The ICS, TDiC and the Rabid Warsie Double Standard

[Enterprise E]

On the pro-Wars foruns, mainly SD.net and Spacebattles, I have noticed that the E2, and even the E3 ICSs are accepted by the vast majority of posters without question, despite the vast amount of evidence that puts their credibility into question. Yet, whenever I have brought up the Star Trek Deep Space Nine episode "The Die is Cast" and the calcs that can be derived from that, the Rabid Warsies form a line and say that it can't be accepted because the were being sent back false sensor readings, the explosions were holographic, the viewscreen was tampered with, the explosions don't fit with the quotes, there are other examples of lower yields, etc. I agree with them to an extent. It is a high end for Star Trek, even the lower to medium calcs that would, oddly enough, put Star Trek weapons at a comparable level to the SW ICS yields.

However, I have noticed something about the two incidents. They are remarkably similar events with regards to canon. And I am also surprised that Trekkies haven't pointed this out. Both present a high end in weapons yields for their respective series. Both are brought into question by other incidents. The space battle in RoTS shows to any reasonable person that the ICS yields were wrong. There were even discrepencies between the yields shown in the E2:ICS and the movie itself. Such discrepencies that come to mind were the yields of Slave I's blaster cannons, the laser cannon blasts from the asteroid field above Geonosis, the Geonosian fighters' laser cannon yield, the LAAT gunship's rockets' yields, etc. Yet the Rabid Warsies accept the ICS as gospel and try to force the movies to fit with it. The ironic thing is that there is actually more canon evidence for lower to middle end "The Die is Cast" yields to be true, or not so far off the mark, than there is for the ICS yields to be true. Don't forget that Garak in "Broken Link" said that the Defiant had "the firepower to reduce [the Changeling Homeworld] to a smoking cinder." And that was just the Defiant. There were a couple other examples as well that put ST firepower, if not at TDiC levels, definately above the usual levels accepted by the Rabid Warsies. My personal view with regards to the ICS and TDiC is that if you accept one of them, you must accept the other due to the similarities of the two with regards to the canon argument. I won't accept the ICS if TDiC is not accepted as well, however I also won't accept TDiC level yields if the ICS isn't accepted as well. For me, it's all or nothing.

I want to know what you guys think of this. Have you noticed this before on forums that you have frequented? What is your view on the two incidents?

[l33telboi]

It's fairly common that things said in Sci-Fi series don't mesh well with what is actually seen on-screen. The obvious reason for this is of course that the fx guys don't really care or have the know how and perhaps even lack the resourses to do it right. But if you are to look at the whole thing as a documentary, then the visuals override the spoken things and author's intent.

It's been a long time since i've seen TDiC so take everything i say here with a grain of salt, i may be remembering stuff incorrectly.

There is one discrepancy in the episode, namely the visuals effects. But there are three things (that i can think of) that speak in favor of what was said in the episode. First off, if the fleet would not be able to destroy the homeworld quite quickly, they wouldn't have mounted the mission as it couldn't possibly succeed. Second, the actual statement about the crust. And third no one seems to especially surprised at this comment.

So there are three things that seem to indicate that what was said was right. And one thing that said it wasn't. Of course, if the rigid rules of "observed overweights the spoken." is to be followed although it seems to be contradicted by multiple other sources, then the visuals are of course the correct ones. The logical thing to do would be to bridge these two discrepansies with some form of explanation that bridges both views on the matter (ie, what is said was correct but it looked funny because...)

On to the ICS, and i base what i say here only what i've heard from the ICS so keep the salt handy, you might need even more of it this time.

It's worth noting that the ICS is not one single separate incident like the TDiC, it is a collection of many. And as such i'd say it would already be unfair to compare these two. Though i have to wonder, if almost everything we see in the ICS that can be quantified is wrong, then why should any of it be believed? That's just my personal opinion though, and has no baring on this discussion.

There are two things that i can remember that directly contradict the movies in the ICS, the rockets fired from the gunships are said to be in the KT range. Now considering these are rockets, they should give off similar nuclear explosion effects as the blast is omnidirectional. This is clearly not the case in the movie though.

Then there is Slave-1 and the asteroid field. The blasters are said to be somewhere in the MT range if i remeber correctly. But when they are seen hitting the asteroids, they don't produce similar effects. Modern day engineers wouldn't need a nuke to clear out that much rock. If they did then the house i grew up in, along with the city i lived in, wouldn't be there anymore.

