OK, how does the Universal Translator work?

[Ben]

Here's what was always weird to me. Say some alien is talking about some amount of items. He's like "We will transfer 1000 cubic tons of delicium to your ship shortly." Presumably that alien doesn't use tons in his society. They have some other unit for weight/mass. The translator is just translating and converting it into tons. But what are the odds that both measures are nice round numbers like this! Or is the alien actually saying "I'll transfer 4.82905208352 blarks to your ship" and that just happens to convert to a nice round 1000? Or does the translator round?

I'm happy to assume that any of these issues have been figured out in the 100-200 years since the devices have been invented. But it's fun to ponder.

 

[Idran]

It probably rounds, the same way translators round in similar contextual situations in real life. If a French book said that something was "douze mètres" tall, a (good) translator wouldn't turn that to "39.37 feet" in an English printing unless it was obvious that it was a precise value; they would turn it to "40 feet". (And even if it was a precise value, they'd probably still stick with significant figures and say "39 feet", as going with the precise conversion is still only as accurate as the original measured value anyway.)

 

[hbquikcomjamesl]

Wasn't there something in The Making of Star Trek to the effect that Roddenberry was contacted by a number of companies that were actually working on some sort of U.T.?

"The vodka is strong, but the meat is rotten."

 

[Timo]

except that if both parties were using that kind of translator, we'd see and hear them speaking each other's languages.

I don't think this is a problem at all - we should simply assume our TV receivers are equipped with a UT of their own. A device that translates all incoming languages into English is the most plausible variant of UT, and that's what CBS has plugged in for our benefit. The heroes cope in their own fashion, and significantly, they are veterans of coping...

As for translations not being convincing, our brain excels in one skill above all others, and that's self-deception. Poor lipsynch becomes invisible after a while, as do odd accents and foreign turns of phrase. Perhaps the most important circuit in the UT is the one that promotes self-deception in the brain and inhibits critical thinking, so that the above effect is magnified? We already have some idea of how such filters work for our different senses (it's not just the brain, the sensing organs do a fair amount of pre-filtering, too); all we need is a basic, generic technology for neural interfacing so that we can mess with those functions.

Or does the translator round?

This is an issue that becomes the most acute with units of time. "Twenty hours" can be very imprecise. But if our heroes get a countdown of "fifty seconds", then rounding might be lethal.

However, both TOS and TNG are infamous for their copious use of seemingly superfluous decimals. Spock need not have been anal-retentively accurate with his units - merely with his translations (he may have been speaking Vulcan all the time, his UT implant hiding this fact). And the spinoff crews also have their share of token aliens, so they might forgo rounding that doesn't benefit everybody on the bridge.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[HIjol]

None of the above.

Sorry.

Here is the One, True way:

The Prop Girls and Guys get a paper towel role from the Commisary
They paint it silver
They glue unique doorknobs on either end
They wire up some mini- lights and stuff, with a battery for power
The Script Girls and Guys write up some jazzy Alien-sounding "words"
The decide what the words "say" in English
They write that down, too
The Actors get their scripts
They study and remember what the "Alien"/English words are
The cameras roll
Everybody knows the words and "translations"
Voila! How the Universal Translator works!
,

 

[Idran]

Timo, do you have actual examples of that kind of direct thought-manipulation tech being as commonplace in Trek as you present? Because I really do have no idea where you get that impression from. With how shocking the events of Dagger of the Mind and The Game were presented as, I really don't see this route as anywhere near parsimonious.

The only time anything close to this was presented with Federation tech that I can remember was in Creative Coupling with the no-right-turns prank, and that took a lot more effort and was a lot more surprising than it likely would have been if direct brain manipulation was simply a fact of life. They wouldn't have had to Differential Diagnosis their way through figuring out what was happening and how the way they did if it was just a built in feature of the UT. And outside the books I can't think of any examples at all offhand.

