Star Trek Into Darkness Aiming For More

53 thoughts on “Star Trek Into Darkness Aiming For More”

1. I think they already have expanded the fanbase. I’m sure some people that saw the last film became interested in checking out some of the television series which is great.

2. He had me right up until he said “science fact” and that it’s “one hundred percent our future.” Star Trek has always been, and always will be, a fictional drama set in an idealized vision of the future. Sure, it’s a future to aspire to and has inspired many people, but let’s not lose grip on reality, though…

3. it’s not science fiction, it’s science fact”

   And I thought some fanboys got a little carried away…

4. Star Trek invented the mobile phone. The automatic door. The iPad. Video conferencing. And more. Star Wars ? The lightsber is impossible and th only thing it gave us was the Trilogy-Purely-To-Make-Money business model. Thanks George Lucre. Thanks.

5. Don’t forget the touchscreen, computer tablets, tricorder-like scanning devices, non-invasive brain surgery, etc. Many more are probably to come (phaser, holodeck, etc.). It may not be “science-fact”, but Star Trek definitely inspired some amazing technological achievements and continues to do so. Which definitely cannot be said for Star Wars. As much as I respect Star Wars, I don’t think it’s a good idea to make Star Trek “star warsy”, which unfortunately they have done with that 2009 movie.

6. Absolute tosh by a pretend technocrat! These ideas were based on extensions of established technology. Fantasy sci-fi like Trek is based on the reasonable extrapolation of ordinary physics, but it does not say how we make the technology nor the theoretical basis you elude too. Worst there is so much more with impossibilities with Star Trek or Star Wars, that those they did get right are by far in the minority. Star Trek is plainly meant to be fiction – no matter what you look at it

7. And what of all the fans that you’ve alienated from Star Trek Mr. Burk? Please don’t kid yourselves sir that you’ve done some great service to the Star Trek fan base. Most of the so called “fans” that started watching the stuff before the 2009 film either would have sooner or later anyway or already had and had just taken break from it. Any good Star Trek film or show after the break between Enterprise and the 2009 film would have done the same. The bulk of the fans for JJ-Trek don’t care about anything that came before, they just like the dumb summer action movies with the hot actors.

   Further, look how it already starts with the further talk and comparisons of Star Trek to Star Wars. JJ does not care about Star Trek and never has! What a pompous jerk how he calls Star Wars superior to Star Trek! And THIS is the guy the “fans” are happy with running all things Trek? At least Rick Berman liked Star Trek….in fact, he loved it!

8. Star Wars is very upfront about not being science-fiction, to the point of beginning with, “A long time ago”–the basis for fantasy. Star Trek, like any good science-fiction, looks in the other direction and shows us not what is, but what could be.

9. In actuality, most of the physics and established technology in both Star Wars and Star Trek doesn’t match nor can feasibly exist in the real universe. I.e. Matter transfer in transporters or replicators, subspace in warp speed or faster than light communications, weapons like photon torpedoes or phasers, etc., as the needed energy requirements are literally astronomical. Even the computer / information technologies to run even the most basic holosuite programs are totally impossible because of limited constraints by nature. I.e. Information or calculations are constrained by the nature of quantum mechanics. Whilst it is true that some concepts can be approximated, there is no way these can exist on this degree of complexity because there is a barrier where simply physical laws are made utterly impossible.

   It could be argued that new laws of physics might exist, and so in the future these could be harnessed, but the argument fails horribly because it is not capable to use it force or energy with in the predicted future technology shown on the screen. Star Trek has some fifty-four different types of radiation, which compared to nature as it stands today is only a handful. Unless we completely throw out the entire book of known physics with a new set of physics, the kinds “what could be” will never happen.

   I agree it doesn’t make good science fiction storytelling, but realistic plausibility must be a tenant a good drama if it is to be said to be any true mimic of futurism. Those are the hard facts. Wishing otherwise, especially by various non-scientific novice fans, is plainly foolish, and is some cases, frankly delusional.

   I truly wish these facts were different, but they are not.

10. I disagree. Both are really meant to have centrally to be drama-based stories about interacting human / alien personalities. Technology and the science behind it is just the selected background / backdrop of the storytelling. When it comes to both Star Trek and Star Wars, they are equal implausible on many levels when it comes science and technology.