Then there are of course logical problems, or indirect problems. The fight in the beginning of ROTS for instance, would have been a sheer curbstomp on the part of the droids if the stats were correct. As both the munificents have weapons that can kill ships with one hit and the Lukrehulks are said to be able to take on multiple ships at once. The latter part i'm not sure about though, a guy over at SB said he didn't remember the battleships being in the ICS at all and said he'd check it. So that i'm definetly not sure about.

Then there is the battle of geonosis. If they had KT and MT weaponry at their disposal, why didn't they use them? One single bolt from one of the landing Acclamators could have blown the smaller droids straight to hell. But they didn't do it.

So in short. The comparison is a bit faulty, as the ICS and TDiC are two different kind of things. The visuals override the dialogue and intent with current rules. And the ICS have been seen wrong, but does that mean everything in it can be scrapped? Yet one one thing doesn't fit in TDiC and it isn't accepted. While 2 concrete things and several more indirect things don't match in the ICS, yet it is accepted.

Final Conclusion: With accepted rules, TDiC is wrong. While the ICS is a bit of a gray area depending on how you interpret "higher canon overrules lower canon".

In any case, that's my two cents on the issue.

[Nonamer]

Wait, by both ST and SW standards, TDiC is highest canon and ICS is low canon to complete non-canon. Otherwise, you must now reconcile the movies, ICS, the garbage from KJA, as well as any other book written that doesn't make any sense anymore, like how Vader lost his hand in Shadow of the Empire.

And it's not a collection of events, it's one author with absolutely no support among any other author on his claims. TDiC on the other hand went through at least several writers, a producer or two, the director, and probably a science consultant or two.

[l33telboi]

TDiC is highest canon

Yes, but according to the rules of Vs. debates, the thing has to be interpreted as a documentary. So if i've understood it correctly, visuals override what's said. Which would mean that highest canon says it's wrong.

But like i said earlier, finding a compromise that explains both dialogue and visuals would be best.

And it's not a collection of events,

Events might have been the wrong word to use. What i meant was that the ICS has many different things in it that will effect many different events and facts seen on-screen. While TDiC is one separate incident. It's just a matter of the quantity of things involved.

Weather the whole thing should be thrown out because of the errors in it or if everything has to be proven wrong (in order to not be right.) in the ICS, i don't know. If you ask me the way people go about comparing different Sci-Fi franchises (like visuals override dialogue) is wrong. But since it's been established as rules, i won't bring it up in Vs. debates. I leave the decision making of such things to other people.

[AnonymousRedShirtEnsign]

TDiC is an extreme example of Trek firepower, but there are other examples that point to gigaton and high megaton level firepower. And has been stated it is from a show and is thus the highest level of canon. As for the whole spoken vs. seen thing, if we go by what is seen it requires a bridge full of incompetent morons. If a character says that it will take 6 hours to completely destroy the planet's mantle, but the visuals show firepower that can't accomplish this task, then I'm inclined to believe that it will take six hours to destroy the plant's mantle and that the visuals are distorted or wrong.

As for ICS, it requires that we over rule every highest level canon battle we've ever seen, which a just a stupid thing to do.

So basically I think the firepower figures of the ICS are useless, while the figures derived from TDiC are to be taken with a grain of salt as they aren't reflective of the rest of Trek.

[l33telboi]

If a character says that it will take 6 hours to completely destroy the planet's mantle, but the visuals show firepower that can't accomplish this task, then I'm inclined to believe that it will take six hours to destroy the plant's mantle and that the visuals are distorted or wrong.

Just like any rational person would.

But taking the strict rules that vs. debating has around it, you can claim that it was false. Purely based on the rule that visuals override dialogue. At least, this is the way i've understood it.

Vs. debates will never revolve around an accurate description of what the intended verses involved were like. Simply because of these rules. It becomes all about finding loopholes and technicalities that circumevent what's really going on. (EDIT: And TDiC is the perfect example of this.)

[Nonamer]

TDiC is highest canon

Yes, but according to the rules of Vs. debates, the thing has to be interpreted as a documentary. So if i've understood it correctly, visuals override what's said. Which would mean that highest canon says it's wrong.

But like i said earlier, finding a compromise that explains both dialogue and visuals would be best.

So basically:

Documentary method: Dialog screwup
ICS style canon: Absolute truth, contradictions be damned

The more reasonable person would say something is up with the dialog in TDiC, but same line of reason would reject ICS as a forgery. The second line implies that everything, demonstrated or not, must be accepted as valid. This will bring ICS as a piece of canon, but it also makes TDiC firepower claims equally irrefutable.

