay stations. I suppose when a relay station receives an uncoded transmission, they can monitor the message and pass it to where it needs to be.

I believe that's the "wearing a blindfold" part of Scotty's analogy. I doubt they could have beamed aboard the Enterprise UNLESS it was at warp; more likely he punched in some field equations for the ship's warp drive from memory and directly programmed the transporter beam to seek out that warp field and deposit Kirk and Scotty in an arbitrary section where Spock figured the engineering section would be.

A transporter beam is a beam of information sent to a location determined by co-ordinates (called transporter co-ordinates) that are located using sensors (presumably including a program to reconstitute the signal when those co-ordinates are reached). The beam itself doesn't have sensors, the transporter equipment does (called targeting sensors), which lock onto the comm badge signal or fellow ships transporter signal etc (transporter lock). All Scotty's equation is doing is predicting where the Enterprise will be in the time it takes the signal to reach the co-ordinates determined by the sensors. If the beam was tracking the warp signal itself, they wouldn't need to worry about space moving because the beam would target the signal no matter where it was.

Space is big. REALLY, REALY BIG. I can't begin to explain just how mind bogglingly big space is. (I apolgise for the dodgy paraphrasing, it's been a while since I listened to the play). Thus, they need sensors to locate the warp field and warp trail and Scotty's equation to predict where the moving ship will be in the time it takes to get there.

Ergo, they do have sensors and they do have a long range transmitter.

This is why I said viable character. I would be kind of annoyed if Rand was reintroduced in the Trek reboot--once again--as "some blonde chick with a padd."

My point was to counter your assertion that it would take 45 minutes to introduce her when it did not take 45 minutes to introduce anybody other than the two leads. She can be INTRODUCED as someone with a padd who later uses combat training to subdue Kirk, is tasked with overseeing his incarceration on the planet, is persuaded by Spock and Kirk to help (foeshadowing her admiration for her captain) and who has to help working on transporters and communications. That is pretty much on par with the air time that Sulu and Chekov were allowed. Don't forget, much as I love Janice, she's going to be a third tier character since principle female lead is now Uhura's bag.

Why would they warn Earth? They didn't know anything about Nero, and those that did surely had no idea where he was going. Probably a few of them sent messages to Earth explaining that Vulcan had just been destroyed, which left Starfleet to wonder "What the hell just happened?"

Come to think of it, it might indeed be the case that the primary fleet from the Laurentian System was already recalled because of these warnings, and Kirk actually avoided a huge waste of time by skipping the rendezvous and heading straight to Earth (with the fleet still hours away by the time it was all said and done).

Logic dictates that the Vulcans, who asked Earth for assistance, should keep Earth appraised of the current position as soon as they are able. Many Vulcans would not know the location of the fleet. Earth is the logical first choice, followed by other Federation worlds to whom they may or may not also have sent the call for aid (assuming the escaping Vulcan citzens had been kept informed by the High Command). The Vulcan ships will also have sensors and will be trying to track Nero. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

Ships from the fleet travelling at warp 9+ could probably have overtaken Nero, who was travelling at less than Warp 4 (for Enterprise to be able to overtake him). It is also possible that Nero was so slow because he was picking off escaping Vulcan ships at warp while trying to get info on Earth's defence grid but the fact remains that he was slow.

I think your disdain for science giving the plot more internal logic is starting to show! Sure many people don't care but if you try to use logic to counter the plot holes it often doesn't work. Those of us that do care are just saying that a few minor tweaks would not have changed the overall plot much would have improved internal logic and pleased a larger number of viewers.

 

[Ryan8bit]

If it doesn't add anything, then why include it?

It's more of a reinforcement or rather not subtracting from the plot. The way I see it is they have a few options:

1. Use good science with the plot
2. Use bad science with the plot
3. Use a completely fictional concept with the plot

Option 1 doesn't pull people out of the story while option 2 does. Option 3 is the kind of thing that already exists in practically every Trek story, yet most people can suspend their disbelief on.