    Your argument doesn’t hold water, unless you think Star Trek is better drama than Star Wars. (IMO both have their brilliant pluses and dreadful minuses, but I see them as equally good and entertaining. That’s me, though.)

11. So true.

12. I absolutely disagree with the statement that both Star Trek and Star Wars are equally implausible in terms of science and technology. Technology is central to Star Trek. Trek aspires to create some plausible technological and scientific concepts. As a result many physicists embraced Star Trek and outed themselves as fans, including Stephen Hawking. I think that says something about Star Trek and its role in inspiring scientists and ideas.

13. Excuse me. While those advances were extensions of existing technology, in many cases their inventors stated outright that they were inspired to make those developments based on the then-fantastical things that they saw on Star Trek. The thrust of this and many other comments in this very thread is that while both Star Wars and Star Trek are fiction, Star Trek has inspired real-world developments by adhering more to extrapolations of existing technological trends, as opposed to the rather impossible science fantasy of Star Wars, which has primarily inspired people to swing exaggerated glowsticks while making whooshing sounds.

14. Wait…

    Midichlorians aren’t real?

15. But mitochondria are. 🙂

16. I said; “When it comes to both Star Trek and Star Wars, they are equal implausible on many levels when it comes science and technology.”

    Then you said; “I absolutely disagree with the statement that both Star Trek and Star Wars are equally implausible in terms of science and technology.”

    So I never said this. To destroy your argument takes only one example. The transporter is impossible. It would require converting the energy equivalent to +3000 stars like the sun just reassemble one average human. (Read L. Krassus “Physics of Star Trek”) Then in Star Wars, how much energy would it take to fly it through space, let alone travel in hyperspace?

    Science-Fiction is called fiction for a good reason. If the science were 100% true, then it isn’t science fiction! Now is it?

17. Frankly. I just think they are just being kind.

    Actually, the inspiration here is not they actual invention of the technology but in living in a world where invention of technology and innovation is encouraged.

    Just one moot point. Star Wars also inspired technology too. I.e. Luke Skywalker bionic hand, droids or even holographic technologies in 3D.

    It is a long stretch to say the Star Trek did this exclusively, though.

18. “And powerful little things they are…”

19. I don’t see how you can compare Star Wars, with about 15 hours under it’s belt, and Star Trek, with over 500 hours.

20. I wouldn’t take any of Krauss’s conclusions too seriously; he doesn’t understand, or usually even mention, subspace or some of the other fictional constructs used to explain Trek technology.

21. Thanks for the lecture. As a qualified and trained applied scientist I beg to differ. As I said below; “Unless we completely throw out the entire book of known physics with a new set of physics, the kinds “what could be” will never happen.” Krauss’ words are not just minor estimates, they prove beyond doubt that even logically are quite silly.

    As with the example of the transporter, the energy required is so high, that it would not be even feasible. If you held the power of 3000+ suns, you would use it as a weapon to destroy entire solar systems! As you should be aware, the transporter was introduced by Roddenberry as a plot device for getting from one scene to another. It was not made solely as a prediction of the future.

    I have said elsewhere here my reasoning, and do not intend to diminish the requirements to push the storyline. It is entertaining, but it ain’t close to the scientific plausible truth.

22. I never claim that anything by quantity of filmed product or seen technology. It is just that the universes they live in are just quite implausible on many levels.

23. But if the universe is truly infinite, shouldn’t there be a United Federation of Planets AND a deathstar out there somewhere? lol

24. Interesting question. That’s something I’ve been wondering too. If the universe is really infinite, and if it lasts for billions, possibly even trillions of years, wouldn’t there be more than enough time and space for anything and everything to exist?

25. Who would have thought 500 years ago that a device like cell phone could ever be possible. And could a caveman ever have imagined that man would be able some day to harness such powerful energy as the atomic energy?

    While it’s true that the transporter was merely a convenient plot device (as you probably know, the shuttle models were not available and were more expensive), nevertheless, that Trek device too was in a certain way prophetic. Today, there’s such thing as quantum teleportation. Granted, that’s a far cry from the Trek transporter, but who knows what the distant future holds.