The compromise you're looking for is mostly likely the rejection of outliers. All scientific evidence has them; stuff that doesn't fit with everything else. Normally we reject them. This removes the TDiC firepower claims as exaggerated, but also removes all but the most mundane claims of the ICS as well.

And it's not a collection of events,

Events might have been the wrong word to use. What i meant was that the ICS has many different things in it that will effect many different events and facts seen on-screen. While TDiC is one separate incident. It's just a matter of the quantity of things involved.

And how is it different from ICS? There are several threads on this board documenting the colossal contradictions regarding ICS. Are we to believe that turbolasers move at lightspeed? Shields with hundreds of exawatts of energy dissipation? Guns with dozens of teratons of firepower, fired in the atmosphere no less at full power? At nearly every turn every one of the claims made are wrong. It's merely a matter of finding the contradiction rather than the contradict being in front of you.

Weather the whole thing should be thrown out because of the errors in it or if everything has to be proven wrong (in order to not be right.) in the ICS, i don't know. If you ask me the way people go about comparing different Sci-Fi franchises (like visuals override dialogue) is wrong. But since it's been established as rules, i won't bring it up in Vs. debates. I leave the decision making of such things to other people.

There's one method of analysis you haven't looked at: These are works of fiction written by people. These people can either be wrong, confused, misinterpreted, or in the ICS's case outright dishonest (a belief I hold, given the obvious technical errors in the ICS that a smart guy like Saxton should have caught). The TDiC incident can be interpreted as a mistake, with some degree of truthfulness, that wasn't a big problem among the makers of ST. However, the ICS cannot be interpreted as anything other than one single author with an agenda or is seriously deluded. From this point of view, the TDiC case is vastly more acceptable than the ICS case.

[l33telboi]

So basically:

ICS style canon: Absolute truth, contradictions be damned

I never said the contradictions should be damned. The things that can be proven wrong should be forgotten. But does this mean the whole book should be thrown out with it?

It all depends on the question i posed earlier and on the varying canon views there are floating around.

The Warsie side of this would be "Anything with any kind of canon status would be the truth, unless it's contradicted by a higher source."

So to recap, the question is: Since the ICS is known to concretely contradict some instances seen in the movie. Should the whole thing be disregarded, or just the things we saw contradicted? With the other facts that can't be proved directly false still be considered the truth?

Personally i don't care about what's considered canon or not. I just want to be in debates that don't involve hundreds of books, games and other various stuff. The movies and the series are enough for me.

And since there are obviously so many people unhappy about the rules of these vs. debates, why not just change the rules? Just because one faction uses their method of debate and analysis doesn't mean others have to do the same.

The more reasonable person would say something is up with the dialog in TDiC,

Agreed.

but same line of reason would reject ICS as a forgery.

Ah, but the whole ICS, or just the parts that can be proven to contradict the movies concretely?

The second line implies that everything, demonstrated or not, must be accepted as valid.

The line you wrote might imply so. But that's not what i said. The KT missiles can for instance be thrown right out the door because we have solid proof from a higher canon source that this isn't so.

This will bring ICS as a piece of canon, but it also makes TDiC firepower claims equally irrefutable.

It's only a piece of canon sure. But it's also much like a episode in nature. There are many different facts in it that impact on many different things in it.

Consider it like this. If you find a discrepancy in a ENT episode regarding Warp speed. You don't ignore the rest of the episode just because of that discrepancy.

The compromise you're looking for is mostly likely the rejection of outliers. All scientific evidence has them; stuff that doesn't fit with everything else. Normally we reject them. This removes the TDiC firepower claims as exaggerated, but also removes all but the most mundane claims of the ICS as well.

Look, i'm in agreement with most of you on this issue. The ICS changes a lot of things in the movie and the whole thing has to be watched in a competly different light as a result. It's not something i like. I like SW just fine the way it's presented on-screen.

I'm just saying that by manipulating the rules, you can say that the things in the ICS that don't contradict directly with what is seen on-screen is the truth. And because of the loopholes you would be within your full rights to do so.

So don't kidd yourself. For most people this isn't something rational. It's not about what would really happen if the Federation met the GE so you shouldn't assume them to be rational either. For most it's more like using the material you have and then finding loopholes and discrepancies in them that boost your own sides power. While simultaniously downtrodding the other side by the same means. And i'm not just talking about warsies, Trekkies aren't innocent as snow in the mather either.

And how is it different from ICS? There are several threads on this board documenting the colossal contradictions regarding ICS. Are we to believe that turbolasers move at lightspeed? Shields with hundreds of exawatts of energy dissipation? Guns with dozens of teratons of firepower, fired in the atmosphere no less at full power? At nearly every turn every one of the claims made are wrong. It's merely a matter of finding the contradiction rather than the contradict being in front of you.

