If they do another series tell Bad Robot to GO AWAY, and use their regular Star Trek licience instead of Bad Robots Star Trek Licience.
Instead of just screaming at you, lets put the information on the table.
When Viacom split, Paramount pictures was given the rights to make movies. CBS remained the sole entity for marketing and licensing of the Star Trek product line for both the television as well as the movie properties, instead of farming it out to Paramount's own division, Paramount Licensing, Inc. This is important, because Paramount cannot promote, market or merchandise a Star Trek movie without working with CBS. Specifically, CBS Consumer Products.
However, CBS Consumer Products has not always had access to all of the concepts from the recent movies. In January 2011, License! magazine reported that CBS Consumer Products had deals for " Playmates Toys for action figures and accessories; Mattel for Star Trek-themed Barbie collector dolls; Tyco for flying radio-controlled vehicles; Scene It? DVD game; Radica for 20Q Star Trek trivia game; Pocket Books for a movie novelization; IDW Publishing for a comic book prequel "Star Trek: Countdown;" Fundex for customized versions of classic games UNO, Scrabble and All About Trivia; USAopoly for a Star Trek Continuum Collector's Edition; Vandor for gift items such as business card holders, salt and pepper sets, mugs, clocks and magnets; Funko for bobbleheads and vinyl figurines; Briefly Stated for adult sleepwear and loungewear; E.S. Originals for kids' footwear, bags and accessories; and AME for kids' sleepwear.".
Yet, CBS Consumer Products still had to work out licensing issues for products like our very own Star Trek Online: "until CBS/Paramount come to some sort of agreement over the new movies, we will not be able to add any items or references from the "JJ" movies. -Executive Producer Dan Stahl, in Ask Cryptic June 2011
Most of those issues seemed to be ironed out when CBS Consumer Products declared that the recent Paramount movies would be the "Kelvin Timeline". A June 2016 Tweet by Holly Amos, Product Development Coordinator at CBS Consumer Products, stated "we needed an in-universe term since we needed some way to refer to it in the encyclopedia". The name was credited to Michael and Denise Okuda, authors of the 50th Anniversary Star Trek: Encyclopedia.
In order for Star Trek: Discovery to use Paramount's material, they would once again have to come to an agreement with CBS Consumer Products. Additionally, promotional material would need to indicate that some portion of Star Trek: Discovery is the intellectual property of Paramount Pictures. You would see "copyright Paramount Pictures" on trailers, posters and merchandise.
I must confess that while the idea of a Khan series has some attraction, it seems to me to be impossible to reconcile Khan as a protagonist in a Trek series.
Khan is a dictator: Star Trek attempts to show an enlightened egalitarian society.
Khan uses force as his primary tool: Star Trek attempts to avoid the use of force in favor of rational discussion.
Khan uses genetic manipulation to 'improve the breed': Star Trek posits self improvement to be the ultimate goal of all humans while outlawing genetic manipulation for any reason other than medical necessity.
While Khan is certainly a Trek character, having him as anything but the villain could never result in a Star Trek series. Maybe an episode in an anthology style Trek Show, but not as a stand alone Star Trek, because Khan is the exact opposite of Kirk, Picard, and the others. And already knowing the fate of the colony would mean that a Khan series would start at grimdark and get worse from there.
For me, I can't see how the Ceti Alpha V/Botany Bay colony could become a Trek series without becoming just another 'from the bad guy point of view drama'. And such a concept holds little interest for me. Your mileage may vary.
If they do another series tell Bad Robot to GO AWAY, and use their regular Star Trek licience instead of Bad Robots Star Trek Licience.
Instead of just screaming at you, lets put the information on the table.
When Viacom split, Paramount pictures was given the rights to make movies. CBS remained the sole entity for marketing and licensing of the Star Trek product line for both the television as well as the movie properties, instead of farming it out to Paramount's own division, Paramount Licensing, Inc. This is important, because Paramount cannot promote, market or merchandise a Star Trek movie without working with CBS. Specifically, CBS Consumer Products.
However, CBS Consumer Products has not always had access to all of the concepts from the recent movies. In January 2011, License! magazine reported that CBS Consumer Products had deals for " Playmates Toys for action figures and accessories; Mattel for Star Trek-themed Barbie collector dolls; Tyco for flying radio-controlled vehicles; Scene It? DVD game; Radica for 20Q Star Trek trivia game; Pocket Books for a movie novelization; IDW Publishing for a comic book prequel "Star Trek: Countdown;" Fundex for customized versions of classic games UNO, Scrabble and All About Trivia; USAopoly for a Star Trek Continuum Collector's Edition; Vandor for gift items such as business card holders, salt and pepper sets, mugs, clocks and magnets; Funko for bobbleheads and vinyl figurines; Briefly Stated for adult sleepwear and loungewear; E.S. Originals for kids' footwear, bags and accessories; and AME for kids' sleepwear.".
