The ultimate computer

[Gorn Captain]

Should be retitled court-martial except they already used that episode title.

Because that's what would happen to whoever the genius was who agreed to a full-scale test of m5 on a ship of the line. One of 13 precious extremely important ships that are the federations primary defense in a time of frequent conflict with both the Romulans and the Klingons.

Wouldn't you think they would have beta testing by the 23rd century? Wouldn't this have been better tested on a smaller ship? To me this is just not a realistic plot because it would never happen.

(Please forgive the spotty writing but I'm being lazy and using voice recognition)

 

[Knight Templar]

Should be retitled court-martial except they already used that episode title.

Because that's what would happen to whoever the genius was who agreed to a full-scale test of m5 on a ship of the line. One of 13 precious extremely important ships that are the federations primary defense in a time of frequent conflict with both the Romulans and the Klingons.

Wouldn't you think they would have beta testing by the 23rd century? Wouldn't this have been better tested on a smaller ship? To me this is just not a realistic plot because it would never happen.

(Please forgive the spotty writing but I'm being lazy and using voice recognition)

Not necessarily.

I thought the whole point of M-5 was that it could do a better job running and commanding Starfleets biggest, strongest, and best ship (Constitution class) than the captain and crew.

So if it was installed on a Starfleet scout ship it really would not prove anything.

One might also argue that it was BECAUSE of growing conflicts that the M-5 was tested the way it was. It was capable of handling a Constitution class starship so well that it would allow a single starship to out fight four other comparable ships (both Kirk and Spock took it for granted that the Enterprise controlled by M-5 would be able to destroy Lexington, Hood, and Potemkin just as it did to Excalibur).

 

[Wingsley]

I would have to agree with Knight Templar on this one.

Added tangent: while it may be true that Capt. Kirk bragged to Capt. Christopher in "Tomorrow is Yesterday" about the Enterprise: "There are only twelve like it in the fleet", Kirk never elaborated on what that meant... Did it mean that there were only twelve Class I starships-of-the-line in the entire fleet? Did it mean there were only 12 (or maybe 13) Constitution-class heavy cruisers as of 2267? Did it mean there were only 12 Class I cruisers period as of 2267? Or did it mean that there were only 12 Class I starships-of-the-line from Earth?

As CINCPac's radio telegrapher once transmitted to Admiral Halsey during the Battle of Leyte Gulf: "The world wonders".

 

[Timo]

Taking the other tack, what evidence do we have that M-5 wasn't carefully tested in a variety of environments (real and simulated) already?

Indeed, there is dialogue establishing that the system has undergone something called "simulated tests", and performed well. And this by no means establishes that only simulations have taken place and the system has never seen use aboard a spacecraft. After all, the reference to "simulated tests" comes after Commodore Wesley specifies that the M-5 will be tested on how it handles "routine SAR, navigation and wargames" aboard a starship - these starship-specific tasks are no doubt the ones that have been subjected to "simulated tests", whereas more practical testing on other issues may well have taken place aboard various lesser vessels and test rigs.

Nowhere in the episode does the issue or feeling arise that M-5 would be poorly pretested. When things go haywire, they do so because M-5 starts acting out of the norm.

Now, Kirk does worry about getting M-5 rather than M-1, perhaps even more so after Dr Daystrom explains to him that M-1 through M-4 were not yet entirely successful. But that's bass-ackward logic, and Kirk should be delighted to get a thoroughly tried and true evolutionary model rather than a brand new concept demonstrator.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Maurice]

...After all, the reference to "simulated tests" comes after Commodore Wesley specifies that the M-5 will be tested on how it handles "routine SAR, navigation and wargames"...

Actually, the quote is:

WESLEY:
There'll be a series of routine research and contact problems for the M-5 to solve, plus navigational maneuvers and the war games problem.

Quotation marks imply an accurate quotation, which you aren't doing.

Anyway, as to the issue, they could have hand-waved it away had they set it up properly, but as-is the M5 seems to "snap" for no apparent reason. It treats the first, unscheduled attack as a wargame as it should, then it just goes after the freighter and blows it up. There's no story reason for this to happen. For instance, if the M5 felt threatened in some new way (to it) then maybe it's flaws would have come to the forefront. As is it's just convenient to the story.

 

[Timo]

Quotation marks imply an accurate quotation, which you aren't doing.

Quite so - will be more careful in the future.

There's no story reason for this to happen.

Indeed. Although since the encounter with the Woden comes in the middle of wargames, M-5 might be justified in thinking that she is part of the games - making it conclude that she is a threat, even if a simulated one. And when she subsequently fails to prove that she is a simulated threat, M-5 jumps to the conclusion that she is a real one...