Well basically, if you see it from the viewpoint of a Warsie. Then yes, each and every one of the things in the ICS would have to be proven wrong separately in order for it to not be the truth. And from what i've seen, this demand would be ok, given the current canon statements and rules debates like this follow.

From what i've understood, even a warsie has to admit something is funky if the onscreen evidence says one thing, and the ICS another.

There's one method of analysis you haven't looked at: These are works of fiction written by people. These people can either be wrong, confused, misinterpreted, or in the ICS's case outright dishonest (a belief I hold, given the obvious technical errors in the ICS that a smart guy like Saxton should have caught).

Sure the people might have gotten it backwards, but it's still somewhat canon. So i refer you to the ENT analogy i made earlier. Should the whole episode be thrown out, just because there's a discrepancy in the Warp speed in it. I think this question is key.

The dishonest part i will not comment on. I don't know anything about Saxton.

The TDiC incident can be interpreted as a mistake, with some degree of truthfulness, that wasn't a big problem among the makers of ST. However, the ICS cannot be interpreted as anything other than one single author with an agenda or is seriously deluded. From this point of view, the TDiC case is vastly more acceptable than the ICS case.

Sure, but for some reason, Saxton's work still got ok'd when it came to verifying it as canon. So whatever his agenda might have been, it's still canon. It's the same problem warsies are having with the three million man clone army. Thus each point has to be proven wrong in order for it to actually be wrong.

Personally i don't get why people get so hung up on this whole issue. If you just want to compare movie SW with ST. Say so and change the rules of following canon involved. The rules aren't something written in stone, they are just something a group agreed on when they started debating. However now half that group seems to think it's not ok anymore, so what exactly is it that forbids you to say "bye bye old rules, hello new rules".

[Jedi Master Spock]

Sure, but for some reason, Saxton's work still got ok'd when it came to verifying it as canon. So whatever his agenda might have been, it's still canon. It's the same problem warsies are having with the three million man clone army. Thus each point has to be proven wrong in order for it to actually be wrong.

And here's another similarity between TDIC and Saxton's ICS work.

It's pretty simple, really: How good are the people in charge of editing and publishing? Seriously. In general, these are not at the same time experts in science, sales, literature, and the past history of the series with a perfect eye for detail - nor do they even wish to impose that degree of control on writers the franchise boss is hiring. You'd have trouble if you micro-managed your authors that much.

Your typical editor has no idea what the implications of twenty ships pounding a planet to pieces are (or of wee little 200 GT quad turbolasers), no clue that it might not fit in with the rest of continuity, and aren't generally looking over the technical details in any case.

It always amazes me when people try to pretend material stamped out by a giant mass media franchise is necessarily consistent and well researched. As I said in the other thread, there probably weren't any other "science experts" reviewing Saxton's work on the ICS for LL.

It takes very detailed editorial work on top of sincere and careful work by the original authors to put out good technical materials and scientific articles for the real world - and the scientists don't have to make up the real world, it's already out there for the looking at.

Heck, even peer review sometimes fails scientific journals, and they put a lot more attention into it. Once in a while you hear about stuff slipping by.

[l33telboi]

-snip-

Which is exactly the reason i personally don't understand why someone would make up rules like "author's intent can not be submitted as evidence" and "visuals overrule dialogue". It twists the whole thing into something completly different then what it was meant as. TDiC, like i already said, is a perfect example of this.

[Nonamer]

I never said the contradictions should be damned. The things that can be proven wrong should be forgotten. But does this mean the whole book should be thrown out with it?

It all depends on the question i posed earlier and on the varying canon views there are floating around.

The Warsie side of this would be "Anything with any kind of canon status would be the truth, unless it's contradicted by a higher source."

So to recap, the question is: Since the ICS is known to concretely contradict some instances seen in the movie. Should the whole thing be disregarded, or just the things we saw contradicted? With the other facts that can't be proved directly false still be considered the truth?

Ok, let's put it this way: If for some reason Lucas were to make additional scenes directly regarding the weapon systems and technology touched upon by the ICS, will the new material completely contradict ICS or will it support it?

I think the answer is obvious. In this hypothetical situation, Lucas will contradict every single aspect of ICS that we find troublesome. In fact, that's basically why we find it so troublesome in the first place. So its not that there is a contradict, but we expect every claim made by the ICS to be eventually contradicted or is a contradiction to what Lucas would have done. It's also just contradictory in logic, which I'll get to later.