Yet, CBS Consumer Products still had to work out licensing issues for products like our very own Star Trek Online: "until CBS/Paramount come to some sort of agreement over the new movies, we will not be able to add any items or references from the "JJ" movies. -Executive Producer Dan Stahl, in Ask Cryptic June 2011
Most of those issues seemed to be ironed out when CBS Consumer Products declared that the recent Paramount movies would be the "Kelvin Timeline". A June 2016 Tweet by Holly Amos, Product Development Coordinator at CBS Consumer Products, stated "we needed an in-universe term since we needed some way to refer to it in the encyclopedia". The name was credited to Michael and Denise Okuda, authors of the 50th Anniversary Star Trek: Encyclopedia.
In order for Star Trek: Discovery to use Paramount's material, they would once again have to come to an agreement with CBS Consumer Products. Additionally, promotional material would need to indicate that some portion of Star Trek: Discovery is the intellectual property of Paramount Pictures. You would see "copyright Paramount Pictures" on trailers, posters and merchandise.
it would be great to see the two sides collaborate a little more closely. i wouldn't mind if STO had more JJtrek in it beyond the strange android fellow and the enterprise, get involved in completely new conflicts that threaten the sto universe .
in any event, with Discovery it makes interaction a lot more likely going forward for additional tv series if it gets to that point.
T6 Miranda Hero Ship FTW. Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
You can plainly see in any Trek series that there's still a recognizable scarcity-fueled economy. Here's one way how it would work: if you can easily duplicate and mass-produce objects, then uniqueness, craftsmanship, and showmanship, as well as skills to authenticate same (as unreplicated) and transport and sell same, logically become more valuable. That's why Joseph Sisko's restaurant and the Klingon eatery can stay in business (that pesky DS9 again): if all folks wanted was replicated clams they could stay home, but they go out to eat for the experience of dining out at a place where the food is "real" and hand-prepared (and thus slightly different even if you order the exact same menu item every time) and the host comes out to shoot the breeze with the customers. Kasidy Yates the freighter captain similarly likely traffics mainly in handicrafts and art.
And where there's value, you need a widely accepted means of exchange or otherwise you're left hoping that somebody will trade his widgets for your doohickeys. Guess what the technical term for that is? That's right: money.
There's another limiter as well: energy. They're not pulling power out of their asses to run these things, they're powered by fusion and matter/antimatter annihilation. That requires maintenance, meaning scarcity of people with skills who have to be trained, and parts (even if replicatable, the energy and mass to create them has to come from somewhere) which means more skilled persons. They might end up mining materials such as dilithium instead of replicating it because it turns out to actually be cheaper. And you need fuel, which in this case is admittedly plentiful for everything except antimatter.
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
I must confess that while the idea of a Khan series has some attraction, it seems to me to be impossible to reconcile Khan as a protagonist in a Trek series.
Khan is a dictator: Star Trek attempts to show an enlightened egalitarian society.
Khan uses force as his primary tool: Star Trek attempts to avoid the use of force in favor of rational discussion.
Khan uses genetic manipulation to 'improve the breed': Star Trek posits self improvement to be the ultimate goal of all humans while outlawing genetic manipulation for any reason other than medical necessity.
While Khan is certainly a Trek character, having him as anything but the villain could never result in a Star Trek series. Maybe an episode in an anthology style Trek Show, but not as a stand alone Star Trek, because Khan is the exact opposite of Kirk, Picard, and the others. And already knowing the fate of the colony would mean that a Khan series would start at grimdark and get worse from there.
For me, I can't see how the Ceti Alpha V/Botany Bay colony could become a Trek series without becoming just another 'from the bad guy point of view drama'. And such a concept holds little interest for me. Your mileage may vary.
Well times have changed, the once far off technology of genetic manipulation is now at our finger tips. With the transition from being a far off idea to being a real world thing, the temptation to use it has become much more alluring. There is a growing portion of society that is quite in love with the idea of transhumanism, using technology to "improve the breed". With this change in social attitude has come a reevaluation of the older TOS stories.
I'm personally not a fan of the concept, as it easily leads to institutionalized classism, where society is split between the natural born peasants and the genetically "superior" ruling class. However some people view the rise of the supermen as progress.
