Why Build On Earth?
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The reason why the engineer was doing the manual work was because it was more dramatic.
Period.
TNG established the ship can repair itself (Riker said so himself), yet none of those systems were ever evidenced on screen.
To say such technology was non existant some 80 years beforehand when everything else is based on the older techs is a bit far fetched (at least from my perspective as the 23rd century seemed quite advanced in it's own right).
And to NOT develop automated systems that are preprogrammed with design specs of the ship along with computers centuries ahead of what we have today that would enable you to construct large starships is plain and simple DUMB (at least for civilization that is supposed to have a FLEET of ships out there).
It's bad because numerous people seem to think that construction time for something as large as the Enterprise-D is YEARS (and that's for the 24th century).
I mean, sure if you let human workers do the entire work.
However if you let machinery do most of the construction, you'd be done in weeks, few months at the latest.
Period.
TNG established the ship can repair itself (Riker said so himself), yet none of those systems were ever evidenced on screen.
To say such technology was non existant some 80 years beforehand when everything else is based on the older techs is a bit far fetched (at least from my perspective as the 23rd century seemed quite advanced in it's own right).
And to NOT develop automated systems that are preprogrammed with design specs of the ship along with computers centuries ahead of what we have today that would enable you to construct large starships is plain and simple DUMB (at least for civilization that is supposed to have a FLEET of ships out there).
It's bad because numerous people seem to think that construction time for something as large as the Enterprise-D is YEARS (and that's for the 24th century).
I mean, sure if you let human workers do the entire work.
However if you let machinery do most of the construction, you'd be done in weeks, few months at the latest.
Why build on Earth? One word. Haliburton.
I wouldn't be surprised if some Halibuton, Lockheed Martin, GE conglomeration got a no bid contract in th 23 Century to build Constellation Class ships. Build the big pieces on Earth. Transport them into space for final assembly.
I wouldn't be surprised if some Halibuton, Lockheed Martin, GE conglomeration got a no bid contract in th 23 Century to build Constellation Class ships. Build the big pieces on Earth. Transport them into space for final assembly.
I don't know that it has been suggested, yet, that final assembly isn't going to happen according to the reference materials already available. That is, final assembly in orbit.
At some point, raw materials or processed materials: ore for alloys, etc. are going to have to come out of some gravity well: Earth (deeper 'well', closer to assembly area), Moon, Mars, asteroids (negligible 'well', further from assembly site), etc. to get to the orbital site -- even if you have the processing facilities also in orbit. Not to mention the time+energy expenditure to move materials from any of those locations -- with the distance limitations noted (outside of canon, iirc -- except generically "...just inside/outside of transporter range") for transporters -- to the assembly site.
If this were a TNG-era, or near TNG-era, one could suggest industrial-scale replication technology for those processed elements needed for construction. But, I don't recall that wholesale replication was mentioned outside of food (which still had a galley, with live turkeys at one point
), and gems (generically so in "Catspaw") in canon.The weightless items still have mass. Newton's first law. You'd have to use energy to accelerate the piece. Aim (or tow). And then, use energy to decelerate it to a stop. If you assume the technology to reduce/eliminate inertia, then all sorts of possibilities occur. Probably, including assembly in a shirt-sleeve environment/1g field on the ground... Right?
Case in point, in Emissary, at M-A.org...
"With only six functional maneuvering thrusters, Dax suggests they lower the inertial mass of the station with the deflector array."
Its easy to get the ship into orbit. All you need to do is tech the tech and reverse the polarity of the electron flow & bob's your uncle, you're in orbit!
And Warp Drive is also a fictional device used to make the entire series make sense.
So since our understanding of Real World physics says it can't happen, "No Way,"
I guess we might as well through away all our DVD's and never watch another Trek episode or movie again.
It's not called science fiction for no reason.
It's a TV show that has also spawned some movies.
It's not real.
People must either choose to suspend their disbelief enough to enjoy it or not.
