The galaxy is small, you can get from Earth to Vulcan in ten minutes and that's 16 ly away
Nostalgia for the 24th Century
- Thread starter Emperor Norton
- Start date
She said implied that the alpha quadrant was largely explored in their time. It's not a simple matter of being fast, but of exploring. There would be about 75 billion stars in the alpha quadrant. Let's assume that "largely" means 51%. That's 38.25 billion stars that must have been explored for Janeway's statement to be true.
If we take the time between Janeway's statement and Earth's first FTL explorer (S.S. Valiant) we get 308 years. That means that on average 124,188,311 Stars and their systems would need to have been explored every year. To me the term exploration means more than just charting it means, seeing what is there. How long would it take a starship to explore one star system? It seem like even a week wouldn't be enough to adequately explore a star system. But for our purposes lets say it takes a week and that you have not travel time. That means that it would take an average of 2,388,236 starships per year to explore 51% of the alpha quadrant. That seems a little bit high to me.
You could adjust to include data from other member world but I think the result would be largely the same. It is just not physically possible for the alpha quadrant to be largely explored by Janeway's time. It doesn't matter how fast you get there.
Not all stars have planets or inhabited ones, out of those roughly 120,000,000 stars let's say 10 percent have planets of any interest not just rocks and the occasional gas giant.
Then out of those 12,000,000 ten percent have intelligent civilizations pre-warp or post-warp. That checks out to 1.2 million real star systems of interest. Out of 1.2 million let's say 120,000 of those have post warp societies the rest are any where from the Neolithic to current earth levels of technology. Heck even then not all might have warp some are destroyed in early interstellar wars, others go extinct in the verge of warp discovery. Some pursue isolationist policies keeping away from outsiders, others are exterminated by other alien species they encounter. Or heck omega disasters rendering FTL travel(by warp means) impossible.
120,000 is still a lot and some will surely make contact with the federation at some point but eventually it will happen and quicker than you think.
Yes you will also have your Trekkian anomalies, godlings and so on that will distort the stats somewhat but that isn't much in the grand scale.
Now you might respond by saying all star systems. Okay that's substantially more. How many have more than a few planets? How many have have nothing of interest but helium, hydrogen, and perhaps some dilithium? Sure some will have flourishing ecosystems and interesting stuff for scientists to spend decades studying but that's the point that stuff will wait and you can always use long range scans(possible in Trek) to do any research.
I would think all planets would of interest. Even planets with just rocks would be of intense interest to geologists. I doubt any science ship will pull into a system, observe only rocky bodies and gas giants, then leave becasue there was nothing to see. It would probably be many scientists dream to explore a previously explored rocky planet or gas giant. While such a system might not have any interest to us as a TV viewing audience, that same shouldn't be said for people whose careers or centered on that field of study.
A survey ship might just zip through a system, but an exploration ship would stay and research. And I'd say that even a week would far too short a time to properly explore a star system, let alone one planet. I'd imagine a ships would spend months in one system. The reason we don't see our hero ships do that is becasue they are also involved in transportation or cargo, patrol, and security. They are the swiss army knife of spaceships, so they are going to be zipping around a lot more.
Now I did specify a different between charting and exploring. Charting/mapping/surveying is just finding out what objects are where. Exploring is actually taking the time to examine each object. Exploring can't be done on long range sensors. And to note by 2365 19% of the galaxy had been charted. So while the majority of the Alpha Quadrant may have been charted by Janeway's time, it seems highly unlikely that it has been largely explored.
Do you recall in Enterprise the Vulcans used an elaborate scanning device to spy on the Andorians? I imagine by the 24th century various techniques are advanced enough to allow accurate and detailed observation from a distance.
And as I also said the number of civilizations found will be varied with substantially fewer warp ones.
And other civilizations as well say STL travel or near FTL(Valakians). Might be well around the range of tech which given prime directive considerations will be avoided if observed from a distance.
Not to mention civilizations that have transcended(become like Organians) or whose tech is so integrated into nature it becomes impossible to distinguish a star or planet from highly advanced culture.
And then don't mention say the Horta, or any other range of species that don't have carbon chemistry, from Q-lings to microscopic sentiences to vacuum dwelling creatures. All sorts of wonderful variety that might go entirely unnoticed.
That sort of stuff previously mentioned will either be discovered, reveal itself, or never be found and the federation will deem hence regions explored.
Your right about IU geologists being interested in rocks and gas giants, but I doubt Janeway meant thoroughly catalogued to the last virus when she said Alpha Quadrant mostly unexplored.
