OK, I think we all have already heard from the following dialogue from "The Outrageous Okona":
- "Captain, they are now locking lasers on us."
"Lasers?"
"Yes, sir."
"Lasers can't even penetrate our navigation shields. Don't they know that?"
"Regulations do call for yellow alert."
"Hmm, a very old regulation. Well, make it so Number One. And, reduce speed... drop main shields, as well."
"May I ask why, sir?"
"In case we decide to surrender to them, Number One
They could fire 'till their lasers ran dry; they wouldn't hurt the Enterprise."
That lines has created much heated and not always reasonable and friendly debates between pro Star Trek debaters and pro Star Wars debaters.
Some pro Star Trek debaters have argued that that lines indicates that no laser can penetrate navigation shields. And because Star Wars is using lasers - in the form of turbolasers - their weapons couldn't penetrate the navigation shields of Starfleet ships. Some are even gone so far to claim that even the main laser of the Death Star couldn't damage a Starfleet vessel with navigation shields.
It's obviously that they are wrong - at least regarding their second and third conclusion. Although the weapons are called lasers in Star Wars, its obviously that they can't be lasers. A laser is not visible from the side but only at the point where it hit something. A laser in atmoshere for example can't really be seen from the side - as many are claiming. Only the molecules of the atmosphere, that are hit by the laser, can be seen. In vacuum, where aren't even such molecules, a laser and its path would be invisible.
But the turbolaser and blaster bolts in Star Wars are all visible. That's why they can't be real lasers and why the conclusion that they can't penetrate navigation shields - regardless how strong they are - is fallacious.
But there is still the first conclusion: Can it be true that no laser can penetrate navigation shields - regardless how strong they are?
Pro Star Wars debaters are arguing that the quote from Picard has to be interpreted another way. They argue that Picard has known the size and power of the ship and could therewith conclude that the lasers of that ship can't be powerfull enough to penetrate the Enterprises navigation shields.
To be honest, that is not convincing to me: The fact is that Worf hasn't given any specifications from that ship. Picard, who clearly hasn't know them before - otherwise he would have known that they are only armed with lasers - couldn't therfore know how much energy these ships can produce and how much energy they have available for their weapons. They could had have for example some kind of batteries or akkumulators in which they have stored the energy that is needed to power up mighty lasers.
Indeed, the line that "they could fire 'till their lasers ran dry", seems to indicate that he is imagining a similar power system for their lasers. Because if the lasers are only powered by the energy the ships reactors are providing continuously, and assuming that these ship reactors are able to provide energy over an indeterminably long period, the lasers wouldn't ran dry. Only if they would use already stored energy to power up their lasers, could they ran dry when this energy is exhausted.
That's why he couldn't really know how powerfull their lasers could get.
And that's why his claim seems to me more plausible interpreted, that he really means that a laser - regardless of its power - isn't able to penetrate the Enterprises navigation shields.
Pro Star Wars debater object against the notion, that the navigation shield could be able to withstand all lasers, regardless how powerfull, is completely impossible.
Mr. Wong has argued:
- Everything has limits. Science is largely based on finding those limits. But if we don't know what those limits are, how reasonable is it to conclude that they must not exist at all? It is unscientific, unreasonable, and has absolutely no basis in logic whatsoever. There is one obvious reason that Kennedy subscribes to this ridiculous myth about navigational deflectors being godlike in their immunity to lasers: he wants them to be, because he thinks that Star Wars weapons are lasers. No one with a remotely rational mind would assume that since Picard didn't elaborate on his statement, he must have meant that it was a universal law. No one with any grasp of logic or science would assume that in the absence of a known upper limit, there must not be any upper limit at all.
And Mr. Saxton has "argued":
- STvsSW threads are notoriously capable of devouring human energy and time, but I am tempted today to take a dip in the stagnant pool and address the silliest Trekkist fallacies.
What a peculiar fixation! A particular kind of shield immune to a particular kind of weapon, regardless of power? Regardless of whether the weapon power exceeds the dissipative capacities so carefully stated in the TrekTech manuals?
Consider this dialogue:
- My skin is immune to butterflies.
How do you know?
A butterfly blundered into a collision with my nose yesterday. I am unharmed.
But if you are hit by 10^40 butterflies simultaneously moving in the same direction, you'll be knocked off your feet.
[Voice becoming shrill as her faith is challenged.]