Which means, if writers on Star Trek can't think outside the box of scarcity-fueled capitalism then they have no business working on Star Trek. If they can't handle writing characters who are highly trained professionals who won't let drama interfere with their duties, they have no business writing Star Trek. If they can't handle writing characters who think science first, gather data and make observations and test theories and then draw conclusions on which to apply creative problem solving techniques, they have no business writing Star Trek. If they can't handle characters who look on force as a last resort and seek every possible solution first before resorting to the use of weapons... well you get the idea. Democratic socialist secular humanist liberal semi-utopia, write that or go apply for a job writing NCISCI Los Yorkago or what the frak ever.
Science fiction, means wrapping your head around science and futurism. Those who cannot or will not need not apply.
Despite all this though, even if you can fully automate the manufacturing process in a world that magically has an infinite supply of raw materials, it still doesn't take away the need for money. A post-scarcity society still doesn't address things like land ownership, intellectual properties and art, objects to large and complex for fast replication (starships, etc), and one of a kind objects that hold value due to their history.
Deep Space Nine noted this in an episode where Jake Sisko wanted to get a baseball from a historic game for his father. He could have easily replicated it, but that would have simply been an imitation. Simply wanting this rare artifact didn't automatically mean that its current owner was obligated to give it to him, he had to earn it.
Money is a tool, and tools are neither inherently good or evil. Vilifying money is just an act of spite and does nothing to address real social concerns.
@lordrezeon: I don't disagree with your analysis, but I am continually baffled by the 'logic' some people employ. We have yet to invent a government that understands what a budget is, yet these geniuses think they can 'improve' a species.
I'll give an example of this in action: not so long ago genetically modified corn crops were engineered with pest resistant properties. Unfortunately, the pollen contained the insect resistant traits and suddenly bees and monarch butterflies began to die off. It seems pollinators were the 'pest' most affected by the engineered traits, and corn cannot self pollinate.
Star Trek could tell such stories as cautionary tales.
@lordrezeon: I don't disagree with your analysis, but I am continually baffled by the 'logic' some people employ. We have yet to invent a government that understands what a budget is, yet these geniuses think they can 'improve' a species.
I'll give an example of this in action: not so long ago genetically modified corn crops were engineered with pest resistant properties. Unfortunately, the pollen contained the insect resistant traits and suddenly bees and monarch butterflies began to die off. It seems pollinators were the 'pest' most affected by the engineered traits, and corn cannot self pollinate.
Star Trek could tell such stories as cautionary tales.
Oh I was thinking at first you were gonna mention the case where crops were engineered to resist an herbicide.... and somehow passed that resistance to the weeds that the herbicide was supposed to kill.
Now that's a scary thought, augment genes getting passed around the ecosystem by viruses...
@lordrezeon: I don't disagree with your analysis, but I am continually baffled by the 'logic' some people employ. We have yet to invent a government that understands what a budget is, yet these geniuses think they can 'improve' a species.
I'll give an example of this in action: not so long ago genetically modified corn crops were engineered with pest resistant properties. Unfortunately, the pollen contained the insect resistant traits and suddenly bees and monarch butterflies began to die off. It seems pollinators were the 'pest' most affected by the engineered traits, and corn cannot self pollinate.
Star Trek could tell such stories as cautionary tales.
Oh I was thinking at first you were gonna mention the case where crops were engineered to resist an herbicide.... and somehow passed that resistance to the weeds that the herbicide was supposed to kill.
Now that's a scary thought, augment genes getting passed around the ecosystem by viruses...
And yet quite plausible. It's conventional wisdom in genetic-analysis circles that substantial portions of human DNA were inserted by retroviruses over the millennia. You don't even need some silly "Levodian flu" to do it.
Which makes the existence, and rapidly-dropping price, of CRISPR just a tad chilling. I don't think it's going to be our undoing in the end, but it's not impossible...
@lordrezeon: I don't disagree with your analysis, but I am continually baffled by the 'logic' some people employ. We have yet to invent a government that understands what a budget is, yet these geniuses think they can 'improve' a species.
I'll give an example of this in action: not so long ago genetically modified corn crops were engineered with pest resistant properties. Unfortunately, the pollen contained the insect resistant traits and suddenly bees and monarch butterflies began to die off. It seems pollinators were the 'pest' most affected by the engineered traits, and corn cannot self pollinate.
Star Trek could tell such stories as cautionary tales.
Oh I was thinking at first you were gonna mention the case where crops were engineered to resist an herbicide.... and somehow passed that resistance to the weeds that the herbicide was supposed to kill.
