Warp vs Genesis (TNG 7 x 19) What counts as bad science in Trek? And why nitpick?

[knightgrace]

So, the Enterprise was a hybrid...

Ducks...

This explains the twenty hour limit of the deflector screens/shields as mentioned in TMOST.

Going further, this suggests that going beyond warp factor six is a combined event of the matter/antimatter reactors plus Dilithium, which would limit endurance above warp factor six. Which shows that there is a problem with warp intensities above warp factor six. Too energetic for safety across multiple reasons why.

Which goes back to the original treatment in the original script for Star Trek Phase II.

 

[Ronald Held]

No way to have stable Li2 at STP?

 

[knightgrace]

Unsure. It depends on the technology. Actual technology.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Trek dilithium is not an element, but a compound. The TNG Technical Manual identified "dilithium" as shorthand for "the forced-matrix formula 2<5>6 dilithium 2<:>1 diallosilicate 1:9:1 heptoferranide," in other words, a complex crystal made of the elements lithium, silicon, oxygen, and iron. (A silicate is a silicon-oxygen compound.)

Yes, a barely legible screen graphic in TNG: "Rascals" put dilithium on the periodic table, but that graphic was full of joke names like "Stoogeium," "Groucho," and "Exitstageleft," so it was never meant to be taken remotely literally, and Memory Alpha's choice to treat it as a canonical source is just plain stupid.

Either way, the substance called dilithium in Star Trek is has properties that make it unreal and differentiate it from the real substance.

Memory Alpha exists to archive officially produced Star Trek content in a neutral and objective way, as an encyclopedia would. They don't debate what was literally shown on screen as being anything other than something that was literally shown on screen.

The standards that govern Memory Alpha's policy and the impact that those have had on the content of the article are discussed on the article's Talk Page.

According to Memory Alpha policy, the TNG tech manual is considered a supplementary resource. As far as I know, the description you are referring to did not make on screen in any capacity, including into dialog.

Resource policy

memory-alpha.fandom.com

You are making an assumption. I am not. Dilithium does indeed exist, Li2 under the conditions specified.

And using nanotechnology fabrication techniques...it is possible.

No. Real dilithium will never, ever behave like the fictional substance in Star Trek.

 

[kkt]

Trek dilithium is not an element, but a compound. The TNG Technical Manual identified "dilithium" as shorthand for "the forced-matrix formula 2<5>6 dilithium 2<:>1 diallosilicate 1:9:1 heptoferranide," in other words, a complex crystal made of the elements lithium, silicon, oxygen, and iron. (A silicate is a silicon-oxygen compound.)

Yes, a barely legible screen graphic in TNG: "Rascals" put dilithium on the periodic table, but that graphic was full of joke names like "Stoogeium," "Groucho," and "Exitstageleft," so it was never meant to be taken remotely literally, and Memory Alpha's choice to treat it as a canonical source is just plain stupid.

Darn, I was hoping there would be an episode about a few bachelor Exitstageleft miners seeking wives...

 

[Is this Darjeeling]

I’m a hardcore Trekkie too. I watch several hours a day, dig into the lore, hang out here, even cosplay as the Borg Queen. I love all of Trek, even the stuff like Genesis. However, I don’t confuse Trek’s terminology and ideas with real science. Dilithium, matter/antimatter driving warp coils, Trek's warp in general, as well as dramatized atavisms, they’re fun concepts, but never executed well in real science. Even Alcubierre being inspired by Trek doesn’t make it's warp drive real, nor does it mean that a warp bubble for FTL travel practically possible. I don’t nitpick Trek for being unrealistic, that’s missing the point. I don’t pretend the technobabble is actual science. It’s fiction. Always was, always will be. Do I wish for a sci-fi future like that? Sure. Are some of these things based on real concepts? True. Are any of them executed well? No. Is most of it just fantasy and technobabble? Uhu. Do I still love Trek without discriminating. Yes, and that's my point. If you're going to point inconsistencies and dramatizations out in one thing, might as well abandon warp all the way as well as Starfleet. Because there's also no reason to think that we'd actually make it to the 24th century. As the Great Filter in the Fermi Paradox suggest, we might just end up annihilating ourselves due to some hurdle. And even then, it wouldn't look anything like in Trek. We'd just be barely entering a type 1 civilization on the Kardashev scale probably. I'm not kidding myself, but I couldn't live without Trek, either way.

 

[knightgrace]

Either way, the substance called dilithium in Star Trek is has properties that make it unreal and differentiate it from the real substance.

Memory Alpha exists to archive officially produced Star Trek content in a neutral and objective way, as an encyclopedia would. They don't debate what was literally shown on screen as being anything other than something that was literally shown on screen.

The standards that govern Memory Alpha's policy and the impact that those have had on the content of the article are discussed on the article's Talk Page.