 

[Pauln6]

Actually, scientists are working UTs that can interpret activity in the human brain (our inner voice) for those with locked in syndrome. It requires a lot more trial and error though since presumably it is completely individual and can only interpret concepts to which it has already been exposed. Still pretty cool though and shows that, despite skepticism, the UT could work by interpreting brainwaves rather than requiring people to speak out loud.

 

[Timo]

Technology to manipulate neural signals is seldom mentioned in Trek - but we could argue this is because it's so commonplace. DS9 shows petty criminals operating with direct brain-to-machine interfaces; Crusher is always applying fancy medical machines on the foreheads of her patients to do something to their neural signals; and Bashir has those "Romulan mind probes" that are such a convenient tool for toying with brain signals that the UFP had to make them illegal. This is not really state-of-the-art technology - sure, you may have to steal it from somebody's lab, but that's also how you access illegal recreational drugs today, and them coming from a "lab" doesn't mean they'd be high tech.

What was shocking about "Dagger of the Mind"? Helen Noel's professional option was that the neural neutralizer was a very useful medical tool, just as she had read in all the articles; the device was by no means rare and unusual (in the sense of being the secret invention of the mad scientist) as another was later encountered at Elba II, another facility with the perfect excuse to have one.

As for "The Game", this just goes to show that mind manipulation tech is available to all sorts of two-bit villains.

What is explicitly lacking is technology to tie together the gadget-based reading and manipulation of minds, and the natural abilities of telepathic species and individuals. Quark in "Jem'Hadar" is convinced that even a device as crude as a generic telepathic inhibitor is beyond the skills of the entire known civilization. However, this wouldn't stop a Vulcan scientist from perfecting the machine-based neural interface by using his natural senses to monitor the test subject...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Idran]

You're arguing based on your conclusion, though, Timo. You could argue that the fact that it's seldom mentioned is because it's commonplace, but that would be a fallacious argument; a lack of evidence is just a lack of evidence.

For "Dagger of the Mind", what was shocking was the existence of it; I didn't mean shocking as though the mere existence offended from the start, but rather that the existence of it was a surprise even though it would be a short jump from the kind of UT brain implant you're suggesting. The device from "The Game" was similar even though it was even more fundamentally simple. The analysis showed that it just generally triggered the pleasure center, causing suggestibility and impeding higher reasoning. A sledgehammer compared to the chisel you're talking about. Though I'll admit that the way it was introduced onto the ship was exactly the direction it should have gone while still being unnoticed, so I'll concede that it isn't really evidence against your position, if for a different reason than you were proposing.

And your examples are still a wide jump from this. Crusher's medical machines are cortical stimulators, they're the brain equivalent of a defibrillator and that's all they've ever been presented as; it's the rare example of a piece of technology in Star Trek with a single defined use that had never been shown put to any off-book application, in fact. Romulan mind probes, meanwhile, only record thoughts, they don't modify them; they're a sort of technological telepathy themselves, they read minds. And even then it's mind reading clocked in abstraction and metaphor rather than individually targeting specific thoughts. And, I mean, the fact that something purely meant for analyzing and storing thoughts is illegal in the UFP is more evidence against your interpretation, not for, as technology with that function would be a fundamental necessity for this kind of brain implant.

As for direct brain-to-machine interfaces, they have nothing at all to do with the technology that would be needed to to this. We have direct brain-to-machine interfaces here now, in real life. And they don't have any ability whatsoever to identify individual abstract concepts, because they don't need to in order to function. Maybe the specific example you're referring to is more complex than moving a cursor, but I honestly can't remember what specifically you're referencing with that; what exactly was the example you're talking about?

I'm thinking further on examples of direct brain technology that showed up in Trek, and literally every single example I can think of was presented as either something revolutionary or something that just doesn't fit with the idea of such an implant. Ira Graves' tech was a revolution that could never be duplicated. Pulaski's memory erasure technique was purely chronological-based and couldn't identify memory by content, and even then it was only partially successful. "Life Support" presented humanoid thoughts as though they were something specially biological that couldn't be properly expressed by a machine. Again and again Trek rules out the idea of being a civilization where technology regularly successfully interacts with neurology.