From the original leap of illogic, it's a pretty reasonable downwards slide. Later events prove that the M-5 understands the concept of crime and punishment, the concept of murder and death penalty, and thus probably the fact that it has royally screwed up and will face consequences. It just doesn't want to face them, making a rebellion a reasonable course of action.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Knight Templar]

...After all, the reference to "simulated tests" comes after Commodore Wesley specifies that the M-5 will be tested on how it handles "routine SAR, navigation and wargames"...

Actually, the quote is:

WESLEY:
There'll be a series of routine research and contact problems for the M-5 to solve, plus navigational maneuvers and the war games problem.

Quotation marks imply an accurate quotation, which you aren't doing.

Anyway, as to the issue, they could have hand-waved it away had they set it up properly, but as-is the M5 seems to "snap" for no apparent reason. It treats the first, unscheduled attack as a wargame as it should, then it just goes after the freighter and blows it up. There's no story reason for this to happen. For instance, if the M5 felt threatened in some new way (to it) then maybe it's flaws would have come to the forefront. As is it's just convenient to the story.

I wondered about this.

To me

1) M-5 was already terribly paranoid and "nervous" when it was installed on the Enterprise.

2) The unschedule wargames drove it to near insanity though it held it together

3) The completely surprising encounter with the Woden drove it insane (admittedly that had to have been a one in a billion encounter)

4) The above is backed up by the fact that even Kirk before M-5 fired on Lexington with full phasers thought that MAYBE M-5 was reverting to normal when it acknowledged the wargames transmission.

5) Note that the M-5 installed and working on the Enterprise was NOT the same as the one tested previously. It had extensively modified itself hardware wise unknown to Daystrom. It had installed forcefield emitters (Daystrom specifically said "Not my doing Kirk") and the capability of tapping into the ships antimatter (if Daystrom had been aware of this he would certainly have warned Scotty and the crewman).

Either it had modified itself extensively BEFORE the installation on the Enterprise and hid those changes from Daystrom or it did so after being placed aboard the Enterprise.

At any rate, it is unlikely anyone in Starfleet would be held responsible for a computer that radically modified itself without orders any more than an engineering officer would be held responsible if the warp drive computer aboard a starship suddenly decided that Warp 9.95 was the new safe cruising speed instead of Warp 6.

 

[Timo]

I guess we are supposed to assume that the computer not only had the above "human traits" because it was partially human, because it partially incorporated Daystrom's own mind - but that it was also somewhat insane because Daystrom was.

In essence, Kirk's worst fears proved unfounded: replacing a human skipper with a machine was harmless and possibly even beneficial. But replacing a human skipper with another human in the guise of a machine spelled disaster!

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Knight Templar]

I guess we are supposed to assume that the computer not only had the above "human traits" because it was partially human, because it partially incorporated Daystrom's own mind - but that it was also somewhat insane because Daystrom was.

In essence, Kirk's worst fears proved unfounded: replacing a human skipper with a machine was harmless and possibly even beneficial. But replacing a human skipper with another human in the guise of a machine spelled disaster!

Timo Saloniemi

Indeed. Didn't Spock describe M-5 after it went crazy as a "human mind with the power and speed of a computer".

Note, a decades later Star Trek novel lrefers to the problem with such computers and Starfleets fear of them saying that

"intelligent computers inevitably go 'mad or bad'"

 

[A beaker full of death]

Added tangent: while it may be true that Capt. Kirk bragged to Capt. Christopher in "Tomorrow is Yesterday" about the Enterprise: "There are only twelve like it in the fleet", Kirk never elaborated on what that meant... Did it mean that there were only twelve Class I starships-of-the-line in the entire fleet? Did it mean there were only 12 (or maybe 13) Constitution-class heavy cruisers as of 2267? Did it mean there were only 12 Class I cruisers period as of 2267? Or did it mean that there were only 12 Class I starships-of-the-line from Earth?

No one contemplated either the specific designations you mention or the year you give. Starships in TOS filled the role that fleet carriers filled in WWII - hence their bearing the same names as the carriers. There were only eight in service when the US entered the war (Langley, Lexington, Saratoga, Ranger, Yorktown, Enterprise, Wasp and Hornet). The US built about 13 more during the war.

 

[ROBE]

I presume the 12 Federation capital ships are similar to the 12 super carriers the USN has, they are the top ships, hence the reason why only captains and commodores command them.
The Federation has lots of smaller ships.

 

[Knight Templar]

I presume the 12 Federation capital ships are similar to the 12 super carriers the USN has, they are the top ships, hence the reason why only captains and commodores command them.
The Federation has lots of smaller ships.

Indeed.

For some reason though, for years lots of fans (and even some novel writers) seemed to assume that the Constitution class starships were the ONLY , that is ONLY ships in all of Starfleet.

 

[Wingsley]

Well, actually there were mentions of other starships sprinkled throughout TOS (and mentions of different ship names in early script drafts or whatever not-on-screen planning the staff did). The best example that comes to mind would be "Friday's Child", which mentions an apparently non-Starfleet Federation ship (the S.S. Dierdre) and an obvious Federation starship which we can assume is not a cruiser (the U.S.S. Carolina).

