What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?
- Thread starter Amasov
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Minnesota Klingons. Why didn't anyone think of this before?
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“Revenge is a dish best served cold, dontcha know?”
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“Knock me over with a wet noodle, your house has no honor!”
Barclay is not the worst character in TNG
With graaavy.
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"Oh, YAHHHHH."
"Yah?"
"YAHHH."
"Oh, YAHHHHH."
"Yah?"
"YAHHH."
Controversial Opinion:
I think Trek gets a lot of judgement by folks for having "fantasy science" and things like that, where it is completely undeserved.
We say that "we KNOW" that FTL travel is likely impossible for <insert any number of scientific reasons here>. Or we say that "we KNOW" that a teleportation device is pure fantasy because <insert modern physics explanation here>.
But, throughout history, there have been so many things that we thought "we KNEW" that later turned out to be not the way we thought. At one point, "we KNEW" the Earth was flat and / or that the universe revolved around it. Or "we KNEW" that attaching leaches to a sick person would result in the toxins being sucked out of the bloodstream. All of human history is a wonderful story of achieving that which we once thought was impossible or learning that what we thought was truth really was not. <Insert plagiarized speech from Sybok here>.
I think we are very (perhaps extremely) scientifically arrogant in this age of humanity, and there are likely a number of things that Star Trek predicts that are very possible, but are beyond our current understanding of science and physics.
I think Trek gets a lot of judgement by folks for having "fantasy science" and things like that, where it is completely undeserved.
We say that "we KNOW" that FTL travel is likely impossible for <insert any number of scientific reasons here>. Or we say that "we KNOW" that a teleportation device is pure fantasy because <insert modern physics explanation here>.
But, throughout history, there have been so many things that we thought "we KNEW" that later turned out to be not the way we thought. At one point, "we KNEW" the Earth was flat and / or that the universe revolved around it. Or "we KNEW" that attaching leaches to a sick person would result in the toxins being sucked out of the bloodstream. All of human history is a wonderful story of achieving that which we once thought was impossible or learning that what we thought was truth really was not. <Insert plagiarized speech from Sybok here>.
I think we are very (perhaps extremely) scientifically arrogant in this age of humanity, and there are likely a number of things that Star Trek predicts that are very possible, but are beyond our current understanding of science and physics.
^
THIS.
THIS.
You know, your support and compliments don't work nearly as well when you use an arrow to point to the post, not realizing that you'd be the top poster on a new page!!
I also support the next message above me on the new page. I'm multitasking!
Are there really that many people who "judge" Trek for including "fantasy science"?
I know the only thing I ever said in that direction is that Trek isn't the "hard" science fiction show some people wish it was. And that's actually how I prefer it. In an entertainment show it's much more important whether what we see on-screen is well, entertaining, rather than 100% scientifically accurate.
I know the only thing I ever said in that direction is that Trek isn't the "hard" science fiction show some people wish it was. And that's actually how I prefer it. In an entertainment show it's much more important whether what we see on-screen is well, entertaining, rather than 100% scientifically accurate.
I’m not in Trek for the science. I’m there for the characters.
If my enjoyment of Trek started and ended with scientific realism I'd have quit after "The Cage(TOS)." It's science fiction, not a Carl Sagan five-part documentary series on PBS.
There are a lot of people who call elements of Trek "pure fantasy" and things like that.
My point is simply that, 40 years ago, an iPhone was "pure fantasy."
I would say the physical science side of Trek was. okay through TOS and the Berman Trek era. The newer shows have been getting sloppier with things like the speed of light, rubble planets which somehow have the bits not all accrete properly into a sphere under the influence of gravity, ships in orbit being visible from the surface (as more than tiny specks - and during the daytime) etc. Most of this I actually blame on the VFX team - I don't think the science advisor really checks over that stuff like they do the scripts.
Trek has always been absolutely awful regarding biological sciences though. I don't think a single writing team has understood how DNA and evolution worked...like ever.
The thing to remember about Trek though is when TOS was first crystalizing the whole idea of "hard science fiction" was really nascent. Not to mention things such as ESP still had a lot of mainstream respectability and were being researched by the government. So TOS was simultaneously meant to be "harder" than we interpret it today, though more generally it was just supposed to represent the full range of SF at the time, from hard to soft.
After TOS, Trek became largely self-referential, so the kinda whifty elements of the universe were cast in stone, which leads to some things within universe feeling a bit dated to us even with the periodic updates.
Trek has always been absolutely awful regarding biological sciences though. I don't think a single writing team has understood how DNA and evolution worked...like ever.
The thing to remember about Trek though is when TOS was first crystalizing the whole idea of "hard science fiction" was really nascent. Not to mention things such as ESP still had a lot of mainstream respectability and were being researched by the government. So TOS was simultaneously meant to be "harder" than we interpret it today, though more generally it was just supposed to represent the full range of SF at the time, from hard to soft.
After TOS, Trek became largely self-referential, so the kinda whifty elements of the universe were cast in stone, which leads to some things within universe feeling a bit dated to us even with the periodic updates.
Totally agreed. I'd like this post a hundred times, if it were possible.
40 years ago a so-called ‘super computer’ filled a room and was the province of the elite scientific community.
Cut to present day and we all have ubiquitous computers with far greater power that fit in our pocket. And we use them to watch videos of funny cats.
The future is a moving target. Always has been.
Edit - Also, if we are to invoke Roddenberry’s vision, he wanted to do a show that was character focussed, using science fiction as a backdrop, to tell stories about contemporary times that otherwise might not pass censors.
Star Trek (TOS) was never envisioned as a show about science in and of itself. Even something like the transporter was an invention of production necessity.
Original makeup Worf from 1987 was more Klingon and more intimidating. Also creepier and more nightmare-inducing but still.
I think The hairline is more reminiscent of the STIII:TSFS Klingons.
One of the reasons I feel that the "future" scenario in AGT was just a big Q illusion is the fact that Worf didn't have his Season 1 appearance. Behind the scenes it was probably just a matter of practicality to use the current forehead design, but on-screen discrepancies demand in-universe explanation/rationalization/whatever!
Kor
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