Not every single thing has an in-universe interpretation. Sometimes a cameraman's reflection gets caught on film, sometimes a boom mike slips into a shot, and sometimes they come up with magic technology to make writing easier. Sometimes you've just got to be Doylist, and I think this is one of those times. If you ignore every single piece of circumstantial evidence across the entire series just for the sake of making what we see exactly what really happened, then sure, but why does what we see have to be exactly what really happened?

(Also I think this is the longest post I've ever written on TrekBBS; I hope you don't take the length of the post as a sign of any sort of ire towards you. This is actually an enjoyable debate on my end, and I hope it is for you too!)

 

[Christopher]

Not every single thing has an in-universe interpretation. Sometimes a cameraman's reflection gets caught on film, sometimes a boom mike slips into a shot, and sometimes they come up with magic technology to make writing easier. Sometimes you've just got to be Doylist, and I think this is one of those times. If you ignore every single piece of circumstantial evidence across the entire series just for the sake of making what we see exactly what really happened, then sure, but why does what we see have to be exactly what really happened?

Yeah. Sometimes it helps to consider what we're seeing as a dramatization, and that means some things are streamlined or simplified for the sake of pacing. Maybe there's a longer process of the translator initially learning a new alien language before it manages to achieve fluency, as we sometimes see in novels, but TV and movies don't have time to show it, so they simplify (except in occasional instances like early Enterprise and DS9's "Sanctuary"). Although it's harder to explain the use of translators to fake being natives, like in "Civilization." Ultimately that's just as much a dramatic conceit as having humanoid aliens in the first place. You can try to handwave it away to make it feel somewhat more plausible, but ultimately there's still some suspension of disbelief required.

 

[Melakon]

The Ferengi version of the Universal Translator seems to be placed inside the ear, according to "Little Green Men", so it might work like a Babel Fish.

 

[Klaus]

With those ears, a Babel trout would work...

 

[Timo]

You could argue that the fact that it's seldom mentioned is because it's commonplace, but that would be a fallacious argument; a lack of evidence is just a lack of evidence.

Ah, but when X is seldom mentioned and when it does get mentioned it is not considered that big a deal, then this actually has quite a bit of evidence value. Let's examine this again:

For "Dagger of the Mind", what was shocking was the existence of it

Of what? The Neural Neutralizer was not shocking any experts. Noel: "Beam neutralising has been experimented with on Earth, Captain. I'm not acquainted with this particular style of equipment, but I can assure you that Doctor Adams has not created a chamber of horrors here."

OTOH, the device isn't a particularly good example of intricate manipulation of the brain. It's just a hypnosis device of sorts that then allows the therapist to perform classic suggestion. (Although this is the very power that the UT would need in order to make the user blind to the clumsiness of the translation!)

It's not an implant, either... But Noel does say that the use of a "beam" is the thing that is experimental here; perhaps previous technologies to this end have been of the contact type?

The analysis showed that it just generally triggered the pleasure center, causing suggestibility and impeding higher reasoning. A sledgehammer compared to the chisel you're talking about.

Well, you brought up the device as relevant. I deny that relevance because nothing about the device is considered shocking, mysterious or radically new. It's simply nastier than the heroes at first surmised - an innocuous gadget being used for evil.

Again, though, the tech clearly is there for making the brain accept as natural certain things it would not otherwise accept, which helps out with the UT challenges.

Romulan mind probes, meanwhile, only record thoughts, they don't modify them; they're a sort of technological telepathy themselves, they read minds.

Hmh? They created a wholly interactive environment inside Sloane's noggin. Bashir and O'Brien weren't speaking to the unconscious (and ultimately dead) Sloane, they were rummaging through his mind, and he still responded.

And, I mean, the fact that something purely meant for analyzing and storing thoughts is illegal in the UFP is more evidence against your interpretation, not for, as technology with that function would be a fundamental necessity for this kind of brain implant.