It seems a bit funny that we can accept something like Warp Drive and Grav plating yet we're worried about how aerodynamic the fiction, star-hopping space ship is in atmospheric flight.
That's a little like not liking Dr. Who because the robotic Daleks are impractically built. There are bigger technical/scientific/logical issues one has to overlook to enjoy the show.
The real answer is because the guy who created the TV series said so.
Logical. No.
Possible, through the proper application of non-scientific techno-babble excuses, it's just as possible - actually more possible - then any one of about another half dozen unlikelies we have to accept to enjoy the show.
Relax.
It's just a TV show/movie.
This is the 21st centuary.
The technology to build cars entirely by robots exhists now, and some cars are built that way, most are not.
Top of the line cars are always built by hand, and so are top of the line ships.
Kirk and Spock weren't robots, and neither were the crew.
So if robots don't fly the ship, why should they build the ship?
And all these people clammering for the spaceship to be built in space...
Would you build a submarine at the bottom of the sea?
As many people have said above, gravity is accelaration, if you are standing on a surface, gravity holds you to it, if you drop off a suface, in an atmosphere, gravity will accelerate you to terminal velocity.
The gravity on earth is a constant 1G.
You can pull five or more G in a fighter jet safely, the jet itself can pull more, but the pilot will black out with much more than 5.
The shuttle pulls 3 on take off.
For three years and six films, we watched the enterprise travel at impulse speeds, without a warp bubble, just newtonian acceleration.
You either accept that the enterprise can withstand those accelerations, or there is no enjoyment of the show for you.
And if you accept that, than the 1G of earth is nothing.
You cant have it both ways.
If the enteprise cant stand 1G, it just cant go anywhere, and you have no show.
The technology to build cars entirely by robots exhists now, and some cars are built that way, most are not.
Top of the line cars are always built by hand, and so are top of the line ships.
Kirk and Spock weren't robots, and neither were the crew.
So if robots don't fly the ship, why should they build the ship?
And all these people clammering for the spaceship to be built in space...
Would you build a submarine at the bottom of the sea?
As many people have said above, gravity is accelaration, if you are standing on a surface, gravity holds you to it, if you drop off a suface, in an atmosphere, gravity will accelerate you to terminal velocity.
The gravity on earth is a constant 1G.
You can pull five or more G in a fighter jet safely, the jet itself can pull more, but the pilot will black out with much more than 5.
The shuttle pulls 3 on take off.
For three years and six films, we watched the enterprise travel at impulse speeds, without a warp bubble, just newtonian acceleration.
You either accept that the enterprise can withstand those accelerations, or there is no enjoyment of the show for you.
And if you accept that, than the 1G of earth is nothing.
You cant have it both ways.
If the enteprise cant stand 1G, it just cant go anywhere, and you have no show.
I heard that after the main parts are done Abrams is going to have a really long sequence in which Starfleet turns it all over to UPS
then a bunch of guys wearing brown shorts deal with all the hard work of getting the Enterprise up there.
Paramount gets a big fat product placement check from UPS!
Problem solved!
Uh... no. The area of the weld is stronger the orginal metal usually when there is a failure its the metal next to the weld. http://www.forensicmetallurgy.com/images/broken_weld2.jpg
heres an example the weld is intact but the surrounding metal failed.
Soar Dude
I must admit I only roomed with engineers in college. I was the one with the social science degree.
That said, as Jackson Roykirk pointed out above, there are inertial forces at work in space, but I don't think they are real gravitational forces (especially the farther and farther you get from gravitational pulls).
If I'm in space floating in a tin can going in a straight line, all is good. If the can suddenly turns, inertia will cause me to keep going straight, and I may hit a wall of the can. It could be called a kind of artificial gravity.
As far as the other "magic" goes, it's all fiction. Warp drive, the shape of the ship, artificial gravity, everyone's a bi-ped, language barriers are no problem, and so on.