Now that's a scary thought, augment genes getting passed around the ecosystem by viruses...
And yet quite plausible. It's conventional wisdom in genetic-analysis circles that substantial portions of human DNA were inserted by retroviruses over the millennia. You don't even need some silly "Levodian flu" to do it.
Which makes the existence, and rapidly-dropping price, of CRISPR just a tad chilling. I don't think it's going to be our undoing in the end, but it's not impossible...
Honestly augments are probably inevitable at this point. Truthfully simple tweaking... sounds doable with current tech, just expensive. And so the bioengineering wars begin...
Well you have to remember that Gene Roddenberry was a combat veteran of the second World War. He saw the horrors committed in the name of eugenics. That is bound to leave a strong impact on a persons worldview. The writers of today however view those events as just another far flung page in the history books.
There is also the issue of natural selection to consider, or in this case unnatural selection. We might not like to admit it, but survival of the fittest is still relevant despite our technological and social advances. In a world where augmented people might exceed natural human limits it becomes difficult for normal people to thrive. As the population ratio of augments to normals grows the societal need for everyone to be augmented to stay competitive becomes a real issue. Eventually it turns into an arms race of who can engineer the ultimate breed with the rest being left behind. When the number of augments reaches a high enough threshold they will begin to demand that they be the ones to call all the shots, after all why would a "superior" breed take orders from their genetic inferiors. You wind up spiraling towards the inevitable scenario of the movie Gattaca, where normal people are simply viewed as a servant class.
As the Enterprise episode The Augments said "Superior ability creates superior ambition".
But it isn't really a double standard. Earth's experiments in human genetic augmentation in the Trek Universe proved to be far more disasterous than experimenting with fission, fusion, and antigravity. It's a case of, "Once burned, lesson learned."
Of course, it's impossible to judge now the result of our real world ventures into genetics, but if DNA is, (as Mr. Herbert proposed in the Dune novels,) the language of God, then we are still in the baby-babble stage of learning to speak it.
Our history shows we're always a generation behind our technological development. Let's hope we catch up to genetics before we create the zombie apocalypse TV warns us is coming.
Well you have to remember that Gene Roddenberry was a combat veteran of the second World War. He saw the horrors committed in the name of eugenics. That is bound to leave a strong impact on a persons worldview. The writers of today however view those events as just another far flung page in the history books.
There is also the issue of natural selection to consider, or in this case unnatural selection. We might not like to admit it, but survival of the fittest is still relevant despite our technological and social advances. In a world where augmented people might exceed natural human limits it becomes difficult for normal people to thrive. As the population ratio of augments to normals grows the societal need for everyone to be augmented to stay competitive becomes a real issue. Eventually it turns into an arms race of who can engineer the ultimate breed with the rest being left behind. When the number of augments reaches a high enough threshold they will begin to demand that they be the ones to call all the shots, after all why would a "superior" breed take orders from their genetic inferiors. You wind up spiraling towards the inevitable scenario of the movie Gattaca, where normal people are simply viewed as a servant class.
As the Enterprise episode The Augments said "Superior ability creates superior ambition".
Edit: Fixed some typos.
Superior ambition doesn't create superior reasoning though, not even Bashir is immune to the effects of not being able to think outside what his training has allowed him or his own sense of pride which was shown on more than a fair few occasions. Typical Augments have shown the same limitations which is what keeps catching the Augments out on the NX-01, the 1701 and again on the 1701-D in that colony.
T6 Miranda Hero Ship FTW. Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
The issue in the real world, of course, is that genes don't exist in isolation. There is no single gene that encodes for, for instance, superior intellect - that's a matter of the interplay of multiple genes, folding proteins this way and that in the developing brain. (Studies in Iceland, where the national database of genetic information is pretty complete, have shown a genetic component to autism - with the most common linked mutation occurring in just over one percent of subjects.)
The augments shown on DS9 were of a more likely sort than Khan and his people - they were more intelligent than the average human, but had significant neurochemical issues along with it. Basically, Julian was lucky; his parents' well-meaning resequencing of his DNA could well have resulted in his being a drooling madman, rather than the somewhat charismatic medical professional he became.
It's hard to even know where to start about this level of idiocy, but it's a clear signal that these television writers don't have the mindset of the mentality for science fiction and would be happier on some procedural soap opera thing where they don't have to deal with any futuristic ideas that might interfere with their use of the basic cliche formulas they rely on with everything they write. It explains why things like the "Roddenberry Rule" were so important to force these writers to think outside the box and come up with actual science fiction ideas rather than relying on drama cliches.