According to Memory Alpha policy, the TNG tech manual is considered a supplementary resource. As far as I know, the description you are referring to did not make on screen in any capacity, including into dialog.

Resource policy

memory-alpha.fandom.com

No. Real dilithium will never, ever behave like the fictional substance in Star Trek.

Behave like what? It is tool, nothing more.

Oh! Wait!!

I forgot about something...something about a real red crystalline material...generating a bright red light...never mind they don't exist.

Death rays don't exist, because the energy destroyed the device the moment you turn it on. Because, in the 1930s this was proven to be true.

 

[Christopher]

I’m a hardcore Trekkie too. I watch several hours a day, dig into the lore, hang out here, even cosplay as the Borg Queen. I love all of Trek, even the stuff like Genesis. However, I don’t confuse Trek’s terminology and ideas with real science.

It's not so simplistically all-or-nothing. Trek has always had a mix of good science and bad science, and until recent decades, most of its contemporaries on TV and film had only bad science. TOS was the only SF show of its generation that was embraced and celebrated by scientists, engineers, NASA, and science fiction writers because of how plausibly it depicted spaceflight compared to just about everything else on the screen. TNG was even more plausible in its early seasons. Yes, later Trek unfortunately got more fanciful, but that's all the more reason that the relatively good science in the early years should be acknowledged and remembered, not erased from history.

Dilithium, matter/antimatter driving warp coils, Trek's warp in general, as well as dramatized atavisms, they’re fun concepts, but never executed well in real science. Even Alcubierre being inspired by Trek doesn’t make it's warp drive real, nor does it mean that a warp bubble for FTL travel practically possible.

That is a nonsensical standard to apply to the quality of fictional science. It's not about whether it could actually work; it's just about how well an unreal idea is grounded in reality, how much it shows that the writers have done their homework and know real science, rather than just making up nonsense and not knowing any better. Warp drive is better grounded in known physical theory than probably any other fictitious FTL method, except wormholes. It's literally a solution of Einstein's equations, and it doesn't get more hard-physics than that. Yes, of course it's fiction -- you don't need to point out something so obvious -- but it's plausible fiction, because it's based in enough real theory that it's easy to pretend it can actually work. If any kind of FTL drive were hypothetically possible, it would probably be a warp drive. And that's good enough for fiction.

As for matter-antimatter as a power source, I have no idea why you think that's nonsense. You do know that antimatter actually exists, right? It's not something they made up.

 

[Is this Darjeeling]

It's not so simplistically all-or-nothing. Trek has always had a mix of good science and bad science, and until recent decades, most of its contemporaries on TV and film had only bad science. TOS was the only SF show of its generation that was embraced and celebrated by scientists, engineers, NASA, and science fiction writers because of how plausibly it depicted spaceflight compared to just about everything else on the screen. TNG was even more plausible in its early seasons. Yes, later Trek unfortunately got more fanciful, but that's all the more reason that the relatively good science in the early years should be acknowledged and remembered, not erased from history.




That is a nonsensical standard to apply to the quality of fictional science. It's not about whether it could actually work; it's just about how well an unreal idea is grounded in reality, how much it shows that the writers have done their homework and know real science, rather than just making up nonsense and not knowing any better. Warp drive is better grounded in known physical theory than probably any other fictitious FTL method, except wormholes. It's literally a solution of Einstein's equations, and it doesn't get more hard-physics than that. Yes, of course it's fiction -- you don't need to point out something so obvious -- but it's plausible fiction, because it's based in enough real theory that it's easy to pretend it can actually work. If any kind of FTL drive were hypothetically possible, it would probably be a warp drive. And that's good enough for fiction.

As for matter-antimatter as a power source, I have no idea why you think that's nonsense. You do know that antimatter actually exists, right? It's not something they made up.

Again, you're needlessly defending technobabble and not really grasping what I'm trying to say. I've never said it cannot be an energy source, just that it cannot be used as it is in Trek. Also, for a real warp, matter/antimatter annihilation driving the technology to produce a warp bubble would not really matter. It's irrelevant to the central problem. It needs exotic matter/negative energy density; it's not just about lots of power. Trek's warp core concept does not align with what the math actually demands. Yeah, yeah, they're better at it than their contemporaries in their 'science,' but it's still fiction and not really grounded in facts, practicality, or actual possibility. There are key distinctions you're missing and seem to be deliberately glossing over. For the love of Trek, I'm ending this conversation here as well, because it's just a bunch of circles. Have a great night . (Also, clearly, you haven't read my previous responses comprehensively either, or you haven't memorized them. As I've already said, it could be an energy source in real life, yeah, but not in the way Trek does it, and for a real Alcubierre drive it wouldn't even matter–pun intended–to being with.)

