OT - Unexplainable mysteries of the Universe ... Explained!

[General Woundwort]

Originally posted by narf poit chez BOOM:
"Phasers...check."

"Photon torpedoes...check."

"Quantum torpedoes...check."

"Genesis device...check."

"Holodeck.."
"Hold it! You sure we need a weapon of mass destruction?"

Hey Narf, can I use this for my sig?

[narf poit chez BOOM]

go ahead.

[General Woundwort]

Thanks.

[Suicide Junkie]

Originally posted by DavidG:
Just watched a recent Voyager episode which reminded me of this thread with the question, re new Star Trek:

How many holo deck failures that almost destroy the ship does it take before someone decides to turn the FU#&*%# thing off!!??

The holograms are more intelligent than you give them credit for!
Those sneaky holographic people use chemicals and subtle environmental effects to make sure everybody loves the Holodeck and would never think of taking it apart.
Heck, Voyager had the Holographic doctor. Just imagine what he could be doing!

[Kamog]

Yeah, the holographic doctor is a medical genius. He is just as brilliant as Dr. McCoy or Dr. Crusher or Dr. Bashir. If holograms are so smart, why do starships need any real crew at all?

By the way, I never understood how these "solid" holograms are supposed to work, because they are supposed to be made of light. You can pick up holographic objects in the holodeck and they feel solid, and the Doctor can operate real medical equipment, and so on. The only time the Doctor isn't solid is when some aggressive alien attacks him. Then the weapon or fist or whatever passes right through him.

[Jack Simth]

Originally posted by Kamog:
Yeah, the holographic doctor is a medical genius. He is just as brilliant as Dr. McCoy or Dr. Crusher or Dr. Bashir. If holograms are so smart, why do starships need any real crew at all?

Two reasons:
1) Power outages put holograms down, and they are limited to prepared areas (the Doctor on Voyager was limited to the holodeck until they picked up the mobile emitter from a visitor from the future - a unique piece of equipment.)
2) Humans are more creative: they turned the doc into a command hologram once or twice - Harry came up with the ideas to save the ship, not the doc.

Originally posted by Kamog:


By the way, I never understood how these "solid" holograms are supposed to work, because they are supposed to be made of light. You can pick up holographic objects in the holodeck and they feel solid, and the Doctor can operate real medical equipment, and so on. The only time the Doctor isn't solid is when some aggressive alien attacks him. Then the weapon or fist or whatever passes right through him.

They are made out of photons and force fields; the photons provide the color, the force fields provide the shape, solidity, and physics (all managed by a computer, usually offscreen). Weapons/fists/whatever pass through because he isn't a comparatively high powered force field; he is designed to move tricorders and the occasional unconscious person, not stop swords.

[Jack Simth]

Originally posted by David Gervais:
Why doesn't glue stick to the inside of the bottle?
Good Question!

It does; however, it only permanently bonds when exposed to air, which it uses up in the process of bonding. Inside the bottle, it is sealed away, and only a small amount bonds while in storage.

[Fyron]

Weapons/fists/whatever pass through because he isn't a comparatively high powered force field; he is designed to move tricorders and the occasional unconscious person, not stop swords.

Actually, I believe it was explained that he is programmed to become temporarily incorporeal whenever someone or something attacks him in one of the episodes. I forget if he had to control it or not though.

[Jack Simth]

Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
Actually, I believe it was explained that he is programmed to become temporarily incorporeal whenever someone or something attacks him in one of the episodes. I forget if he had to control it or not though.

Actually, it went both ways, depending on the episode. The episode I suspect you are thinking of is the one where he went on the holodeck because some beings from another dimension had used it to kidnap some crew members, and only the doctor was safe from them. The incorporeal-ness you describe was a conscious only thing specific for that episode in order to deal safely with the holodeck characters in the program that was running, and applied to his entire form only. However, that was only in the one episode. In the rest, if it gets mentioned, it happens because he isn't programmed to react to the stimulus with an appropriet injury, and/or his projectors aren't up to stopping it (he held onto an object once or twice when such events were occuring - clearly his entire form wasn't becoming non-corporeal). Sometimes such antics cause problems with his holo-matrix, but not very often. The ST universe does have its contradictions.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

it's the multiple writers. i see contradictions with multiple writers writing books; the more writers, generally, the more contradictions. well, generally not bad enough to be called contadictions with two or three writers, but different ideas. add up all the ST writers...50? 100? 200?