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Scotty in the Pipe

The whole INERT REACTANT raised my eyebrow as well. What exactly was something inert supposed to be reacting with?
Hollywood Science
No need to go that far, as it turns out - it seems to be a perfectly legitimate term which can be found in chemistry texts or technical papers and which is used to refer to a substance that is present during a reaction but which--for the purposes of that reaction--is inert.
 
The whole INERT REACTANT raised my eyebrow as well. What exactly was something inert supposed to be reacting with?
Hollywood Science
No need to go that far, as it turns out - it seems to be a perfectly legitimate term which can be found in chemistry texts or technical papers and which is used to refer to a substance that is present during a reaction but which--for the purposes of that reaction--is inert.

Huh!

And all this time, I thought it was JJ's nod to GNDN. Thanks, M'Sharak.
 
The thing is, water is a reactant. It reacts with all sorts of things. Why not just label it "Fresh Water"?
 
Huh!

And all this time, I thought it was JJ's nod to GNDN.
It might still be, for all I know--I don't recall ever seeing anything which had JJ or the writers being asked about it one way or the other. I just found it interesting to discover that what at first seemed a self-contradictory term wasn't necessarily so. Fun with language! :D
 
I thought Pine came really close to almost mimicking (I mean that in a good way) the Shatman in this scene. I just can't believe Scotty could hold his breath for that long and still be OKAY.
 
I thought Pine came really close to almost mimicking (I mean that in a good way) the Shatman in this scene. I just can't believe Scotty could hold his breath for that long and still be OKAY.

Well, Kirk was under water for that length if not longer in "The Voyage Home."
 
Or it could simply be a turbine rotor - some of those are pretty wicked-looking in the universe we live in.

<clipped much appreciated resource links>

Ah, well that works, too. :D

To say it short and sweet, it was realistic enough to me that my mind immediately rationalized it with similar existing technology, and it didn't take me out of the movie.

The thing is, water is a reactant. It reacts with all sorts of things. Why not just label it "Fresh Water"?

It may not be fresh water. It could have been heavy water.
 
It may not be fresh water. It could have been heavy water.

Now this can't be, can it?
J.J. Abrams and his minions can't possibly have thought of the little 'fact' that the Enterprise engines run, in part, on deuterium.
That's not possible.
Because, you know, if they had thought of that, then this wouldn't be a slap in the face of the fans. And we all know that Star Trek is nothing but a big slap in the face of the REAL fans.
[/sarcasm]
 
Or it could simply be a turbine rotor - some of those are pretty wicked-looking in the universe we live in.

<clipped much appreciated resource links>

Ah, well that works, too. :D

To say it short and sweet, it was realistic enough to me that my mind immediately rationalized it with similar existing technology, and it didn't take me out of the movie.
Exactly, and the transparent (aluminum?) rotor housing was nothing more than a Hollywood conceit, together with Kirk's quick glances and "No, no, no!" conveying to the non-Trekkies (and the non-hydraulic engineers) in the audience that "Oh, dear - Scotty could be in some serious trouble, here!"

The thing is, water is a reactant. It reacts with all sorts of things. Why not just label it "Fresh Water"?

It may not be fresh water. It could have been heavy water.
Even if not, water is not always a reactant; in many reactions where water is present, it is--for the purposes of that reaction--an inert compound, serving perhaps only to moderate the rate of reaction without being chemically part of it. And if it's part of a circulating system in which such reactions take place, "inert reactant" makes more sense than "fresh water," which would be part of a different and completely isolated system, denoted perhaps by blue flanges rather than the "inert reactant" orange.
 
Or it could simply be a turbine rotor - some of those are pretty wicked-looking in the universe we live in.

<clipped much appreciated resource links>

Ah, well that works, too. :D

To say it short and sweet, it was realistic enough to me that my mind immediately rationalized it with similar existing technology, and it didn't take me out of the movie.
Exactly, and the transparent (aluminum?) rotor housing was nothing more than a Hollywood conceit, together with Kirk's quick glances and "No, no, no!" conveying to the non-Trekkies (and the non-hydraulic engineers) in the audience that "Oh, dear - Scotty could be in some serious trouble, here!"

The thing is, water is a reactant. It reacts with all sorts of things. Why not just label it "Fresh Water"?

It may not be fresh water. It could have been heavy water.
Even if not, water is not always a reactant; in many reactions where water is present, it is--for the purposes of that reaction--an inert compound, serving perhaps only to moderate the rate of reaction without being chemically part of it. And if it's part of a circulating system in which such reactions take place, "inert reactant" makes more sense than "fresh water," which would be part of a different and completely isolated system, denoted perhaps by blue flanges rather than the "inert reactant" orange.

This make sense.
I ask that it be stricken from the record immediately. :shifty:
 
All the Star Trek characters are tri-ox junkies. It's how Kirk held his breath in "Space Seed" and STIV, it's how Beverly and Geordi held their breath in "Disaster" and it's how Scotty held his in STXI.
 
All the Star Trek characters are tri-ox junkies. It's how Kirk held his breath in "Space Seed" and STIV, it's how Beverly and Geordi held their breath in "Disaster" and it's how Scotty held his in STXI.

Can we use that excuse for the characters in The Poseidon Adventure and Poseidon too? Or any movie in which a character has to hold his/her breath? ;)
 
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