 

[Christopher]

Again, you're needlessly defending technobabble

No, I'm not, because it's not all "technobabble." That word applies to nonsense words like "isolytic tetryon pulse," gibberish made up in place of actual scientific terminology. As a hard science fiction author, I find it personally insulting that you lump the kind of science-based conjecture I engage in with that kind of brainless nonsense. So hell yes, I will defend good science in science fiction against thoughtless people like you who are just looking for excuses to attack and dismiss rather than broaden your horizons.

 

[Is this Darjeeling]

No, I'm not, because it's not all "technobabble." That word applies to nonsense words like "isolytic tetryon pulse," gibberish made up in place of actual scientific terminology. As a hard science fiction author, I find it personally insulting that you lump the kind of science-based conjecture I engage in with that kind of brainless nonsense. So hell yes, I will defend good science in science fiction against thoughtless people like you who are just looking for excuses to attack and dismiss rather than broaden your horizons.

"Against thoughtless people like you who are just looking for excuses to attack and dismiss rather than broaden your horizons." Same can be applied to you. Have a wonderful night .

 

[knightgrace]

Speaking of death rays, the thing that has to be understood is that the precursors to death rays already existed...

These precursors are called "flash bulbs". They could flash only once, then had to be disposed of. What happened, and why? Before flash bulbs, there was something called flash powder...which for poor sensitivity to light the glass plates required a rather, comparatively large amount of flash powder. The flash bulb replaced this powder with a filament based magnesium light source.


???

The glass bulb would melt and/or burn. Yes, glass can burn.

This led to the thought that death rays were actually possible. But there was a problem. This problem is called the inverse square law. An event that could melt/burn glass at zero distance couldn't do anything at even ten feet away. To put it another way, the basic filament material was in effective at any significant distance, that would be of use for military purposes. A death ray, with a range of 1,000 feet, would need to be one million times brighter than one at one foot. Reflecting it into a better beam, had problems as well. The reflector would melt/burn, as being not perfectly reflective.

So this was the model in place, against death rays...the filament bulb.

Then in the late 1940s/early 1950s the MASER, was invented. Microwave Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation, was born. Far more effective Microwave generator. This led to the search for an optical version. Now known as the Laser.

Yes, it does obey the inverse square law. But not in way of a flash bulb, emits polychromatic incoherent light, as opposed to monochromatic coherent light.

Instead of being omnidirectional, it is monodirectional. Such that at the initial point of emitting, as the beam expands, the change reduces the partial total energy.

The first lasers were very inefficient in nature, meaning that most of the energy was wasted ar random heat. Meaning that Laser weapons are a thing. Also, totally illegal. Why? Eyes. Our eyes are a true miracle of existence. But to cover what they do, they must be very sensitive in their nature, such that it doesn't take much in the way of power to harm, cause great lasting pain.

So don't use them!!!

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Chemistry does not regulate antimatter. Matter/antimatter annihilation is a fundamental particle interaction. When particles overlap, annihilation should happen instantly. No crystal structure or molecule can delay it to make a regulated reaction. That's pure Trek fiction, again, not actual physics. Calling this dilithium as in Trek is like saying a goat with one horn is a unicorn.

It actually gets worse than that. If we were to take what's in the TNG tech manual concerning the properties of dilithium seriously, we'd have to swallow this nugget on page 60:

the dilithium crystal... is the only material known to Federation science to be nonreactive with antimatter when subjected to a high-frequency electromagnetic (EM) field in the megawatt range, rendering it "porous" to antihydrogen.​

So not only do dilithium crystals have a magic property, but also no other substance known by the 24th century has it. It's either dilithium crystals or nothing. If for some crazy reason, you'd want to bang your head against the wall to somehow make real dilithium exhibit this magic property, then a condition of that occurring is that every other substance we'd know of if you'd ever pull it off (assuming you did it by the 24th century) must also lack that property.

Of course, the only reason it's framed this way is not for any scientific reason at all. It's to support the scarcity of the resource in the context of the fictional universe.

This example illustrates one of the big problems with all technobabble, when it's taken literally.

For an assertion to be scientific, it must be testable by experiment. Once the technobabble used to describe magic technology gets too specific, it cannot stand up to real world experiments. How could it? If a writer actually could make it stand up, for example in the case of an FTL device, then they'd literally have invented practical FTL!

What you mention, "No crystal structure or molecule can delay [annihilation] to make a regulated reaction," that's supported by all experiment. The claim on page 60 of the TNG tech manual has no evidential support whatsoever, relative to our science, and the likelihood that it ever could be supported by experiment is nil.

Assigning the crystal name a formula doesn't improve fidelity or realism. In fact it worsens these things, because it creates even more reasons for the substance to fail to live up to experimental demands.

I really don't understand the appeal of this kind of technobabble. Perhaps for some people it helps to suspend disbelief by forestalling contact with reality by some kind of bewilderment or obfuscation?