The edge of the universe in "Where no one has gone before" and the Mycelium Network

[Longinus]

But was it based on that or was it a happy coincidence?

Both. Theories about curvature of space and how it affects travel have certainly existed since Einstein, and but as far as I know there weren't even theoretical ways to alter that curvature when Star Trek was created. Alcubierre was inspired by Star Trek, and actually developed a theory about how such thing could actually work.

 

[Spot261]

Yeaaah... no
It's pretty clear that STD writers are not looking at any existing Star Trek canon to write this new show (style, history, common sense). Anything resembling continuity and common sense is purely coincidental.

Yeah, think you're just missing a lot, either not watching closely enough, not acknowledging how shaky continuity always has been or simply not being aware of the references.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Though that inspiration is pretty damn loose. Yes, there is science about tardgrades and mushrooms, none of it relates to space travel.

No one said it did, just that the appearance and certain broad properties of the mycelial network like its connectivity between organisms and the tardigrade's extraordinary environmental survival techniques served as inspiration for the ones featured in DSC. You know perfectly well he (or I) wasn't suggesting that the ones on Earth are a direct one-to-one comparison of the features of the fantasy ones on the show.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Crystals are just catalyst for antimatter reaction, there's really nothing particularly magical about them. The only reason they exist is to act as unobtanium for plots, an important thing that can break, you need it, and you can't replicate it.

Salamanders are obviously idiotic, and everyone agrees on that. But I certainly accept that the spore drive makes about as much sense as them.

The crystals are the x-factor that makes it work. Same as the exotic matter needed for the Alcubierre Drive. The Alcubierre Drive needs some currently undiscovered form of unobtanium for it to actually work. Of course how exactly Treks Warp drive works probably changes as science does. New theories get dropped in Treknologies as they are discovered.

From what I can tell is the writers of Discovery have taken the idea of the mycelial networks on Earth which is used by plants to communicate and transfer nutrients and used it as the basis of a subspace real where matter is transferred rather than nutrients. Again there is exotic matter involved, the x-factor that makes it work.

After reading the article in Locutus of Bored/ @ the Pumpkin Spice Must Flow's link my guess is using the subspace mycelial networks for transportation is damaging the network and will destroy the universe, hence why it's not used in the future.

Also from the article, the real Stamets' theories were based on the similarity he saw between mycelial networks and ARPANET back in the 70's. Scientist have taken to calling in the "wood wide web".

 

[Longinus]

The crystals are the x-factor that makes it work. Same as the exotic matter needed for the Alcubierre Drive. The Alcubierre Drive needs some currently undiscovered form of unobtanium for it to actually work. Of course how exactly Treks Warp drive works probably changes as science does. New theories get dropped in Treknologies as they are discovered.

Sure. When making a story where something that currently does not work, does work, you have to insert some fiction. If the writers really knew how to make the Alcubierre Drive to work, then they should work for NASA instead of wasting their time writing TV shows!

From what I can tell is the writers of Discovery have taken the idea of the mycelial networks on Earth which is used by plants to communicate and transfer nutrients and used it as the basis of a subspace real where matter is transferred rather than nutrients. Again there is exotic matter involved, the x-factor that makes it work.

Yeah, I get the analogy. I just think they took it too far in making it literal fungus network composed of literal mycelium in space. Some large quantum entangled network of dark matter that works a bit like mycelium networks on Earth would have been way easier to accept.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Sure. When making a story where something that currently does not work, does work, you have to insert some fiction. If the writers really knew how to make the Alcubierre Drive to work, then they shouldn work for NASA instead of wasting their time writing TV shows!

Nah they just need to find the unobtanium,

 

[Rahul]

But was it based on that or was it a happy coincidence?

Yes!
Both. During the creation of TOS, they paid a physics student 50 dollar to come up with a realistic way the starship can move. He decided the starship would need two(!) seperate ways of propulsion: One for sub-light, and all the manoevering that would look nice on screen (battles, rendez-vous). And another one to be able to fly from one solar system to the next. An incredibly fast one, a FTL drive. He decided to use the "warp" drive, because that was the only somewhat realistically achievable option he knew at the time.

This stuff might be very obvious nowadays. But it was really groundbreaking at the time.

When TNG came on, they routinely consulted with NASA, to chek their science, and get impressions and ideas for real phenomena and new plot ideas. They used a LOT of creative freedom. But that they even did in the first place was (and still is) kind of unique.

