RDM says technobabble was gibberish

[Myasishchev]

Well, if they ever bothered to explain how nadions, polarons, tachyons, protomatter or thalarons fit into the standard model, I didn't see that episode.

What could have possibly so horrible about just letting phasers be neutral hydrogen beams? Why does a thalaron device need to exist at all when you have antimatter bombs?

I'm not sure which bothers me more, fake particles or using real ones in ways that are silly. "Baryon sweep"? I don't believe they ran that one past a science guy. Or an encyclopedia. How is bathing the Enterprise in baryonic matter--neutrons I guess, but even that doesn't make very much more sense, insofar as a wall full of metal will generally still stop most of them--supposed to help, anyway? Is making the Enterprise radioactive really that conducive to starship maintenance?

See also: positronic (I know it was a Asimovism, it still sounds silly these days), anion, and neutrino.

 

[Brutal Strudel]

Going back to point number 2), I'm actually pretty sure RDM doesn't actually know what a mitochondrion is, since otherwise he probably would not have had the Cylons be superstrong one minute and indistinguishable from a human the next. Phosphorylate my glucose with what now?

You down with ATP?
Yeah, you know me!
You down with--

I'm sorry. I'm really very, very sorry...

 

[Crazy Eddie]

Well, if they ever bothered to explain how nadions, polarons, tachyons, protomatter or thalarons fit into the standard model, I didn't see that episode.

What could have possibly so horrible about just letting phasers be neutral hydrogen beams? Why does a thalaron device need to exist at all when you have antimatter bombs?

I'm not sure which bothers me more, fake particles or using real ones in ways that are silly. "Baryon sweep"? I don't believe they ran that one past a science guy. Or an encyclopedia. How is bathing the Enterprise in baryonic matter--neutrons I guess, but even that doesn't make very much more sense, insofar as a wall full of metal will generally still stop most of them--supposed to help, anyway? Is making the Enterprise radioactive really that conducive to starship maintenance?

See also: positronic (I know it was a Asimovism, it still sounds silly these days), anion, and neutrino.

In essence, that still comes to a matter of lazy writing: if you can't think of an appropriate scientific term, just make up some random concept out of whole cloth that happens to fit whatever it is you wanted to inject into the plot.

"Disaster" is the clearest example. The writers originally wanted Enterprise to be hit by an asteroid, but the kinds of situations the crew would face were of a type that asteroids probably wouldn't cause, so they switched it from "We were hit by a meteor" to "We were hit by a quantum filament." Apparently it would be too difficult to modify the script to make their assorted perils more consistent with an asteroid collision, so they just changed it to some empty technobabble concept and left it at that.

Imagine a similar procedure in an episode of, say, CSI. Nick finds a body in the desert that's badly decomposed and they need to figure out how long it's been dead; unfortunately, the writers can't figure out how a real forensic scientist would do this, so instead they invent "phylomorphic bacteria" and bestow it with all of the properties they need to solve their problems. This, as opposed to actually finding out a real-world procedure similar to the one they're looking for, or failing that, tweaking the script so they find the body somewhere other than the desert. It's forgivable if they only do it once, but after three seasons of it the audience would probably start to get annoyed (witness the dwindling ratings of CSI New York).

ETA: Best example ever comes to mind: Archer and Trip trapped on a desert planet find an old hut with a barrel of tepid standing water lying there. In the next scene we see Archer holding a bowl of water over a flame and saying to Trip "Here. I managed to boil off most of the toxins."

 

[Myasishchev]

^

My favorite anti-science scene from Enterprise--perhaps from all Trek--was when Mayweather broke his leg because he fell down... on a comet. There was clearly no consideration at all about what real comets are like. I'm positive that only the barely sapient thought process ensued: we need danger --> comet provide danger!

I mean, Jesus, guys, have you never read 2061? Or, a book?

 

[The Wormhole]

^

My favorite anti-science scene from Enterprise--perhaps from all Trek--was when Mayweather broke his leg because he fell down... on a comet. There was clearly no consideration at all about what real comets are like. I'm positive that only the barely sapient thought process ensued: we need danger --> comet provide danger!

I mean, Jesus, guys, have you never read 2061? Or, a book?

One thing that really bothere me was the Enterprise episode where Mayweather learns his father died. We see him in his "sweet spot," the area of the ship he goes to that is zero G. While he's there he cries, and the tears stream down his face. I'm no expert, but would tears actually stream down in zero gravity?

 

[Tulin]

Yeah, and a broken clock is right twice a day. Moore is no one to talk about technobabble being crap. Sure, he eschewed explanations--in everything--but that doesn't make him better than Brannon Braga or anyone else famed for their technobabble, who at least tried to explain their bullshit, only with more bullshit.

"Mitochondrial Eve" is still technobabble if you don't know what it means. "Silica relays" is still technobabble if it doesn't make sense.

And I'd like to ask Moore if theobabble is any better.

Thank you.

At least there was nothing pretentious about TNG. BSG bored the fucking SHIT out of me in its second half. I watch SF for escapism and futurism(and I was even fine with the doom and gloom and end of the world stuff), NOT fucking religion and new age mumbo jumbo.

Some people rag on B&B for destroying VOY's premise, but recent evidence that has come to life seems to indicate it was killed by constant edicts from the network to "TNG" it.

MooreRon cannot say the same thing - HE, PERSONALLY destroyed any potential his own show had and THAT is FAR MORE reprehensible.

