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So, was Cochrane's warp drive concept something special, or wasn't it ?

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I can only recall the hoop/ring structure.
Which was referred to as "nacelles" (yes, the ring was referenced in the plural). From Breaking the Ice:
ARCHER: If I'm not mistaken, you're flying a Surak class ship.
VANIK: You're not mistaken.
ARCHER: You can get her up to, what, six, six point five?
VANIK: Six point five.
TUCKER: I'd love to get a look inside those nacelles.
VANIK: Our warp systems are classified.
 
So a Human refers to the rings as nacelles, but the Vulcans don't?
Could be one of those accidental production errors were the episode's writer(s) didn't know that the Vulcan ships used rings and just assumed the special effects would depict a ship with nacelles.
 
A close look at the CGI model reveals nacelles interspersed at intervals around the ring:
vulcan_surak_angled.jpg
 
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Could be that Tucker didn't know what to really call them, so he called them nacelles. But a dictionary basically calls a nacelle any enclosed separate structure for an engine, so technically those rings could indeed be rightfully called nacelles.
 
I always imagined that the ring was basically a nacelle with warp coils stretched out instead of coiled.

And if Vulcans had been spacefaring for so long and could only get to Warp 6-ish, then maybe their design hit a wall, and Cochrane's design was the way of the future that ultimately made Warp 8+ possible.
 
Or, the Surak class can't travel as fast as other Vulcan ships of the day.

Not all modern day Navy ships have the same top speed.
 
And Cochrane was never said to be the inventor or discoverer of all FTL travel, either, but specifically warp drive.
Actually, the dialogue in "Metamorphosis" doesn't refer to "warp drive" either:

KIRK: Zefram Cochrane of Alpha Centuri, the discoverer of the space warp?
So it could be that the TOS version of Zefram Cochrane was intended to have discovered a naturally occurring phenomenon, rather than invented a mechanical process for achieving warp speed.
 
It's possible that Cochrane discovered the underlying principal of the space warp, while someone else (perhaps Lily Sloane) worked out how to make use of his discovery?

One was a theoretical physicist, the other a practical engineer?

Sheldon Cooper: "Pay no attention to Lily Sloane, she only has a masters degree."
 
As far as different calenders, the names of the months would establish quickly what calender was being used.

Chaitra is a month in the Hindu calender, not the European.

And have you counted the number of times that "European" months were mentioned as part of the dates in Star Trek productions?

Furthermore the "European" month names are based on the Julian calendar that was used (along with local calendars) in Western Europe during the Roman Empire. And it is a historical fact that medieval Western Europe societies all used the Julian calendar but they did not all agree on the starting year. Many societies that used the Julian calendar dated events by the reign of the current king and started renumbering again at the start of a new reign, for example.

The Anno Domini or AD system of counting years from AD one was invented over five hundred years after the Julian calendar with its month names was invented. And it did not catch on for several more centuries. The Anno Domini or AD year count as invented in Rome by Dionysius Exiguus in AD 525. The Anglo Saxon scholar Bede first used it in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People in AD 731.

The Anglo Saxon scholar Alcuin popularized the AD system in Charlemagne's court, which led to its gradual spread over western Europe. Portugal continued to use the Era of the Caesars or Spanish Era (dating from 38 BC) until AD 1422. (Apparently in Portugal the year 1459 was followed by the year 1422 - did peasants riot demanding to get their lost years back?) Russia was the first Eastern Orthodox country to adopt The Anno Domini year count in 1700.

So even the use of the month names from the Julian and Gregorian calendars does not prove that the characters are using our calendar era or year count. And in fact it seems quite obvious that different characters in different episodes use different calendar eras.
 
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Could be that Tucker didn't know what to really call them, so he called them nacelles. But a dictionary basically calls a nacelle any enclosed separate structure for an engine, so technically those rings could indeed be rightfully called nacelles.

