Edit: need to hire a proofreader

  • wise_pancake@lemmy.ca
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    3 months ago

    The teleporter is a fun scifi device in Trek, it’s both philosophically interesting, and the ambiguity around how it works and what it can do creates some interesting plots and discussions online.

    Without spoiling anything, in The Next Generation there’s a character who refuses to use it, in a prequel (Enterprise) there’s a general fear of teleportation. In DS9 there’s an episode where it gets used as a weapon. In Voyager and TNG there are episodes where malfunctions result in some pretty intense moral dilemmas.

    The writers of Trek use it to good effect and that’s what makes it my favourite scifi.

    • x4740N@lemm.ee
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      3 months ago

      The transporters don’t kill you, that one ST:ENT episode with the invented of teleporters proved that

      He had to get his lost son back into phase which died shortly after

      It seems that all the stuff we’ve seen in star trek suggest the transporters move you through subspace and the weird transporter incidents are likely to just be freak subspace phenomenon that they haven’t accounted for with the transporters

      • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
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        3 months ago

        I mean to be honest the writers never really got a handle on how the transporter actually worked. Its mechanics were never as locked down as the various transporters in Stargate. We knew what their limitations were.

        If transporters really work the way Star Trek claims there is absolutely no reason they would constantly get blocked by magnesite, random stones, atmospheric interference, or whatever the current MacGuffin of the week is.

        • x4740N@lemm.ee
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          3 months ago

          If transporters really work the way Star Trek claims there is absolutely no reason they would constantly get blocked by magnesite, random stones, atmospheric interference, or whatever the current MacGuffin of the week is.

          Perhaps the things you mention really only interfere with the transporters sensor’s in some way

          Skimming memory alpha Magnesite does interfere with sensor and transporter functions but memory alpha doesn’t specify if the transporter function interference is related to the transporter sensors or not

          I don’t see how random stones apply here as it could be any kind of stone and you’d have to be more specific, transporters can already discern rocks from people, i think i recall hearing something about subspace shadows somewhere but i cannot recall where i heard it so i cant confirm subspace shadows