Not to mention civilizations that have transcended(become like Organians) or whose tech is so integrated into nature it becomes impossible to distinguish a star or planet from highly advanced culture.
And then don't mention say the Horta, or any other range of species that don't have carbon chemistry, from Q-lings to microscopic sentiences to vacuum dwelling creatures. All sorts of wonderful variety that might go entirely unnoticed.
That sort of stuff previously mentioned will either be discovered, reveal itself, or never be found and the federation will deem hence regions explored.
Your right about IU geologists being interested in rocks and gas giants, but I doubt Janeway meant thoroughly catalogued to the last virus when she said Alpha Quadrant mostly unexplored.
Sometimes, you just can't hold televised sci fi to the standard and scope of reality. A fourth of the real galaxy is vast. But in 24th-century Trek parlance, the "Alpha Quadrant" is often synonymous with a handful of familiar planets controlled by 3-5 major interstellar powers. It's kind of like how a real Earth-like planet is vast, but in 23rd- (and 24th-) century Trek, almost every M class planet has one language, culture and clothing style, and everyone on that planet lives in 2-3 major settlements.
I hope the Trek franchise is never completely rebooted, without any fictional connection to what's come before. It seems to me, only two kinds of properties get that kind of full reboot:
a) completely moribund properties being remade almost exclusively for a new audience
b) cartoony, comic book-like properties that are in a state of perpetual reboot--like characters in the funnies, the characters in these properties seem not to age (at least not normally) as time goes by--intentional continuity breaks in their fictional worlds are common--different actors pass in and out of the familiar roles like modular playing pieces
I hope Trek hasn't become (a), and I don't want to see it become (b).
a) completely moribund properties being remade almost exclusively for a new audience
b) cartoony, comic book-like properties that are in a state of perpetual reboot--like characters in the funnies, the characters in these properties seem not to age (at least not normally) as time goes by--intentional continuity breaks in their fictional worlds are common--different actors pass in and out of the familiar roles like modular playing pieces
I hope Trek hasn't become (a), and I don't want to see it become (b).
What about Star Wars though? They rebooted my beloved EU yet kept the movies and TCW? How does that fit under your classification?
While a light sprinkling of occasional politics is okay, a political heavy Star Trek show would not be "worth watching."
And then there the holes in Chakotay's detailed knowledge of his ancestors.
Janeway might not have been speaking solely Earth exploration, but the combine explorations of all Federation member, some of whom could have been exploring for thousands of years before Earth even started.
Well, since you brought it up . . .
In my opinion, everything Disney has done with Star Wars has made it look more like a comic book franchise, from completely decanonizing the "Expanded Universe" to promising an endless parade of movies in which different actors portray the most beloved (thus iconic) original characters. They're basically running Star Wars the way they run Marvel.
What we knew, is gone.
Our home, our lives.
All that we were... Dust!
Blasted across empty, heartless skies.
But we live...our legacy lives!
Within every ship we fly, upon every world we touch!
In our hearts, in yours.
There will be challenge, you will know fear!
But you will overcome!
You will survive!
And answer vengeance with blood!
You will do as you must!
Rule cannot be handed to the faithless!
Our legacy cannot be lost to villains!
Bury the past, to face the future! In enemies, find allies!
There is no price we have not paid!
No loss we have not felt!
Our dead world!
Our long suffering!
These are not ends!
We are not ended!
For your crew, for your people, for this new home!
We must face all doubt!
We must break the strong who would destroy us!
We must overcome the impossible!
We must fight, against any, and all!
We must, we will!
FOR WE ARE ROMULAN!!!
And yet, still better than the SW prequels.
Honestly, as somebody who has been reading Marvel Comics since they were only twelve cents apiece, and who discovered STAR WARS in the comic books months before the first movie opened in 1977, I think Disney is doing a great job with both properties.
Where's the harm in rebooting a classic character or universe every generation of so? To my mind, that's preferable to treating the "canon" as an "iconic" sacred cow that needs to be preserved at all cost. Have fun with this stuff, mess with it, update it, treat as it raw material to play with anew. That strikes me as potentially more creative and rewarding than stubbornly trying to maintain some sort of seamless continuity with whatever's come before.
And where's the harm in recasting a part? That's kinda been what theater has done since the days of the Greeks, and Hollywood as well. No role is "owned" by one actor exclusively. There's always room for a new interpretation. Heck, half the fun of remakes and reboots and revivals is seeing how how different actors portray the same classic roles.
