USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-D)

[Huguenot]

Just watching an episode of Next Generation, and was struck by how rapidly the stars appear to whisk past the starship when you get the external view.

In Voyager it was going to take them 75 years to get home at Warp 9 from the Delta Quadrant. However, this seems at odds with the speed of those twinkling lights winging past.

Can someone explain where I'm getting it wrong?

[binary_star]

Huguenot Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Can someone explain where I'm getting it wrong?

It's just a tv show.

[Keef]

When at warp speed, the ship isn't exactly moving that fast, it's that the warp engine kind of bends space in to waves, so that the ship crosses it more quickly.

Don't ask me how I know that.

I used to be quite the trekie.

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

It's fairy dust.

[Santerme]

Not fully suspending your disbelief?

[HAL9000]

It would take over 100,000 years to cross the Milky Way galaxy while travelling at the speed of light.

I think most people find galactic distances beyond everyday comprehension.

Star Trek uses many clever literary devices to fit intra-galactic storylines into hour-long episodes - warp drive being one of the most significant.

[HAL9000]

According to the ST:TNG Technical Manual:

From page 55:

"Field intensity increases geometrically and is a function of the total of the individual field layer values..... For example, a ship travelling at Warp Factor 3 is maintaining a warp field of at least 39 Cochranes and is therefore travelling at 39 times c , the speed of light."

Warp Factor (c = speed of light)

1 = 1 Cochrane = c x 1

2 = 10 Cochranes = c x 10

3 = 39 Cochranes = c x 39

4 = 102 Cochranes = c x 102

5 = 214 Cochranes = c x 214

6 = 392 Cochranes = c x 392

7 = 656 Cochranes = c x 656

8 = 1024 Cochranes = c x 1024

9 = 1516 Cochranes = c x 1516

For perspective: it takes about 24 hours to get from Earth to Alpha Centauri at Warp 9.

The above factors are fairly consistent with Voyager?s 75-year journey to cross the galaxy at normal cruising speed.

HTH

[Captain Scarlet]

Nahhhhhhhhhh use warp gates....like from Babyalon 5 ...much cooler show

[mockney piers]

Very true. Not a Trekkie myself, it's so self important. Babylon five was genuinely funny, it even had Neil Gaiman as a writer.

New Battlestar Galactica is pretty good drama, though admittedly missing much of that all important humour element.

New V is just awful.

[HAL9000]

Prefer the Stargate myself - easy to build, economical to run and virtually instantaneous even over inter-galactic distances.

[karter]

Scottie, please beam up Hal and piers, they need to experience some real space adventures.

[Captain Scarlet]

Yes I agree V is awesome show.....

Battlestar remake bloody good show....Liked at the end when battlestar started cracking up because of too many hyperjumps.

Caprica the spin off series not sure about it really tried to get into it but finding it hard going.

[Tarot]

This is the voice of the mysterons. Why havent you contacted us yet Captain Scarlet?

[Tarot]

In the world of fiction, you can go at any speed you want. Star Trek was one of the best and origional series made.

It was amusing ecscapism.

I thought the new Mr Spock, the bloke from heroes, was a good replacement, but the one that replaced Kirk was nothing

like him.

Mr Spock was fascinating.

[Huguenot]

Most quality science fiction tries to be somewhat consistent with speed and distance.

I particularly like Alistair Reynold's books, which address the massive problems involved with time dilation when travelling at relativistic speeds.

Am quite enjoying Stargate: Universe at the moment, which seems to have a nice blend of visual spectacle and character drama. Do you get that in the UK?

Caprica starting with us next week. I've not watched any Battlestar Galactica remake yet, so clearly I need to have a heavy duty weekend of that.

Never even realised there was a V remake. I've got no idea how they intend to do that!!!

