MakeUseOf Does the Debate

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2046
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MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by 2046 » Fri Jun 19, 2015 7:38 am

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/star-trek- ... -advanced/

ST-v-SW.Net gets extensive reference. How'd I miss this? It's from April.

Firmus Piett
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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by Firmus Piett » Fri Jun 19, 2015 1:56 pm

"One major complication is that, while Star Trek writers at least attempted to create plausible explanations for the technology, George Lucas did what he wanted by throwing in random technobabble."
Wow.This part has to be one of the most hypocritical and arse about face things I've read in a while, lol. And it's yet another example of Trekky snootiness when it comes to the Sci Fi genre.


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Clearly in context, this is a misplaced dig that was supposed to be aimed at some weapons stats from the EU, not canon films, because "random technobabble" explanations in the films were.... almost nonexistent. The only example I can recall are the "midichlorians", which ya know, somehow make the force plausible in the star wars verse. We could dig up a handful of examples from the cartoons if we wanted, such as the kyber crystals, but this just doesn't compare to the "random technobabble" we get from star trek pretty much every other episode.

I think that many scientific laymen / some star trek fans swallow the clever sounding "technobabble" as "plausible explanations" and then climb up on their high horse to snipe at all the other sci fi's out there for not being as sciencey and as realistic as Trek (which ya know, contains countless god like beings with uber powers that make force users look like little girls by comparison ;) ).
Last edited by Firmus Piett on Fri Jun 19, 2015 2:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by Firmus Piett » Fri Jun 19, 2015 2:03 pm

Technological advancement, morality, exploration and wonder. I believe these are the things that Star Trek has done well to promote science. I'd say that these are the "sciencey" elements of the show, not the random technobabble BS. Trying to contrast Star Trek as proper sci fi with Star Wars as space fantasy makes much more sense from a story telling point of view... but I still think it's kind of unfair: I don't believe for a second that we have to basically follow a bunch of scientists and explorers around the galaxy for a technological space based saga to be considered proper sci fi.

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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by Lucky » Thu Jun 25, 2015 7:21 am

Firmus Piett wrote:"One major complication is that, while Star Trek writers at least attempted to create plausible explanations for the technology, George Lucas did what he wanted by throwing in random technobabble."
Wow.This part has to be one of the most hypocritical and arse about face things I've read in a while, lol. And it's yet another example of Trekky snootiness when it comes to the Sci Fi genre.


------
Clearly in context, this is a misplaced dig that was supposed to be aimed at some weapons stats from the EU, not canon films, because "random technobabble" explanations in the films were.... almost nonexistent. The only example I can recall are the "midichlorians", which ya know, somehow make the force plausible in the star wars verse. We could dig up a handful of examples from the cartoons if we wanted, such as the kyber crystals, but this just doesn't compare to the "random technobabble" we get from star trek pretty much every other episode.

I think that many scientific laymen / some star trek fans swallow the clever sounding "technobabble" as "plausible explanations" and then climb up on their high horse to snipe at all the other sci fi's out there for not being as sciencey and as realistic as Trek (which ya know, contains countless god like beings with uber powers that make force users look like little girls by comparison ;) ).
You might want to check the technobabble with a dictionary handy because it is often not random.

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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by 2046 » Tue Jun 30, 2015 1:17 am

Trek's use of nonsense is pretty appalling ... I use their science advisor Bormanis's book as toilet paper ... but the general scientific reasonings and processes are usually superior to what is seen in Wars, save for some too-Trekkish late TCW stories.

The best example of science reasoning from the films is, IIRC, Obi-Wan's uncertainty of what to conclude with the mass of the Kamino system being obvious, and having to consult Yoda. Pretty sure even Worf could've nailed that one.

Edit: to clarify, I am not suggesting one or the other side has more intelligent characters. I am simply referring to scientific reasoning displays.

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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by Firmus Piett » Tue Jun 30, 2015 10:58 pm

Yeah that is a fair point, and I think it's appropriate that starfleet personnel are a bit more on the their scientific ball than the kinda characters we follow in Wars.

--
And you know what I'm talking about Lucky..

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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by 2046 » Wed Jul 01, 2015 1:41 am

It's CSI vs. NCIS ... er, wait, you're British, right? How about CSI vs. Midsomer Murders? He has forensic people, they just aren't the focus.

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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by Mr. Oragahn » Thu Jul 02, 2015 9:25 pm

2046 wrote:Trek's use of nonsense is pretty appalling ... I use their science advisor Bormanis's book as toilet paper ... but the general scientific reasonings and processes are usually superior to what is seen in Wars, save for some too-Trekkish late TCW stories.

The best example of science reasoning from the films is, IIRC, Obi-Wan's uncertainty of what to conclude with the mass of the Kamino system being obvious, and having to consult Yoda. Pretty sure even Worf could've nailed that one.

Edit: to clarify, I am not suggesting one or the other side has more intelligent characters. I am simply referring to scientific reasoning displays.
Clerarly the goals were elsewhere. The explanation of midichlorians... many wish it had never been put down on paper.
On the other hand, Yoda's explanation of life and the Force in a few sentences in TESB is a rather strong spiritual moment in movie making, well memored.

Thinking about the Jedi Database, Dooku must have access to some solid admin privileges in order to erase the data and erase the modification history too, logs and all that.
Which of course would make the whole thing suspicious, because if it's tiered and intertwined like a wiki, every single mention of Kamino had to be erased from all pages and somehow, all the enterprise had to remain invisible.

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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by Mr. Oragahn » Thu Jul 02, 2015 9:28 pm

2046 wrote:It's CSI vs. NCIS ... er, wait, you're British, right? How about CSI vs. Midsomer Murders? He has forensic people, they just aren't the focus.
Midsomer Murders. Huh, featuring that small town with a birthrate so high that it somehow manages to cope with the insane amount of weekly murders.
It makes Mos Eisley look like a caring geriatric hospice in comparison.
Last edited by Mr. Oragahn on Mon Jul 06, 2015 9:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by 2046 » Sun Jul 05, 2015 8:38 am


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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by Lucky » Fri Jul 10, 2015 6:23 am

Firmus Piett wrote: And you know what I'm talking about Lucky..
I'm not really sure what you're talking about?

Star Trek writers seems to usually be aware of when their doing something that should be impossible like in the case of the Verteron Array being changed from a powerful L.A.S.E.R. to a device that shot fictional FTL particles because the writers realized that the speed of light was too slow for what they wanted to depict. You also have the writers dropping L.A.S.E.R. for phaser do to knowing that L.A.S.E.R. can't do a lot of what they wanted phasers to do.

Star Wars writers on the other hand just say what ever sounds "cool" to them without regard for what it really is. Star Wars is rather well known for its Twin Ion Engine craft that don't act like they have ion engines, and weapons called lasers that don't remotely act as L.A.S.E.R., and never really cared about realism in the slightest.

I see Star wars as high fantasy with the superficial trappings of science fiction, but Star trek at least trying to pay attention to the science in the fiction.

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Re: MakeUseOf Does the Debate

Post by 2046 » Sat Jul 11, 2015 12:04 pm

TIEs can have ion engines, just effing powerful ones compared to our efficient little tooters.

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