That's a double standard. I don't see you complaining whenever some character fires a bullet at the gas tank of a moving car, causing that car to erupt in a massive explosion, despite the fact that all scientific evidence suggests nothing of the sort would EVER occur strictly because of a bullet impact.

How could you see me complaining about that?

Believe me, when things like that happen and I am aware of it, I am pulled out of the story.

Since when? I think we jumped the shark of "ridiculously bad science" during the TOS years. Trek science since then has been sophisticated, exotic, colorful, thought provoking, even dramatic, but it has NEVER been realistic.

I mostly refer to TNG, and I never said realistic, I said "not ridiculously bad", which is what I feel this movie had a lot of.

That's because those shows are about the jargon. The characters who use the jargon are virtually interchangeable, so much so that CSI Las Vegas has gone through a half dozen caste members already without even slightly changing its original formula: the science, in the end, IS the real star of the show.

I used to like CSI quite a bit regardless of some of their ridiculous science. The "explanations" were neat, but I watched the show more for the characters. When the characters moved on, I stopped watching, and I never watched the spinoffs.

A show is really only about what someone makes it out to be, I guess. I don't make Star Trek out to be some apex of science, because it clearly isn't, but I also don't lump it in the category of complete fantasy like Star Wars. It's somewhere in between. Given how the producers essentially wanted to make this movie more like Star Wars, I'm not shocked by the result, but disappointed nonetheless.

Star Trek lives or dies first and foremost on the strength of its characters, so anything that draws attention AWAY from those characters tends to reduce the effect of the story.

I dunno, maybe it's just me, but I don't like stories that have boring characters of any kind, and I think a lot of people identify with that. Some people might only care about plot, some might only care about science/details, and some might only care about seeing pretty pictures on the screen. For me it's the whole package, but characters are first and foremost with plot in a close second place, and that's for every form of entertainment, CSI included.

Absolutely. Especially event horizons that do not form around black holes.

Well, I meant in the context of a black hole. The event horizon described as the boundary of what we can see in the universe is pretty irrelevant to this discussion.

What I'd like to know is how a wormhole as depicted in Trek really has an event horizon? I don't care what Geordi said in "The Price" because they didn't use the term correctly.

 

[Peter the Younger]

If it doesn't add anything, then why include it?

It's more of a reinforcement or rather not subtracting from the plot. The way I see it is they have a few options:

1. Use good science with the plot
2. Use bad science with the plot
3. Use a completely fictional concept with the plot

Option 1 doesn't pull people out of the story while option 2 does. Option 3 is the kind of thing that already exists in practically every Trek story, yet most people can suspend their disbelief on.

The difference between 2 and 3 strikes me as a strange and fuzzy distinction. If I understand correctly, you're saying that it's bad science to define singularities vaguely, but equipping the Enterprise with warp drive, artificial gravity, and transporters are okay because that's accepted make believe? How is all that handwaving any different in the eyes of the audience? Even setting that aside, there are many, many fixtures of Trek that don't fit your definitions. Take the M-AM reactor: we may not be able to build one, but we understand the principles well enough to do the math. If Trek were really good about science, the Big E would have external radiators the size of Manhattan.

Sorry, I don't see any objective standard there.

 

[Ryan8bit]

The difference between 2 and 3 strikes me as a strange and fuzzy distinction. If I understand correctly, you're saying that it's bad science to define singularities vaguely, but equipping the Enterprise with warp drive, artificial gravity, and transporters are okay because that's accepted make believe?

It's the line between fact and fiction. Obviously we don't know how to do the technology needed for warp drive, transporters, etc. so the writers come up with things like Heisenberg compensators. That's the fictional part. Same with red matter. We don't need to know how it really works because the writers don't. No one does.

But if for instance, the crew lands a shuttle on a small asteroid, yet gravity appears to be just like Earth gravity, well that's contradicting what we already know about science. It's no longer fiction, it's just unreasonable.

