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what TREK TECH will never be realized?

Anything could be possible if given enough time.

Centuries ago they probably aware of the concept of flying but would say it wasn't practical for people to fly, let alone actually leave Earth and go into space.

And I bet they wouldn't have even thought up the idea of TV, radio, phones, and much less computers and the internet, yet we have all of those now.

So even the unimagineable is more than possible, eventually.
 
BalthierTheGreat said:
C.E. Evans said:
IMO, number one on the list of things that won't be realized is warp drive. Sure, there are countless theories about how FTL propulsion can be achieved (i.e., wormholes, folding space, etc.), but no one has really postulated a viable way to make any of them possible...or survivable. The speed of light remains an inviolate universal speed limit otherwise.

Even in Treknology, the whole thing resides on two magical substances--dilithium and verterium cortenide--as the lynchpins that really makes warp drive possible. Still, you can have all the high-energy electroplasma at your disposal, but your ship isn't going anywhere without the actual means of distorting space, time, and gravity...

I think FTL travel is possible -- there's a theory that allows for it (Heim Theory), and this same theory has made a number of correct predictions about the behavior of subatomic particles. So I wouldn't count out Warp. It just takes a hell of a lot of energy (which we don't have)

Well, like I said there are plenty of theories around that allow for FTL travel, but they all generally involve changing or bending the physical laws of the universe to some degree, and no one has any idea of how to do that other than controlling the very fabric of reality itself.

By the time we achieve that, would we even need warp drive by then?
 
I'm amazed that people are actually choosing artificial intelligence and conversant computers! These are the MOST likely to be realized!

The universal translator as depicted does look like an impossibility to me. Of course, I still don't understand how the Brits could have possibly broke the German's Enigma code during WWII.

The transporter as depicted might be possible but a wormhole-like machine that sends you whole makes a lot more sense.

Most unlikely tech of all? Artificial gravity! Gravity doesn't just work in one direction and without a gradient. Gravity plating as depicted is pure fantasy.
 
Universal translators - as in point it "cold" at a lifeform of completely different biochemistry and environmental origins and expect some useful response to communication attempts. Coming up with a transporter would probably be child's play in comparison.
 
Transporters and Warp speed are the top 2.

Transporters being the most likely to never be realized.

Artificial intelligence and the computers on Star Trek are pretty much already happening. Some are more advanced then they ever were on any of the Treks.
 
Zeppster said:
Transporters being the most likely to never be realized.

Not as portrayed in Trek, but I can see the possibility of nearly instantaneous transport happening via some other medium that doesn't involve dematerializing the subject being transported.
 
Any device that nocks you out of phase with normal matter enough to become invisible and pass easily through walls, etc. while allowing you to breath non-phase-shifted air and remain subject to the effects of artificial gravity systems while not falling through decks/floors. There's one TNG episode (I'm sure most know which one) in particular I'd like to chalk up to a badly written holodeck program.
 
There is absolutely no Artificial Intelligence anywhere on Earth, only thing that's remotely close is Virtual Intelligence
 
misskim86 said:
Still will it be sentient?

I guess that depends on whose criteria you use for Sentience, to be sentient it would have to be able to ask "Who Am I?" and "Why Am I Here?".

Ironically, it would also although it theory be possible to answer these questions, in practise it would be just as hard for humans - if a machine becomes sentient because we have modelled our own minds well enough in a programming language, have we not just mirrored the rpocess that creates sentience anyhow?

In which case all we have done is provide another avenue for life to develop, and if one believes in God then maybe thats part of the plan?
 
Oh, I don't think the distinction between virtual intelligence and artificial intelligence means anything. So I agree with you!
 
There is a clear distinction, a virtual intelligence is intelligence programmed how to react, artificial intelligence is real intelligence
 
Computers are becoming so sophisticated that I think artificial intelligence is probably going to end up more advanced then it ever was in Star Trek. Maybe not right now. But in the next couple hundred years or so.
 
Zeppster said:
Computers are becoming so sophisticated that I think artificial intelligence is probably going to end up more advanced then it ever was in Star Trek. Maybe not right now. But in the next couple hundred years or so.

Could it end up as an equivalent of Barclay being under the influence of the Cytherians type intelligence perhaps....
 
sbk1234 said:
And performing brain surgery without mussing up the patient's hair.

:guffaw: Unless of course all Starfleet officers are required to have flip-top heads for easy upgrades...

On topic, It has to be the transporter for me. No matter how many 'Heisenburg compensators' you have, being able to accurately scan, store, deconstruct, transmit, and re-constitute BILLIONS of moving atoms? I'd love it to happen (ease of rush hour commute anyone?), but just can't see it myself.
 
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