Personally i don't care about what's considered canon or not. I just want to be in debates that don't involve hundreds of books, games and other various stuff. The movies and the series are enough for me.

And since there are obviously so many people unhappy about the rules of these vs. debates, why not just change the rules? Just because one faction uses their method of debate and analysis doesn't mean others have to do the same.

Are you referring to this board or some other. Here I don't think we would care what you use. If your referring to SB.com they'll never change rules as long as the same mods are running the show. Basically, they're not biased but ideologues. They can't help but think that ICS is absolute canon.

The more reasonable person would say something is up with the dialog in TDiC,

Agreed.

but same line of reason would reject ICS as a forgery.

Ah, but the whole ICS, or just the parts that can be proven to contradict the movies concretely?

All of it. It feels so out of place that if historians were to run into it (assuming we are treating SW like history) they will reject it outright.

The second line implies that everything, demonstrated or not, must be accepted as valid.

The line you wrote might imply so. But that's not what i said. The KT missiles can for instance be thrown right out the door because we have solid proof from a higher canon source that this isn't so.

This will bring ICS as a piece of canon, but it also makes TDiC firepower claims equally irrefutable.

It's only a piece of canon sure. But it's also much like a episode in nature. There are many different facts in it that impact on many different things in it.

Consider it like this. If you find a discrepancy in a ENT episode regarding Warp speed. You don't ignore the rest of the episode just because of that discrepancy.

This happens a lot in ST. In fact it appears that ships often move at "the speed of plot" in various episodes Anyways, in this case it's nature of the contradiction, not the fact that there is a contradiction. A much better example would be Threshold, where Tom Paris creates a Warp 10 drive (infinite warp). Many consider this episode to be just non-canon, possibly even the producers and writers themselves. Same is true of ST:V. These episodes are definitely the ST version of the ICS and have crazy contradictions that are like saying 2 + 2 = 5 and thus many reject them completely, even though it was in fact just a few things that were out of place.

The compromise you're looking for is mostly likely the rejection of outliers. All scientific evidence has them; stuff that doesn't fit with everything else. Normally we reject them. This removes the TDiC firepower claims as exaggerated, but also removes all but the most mundane claims of the ICS as well.

Look, i'm in agreement with most of you on this issue. The ICS changes a lot of things in the movie and the whole thing has to be watched in a competly different light as a result. It's not something i like. I like SW just fine the way it's presented on-screen.

I'm just saying that by manipulating the rules, you can say that the things in the ICS that don't contradict directly with what is seen on-screen is the truth. And because of the loopholes you would be within your full rights to do so.

So don't kidd yourself. For most people this isn't something rational. It's not about what would really happen if the Federation met the GE so you shouldn't assume them to be rational either. For most it's more like using the material you have and then finding loopholes and discrepancies in them that boost your own sides power. While simultaniously downtrodding the other side by the same means. And i'm not just talking about warsies, Trekkies aren't innocent as snow in the mather either.

All of it is true. The problem with the ICS is that many ICS supporters take a perverse version of this in that if it hasn't been proven absolutely, irrefutably, unarguably, without any possibility of ever in the slightest most tiniest way possible of ever being conceivably wrong, then the ICS is right.

Here's the problem with this reasoning. If you create such loopholes in the rules, they will be abused. Furthermore, where do you draw the line? Everything can be made to be in agreement with everything else with enough elbow grease. If you agree to this line of reasoning, it can be argued that every single claim in the ICS hasn't be shown false, ever.

And how is it different from ICS? There are several threads on this board documenting the colossal contradictions regarding ICS. Are we to believe that turbolasers move at lightspeed? Shields with hundreds of exawatts of energy dissipation? Guns with dozens of teratons of firepower, fired in the atmosphere no less at full power? At nearly every turn every one of the claims made are wrong. It's merely a matter of finding the contradiction rather than the contradict being in front of you.

Well basically, if you see it from the viewpoint of a Warsie. Then yes, each and every one of the things in the ICS would have to be proven wrong separately in order for it to not be the truth. And from what i've seen, this demand would be ok, given the current canon statements and rules debates like this follow.

From what i've understood, even a warsie has to admit something is funky if the onscreen evidence says one thing, and the ICS another.

First of all, they don't do that. That's shocking but it's why ICS is so contentious. The second thing is that it's unworkable, as I explained previously.

There's one method of analysis you haven't looked at: These are works of fiction written by people. These people can either be wrong, confused, misinterpreted, or in the ICS's case outright dishonest (a belief I hold, given the obvious technical errors in the ICS that a smart guy like Saxton should have caught).

