a thousand starships like Enterprise to blow up a planet

[Lucky]

Designer: Dr. Michio Kaku

Purpose: Blow up an Earth like planet by causing the planet to implode and then explode

1000 ships that surround a planet and fire on it.

Power Source: Fusion Reactor

Weapon: X-Ray LASER

TUCKER: The pounding your ships gave us didn't help much. Try it now. I'm going to reset the optical subprocessors. That might clear it up. When we slipped through your detection grid, we got a look at the weapon you're building. An impressive piece of engineering. Hell, it'd take at least a thousand starships like Enterprise to blow up an entire planet. You know, I'd like to see the telemetry from the probe you launched against Earth.

If real world physicists agree that a thousand ships can work together to blow up a planet then is it not reasonable to use this example to calculate a yield for the weapons?

I would assume the navigational deflector would be weaponized in this case.

[Jasonb]

Few factors first Trip talk about NX Enterprise upgrade military able include pulsed phase cannons and also talk about Photonic torpedoes able put a three-kilometer crater piece space rock. Then of course maxium yeild made minor change to thing help make able hit inch target. Thousand NX Starship could do the trick part theory why Cardassion and Romulus force do much damage the Dominion fleet being attack in Star Terk die Cast is because aim ready blow a planet fight massive fleet battle.
So Pulse phase cannon over load might well do lot more damage then the NX Enterprise us just plan phase cannons set over load power enough blast mountain when doing test fire even do cause damage to the ship. If thausand starship fire those pulsed phase cannons long enough and had power put engines it do the trick. Would Main defector dish do the trick by itself for thausand NX starship likley yes different story

[theta_pinch]

Few factors first Trip talk about NX Enterprise upgrade military able include pulsed phase cannons and also talk about Photonic torpedoes able put a three-kilometer crater piece space rock. Then of course maxium yeild made minor change to thing help make able hit inch target. Thousand NX Starship could do the trick part theory why Cardassion and Romulus force do much damage the Dominion fleet being attack in Star Terk die Cast is because aim ready blow a planet fight massive fleet battle.
So Pulse phase cannon over load might well do lot more damage then the NX Enterprise us just plan phase cannons set over load power enough blast mountain when doing test fire even do cause damage to the ship. If thausand starship fire those pulsed phase cannons long enough and had power put engines it do the trick. Would Main defector dish do the trick by itself for thausand NX starship likley yes different story

Can you retype that coherently? It's impossible to understand.

[Khas]

Few factors first Trip talk about NX Enterprise upgrade military able include pulsed phase cannons and also talk about Photonic torpedoes able put a three-kilometer crater piece space rock. Then of course maxium yeild made minor change to thing help make able hit inch target. Thousand NX Starship could do the trick part theory why Cardassion and Romulus force do much damage the Dominion fleet being attack in Star Terk die Cast is because aim ready blow a planet fight massive fleet battle.
So Pulse phase cannon over load might well do lot more damage then the NX Enterprise us just plan phase cannons set over load power enough blast mountain when doing test fire even do cause damage to the ship. If thausand starship fire those pulsed phase cannons long enough and had power put engines it do the trick. Would Main defector dish do the trick by itself for thausand NX starship likley yes different story

Can you retype that coherently? It's impossible to understand.

Pffft... Bwahahaha!

Sorry, sorry, it's just that, well, people have been asking him that for years.

[Jasonb]

I mean in practice look all weapon see happen set everything max yield. For example take anything need either having project move or exploded take sense. When come energy weapon set over load it well do lot more damage.

Who came way USS Defiant blast the Death Star to space dust anyway me.

[theta_pinch]

Designer: Dr. Michio Kaku

Purpose: Blow up an Earth like planet by causing the planet to implode and then explode

1000 ships that surround a planet and fire on it.

Power Source: Fusion Reactor

Weapon: X-Ray LASER

TUCKER: The pounding your ships gave us didn't help much. Try it now. I'm going to reset the optical subprocessors. That might clear it up. When we slipped through your detection grid, we got a look at the weapon you're building. An impressive piece of engineering. Hell, it'd take at least a thousand starships like Enterprise to blow up an entire planet. You know, I'd like to see the telemetry from the probe you launched against Earth.

If real world physicists agree that a thousand ships can work together to blow up a planet then is it not reasonable to use this example to calculate a yield for the weapons?