26. The universe is actually finite, estimated as about 93 billion light years in diameter. By observing the recession of galaxies, where the further you look the faster they accelerate, you can workout where the observable universe ends. (It is at the place where the recessional velocity reaches the speed of light. You can go no faster. From all this cosmologists conclude that the Big Bang occurred about 13.7 billion years ago, which is related to the finite distance by the rate of the universe expanding. The universe is thought to keep expanding forever, though it is possible that gravity in the whole universe could holt the expansion, making the universe finite in age too. When the universe collapses and merges together, that is called the Big Crunch.

    It is more complicated than this, but it should satisfy your questions here.

27. That is true about 500 years ago, but science and physics has changed so much, that we can place restraints on how nature is constructed and how the universe works. There is a good assumption that the universe should work on basic principles and laws, which can predict how the universe behaves. Limitations like the speed of light, relativity, quantum mechanics, atomic particles, forces of nature, constrain how the universe works. Whilst it is true we are unsure, say, how gravity works, we have a good idea of the underlying mechanism and how it effects objects in the universe. Again, we are more certain of these limitations by experimentation. I.e. We discovered the so-called Higgs Boson this last year, which was predicted to exist in the 1950s. Its discovery explains why we experience mass, and shows we understand physical and the limits to forces and energies.

    Another good example is the speed of light, which seems finite at 300000 kilometres per second. We know nothing of substance can go faster than it, for if a physical body were ever to reach it, its mass would be infinite as restrained by Einstein’s relativity. As for Star Trek, they use a way around it by travelling through warp space, by changing the very nature of spacetime. The problem in doing this would not be easy. It is constrained greatly by the available energy (or mass), which is well beyond even the most feasible resources available to us. (Frankly, if such technology were reached, you would be able to construct or destroy whole universes. So even if there were other universes where the laws of physics were different, there remains constraints. If it weren’t true, the ways the universe works would not support biology. (They did not know this 500 years ago.)

    In the end there is little wriggle room for some whole additional realm of physics or science, and really no possibilities for science fiction worlds entailed in Star Trek or Star Wars. It makes good story-lines but really really bad physics.

    As for the predictive nature of Star Trek, well it is really an extrapolation of known physics. 50 years ago there was computer filling rooms, limited by the technology of the size of switches. Microchips reduced the size of these switches so you can have things like Pads. These devices are also faster. Yet it would be easy to extrapolate that computers would become portable wit or without Star Trek. (There is also a limitation on how fast computer chip can be, limited mostly by quantum mechanics.) Computers with power and memory like that needed in the Enterprise-D are implausible. The computing power to just run a holodeck would have to be in the order of the size of the Earth!

    As for quantum teleportation, this is only moving single small sub-atomic particles one at the time. A human being is a whole different level. As I said before, getting the power or energy to transport a human being – either physically moving them by converting them into energy and then reconstructing them back into matter or duplicating them – would require the power of a many stars. Logically, as I’ve also said too, it would be better used it as a weapon to destroy whole solar systems. I.e. Crazy Romulans like Nero could have destroyed and fried Earth in an instant. A transporter would be one of the most impossible things in all of Trek lore.

28. And the mindless debate and feuding continues….

29. At least the conversation here is polite and respectful, and as it should be.
    If you are unable to contribute, participate or keep up with the debate, that is no one else to blame but you.

30. Very true. Imaginative fiction can inspire people to start pondering how nifty it would be to have that cool gizmo in their hands, and scheming on how such a thing could be accomplished. Adding further, though I’ve derided Star Wars’ completely fantastical and unrealistic approach to technology, it too has inspired things like medical robots and livestock with easy-open bellies.

31. I don’t see how you can compare 2001: A Space Odyssey, with only 2 1/2 hours under its belt to Lost in Space, with over 83 hours.

32. Indeed. One interesting complication is that the universe is finite, but space appears to be infinite. This raises the intriguing possibility of other universes existing in space (though the commute would be murder).