Sure the people might have gotten it backwards, but it's still somewhat canon. So i refer you to the ENT analogy i made earlier. Should the whole episode be thrown out, just because there's a discrepancy in the Warp speed in it. I think this question is key.

The dishonest part i will not comment on. I don't know anything about Saxton.

Perhaps not in the ENT episode, if it's just a flub. But like in the example of Threshold, outright rejection is totally valid.

The TDiC incident can be interpreted as a mistake, with some degree of truthfulness, that wasn't a big problem among the makers of ST. However, the ICS cannot be interpreted as anything other than one single author with an agenda or is seriously deluded. From this point of view, the TDiC case is vastly more acceptable than the ICS case.

Sure, but for some reason, Saxton's work still got ok'd when it came to verifying it as canon. So whatever his agenda might have been, it's still canon. It's the same problem warsies are having with the three million man clone army. Thus each point has to be proven wrong in order for it to actually be wrong.

Personally i don't get why people get so hung up on this whole issue. If you just want to compare movie SW with ST. Say so and change the rules of following canon involved. The rules aren't something written in stone, they are just something a group agreed on when they started debating. However now half that group seems to think it's not ok anymore, so what exactly is it that forbids you to say "bye bye old rules, hello new rules".

The mods. They say you must accept these rules or you'll be banned.

[l33telboi]

Ok, let's put it this way: If for some reason Lucas were to make additional scenes directly regarding the weapon systems and technology touched upon by the ICS, will the new material completely contradict ICS or will it support it?

Like i've said in my earlier posts, it would contradict it.

I think the answer is obvious. In this hypothetical situation, Lucas will contradict every single aspect of ICS that we find troublesome. In fact, that's basically why we find it so troublesome in the first place. So its not that there is a contradict, but we expect every claim made by the ICS to be eventually contradicted or is a contradiction to what Lucas would have done. It's also just contradictory in logic, which I'll get to later.

You do realize that you're preaching to the choir here, right?

Are you referring to this board or some other. Here I don't think we would care what you use. If your referring to SB.com they'll never change rules as long as the same mods are running the show. Basically, they're not biased but ideologues. They can't help but think that ICS is absolute canon.

I was merely stating what i would like to see. I wasn't suggesting that any existing boards start changing their policies. I know the different policies on different boards, and i follow them.

All of it. It feels so out of place that if historians were to run into it (assuming we are treating SW like history) they will reject it outright.

Then that's your buisness, and if i've understood correctly, then you can use those rules in this forum all you like. Just like other forums can dictate their own policy.

There is no canon laws on how to perform sci-fi vs. debates.

This happens a lot in ST. In fact it appears that ships often move at "the speed of plot" in various episodes Anyways, in this case it's nature of the contradiction, not the fact that there is a contradiction. A much better example would be Threshold, where Tom Paris creates a Warp 10 drive (infinite warp). Many consider this episode to be just non-canon,

Everything in the episode, or just the Warp 10 part?

possibly even the producers and writers themselves. Same is true of ST:V. These episodes are definitely the ST version of the ICS and have crazy contradictions that are like saying 2 + 2 = 5 and thus many reject them completely, even though it was in fact just a few things that were out of place.

Again, i think it's more the specific points that don't make sense that you reject, not the whole episodes and movies. I could be wrong though.

All of it is true. The problem with the ICS is that many ICS supporters take a perverse version of this in that if it hasn't been proven absolutely, irrefutably, unarguably, without any possibility of ever in the slightest most tiniest way possible of ever being conceivably wrong, then the ICS is right.

I don't know exactly how to reply to that. If some people think the ICS is right in the parts where it has been shown incorrect on the screen, then they would be wrong, and violating their own rules.

But, sticking to the things that haven't been proven wrong, well that's another story. Because technically it's not wrong to do this according to the rules they've set up. It might violate the spirit and reason of which those rules were set up, but it still technically follows them. Thanks to the handy "everything in lower canon that isn't shown incorrect in higher canon is to be considered true" loophole.

Here's the problem with this reasoning. If you create such loopholes in the rules, they will be abused. Furthermore, where do you draw the line? Everything can be made to be in agreement with everything else with enough elbow grease.

Well the theories would have to be at least somewhat believable, and occams razor should be aplied.

And yes, rule abusing will happen, why? Because a fundamental part of the whole canon issue has changed since the first rules were established. And the party that benefitted from this change refuse to give it away. There's not much that can be done about that, except going separate ways. And i do believe that's one of the main reason a board like this exists.