Get the difference?

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Lol - but if you insist on viewing what we see on screen in isolation rather than in the context of 40 years of established history...

What, in 40 years of established history, ever implied that Delta Vega has a long range transmitter?

Historically, Starfleet outposts DO have communications and sensors

I'm puzzled as to what that "historically" is based on. The only Starfleet outposts we've ever seen in detail have all been major starbases or large major installations. Delta Vega is neither.

Using your own method of analysis and sticking to what we see on screen, we also know that they do have a long range transmitter in the shuttle if nowhere else, because they use it to transmit the transporter signal across billions of km to the Enterprise.

I believe that's covered under Scotty's "Shield emitters are [tap tap] totally banjacks, as well as a few other things..." that obviously covers sensors and long range transmitters, without which Scotty is evidently marooned on this planet for six months with only emergency rations and a tribble for company.

I believe that's the "wearing a blindfold" part of Scotty's analogy. I doubt they could have beamed aboard the Enterprise UNLESS it was at warp; more likely he punched in some field equations for the ship's warp drive from memory and directly programmed the transporter beam to seek out that warp field and deposit Kirk and Scotty in an arbitrary section where Spock figured the engineering section would be.

A transporter beam is a beam of information

Strictly speaking, it's a beam of phased matter following a subspace carrier wave (established in "Best of Both Worlds" among other things). Tuning a transporter beam to home in on a particular subspace field is something that SEEMS incredibly complicated, unless you've worked out mathematically exactly how to do it. That's why Spock is able to do it with an equation and NOT with a specific set of coordinates and velocity vectors (which Scotty assumes would be needed, and ordinarily he would be correct).

If you assume that space is the thing that is moving, you don't need to know where the Enterprise is, you only need to know its warp signature. This, BTW, is again implied in the deleted scene where Archer's missing beagle materializes in the Enterprise' engine room. Something very similar occurs in ENT "Daedalus" where Emory explains: "This region, the Barrens, is actually a subspace node, a bubble of curved space-time. It's why there are no stars. Quinn's transporter signal is trapped here. At certain intervals, there are fluctuations in the node that cause the signal to reappear. If we can lock onto it at one of those intervals we can save him."

Emphasis mine. Transporter beams go through subspace carrier waves, so materializing again isn't a simple matter of point and shoot. Sometimes, it's a matter of point and hope.

My point was to counter your assertion that it would take 45 minutes to introduce her when it did not take 45 minutes to introduce anybody other than the two leads.

Except if you're not going to give her anything interesting to do other than hand Spock a PADD and guard Kirk, why introduce the character in the first place? They already screwed the pooch adding Keenser for no obvious reason...

Logic dictates that the Vulcans, who asked Earth for assistance, should keep Earth appraised of the current position as soon as they are able.

Current position of what? THe Vulcans that sent the distress signal did so reporting seismic disturbances, probably caused by the formation of Spock's black hole. THEY were all killed when the planet imploded, so the ones that were left would report the destruction of their planet to Starfleet and a few of them might catch a glimpse of a large unidentified space vessel leaving the area soon after.

The only people in the universe who know of Nero's intentions at this point are the crew of the Enterprise; the Vulcans, who do not have access to Starfleet records (and even if they do, aren't experts on the subject like Kirk and Pike) have no idea who Nero is and have never seen the Nerada before.

The Vulcan ships will also have sensors and will be trying to track Nero.

I repeat: why would they be trying to track Nero when not a one of them has any idea who Nero is?

Ships from the fleet travelling at warp 9+ could probably have overtaken Nero

From where? We don't know where the Laurentine system is or how long it would take for Starfleet to travel back to Earth from there, even at maximum warp.

I think your disdain for science giving the plot more internal logic is starting to show!

"Science" doesn't provide internal logic to a story. Good editing does that, science or not.