 

[Myasishchev]

^Pretty much the same for me. I rather liked season 4.0, which is where I got into it, to the extent that I picked up all the DVDs. After going through it, I realized how badly BSG went off the rails when they got to New Caprica. The New Caprica arc was brutally incomprehensible in almost every way, and it pretty much only got worse from there. The tail end of 3 and 4.0 reminds me now of Flowers for Algernon, because they convinced me that BSG wasn't retarded. Then 4.5 came and held out the promise of complete redemption and a good ending, and perhaps even a possibility of brilliance, and...

Well, the rest is history.

Going back to point number 2), I'm actually pretty sure RDM doesn't actually know what a mitochondrion is, since otherwise he probably would not have had the Cylons be superstrong one minute and indistinguishable from a human the next. Phosphorylate my glucose with what now?

You down with ATP?
Yeah, you know me!
You down with--

I'm sorry. I'm really very, very sorry...

Sorry, I forgot to add that I thought this was very cute.

 

[Tulaberry whine]

Technobabble was never supposed to be taken seriously. It's not supposed to be scientifically correct, it just has to sound like it is. It's like the icing on a cake - it's just there to give it flavor, not nutrition.

I agree in theory. In practice however it was used repeatedly as a plot device - Voyager was particularly annoying in this respect.

 

[RapidNadion]

I'm not sure which bothers me more, fake particles or using real ones in ways that are silly. "Baryon sweep"? I don't believe they ran that one past a science guy. Or an encyclopedia. How is bathing the Enterprise in baryonic matter--neutrons I guess, but even that doesn't make very much more sense, insofar as a wall full of metal will generally still stop most of them--supposed to help, anyway? Is making the Enterprise radioactive really that conducive to starship maintenance?

Not to pick nits, but I believe you misinterpreted the nature of the "BS" (haha). The Baryon sweep was depicted as a procedure to rid the ship of accumulated Baryon particles, not to bathe it in more of them.

And not to be snippy, but you should probably devote a little more attention to detail to matters like this before you criticize the writers for being too lazy to pick up an encyclopedia.

 

[Kegg]

At least there was nothing pretentious about TNG.

Well, there was.

That's part of its charm. TNG may not be anywhere near as consciously 'arty' as nuBSG was at times, but it could definitely tend to lean on Picard's stuffy intellectualism (and god I loved and still love the show so very much for that.)

Classic episodes like "The Measure of a Man" and "The Drumhead" are all about TNG being Serious Business, and that talky approach remains to me why I honestly still consider it something of a barometer for space opera TV. Call me fanboy if you must - and that'd be fair - but Picard is awesome.

Also I did get around to seeing "Daybreak." The short version is I liked it, the slightly longer version is, hey, it's still Battlestar Galactica, and the original series was at its heart Van Daaniken-esque "Chariots of the Gods" stuff. Maybe because despite all the serious gritty character-driven stuff I could never quite shake the mental image of Battlestar Galactica being the show where Lorne Greene is Space Moses I was able to accept it. But, yeah, the initial reaction was a little like being hit upside the head with solid lead.

BSG bored the fucking SHIT out of me in its second half. I watch SF for escapism and futurism(and I was even fine with the doom and gloom and end of the world stuff),

There's an element of truth to this. While I did like the series, I sometimes wondered at what point they were going to launch the Vipers and blow stuff up. Whole arcs went by with a noticeable lack of space battles. Budget, I suppose.

 

[Myasishchev]

I'm not sure which bothers me more, fake particles or using real ones in ways that are silly. "Baryon sweep"? I don't believe they ran that one past a science guy. Or an encyclopedia. How is bathing the Enterprise in baryonic matter--neutrons I guess, but even that doesn't make very much more sense, insofar as a wall full of metal will generally still stop most of them--supposed to help, anyway? Is making the Enterprise radioactive really that conducive to starship maintenance?

Not to pick nits, but I believe you misinterpreted the nature of the "BS" (haha). The Baryon sweep was depicted as a procedure to rid the ship of accumulated Baryon particles, not to bathe it in more of them.

And not to be snippy, but you should probably devote a little more attention to detail to matters like this before you criticize the writers for being too lazy to pick up an encyclopedia.

Alright, touche. I baryon swept my car the other day.

 

[DevilEyes]

BSG bored the fucking SHIT out of me in its second half. I watch SF for escapism and futurism(and I was even fine with the doom and gloom and end of the world stuff),

There's an element of truth to this. While I did like the series, I sometimes wondered at what point they were going to launch the Vipers and blow stuff up. Whole arcs went by with a noticeable lack of space battles. Budget, I suppose.

TBH, space battles tend to bore the shit out of me unless they're really wonderfully done and suspenseful and combined with interesting dialogue and character moments. Otherwise I'm like "some starships in space... stuff blowing up... *mind drifting*... did anything important happen while my mind was away?"

But then, I'm also one of those rare people who are absolutely uninterested in cars, except as a helpful means to get home / to a club at night when the city traffic is rare and a friend having one turns out to be helpful, so maybe my lack of interest in space porn is a symptom of my general lack of interest in technology/vehicles porn.

 

[Kegg]

TBH, space battles tend to bore the shit out of me

unless they're really wonderfully done and suspenseful

Oh, heck, everyone thinks that. I'm not exactly hankering for poorly executed and vaguely defined space battles.

But then, I'm also one of those rare people who are absolutely uninterested in cars,

I'm also uninterested in cars, though I understand that there's a close affinity to them in some sci-fi and American sci-fi in particular (the way Han Solo's souping up the Millennium Falcon seems intentionally reminsicient of how people treat their cars), but spaceships and space battles rock.

 

[RapidNadion]

Alright, touche. I baryon swept my car the other day.

Haa - that image actually used to come to mind whenever I'd wash the family vehicle as a kid. Wonder if that was some writer's inspiration for the Remmler Array in the first place.