The existence of illegal tech just shows that the tech exists and has applications. Some of those are illegal; it doesn't follow that others wouldn't be legal. Making new Khans is such a no-no that parents caring for their slow child very nearly face the execution squad, but a starship doctor can still rewrite the entire genome of her patient with no issues raised, say.

As for direct brain-to-machine interfaces, they have nothing at all to do with the technology that would be needed to to this.

Sounds silly, as machines interacting with brains is the very topic at hand. Beyond that, it's all software.

Maybe the specific example you're referring to is more complex than moving a cursor, but I honestly can't remember what specifically you're referencing with that; what exactly was the example you're talking about?

"Honor Among Thieves" and "A Simple Investigation" feature a device that apparently is common among criminals and essential for hacking. It performs the same function as a portable keyboard in movies depicting hackers at work: you plug it into the machine (in this case wirelessly) and start doing complex things to the software so that it begins to serve your criminal goals.

In the former DS9 episode, walking to a futuristic ATM machine and playing with it using this head-dataport device allowed the criminal to reroute the bill for his purchases to an innocent outsider, a thing he had apparently been doing daily. He then got zapped by the system, and his accomplice laconically stated that the dataport had been "an expensive piece of hardware" - the same way a gangster would lament about a ruined expensive suit when his pal gets machine-gunned, and not the way he would complain if he has to pay 1.5 million in bribes and break into Fort Knox in order to get a second one.

In the latter episode, the guest star also uses her dataport for hacking, describing her work in slightly more technical detail. Clearly, her "mind signals" are being made compatible with the machine ones, so that she can manipulate systems and devices in complex ways without moving a muscle or uttering a word. Possession of the dataport does not establish her as anything special in Odo's law-enforcing eyes - not a master criminal, not a rich criminal, not a freak.

Odo dislikes the device for threat-to-privacy reasons ("People tend to use them to access information other people don't want them to access"), but admits it's not illegal or an explicit sign of criminal intent. Significantly, if the device were just a fancy mouse, why should it create special issues with privacy? If two such devices create telepathy of sorts, though, then Odo's issues clearly arise, and the implication also is that

a) the invasion of privacy would be subtle and complex and go unnoticed, and
b) there would be plenty of these devices around, to create a risk worth mentioning.

Ira Graves' tech was a revolution that could never be duplicated.

Transferring a functional mind was indeed a challenge. That's hardly on the same page with tweaking with language signals, though. And it was never indicated that the Graves/Data interfacing would have been the hurdle - the entirety of the mind transfer was.

Pulaski's memory erasure technique was purely chronological-based and couldn't identify memory by content, and even then it was only partially successful.

The issue never arose where specific content would have to be erased: rather, whole moments in the life of an individual had to be suppressed, as they were spent gathering forbidden experiences with all senses. We don't know if Pulaski could have done "better". (But Spock seems to have done fairly specific suppression in "Requiem for Methuselah", so if Picard wanted that, he could have summoned Selar. He never did, not even after Pulaski with her very high success rate left and Picard had to cope with the lackluster Crusher.)

Again and again Trek rules out the idea of being a civilization where technology regularly successfully interacts with neurology.

It seems to me that our medical heroes, in the TNG era at least, are puzzled whenever they aren't 100% on top of a neural issue. Failures and surprises tend to be unrelated to UFP technology; if there is a failure to interact, the established remedy of biologically (supernaturally?) based telepathy is seldom if ever explored, as if privacy were paramount and failure to interact an acceptable price to pay. Novels naturally go deeper there, but aired Trek avoids mind probing as a thing and therefore provides poor basis for judging whether UFP technology would be up to the task. Having a UT implant or an implant for storing family memories isn't ruled out by these privacy concerns, though.

(Also I think this is the longest post I've ever written on TrekBBS; I hope you don't take the length of the post as a sign of any sort of ire towards you. This is actually an enjoyable debate on my end, and I hope it is for you too!)