Utter nonsense! It's all butterflies! It doesn't matter how many butterflies hit me or how energetic they are! It's all just butterflies! You know nothing about physics!
I see.
Similar arguments are made by many pro Star Wars debaters - although most of them are only repeating what these two have said.
The question now is, if it is possible that a laser - regardless how powerfull it is - can't penetrate a Starfleet navigation shield. I think, that it is theoretical possible.
Fact is, we don't know exactly how that navigation shield is supposed to work. We know only - and I'm not sure if that is confirmed by accepted canon - that the navigation shield is supposed to clear the flight path of a ship at high speeds from space debris, asteroids, microscopic particles and other objects that might collide with the ship. How it is doing that is unkown.
That's why we can try to find an explanation that fits to the known facts - for example that no laser - regardless its power - can penetrate it.
And only if we have to conceed that it is absolutely impossible to find an explanation for that ability, we can consider if Picard was maybe wrong or if our interpretation of what he has said is maybe wrong. But even than we have to consider that in Star Trek many things are shown, which should be impossible according to the understanding of science from today. But it happens in Star Trek nevertheless, so that we have to assume that either our understanding of science from today is wrong (only for the sake of that debate - it wouldn't be much left over if all what is shown in Star Trek and is scientifical impossible, would be treated as not-possible) or that they have found somehow a way to compensate the one or other scientifical law (the Heisenberg compensator comes to mind for that route).
But back to the first question: Is it absolutely impossible to find an explanation for the ability of the navigation shield to let no laser penetrate it?
If the navigation shield works for example with gravity or is able to curve space in another way, the power of a laser, that is not absorbed by the shield, but deflected, is irrelevant. Deflect means to bend down or turn aside, especially from a straight course or fixed direction. It doesn't mean to absorb energy.
A flight path of a laser - regardless of its power - is bend by a gravitational source always in the same way and magnitude. The cause of that is the curvature of space and time which is what we sense as gravitation. A laser - regardless of its power - is always following the geodesics in space-time. Thats why only a certain amount of energy is needed to curve space-time but the power of the laser is irrelevant.
That the navigation shield is graviton-based is supported by the facts that Starfleet possess the ability to artificially create gravitation and even anti-gravitation. We know that their shields are operating with a graviton field output
[1].
And we know from the episode "
Silikon Avatar" that they can send graviton beams with a velocity faster than light. Such beams send in the flight path could be used to steer space debris, asteroids, microscopic particles and other objects, that might otherwise collide with the ship, out of the flight path of it. And they could be used to create gravitational lenses that would deflect a laser beam.
That provokes the question, why we are able to see a ship, if all light is bend around it. But the answer to this is simple. Not all light is bend around a ship by the navigation shield.
The navigation shield identifies threats to the ship like space debris, asteroids, microscopic particles and other objects and deflect them. That doesn't mean that the navigation shield is creating a constant field which is active even if there is no such threat. That would be inefficient. It would be far more efficient if the navigation shield effect only that object, that are identified as a thread.
Normal light is no thread to the ship. But a powerfull laser could be a thread. And when the navigation shield is detecting such a laser, it creates a gravitational lens and deflect the laser beam away from the ship. For that it has enough time, because a laser propagates only with lightspeed. But the sensors of Starfleet are much faster than light.
That provokes a further question: Why could we see that normal electromagnetic radiation could endanger the Enterprise and its crew? But the answer to this is also very simple. Such a radiation is diffuse. It's far more difficult to deflect such diffuse radiation that is coming from all-around than a single beam that is coming from only one direction. The navigation shield may not be able to hide a ship in a space pocket, what would be necessary to protect it from such from all directions coming radiation.
A further question could be, why phaser and other Star Trek weapons are able to hit a ship and are not deflected the same way. We know from these weapons that they have some weird characteristics. For example can we observe that they have different speeds. Sometimes they are clearly slower than light, other times we see how they are faster than light and are fired even at warp speed. Alone that ability indicates that such weapons don't operate like normal electromagnetic radiation, which always is propagating with light speed. It could be that they aren't affected by gravity so much as electromagnetic radiation or don't follow the geodesics in space-time like electromagnetic radiation. After all, the heavy space-time distortions of the warp drive don't effect the path of these weapons.
Are there any objections, notes or additions? Is that not reconcilable with what was shown in Star Trek? Or are there events, I haven't regarded, that are contradicting the results of my considerations?