33. I need a certain level of plausibility in my fictional diet. Keeps me regular.

34. Not all the time, it hasn’t.

35. With all of this mindless feuding between Star Trek fans over the original and the prequel reboot, let alone between the Star Trek and Star Wars fans, I’ve come to this inevitable conclusion.

    2001: A Space Odyssey(and its sequels)are certainly better than Star Trek, and Star Wars combined. Let alone better than Lost In Space.

36. Eh? You’ve contributed absolutely nothing to the comments on this story.

    Having a different point of views or experiences is actually healthy because it allows you to see another’s perspective.

    I do really suspect, though I might be wrong, that because this time what is being talked about does not revolving around you. I also suspect from your comment here you expect people to be shallow and vacuous when they say something. Really. Join in or say nothing. Simple.

37. Actually space isn’t infinite. At the time of the Big Bang both space and time were created. What happened before the Big Bang is an invalid question because how do you describe somewhere that has no space and no time?

    Today a satellite known as Planck published an image of the universe when it was about 380,000 years after the Big Bang. They find an age of about 13.8 billion years – slightly older than previously thought. 380001 years before this image time nor space existed! http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-03-22/satellite-maps-oldest-light-in-the-universe/4587828 (I too, though, wonder what the Q were doing as hinted in Next Gen and Voyager.)

    Fact indeed is stranger than fiction.

38. Me too! That’s why I enjoy most sci-fiction.

39. Man… do you deconstruct knock-knock jokes in this much detail too? lol

40. I was mostly joking but I have wondered that as well. Space may actually be finite like SJStar explained but how do we really know? I know scientists would have a better understanding of all this but it’s cool to speculate 🙂

41. If there was no such thing as Night the Sun would have run out twice as fast.

    You may have a point.

42. I’m guessing this is not the time to mention the Alcubierre drive, which oddly enough does move a subspace bubble by expanding space behind the bubble and contracting it in front, and probably an even worse time to bring up the recent refinements of the concept which make it energetically possible, provided of course that the required negative-mass matter can actually exist. Given the progress that’s been made thus far, I don’t think it’s too terribly unreasonable to postulate that increased understanding of the physics involved may one day lead to the development of a practical drive system. (And that day may not be that far off, as the pace of advancement just keeps getting faster and faster. Assuming of course that we will have any need of such toys on the other side of the singularity.)
    Oh my head. Perhaps today is a good day to die, but it’s a terrible one to quit drinking.

43. Me too. If I had all the answers, I wouldn’t be commenting on this site!

    Just to point out, I said mostly here “implausible” not “impossible.” I think there is a perception by Trek fans that the future technology and science in unbounded, but the last fifty years is pointing towards the discovering the whole basis of nature. Unless you have a science background, much of their understanding is only what they see on TV. Compared to fifty years ago, science has progressed a long way, but the theory has not really gone anywhere. In physics the main hurdles are formally explaining gravity properly, and determining the basis of dark matter and dark energy.

    The only future technology of real possibility is using the energies from the quantum vacuum for propulsion, but even with it, the universe is restricted by the speed of light via relativity. Until that universal speed limit is shown to be abled to be broken, getting to the stars via the method used by Trek will not ever happen – requiring centuries or millennia to cross the gulf of space.

    As for your comment on the Alcubierre Drive is interesting, as I have read the physics papers on it. It is a good idea, but it is implausible only because of the energy it is needed to work. Indeed, the paper is more a thought experiment than real science.

    Cheers for the positive comments!

44. Careful…you’ll get him talking about Vic Mignogna. That’s all he has to offer.

45. Space may have existed in some form for the expansion to begin filling. This is a subject of lively debate.

46. Then Trek added its own physics book, and you’re merely being a boring pedant by restating that. Krauss’s failure to mention subspace or the Heisenberg compensators shows a lack of understanding of the effort put into the writing to render it at least slightly plausible, and thus your reliance on his conclusions shows the same weakness. Applied scientists aren’t known for imagination. Go talk to a theory guy down the hall. They may show you how to enjoy science fiction.

47. .

48. Vic who?

49. It didn’t.

50. He’s right. Krauss’s whole analysis of the transporter fails to understand that it’s a jacketed matter stream. He writes all about reduction to bits and so on. Thus his required energy figures are nonsense.

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