But, it's a question of just how far one wants to stretch the suspension of disbelief. "Star Trek" is hardly hard-core science fiction. But it's not fantasy, either. It does try to at least rationalize what's presented.
We do have fighter planes and bombers today that are so areodynamically unstable that the only thing that keeps them in the air are their on-board computers that are constantly tweaking the controls to maintain flight.
Maybe one can rationalize similar factors at work on smaller starships, runabouts, and shuttles. But I'd have to draw the line on a 1000' long starship that's about 180,000 tons. What kind of forces would be necessary to keep that in the air and in control? That's three times the tonnage of an aircraft carrier. Now, Voyager did it, but that's where they lost me. I'll accept the transporter before I accept a ship like that in atmospheric flight -- and landing.
And, if the ship is meant for space, then why invest so much time, energy, and technology in getting it up there when it should be easy to build there in the first place? Sorry, space would seem to be a better environment for construction.
Things still have mass in space, but because they have less weight, they will be easier to manipulate. Cranes and such could be smaller and made of lighter weight materials. Even heavier, denser materials could be used for construction in space. Materials that might be more problematic to move around on the ground. Maybe materials even stored in space in orbiting warehouses.
Was the huge Star Fleet facility built on Earth, too? How were starbases in deep space built? The facilities to work in space should be commonplace for a rich Federation where space travel is dead common.
It's probably not worth getting this worked up about, but that's my case.
Actually a few scienctific types figured out how Warp Drive might actually work in relation to time / space & so on.
Basicly the ship doesn't move, space moves around the ship.
I'd go into detail but it's all rather complicated.
- W -
* Seriously that's what someone actually sat down and figured out on thier own, I think they're right about it *
Basicly the ship doesn't move, space moves around the ship.
I'd go into detail but it's all rather complicated.
- W -
* Seriously that's what someone actually sat down and figured out on thier own, I think they're right about it *
A 'g' doesn't have to come from gravity, it's just a ratio used to measure force. the multiple 'g's that a fighter pilot experiences don't come from gravity either.
The same with 'atmopheres'. It's a unit of pressure in ratio with the pressure from our atmosphere. But the pressure itself can be provided by anything, be it water, or a pressurized tank.
So don't get thrown by the unit name...
The problem with faster then light travel is not just relativity, which has not been solved in any way,
it's the fact that any material, especially US, would be torn apart by the forces involved.
Assuming you could avoid striking even the smallest amount of spacedust - which would tear through and ship and/or occupants at that speed.
I do believe that interstellar travel is possible, as I do believe that we have been visited by alien life,
if that's true they got here somehow.
and it's unlikely they achieved their travel via conventional propulsion.
I believe it's more likely to be accomplished through some warp in the fabric of space, or transformation and re-establishment of matter into a subatomic form.
But my points remain.
This is a fictional show.
Besides that, doesn't anyone remember the Trek movie The Voyage Home in which it was demonstrated that impulse power allows craft to fly and hover in totally non-aerodynamic ways?
How about the Trek episode Tommorrow is Yesterday in which the Enterprise already established it could fly atmospherically, even if they didn't explain they were using impulse?
It still established the TOS E as capable of atmoshperic flight.
So what's the problem with the completed ship taking off from San Francisco via a newly improved(compared to Enterprise NX-01 technology) form of impulse?
The TOS E has already been established in canon as capable of atmospheric flight.
For all we know it may even have landing gear under that yellow hatch just like Voyager had, but simply didn't land due to the incredibly increased tactical danger of doing so.
(Plus the then prohibitive special effects cost of doing so every week in the 60's, it would be safer to not land on a planet unless absolutely necessary, even in cases where the Prime Directive would not have been involved).
I'm sure there are quite a few cosmologists who'd be surprised to learn this. I wonder what makes galaxies cluster together, if not gravity?
Why would you be floating? I'd want my spaceship to be accelerating, thereby imparting a certain amount of 'g' force upon its occupants, making my journey more comfortable and quicker.
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