First of all, they don't do that. That's shocking but it's why ICS is so contentious.

Well then they are wrong in what they say, and we are in full agreement.

Perhaps not in the ENT episode, if it's just a flub. But like in the example of Threshold, outright rejection is totally valid.

But that rejection would still have to be agreed upon by both sides. The problem is that the warsie side does not give up the ICS, and according to the rules they follow, they can do that.

There's really not much that can be done about it, short of imposing your own beliefs on others and forcing them to agree. In any case, that would be a bad idea.

The mods. They say you must accept these rules or you'll be banned.

You missunderstand. I wasn't talking about this board, or any other currently in existance for that matter. I was talking about the people who want to reject the ICS alltogeather and accept TDiC. All they would have to do is create a new forum, with whatever rules they want, and then ignore the other side.

[Nonamer]

Ok, let's put it this way: If for some reason Lucas were to make additional scenes directly regarding the weapon systems and technology touched upon by the ICS, will the new material completely contradict ICS or will it support it?

Like i've said in my earlier posts, it would contradict it.

I think the answer is obvious. In this hypothetical situation, Lucas will contradict every single aspect of ICS that we find troublesome. In fact, that's basically why we find it so troublesome in the first place. So its not that there is a contradict, but we expect every claim made by the ICS to be eventually contradicted or is a contradiction to what Lucas would have done. It's also just contradictory in logic, which I'll get to later.

You do realize that you're preaching to the choir here, right?

Are you referring to this board or some other. Here I don't think we would care what you use. If your referring to SB.com they'll never change rules as long as the same mods are running the show. Basically, they're not biased but ideologues. They can't help but think that ICS is absolute canon.

I was merely stating what i would like to see. I wasn't suggesting that any existing boards start changing their policies. I know the different policies on different boards, and i follow them.

All of it. It feels so out of place that if historians were to run into it (assuming we are treating SW like history) they will reject it outright.

Then that's your buisness, and if i've understood correctly, then you can use those rules in this forum all you like. Just like other forums can dictate their own policy.

There is no canon laws on how to perform sci-fi vs. debates.

Ok, so we're in agreement here. However, I must point out that actually finding a st-v-sw board that allows one to chose ICS as not canon pretty much consists of this board.

This happens a lot in ST. In fact it appears that ships often move at "the speed of plot" in various episodes Anyways, in this case it's nature of the contradiction, not the fact that there is a contradiction. A much better example would be Threshold, where Tom Paris creates a Warp 10 drive (infinite warp). Many consider this episode to be just non-canon,

Everything in the episode, or just the Warp 10 part?

At very least all aspects of the episode relating to Warp 10 such as the plot line and events surrounding the episode needs to be cut. However, that utterly guts the episode to the point of having no absolutely no need for the episode to exist anymore and thus this question becomes moot. Applied to the ICS, the cuts would be so several that the whole point of the book is moot, and axing everything is totally reasonable. You still can keep the cutaway pictures though.

possibly even the producers and writers themselves. Same is true of ST:V. These episodes are definitely the ST version of the ICS and have crazy contradictions that are like saying 2 + 2 = 5 and thus many reject them completely, even though it was in fact just a few things that were out of place.

Again, i think it's more the specific points that don't make sense that you reject, not the whole episodes and movies. I could be wrong though.

Perhaps it is a piece by piece basis that we decide by. Of course, Threshold and ST:V have impossible plot premises, just like ICS has impossible technological premises.

All of it is true. The problem with the ICS is that many ICS supporters take a perverse version of this in that if it hasn't been proven absolutely, irrefutably, unarguably, without any possibility of ever in the slightest most tiniest way possible of ever being conceivably wrong, then the ICS is right.

I don't know exactly how to reply to that. If some people think the ICS is right in the parts where it has been shown incorrect on the screen, then they would be wrong, and violating their own rules.

But, sticking to the things that haven't been proven wrong, well that's another story. Because technically it's not wrong to do this according to the rules they've set up. It might violate the spirit and reason of which those rules were set up, but it still technically follows them. Thanks to the handy "everything in lower canon that isn't shown incorrect in higher canon is to be considered true" loophole.

You'll be surprised how clever they are coming up with excuses. You know that opening scene in SW:ROTS? If they ships have teraton guns, why were what we saw so underpowered? Excuse: they were fight for days or week, and all energy reserves were drained. It's all teeth-grinding crap like that.

Here's the problem with this reasoning. If you create such loopholes in the rules, they will be abused. Furthermore, where do you draw the line? Everything can be made to be in agreement with everything else with enough elbow grease.