I would assume the navigational deflector would be weaponized in this case.

That means the yield of all the ships energy being directed at a target is approximately 10e+29 joules on the low end.
How exactly was he planning to get 100,000 Yottajoules of energy from a fusion reactor?

[Lucky]

Designer: Dr. Michio Kaku

Purpose: Blow up an Earth like planet by causing the planet to implode and then explode

1000 ships that surround a planet and fire on it.

Power Source: Fusion Reactor

Weapon: X-Ray LASER

TUCKER: The pounding your ships gave us didn't help much. Try it now. I'm going to reset the optical subprocessors. That might clear it up. When we slipped through your detection grid, we got a look at the weapon you're building. An impressive piece of engineering. Hell, it'd take at least a thousand starships like Enterprise to blow up an entire planet. You know, I'd like to see the telemetry from the probe you launched against Earth.

If real world physicists agree that a thousand ships can work together to blow up a planet then is it not reasonable to use this example to calculate a yield for the weapons?
I would assume the navigational deflector would be weaponized in this case.

That means the yield of all the ships energy being directed at a target is approximately 10e+29 joules on the low end.
How exactly was he planning to get 100,000 Yottajoules of energy from a fusion reactor?

1) How did you arrive at a yield of 10e+29 joules?

2) Why would the power be coming from a fusion reactors for the impulse drives rather then the warp care?

3) Fictional settings often do seemingly impossible things.

[theta_pinch]

Designer: Dr. Michio Kaku

Purpose: Blow up an Earth like planet by causing the planet to implode and then explode

1000 ships that surround a planet and fire on it.

Power Source: Fusion Reactor

Weapon: X-Ray LASER

TUCKER: The pounding your ships gave us didn't help much. Try it now. I'm going to reset the optical subprocessors. That might clear it up. When we slipped through your detection grid, we got a look at the weapon you're building. An impressive piece of engineering. Hell, it'd take at least a thousand starships like Enterprise to blow up an entire planet. You know, I'd like to see the telemetry from the probe you launched against Earth.

If real world physicists agree that a thousand ships can work together to blow up a planet then is it not reasonable to use this example to calculate a yield for the weapons?
I would assume the navigational deflector would be weaponized in this case.

That means the yield of all the ships energy being directed at a target is approximately 10e+29 joules on the low end.
How exactly was he planning to get 100,000 Yottajoules of energy from a fusion reactor?

1) How did you arrive at a yield of 10e+29 joules?

2) Why would the power be coming from a fusion reactors for the impulse drives rather then the warp care?

3) Fictional settings often do seemingly impossible things.

1. I meant 2e+29 joules. The gravitational binding energy of earth is 2e+32 joules, and it takes 1000 starships directing energy at the planet, so 2e+32/1000=2e+29 joules.
2. I was talking about Michio Kaku's fusion reactor powered x-ray lasers.
3. Yes, yes they do.

[Lucky]

1. I meant 2e+29 joules. The gravitational binding energy of earth is 2e+32 joules, and it takes 1000 starships directing energy at the planet, so 2e+32/1000=2e+29 joules.

And how much energy do you have to add to the Earth in order to cause it to undergo a fusion reaction that will destroy the planet?

2. I was talking about Michio Kaku's fusion reactor powered x-ray lasers.

I'm not good at taking dictation, and can't find online transcripts of the show, but you can find the episode on Youtube. I'll send them in a PM.

[theta_pinch]

1. I meant 2e+29 joules. The gravitational binding energy of earth is 2e+32 joules, and it takes 1000 starships directing energy at the planet, so 2e+32/1000=2e+29 joules.

And how much energy do you have to add to the Earth in order to cause it to undergo a fusion reaction that will destroy the planet?

Crust: Made of silicates; endothermic fusion reaction.
Mantle: Made of silicates; endothermic fusion reaction.
Core: primarily iron; endothermic fusion reaction.
A fusion reaction won't work to destroy the planet because the bulk of the materials when fused give a net energy loss.

[Sandyin]

Regardless of what Dr. Michio Kaku has to say on the matter, I just don't think this Trip quote is a particularly useful one. Sure if you're looking at a transcript it looks like a decent quote but if you watch the scene it's pretty clear that Trip isn't exactly stable at this point and he's clearly speaking off the cuff, so we shouldn't take what he's saying as firm numbers.