From these vague references and other inferences, we can assume that there are numerous starships-of-the-line, but they are likely not all Connies or even Class I ships.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Starfleets biggest, strongest, and best ship (Constitution class)

Assuming the Constitution-class is Starfleet's biggest, strongest, and best ship class.

 

[Knight Templar]

Starfleets biggest, strongest, and best ship (Constitution class)

Assuming the Constitution-class is Starfleet's biggest, strongest, and best ship class.

Well, of course the only larger ones ever suggested by any writer for that era was Franz Joseph in the original Star Trek Technical Manual where he suggested the Federation class dreadnoughts.

One very controversial Federation class dreadnought made a key appearance in the novel "Dreadnought" (U.S.S. Star Empire). In that novel of course, it was stated that the dreadnought was being dismantled due to being against the values of the Federation.

An earlier (one of the earliest Pocket novels) "The Klingon Gambit" mentioned two Federation dreadnoughts as well.

Finally, Diane Duane's books, notably "My Enemy, My Ally" mentions the "Destroyer Dreadnaughts" which are huge vast ships completely inappropriate for anything seen in Star Trek (engineering hull a mile long and a quarter mile wide?).

 

[AtoZ]

Relative the The Ultimate Computer, to veer away from the discussion on M5 for a moment, was Bob Wesley a dolt when it came to dealing with peers?

Why was he smirking like a drugged up beach bum in the transporter room when relating the task at hand to Kirk?

And on that note, was the guy completely devoid of empathy, coldly telling his command peer Kirk, "regards to Captain Dunsel", unaware or aloof to the fact that Kirk's redundancy would ultimately affect him not far down the road?

I found these aspects of Wesley rather curious given how much Kirk loved being a starship captain....my original assumption was that ALL starship Captains/Commodore's felt the same love towards their respective appointments.

Thoughts?

 

[Timo]

If we're talking about a tight-knit brotherhood of Starship captains (only twelve of them!), it only seems natural that they would trade barbs as often as they traded dates. "Devoid of empathy" is just boys being boys, is all.

Yet despite all the hints in TOS that Starships are an elite force among the hundreds of Starfleet spacecraft and their captains are an exclusive bunch, the overall "sailing frigate" spirit of the show would IMHO better befit the idea that Kirk's starship was among the smaller ones. That is, Starfleet would have big fat battleships lying in wait for a Klingon offensive, with a Commodore or a Rear Admiral in command; giant shuttlecarriers; and perhaps something akin to SSBNs as well. But it would be the adventurous young captains of the smaller cruisers running errands across the galaxy that would have the greatest stories to tell.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[J.T.B.]

And on that note, was the guy completely devoid of empathy, coldly telling his command peer Kirk, "regards to Captain Dunsel", unaware or aloof to the fact that Kirk's redundancy would ultimately affect him not far down the road?

Whether it affected him or not, it was highly unprofessional and eliminated whatever respect I might have had for the character.

If we're talking about a tight-knit brotherhood of Starship captains (only twelve of them!), it only seems natural that they would trade barbs as often as they traded dates. "Devoid of empathy" is just boys being boys, is all.

In private, sure. But to openly imply that a captain -- who had done nothing but carry out his orders -- was useless in front of all his subordinates was disgraceful. The reactions on the bridge say it all.

Yet despite all the hints in TOS that Starships are an elite force among the hundreds of Starfleet spacecraft and their captains are an exclusive bunch, the overall "sailing frigate" spirit of the show would IMHO better befit the idea that Kirk's starship was among the smaller ones. That is, Starfleet would have big fat battleships lying in wait for a Klingon offensive, with a Commodore or a Rear Admiral in command; giant shuttlecarriers; and perhaps something akin to SSBNs as well. But it would be the adventurous young captains of the smaller cruisers running errands across the galaxy that would have the greatest stories to tell.

Yes, there are good reasons why Napoleonic-era stories usually favor the dashing frigate or sloop cruising wherever the action is over the line-of-battle ship plodding back and forth endlessly on her blockade station. But as I usually point out when this comes up, we have seen time and again that the greatest threats to the Federation come without warning ,"out of the black" so to speak. It makes perfect sense that the independent exploration, survey and frontier policing vessels would have as much fighting power as those of the main fleet, for the Doomsday Machines, Nomads, space amoebas and so on that may show up.

Justin

 

[ROBE]

Not counting prototypes and black op ships, the Enterprise and sisters ships probably were the capital ships at the time.
The word is deterrent, you don't get that with second rate ships.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Not counting prototypes and black op ships, the Enterprise and sisters ships probably were the capital ships at the time.
The word is deterrent, you don't get that with second rate ships.

Again, assuming that The Constitutions were the deterrent ships