The "Warp-10" salamander is obvious junk science, based on what "unknown" and "unforseeable" consequences new ways of propulsion can have. Funny side-note: In the 18th century, with the advance of the steam engine, there were serious scientists believing humans can't travel as fast as 100 mpH, because it would compress their lungs and they would suffocate. Obvious bull-crap. But at least it started out as a somewhat serious thought experiment on the technical aspect of these matters.

A galaxy-spannung subspace-funghi-network with FTL-transportation capability and human-DNA-compatability on the other hand is clearly the result of a stoned college freshman in the basement, having just read an article by a funghi-expert in a botanic magazine, who just needed to free his mind, man.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Yes!
Both. During the creation of TOS, they paid a physics student 50 dollar to come up with a realistic way the starship can move. He decided the starship would need two(!) seperate ways of propulsion: One for sub-light, and all the manoevering that would look nice on screen (battles, rendez-vous). And another one to be able to fly from one solar system to the next. An incredibly fast one, a FTL drive. He decided to use the "warp" drive, because that was the only somewhat realistically achievable option he knew at the time.

Interesting. I've never heard that before. Where's it from?

 

[Rahul]

Interesting. I've never heard that before. Where's it from?

I really try very hard to remember...
I think it was either one of these "creation of Star Trek" or "the science of Star Trek" books.

The only online-source I found after 5 minutes of google-ing was this:

https://www.welt.de/kultur/literari...e-Kirk-wiegt-die-Enterprise-nur-158-Kilo.html

(Beware! It's German! It's in the paragraph with the title "Mit dem Warp-Antrieb aus der Zeitfalle")
Maybe another Trekkie here has a better source...?

 

[WarpFactorZ]

You do realise that warp drive is basically Alcubierre Drive, which is a real theory, and antimatter is the only known way which could possibly power such a thing?

The Alcubierre warp drive requires exotic matter to work, which is matter with negative energy density. That's not the same as antimatter, which has positive energy density like normal matter. We can easily manufacture antimatter -- CERN makes antiprotons all the time. We have no clue how to make or where to find exotic matter, or if it even exists.

So, the matter/antimatter intermix modulated by dilithium crystals (which was dreamed up in the 1960s by TOS writers) is still pretty much hocus pocus, and has no relation to Alcubierre's proposal.

 

[USS Triumphant]

once turned Tom Paris into a hyper-evolved salamander.

Now be fair:

1. The drive itself didn't do that, it was evolution, as it responded to the forces Tom was exposed to in the environment that the drive put him in and was accelerated by the temporal effects of the drive.
And 2. That episode was really, REALLY fucking stupid. It made "Spock's Brain" seem reasonable by comparison.

A galaxy-spannung subspace-funghi-network with FTL-transportation capability and human-DNA-compatability on the other hand is clearly the result of a stoned college freshman in the basement, having just read an article by a funghi-expert in a botanic magazine, who just needed to free his mind, man.

Spoilers for Reality: Boy, are YOU ever going to feel silly in another decade or two.

 

[Longinus]

The Alcubierre warp drive requires exotic matter to work, which is matter with negative energy density. That's not the same as antimatter, which has positive energy density like normal matter. We can easily manufacture antimatter -- CERN makes antiprotons all the time. We have no clue how to make or where to find exotic matter, or if it even exists.

I know. I merely meant that the energy requirements of such drive would be immense, thus requiring antimatter reaction to power it.

 

[Rahul]

The Alcubierre warp drive requires exotic matter to work, which is matter with negative energy density. That's not the same as antimatter, which has positive energy density like normal matter. We can easily manufacture antimatter -- CERN makes antiprotons all the time. We have no clue how to make or where to find exotic matter, or if it even exists.

So, the matter/antimatter intermix modulated by dilithium crystals (which was dreamed up in the 1960s by TOS writers) is still pretty much hocus pocus, and has no relation to Alcubierre's proposal.

Using a matter/antimatter reaction as an energy source is anything but hocus pocus. Star Trek is definitely not using a Alcubierre warp drive. The ships have warp nacelles, not rings. That means we have no real clue about how the engineering of Star Trek's warp drive really works. It is not unthinkable that it would use some strange, to us currently unknown material (although... in reality it probably wouldn't be "dilithium crystals"). But nonetheless, the dilithium crystals work as a "unobtainium", a magic McGuffin to power the plot of the weeks. They could have called them "exotic matter crystals", if "exotic matter" would have been a wider known concept at the time. All of this is of course wonky science, but, as far as space opera goes, it's actually quite acceptable. It's not especially "realistic". But it isn't "outright obviously impossible" either. Way better than FTL-shrooms at least.