Writing an annoyingly long post or reply and then engaging in item-by-item debating that hogs lines like Worf eats books is routine for me... Apologies for the lack of brevity, and thank you for the debate!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Idran]

I honestly am not sure where to continue here. You've made a good case that the existence of a UT implant isn't ruled out by the show. But I still don't feel that you've shown that the existence of a UT implant is implied by the show to any degree beyond the issues of the UT that have already been brought up. Your evidence holds up fairly well, but it's still not enough to convince me that UT implants exist in Star Trek.

I guess to put it simply, you've shown that the text doesn't contradict your reading, but I don't think you've shown that the text supports your reading. You still haven't really shown any positive evidence towards it, but I can't really argue that it doesn't exist beyond that level because you've established pretty well that there isn't really any negative evidence either. It's definitely not ruled out by the show to the degree that I'd thought it was. But a UT is such a complex and fantastical piece of software as it is that your theorized expansion on it would mean I'd need positive evidence to buy into it. If it wasn't repeatedly established explicitly in the show itself, I wouldn't even buy that an external UT existed, it's so unbelievable a piece of coding; I'd just treat it like Stargate, a purely dramatic conceit for the sake of narrative.

I know this might be an unsatisfying response, but I really can't counter-argue your evidence. It's definitely more solid than I'd remembered Star Trek establishing over the course of its run. It's just not enough to sway me to your side. On the one hand, yeah there's more examples of relatively successful technological mind-reading or mind-interacting than I'd thought. On the other, I keep flashing to the low quality of Google Translate, real-life BCIs crawling along by inches over the last 40 years, and Minsky giving his undergrads cracking computer vision as a summer project back in the 60s.

 

[trampledamage]

I have another, as yet unsold original work where I'd originally written the characters as hearing the translations of alien speech fed into their ears, but then I realized, under influence from the age of texting and augmented reality that we live in, that it might work better if they actually saw subtitles projected onto their retinal implants (with computer annotations as needed to explain complex or ambiguous concepts in the alien language). That way, they could actually hear the alien speech clearly and it would be easier for them to learn it over time.

I love this idea - this makes sense as an actual translation device - especially the useful notes on concepts etc.

 

[JD]

I don't remember where I read it for sure, but I remember reading in either a book or one of the wikis that when ships hail each other they exchange information that is the same universally and the way that information is presented is then used to build a translation program. I know it doesn't explain situations where there is no computer-to-computer contact, but it might at least work for some situations.

 

[Christopher]

I don't remember where I read it for sure, but I remember reading in either a book or one of the wikis that when ships hail each other they exchange information that is the same universally and the way that information is presented is then used to build a translation program. I know it doesn't explain situations where there is no computer-to-computer contact, but it might at least work for some situations.

That was probably one of mine. Start out with universal mathematical and physical constants, build a translation matrix from that, all at supercomputer speeds so that the program's already built by the time the slow-brained human finishes saying "Message coming in, Captain." I think I explained once that that's basically what "hailing" is -- a shorthand term for that elaborate handshaking/translation process between two ships' computers before live communication is even opened.

 

[JD]

Could it have been Orion's Hounds perhaps? That seems like the right period where I think I might have read it, and it does involve first contact with a new spacefaring species.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I don't remember where I read it for sure, but I remember reading in either a book or one of the wikis that when ships hail each other they exchange information that is the same universally and the way that information is presented is then used to build a translation program. I know it doesn't explain situations where there is no computer-to-computer contact, but it might at least work for some situations.

That was probably one of mine. Start out with universal mathematical and physical constants, build a translation matrix from that, all at supercomputer speeds so that the program's already built by the time the slow-brained human finishes saying "Message coming in, Captain." I think I explained once that that's basically what "hailing" is -- a shorthand term for that elaborate handshaking/translation process between two ships' computers before live communication is even opened.

The idea of linguacode dates from TMP.

 

[Idran]

It was never really said in any on-screen stuff what exactly it consisted of, though, was it? I mean, the name would certainly fit Christopher's description, but I don't think it was ever explicitly described, just used as a name for some kind of unspecified translation thing.