Just what level of destruction is being talked about here? Trip says “blow up an entire planet” and given the context it's probably safe to assume Trip is referring to an Earth-like planet but that isn't explicit. (Blowing up Mercury is still blowing up an entire planet.) And while that phrase conjures images of something like the destruction of Alderaan that need not necessary be what Trip meant. Lower levels of destruction could be described that way by someone in the state that Trip was in. It's pretty common to hear people say that humanity's nuclear arsenal could “blow up” the Earth, for example.

Also, he say's “a thousand” which in this context is just means “a large number that is easy to say but isn't too large”. It's a very similar situation to, Han in ANH saying, “The entire star fleet couldn't destroy the whole planet. It'd take a thousand ships with more fire power than I've...”. Given the context, it would be a mistake to claim that this quote means that the Empire has no more then 999 ships.

But given all of that, if you want to take what Trip says at face value, you end up with something like 2e+29 joules for the weapons output of an NX class ship, isn't that wildly out of step with what we see?

Correct me if I'm incorrect but doesn't that work out to 47,801,472,300,000 megatons of destruction per ship or about 478 billion 100 megaton photon torpedoes per ship?

[2046]

I agree that it seems absurd on its face . . . I mean, c'mon. But of course, Star Wars inflationists latch on to absurdities like that for dear life, so at the very least it's fun to have a tit-for-tat example to throw.

That said, however . . . when you consider that 20 ships two centuries later could 'de-existify' the vast majority of a planet in six hours, Trip's comment starts seeming a little less strange. As noted in the thread below, the notion of ships two centuries apart being like 1500 times different in firepower is rather a greater difference than has ever been suggested.

http://www.starfleetjedi.net/forum/view ... ?f=8&t=318

Personally, I still don't know what to do with that, even seven years after the thread above . . . I'm not comfortable using it except in jest. Of course, I don't really use "The Die is Cast" either, since my goal isn't inflationism but consistency. TDiC is like ST5 . . . the sort of thing to latch on to if I was a Trek inflationist running GalaxyClassStarship.Net or TheKironide.com/STTC or similar, but not the sort of thing I seriously think is valid or even worthwhile to discuss.

[Lucky]

Crust: Made of silicates; endothermic fusion reaction.
Mantle: Made of silicates; endothermic fusion reaction.
Core: primarily iron; endothermic fusion reaction.
A fusion reaction won't work to destroy the planet because the bulk of the materials when fused give a net energy loss.

1) Did you watch the episode of Sci-Fi Science that I sent you the youtube addresses because as they explain it better.

2) The lighter the element used as fuel, the more energy you get out of the fusion reaction, and it is not until you start fusing iron that you get a net loss.

3) I'm not sure you even need to start a fusion reaction, and if you did, you'd have a star that was going to go nova.

4) When a star dies it fuses things heavier the iron, and yet still goes nova.

[Lucky]

Regardless of what Dr. Michio Kaku has to say on the matter, I just don't think this Trip quote is a particularly useful one. Sure if you're looking at a transcript it looks like a decent quote but if you watch the scene it's pretty clear that Trip isn't exactly stable at this point and he's clearly speaking off the cuff, so we shouldn't take what he's saying as firm numbers.

It gives a rough number that matches real world physics, and it's all we have to work with.Trip's statement is all we have to work with, and given his job he has a reasonable amount of credibility on the topic.

Just what level of destruction is being talked about here? Trip says “blow up an entire planet” and given the context it's probably safe to assume Trip is referring to an Earth-like planet but that isn't explicit. (Blowing up Mercury is still blowing up an entire planet.) And while that phrase conjures images of something like the destruction of Alderaan that need not necessary be what Trip meant. Lower levels of destruction could be described that way by someone in the state that Trip was in. It's pretty common to hear people say that humanity's nuclear arsenal could “blow up” the Earth, for example.

[Ten forward]


(Wesley and Data are playing 3D chess. Outside is a field of planetary fragments) 


WESLEY: This was the final battle, wasn't it? 


DATA: Neither side intended Orelious Nine to be the decisive conflict. 


WESLEY: There's not much left, is there. 


DATA: The destruction is remarkable considering the primitive weapons of the period. 


(Geordi enters, disconsolate and back in uniform) 


WESLEY: Uh, oh. 


DATA: I beg your pardon, Wesley? 