If I had my way, I would ban the words "canon" and "iconic" from the internet, but that's just me.
YMMV.
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"Janeway might not have been speaking solely Earth exploration, but the combine explorations of all Federation member, some of whom could have been exploring for thousands of years before Earth even started."
Alternatively Janeway might have been off her meds that day and talking completely out of her ...hat...
No, you are not. I've been nostalgic for the 24th century ever since "Enterprise" started and the last TNG movie was made.
Personally I never left the 24th century, or as the Prophets (or what those beings in the wormhole were) said to Sisko: "You exist here!"
Was it? Oops.
And as somebody who liked the Star Wars prequels and who has never felt drawn to read a comic book, nor felt drawn to read or watch any story about a superhero, I don't like Disney's take on Star Wars. So I think we can just chalk this disagreement up to completely different aesthetic tastes.And yet, still better than the SW prequels.
Honestly, as somebody who has been reading Marvel Comics since they were only twelve cents apiece, and who discovered STAR WARS in the comic books months before the first movie opened in 1977, I think Disney is doing a great job with both properties.
The harm is that it makes the story feel more like a cartoony comic book. I don't like them. I accept that other people do and that there's a place for them in the world of entertainment. But that place doesn't have to be televised or cinematic Star Trek, which has always operated by a different kind of fictional rules in its world building.
The choice for every story does not need to be a stark, binary one between perpetual reboots on the Marvel model or "stubbornly trying to maintain some sort of seamless continuity." First of all, not every story needs to be franchised for perpetuity. If you feel creatively stifled by working by the rules of some past story, just let that story rest, and write your own. I'm not calling for complete originality, which is a myth, but you can reimagine and retell a great story without overtly rebooting it. I'd much rather watch West Side Story than a gimmicky reboot of Romeo and Juliet that clothes the characters in distracting costumes from a period to which they do not belong.
But second of all, and more pertinent to Star Trek, there are ways to work creatively within an existing franchise without overtly rebooting it or getting caught in a self-referential web of stubborn, seamless continuity. The creators of The Next Generation hit on one great way. Set your story in a removed enough place and time within the same fictional universe that continuity problems rarely need to come up and even more rarely distract the casual fan from a good story. The creators of the Kelvinverse movies hit on another great way, especially for science-fiction. Set your story in an alternate timeline or reality, so you can re-cast old characters and do things your way without denying the existence of the older stories to which you are indebted. Far from a creative gesture, just wholesale rebooting a franchise (especially now that doing so has become an established Hollywood model) strikes me as a failure of imagination, given the array of other more artful, complicated and generically appropriate options.
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Fair enough. Although I can't resist pointing out that STAR WARS was inspired by FLASH GORDON--which was a comic strip!
You seem to regard "comic-book" as a perjorative while holding movie and TV space operas to a higher standard when it comes to continuity. But, honestly, comic books, space operas, monster movies, etc, all draw from the same sources, overlap and influence each other, and appeal to largely the same audience. Aliens, robots, spaceships, vampires, mermaids, superheroes . . . we're all splashing around in the same pond here.
Plus, it's not just comic books that are recast and rebooted endlessly. Look at King Arthur, Sinbad, Robin Hood, Sherlock Holmes, Dracula, Tarzan, Zorro, The Three Musketeers, Godzilla, King Kong, The Mummy, Planet of the Apes, etc. Why should STAR TREK or STAR WARS be any different?
And, sure, you can come up with sometimes ingenious, sometimes contrived ways to maintain the continuity, but what is exactly is gained there? Continuity should be a means to an end, not an end in itself. Ultimately, it doesn't affect the actual quality or execution of the work. A bad revival isn't improved by maintaining a seamless line of succession, just as a good reboot isn't necessarily hurt by cutting the cord to some prior continuity.
Then again, I love alternative productions of Shakespeare that take place in modern dress or in the Old West or medieval Japan or whatever, so, yeah, we may have very different tastes there!
(I still have fond memories of "A Midsummer Night's Dream" that switched the setting to a 1950s high school, complete with vintage pop tunes, which fit the story surprisingly well. Trust me, it worked! "Let us rock the ground on which these sleepers lie!")
Come to think of it, most of the books I'm editing for Tor these days are cross-genre mashups that mix tropes from comic books, science fiction, horror, fantasy, and westerns together in fun and interesting ways . . . so at least I'm putting my money where my mouth is.
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