[HAL9000]

As an aside - a little titbit of sci-fi fan folklore:

The pilot episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (DS9) aired just weeks before the debut of Babylon 5. Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski indicated that Paramount was aware of his concept as early as 1989, when he attempted to sell the show to the studio, and provided them with the series bible, pilot script, artwork, lengthy character background histories, and plot synopses for the first 22 episodes. Paramount passed on Babylon 5, but later announced Deep Space Nine was in development after Warner Bros. announced its plans for Babylon 5. Straczynski has stated on numerous occasions that he thinks Paramount may have used his bible and scripts as the basis for DS9's first season. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylon_5#Star_Trek:_Deep_Space_Nine_controversy)

 

[mockney piers]

Original star trek was very good. A bit daft, a lot of fun and humour embedded in the DNA.

The problem with the later stuff was that it took the mythos too seriously but lost touch with the ethos of the original series.

You hVe to blame the writers of Next Gen. Subsequent spin offs tried to find a middle ground but were ultimately hampered by decisions taken in next Gen.

Voyager was the most successful of these, DS9 the least. Really, really bad.

I thought Enterprise cleverly sidestepped the prime directive issues by prequeling it, and I still think underrated and unfairly canned, suffering as it did from overload of all the stuff that went before.

At least sic fi is no longer a dirty word and we are spoilt these days. Not that it's all good, but some is, much is passable and we can ignore the rest.

Babylon 5 ended up crushed under the weight of it's own mythos too, and became almost unwatchable after a few series, but we can treasure the first three.

Books will always be the best medium as there's no concomitant budget on the words used to express fanciful ideas.

I, like Huguenot, love a bit of space opera and our own alistair Reynolds is very good. Loving Dan Simmon's stuff, though he nods to many another author as his inspiration. I've been trawling through a lot of the stuff from the fifties and sixties and it's amazing how little it ages and how influential it remains.

Of modern stuff The Road is a standout novel(la). Everyone should read it. I bought a copy for missus mockney's brother who self confessedly doesn't read much and he was blown away by it.

Of course if you want the real thing just read through Philip K Dick's canon.

Aaaaaaand breeeeeaaaaathe......

[Keef]

Voyager was the most successful of these, DS9 the least. Really, really bad.

I'm the opposite, I'd chose DS9 over Voyager. (plus Jadzia Dax was fit!)

Never saw any of Enterprise.

Next Gen had some great great stories, and some not so great. Q was always fun, and episodes with him in them were generally good. The final episode "All good things" was a great ending too (well, sort of ending, unless you count the films, which with the exception of "First Contact" were not great).

[HAL9000]

I grew up on TOS (and Dr Who) and was a voracious reader of everything sci-fi until the early eighties - haven't read much in that genre since, though.

But, for me, Voyager represents the pinnacle of the Star Trek franchise - I'm not sure why it's my favourite (Seven-of-Nine notwithstanding) perhaps because the production team had by then refined and perfected its story-telling skills to the point where fantasy and reality became virtually indistinguishable, albeit sparse on humour.

I especially like the Borg story-arcs (originally introduced in TNG - admittedly) - the Borg being an extraordinarily creative alien construct that, I think, probably evolved from the humble Cybermen.

I also think the world of The Matrix may well been inspired, in part at least, from the Borg's UniMatrix Zero.

The original Stargate series, on the other hand, is notable for its self-effacing humour and plethora of in-jokes - always good for a laugh.

[nashoi]

I agree with pretty much all of that post HAL9000, Voyager was definitely my favourite. Also I think Star Trek was at its best when the Enterprise was captained by a bit of a prat. OK so Patrick Stewart maybe a fine shakespearean actor, but listening to him in interviews is just painful, their two successors were just too bland for Star Trek.

Though I don't read much SciFi these days, when I did, I found the near future novels more interesting. Greg Bear's Eon comes to mind as a great book.

A recommendation, particularly aimed at Mockney Piers though, is for Vernor Vinge's Rainbows End. An excellent look at the near future when his dreams of technological synesthesia have been realised with the help of augmented reality lenses and portable computing.

[Captain Scarlet]

Yep out of the Trekkis Voyager was my favorite too but did have a soft spot for Enterprise.

I wish a series could be made based on Starship troopers!.