WESLEY: Geordi had a big date with Christy tonight. He spent days putting together the perfect programme. Looks like it ended kind of early. 


DATA: Uh, oh. 


RIKER [OC]: Commander Data to the Bridge immediately. 


DATA: Acknowledged.


[Bridge]


RIKER: We're picking up a signal, coordinates two one one mark six one. 


PICARD: It would seen to be an ancient interplanetary code. Mister Data? 


DATA: Confirmed, sir. 


RIKER: Survivors on Orelious Nine after all this time? Not possible. 


PICARD: Well, hardly possible, Number One. Lay in a course to the source of the signal. 


(short trip through the rubble) 


DATA: Approaching the source, Captain. 


PICARD: Put it on the viewer. 


WORF: A Promellian battle cruiser? 


PICARD: With its Lang-cycle fusion engines still intact. 


DATA: Sensors indicate no life signs aboard, Captain. 


PICARD: I should hope not, Mister Data. That ship belongs in a museum. I'm afraid we're a little late. That call for help was probably initiated over a thousand years ago.


Captain's log, Stardate 43205.6. We have arrived at Orelious Nine, to chart the battle in which the Menthars and Promellians fought to their mutual extinction. Among the ruins we have found a relic, a Promellian battle cruiser that has withstood the centuries.

http://tng.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/ ... rap010.jpg
http://tng.trekcore.com/hd/albums/3x06/ ... hd_014.jpg
The question isn't "can they shatter planets with fleets way back in Archer's time", but "how do they use a fleet to turn a M-class planet into an asteroid field with the primitive weapons and ships of the time".

Also, he say's “a thousand” which in this context is just means “a large number that is easy to say but isn't too large”. It's a very similar situation to, Han in ANH saying, “The entire star fleet couldn't destroy the whole planet. It'd take a thousand ships with more fire power than I've...”. Given the context, it would be a mistake to claim that this quote means that the Empire has no more then 999 ships.

I'd rather not bring a different series into this conversation as it tends to drag the thread off topic.

Charles (Trip) Tucker the third is the chief engineer of the NX.01. You don't get a more knowledgeable source about a ship's capabilities then the chief engineer.

But given all of that, if you want to take what Trip says at face value, you end up with something like 2e+29 joules for the weapons output of an NX class ship, isn't that wildly out of step with what we see?

How did you come to the answer of 2e+29 joules?

I see no reason for them to use the anemic weapons the NX-01 was armed with when they can use the navigational deflector

Correct me if I'm incorrect but doesn't that work out to 47,801,472,300,000 megatons of destruction per ship or about 478 billion 100 megaton photon torpedoes per ship?

I don't think photonic torpedos would be for this sort of operation.

That number is actually a low/milddle end as there is evidence for higher yields, and Voyager was only using enough boom rather then all the boom they could have.

[Lucky]

II agree that it seems absurd on its face . . . I mean, c'mon. But of course, Star Wars inflationists latch on to absurdities like that for dear life, so at the very least it's fun to have a tit-for-tat example to throw.

That said, however . . . when you consider that 20 ships two centuries later could 'de-existify' the vast majority of a planet in six hours, Trip's comment starts seeming a little less strange. As noted in the thread below, the notion of ships two centuries apart being like 1500 times different in firepower is rather a greater difference than has ever been suggested.

Personally, I still don't know what to do with that, even seven years after the thread above . . . I'm not comfortable using it except in jest. Of course, I don't really use "The Die is Cast" either, since my goal isn't inflationism but consistency. TDiC is like ST5 . . . the sort of thing to latch on to if I was a Trek inflationist running GalaxyClassStarship.Net or TheKironide.com/STTC or similar, but not the sort of thing I seriously think is valid or even worthwhile to discuss.

Why do people always forget about the fleet of primitive ships that blew up a planet thousands of years before in Booby Trap? This is like saying that the Death Star can't blow up a planet after seeing episode 4. It's not inflationistic if it clearly happens on screen.

What you refer to as inflationism is taking something usually not on screen, and then extrapolating some conclusion that doesn't really make sense when you look at the plot and or series as a whole.

All I started this thread to do was see if anyone knew how to calculate the energy requirements for a scaled up NIF style bombardment to destroy a planet. Then I was planning to see how the figures matched against stated reactor outputs, and weapon yields. I was asking for help, and then see how it fit.