And the plural could come from the fact that Tucker wants a peek inside Vulcan engine nacelles, all of them, even when the Ti'Mur only has one of those to offer.

(Although of course the dialogue actually stems from the writer not knowing what the VFX artists had created.)

So it could be that the TOS version of Zefram Cochrane was intended to have discovered a naturally occurring phenomenon, rather than invented a mechanical process for achieving warp speed.

Or then those are the same thing: realizing that warp exists immediately allows any garage genius to devise a FTL engine that exploits the phenomenon. It takes a bit longer to devise a FTL radio based on the same principle, explaining how the Prime Directive is possible in the first place.

Timo Saloniemi
 
The dialogue in First Contact does. He is referred to as "the man who invented warp drive."

I am no warp engine expert, but it is possible that Cochranes warp engine design was unique to the ones that were used by the Vulcans, Klingons and all the other warp faring species of that era, its also possible that it's the design that continued going forward as Starfleet became the United Federation of Planets and that all these ship engines made by this new alliance are based on that design especially since it appears that the Vulcan's never shared their designs with Starfleet, so from 'a certain point of view' he is the man that invented Starfleets warp drive i.e the design they are all accustomed to. He did not need to be the guy who originally invented the idea for that quote to still hold true.
 
I think another title and direction for this thread would be "Did later writers diminish or change the impact of Cochrane's discovery"? Since some people bring up First Contact or even Enterprise as why he was one among many (and a late comer at that) then I'd say the answer is "Yes."
 
What has always bothered me is the reaction of Captain Kirk when he realized who the person being held by the companion was. He said it bluntly, and with the self assurance of someone who has come to the realization that they are meeting a legend that has suddenly come to life as a flesh and man. And it was not "Zefram Cochrane of Alpha Centauri by way of Earth! It was just, plain, ordinary 'Alpha Centauri'.
So perhaps it was originally intended that Cochrane was not of Earth, but over time, his origin story has been embroidered into what is now canonicaly accepted as Cochrane of Earth. It is not the first time lazy writers have not tightly constructed a script, and it is yet another example of the total lack of continuity in Star Trek lore.
I was around when these episodes were first run. The discussion amongst my friends and myself was that Cochrane looked human, but in the wacky way everyone from every world in Star Trek looked kind of human, or humanoid, so perhaps the maker hit upon a good model and populated everywhere with the same basic unit, but with subtle differences that could be explained away by differences in environmental conditions and so forth. However, that hard declairitory statement by Kirk put the brand of Cochrane purly on the tital as inventor of the Mk. I Warp Drive. And it was from there that it spread to everyone else. Of course, what do I know, "...I'm just a guy in a checkered coat..."
 
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What has always bothered me is the reaction of Captain Kirk when he realized who the person being held by the companion was. He said it bluntly, and with the self assurance of someone who has come to the realization that they are meeting a legend that has suddenly come to life as a flesh and man. And it was not "Zefram Cochrane of Alpha Centauri by way of Earth! It was just, plain, ordinary 'Alpha Centauri'.
So perhaps it was originally intended that Cochrane was not of Earth, but over time, his origin story has been embroidered into what is now canonicaly accepted as Cochrane of Earth. It is not the first time lazy writers have not tightly constructed a script, and it is yet another example of the total lack of continuity in Star Trek lore.
I was around when these episodes were first run. The discussion amongst my friends and myself was that Cochrane looked human, but in the wacky way everyone from every world in Star Trek looked kind of human, or humanoid, so perhaps the maker hit upon a good model and populated everywhere with the same basic unit, but with subtle differences that could be explained away by differences in environmental conditions and so forth. However, that hard declairitory statement by Kirk put the brand of Cochrane purly on the tital as inventor of the Mk. I Warp Drive. And it was from there that it spread to everyone else. Of course, what do I know, "...I'm just a guy in a checkered coat..."

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This thread's been dead for 2 1/2 years. Let's let it rest in peace.

Thanks

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