Well the theories would have to be at least somewhat believable, and occams razor should be aplied.

And yes, rule abusing will happen, why? Because a fundamental part of the whole canon issue has changed since the first rules were established. And the party that benefitted from this change refuse to give it away. There's not much that can be done about that, except going separate ways. And i do believe that's one of the main reason a board like this exists.

Unfortunately, in the case of ST-vs-SW, everything has become one giant rule abuse with dead-set ideologues. Luckily, there are places that always reason and rationality to exist, but they are pretty small.

First of all, they don't do that. That's shocking but it's why ICS is so contentious.

Well then they are wrong in what they say, and we are in full agreement.

Perhaps not in the ENT episode, if it's just a flub. But like in the example of Threshold, outright rejection is totally valid.

But that rejection would still have to be agreed upon by both sides. The problem is that the warsie side does not give up the ICS, and according to the rules they follow, they can do that.

There's really not much that can be done about it, short of imposing your own beliefs on others and forcing them to agree. In any case, that would be a bad idea.

Definitely true, but the problem is they are dead-set in their ways and have been insulated from rational debates for years. In any case you need a iron will to keep up with them.

The mods. They say you must accept these rules or you'll be banned.

You missunderstand. I wasn't talking about this board, or any other currently in existance for that matter. I was talking about the people who want to reject the ICS alltogeather and accept TDiC. All they would have to do is create a new forum, with whatever rules they want, and then ignore the other side.

Not quite so simply, SB.com and SD.net are big sites. Making a site as big as those would be very difficult. Also, SB.com came before the ICS supporters, which took over the vs. board later.

[AnonymousRedShirtEnsign]

I33telboi, what "rules" are you refering to? They are different on every site and board, and nothing like what you are describing are present here. I agree with you that many people aren't in this debate to find out what a "realistic" encounter between the Federation and the Empire would be like. As for what people consider canon, most people would say that they use the official canon policy of the franchise in question, the problem is with Star Wars this isn't very clear cut. Trek canon is pretty simple, all the shows (execpt the animated series, I think) and films and 2 books are canon. For Star Wars, some people go by the ever changing ranking system used for internal stuff at LL, while others go by Lucas's statements since he owns Star Wars. And so people don't just change the rules to help their side since that will make them and their position look crappy.

The Enterprise episode example is a bad one. If there were many, many things wrong witht the episode then everything in it should be at the very least viewed with skepticism. That is how I look at the ICS, ST:V, etc. I am wary of everything else contained within rather than just throwing the whole thing out. That is I would if I didn't just disregard the ICS because it is part of the EU, I agree with G2K about Star Wars canon.

[l33telboi]

I33telboi, what "rules" are you refering to? They are different on every site and board, and nothing like what you are describing are present here.

I realize the canon rules are different here. But i was under the impression that "visuals override dialogue" and "author's intent is irrelevant" was in use here?

I agree with you that many people aren't in this debate to find out what a "realistic" encounter between the Federation and the Empire would be like. As for what people consider canon, most people would say that they use the official canon policy of the franchise in question, the problem is with Star Wars this isn't very clear cut. Trek canon is pretty simple, all the shows (execpt the animated series, I think) and films and 2 books are canon. For Star Wars, some people go by the ever changing ranking system used for internal stuff at LL, while others go by Lucas's statements since he owns Star Wars. And so people don't just change the rules to help their side since that will make them and their position look crappy.

Well since the whole canon issue is a little mudded, one could say it's open to interpretation. I don't know about people here, but at SDN and SB the canon policy is "lower canon is canon if not contradicted by higher canon." And they are within their rights to say so.

Let them have their rules and you follow yours. This is after all a place where you can choose what to consider canon or not site.

The Enterprise episode example is a bad one. If there were many, many things wrong witht the episode then everything in it should be at the very least viewed with skepticism. That is how I look at the ICS, ST:V, etc. I am wary of everything else contained within rather than just throwing the whole thing out. That is I would if I didn't just disregard the ICS because it is part of the EU, I agree with G2K about Star Wars canon.

Like i told nonamer, it would be really simple if everybody agreed on throwing away the ICS, but clearly that isn't the case, and neither can you force them to agree with you.

I say let the warsies use their ICS if they want to, and you can choose not to use it if you want too. On this site that is. But i think it's only fair that you follow house rules when on other boards. You may not like them, and you might be totally correct in not liking them. But this whole ICS debacle isn't going to get better by complaining about.

Just leave the ICS people to themselves, why would you even want to debate with someone who according to you does things like this, clearly it would be a no win situation.