Does Deep Space Nine still count as "modern"?
And have we ever seen Star Trek actually take the meaning of the existence for replicators completely seriously?
I think not. They deliberately invented limitations so they could still have all the stories that involved scarcity. Neither modern nor old Star Trek writers could work without this.
They have been inevitable since the moment they showed us the transporter. Once you can disassemble and reassemble matter while applying a pattern to it to guide the reassembly, you have all the functional elements of a replicator. The only thing limiting the possibilities is computer storage for the patterns, maybe they're too data-intensive for the computer systems in the TOS era. However, there's a workaround for that --you use physical samples, and duplicate them. It's not quite the replicator of TNG, but a matter duplicator has most of the same applications with only a few extra inconveniences. If you have a sample of what you want, you can make as much of it as you like.
Not neccessarily. The problem started only in TNG when they actually could manipulate the stuff they were beaming through.
Before that, it was possible that the "magic" of transporters worked in a way that did not actually invovle a scanning process, but instead initiating some kind of internal physical process that guaranteed the disassembly and reassembly of the targeted matter, without actually scanning the object itself. Once the tech writers decided that it actually involved scanning (and ignoring Heisenberg's Uncertainity Principle), they created the way for replicators.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
they didn't ignore it, they compensated for it - that's why that huge platform everyone stands on before being transported wherever they need to be is called a heisenberg compensator
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
they didn't ignore it, they compensated for it - that's why that huge platform everyone stands on before being transported wherever they need to be is called a heisenberg compensator
"ignored" was a lax way of describing that they chose to invent a pseudo-science device to ignore the scientific problem of the transporter based on scanning something and recreating it elsewhere.
And they haven't really explained why no one seems to use transporter technology to create copies of people. I guess that is the No-Gemini Certainity Principle at work?
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
"ignored" was a lax way of describing that they chose to invent a pseudo-science device to ignore the scientific problem of the transporter based on scanning something and recreating it elsewhere.
And they haven't really explained why no one seems to use transporter technology to create copies of people. I guess that is the No-Gemini Certainity Principle at work?
Star Trek has been really inconsistent on how clones are even treated. Most of the time we see stereotypical evil doppelgangers who are quickly dealt with. In TNG we see Riker and Pulaski take the stance of immediately executing clones of themselves. The ethics of this are never even raised by anyone, which is really disturbing to think about. The only real example I can think of where a clone was welcomed into Federation society was the case of the twin Rikers, and even they had a lot of ups and downs trying to integrate both of them into society.
My personal head-canon is that cloning inside the Federation is probably a restricted process, actively discouraged but rarely enforced. Considering how lax the Federation is in keeping track of its own internal affairs we might have entire planets of clones and not know about it.
"ignored" was a lax way of describing that they chose to invent a pseudo-science device to ignore the scientific problem of the transporter based on scanning something and recreating it elsewhere.
And they haven't really explained why no one seems to use transporter technology to create copies of people. I guess that is the No-Gemini Certainity Principle at work?
Star Trek has been really inconsistent on how clones are even treated. Most of the time we see stereotypical evil doppelgangers who are quickly dealt with. In TNG we see Riker and Pulaski take the stance of immediately executing clones of themselves. The ethics of this are never even raised by anyone, which is really disturbing to think about. The only real example I can think of where a clone was welcomed into Federation society was the case of the twin Rikers, and even they had a lot of ups and downs trying to integrate both of them into society.
My personal head-canon is that cloning inside the Federation is probably a restricted process, actively discouraged but rarely enforced. Considering how lax the Federation is in keeping track of its own internal affairs we might have entire planets of clones and not know about it.
Don't forget about the case of multiple Ibudan's on Deep Space 9.
I think the reason Riker and Pulaski went to the trouble they did to terminate the clones is because their DNA was taken off them without consent and clones were grown from that DNA, again without consent of the original unwilling donors. It makes sense to feel violated and wanting to do something to end it. However it mostly depends if the clones were alive at the time Riker and Pulaski got to them.
T6 Miranda Hero Ship FTW. Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
I have always hated Star Trek's ridiculous double standard in regards to augmentation.
The shows constantly preaches that tech isn't bad, its how we use it that's bad, and make mention of things like how nuclear weapons were once used a weapons of war that nearly destroyed humanity, but were then used to power many early starships, helping us explore the stars.
But augmentation exists outside of this paradigm, and in basically all Trek shows but DS9, if you are an augment, you are nothing but a violent, bloodthirsty, warmonger/manic. And no matter what, you will be evil for using it. There is no "other side" to it, it's just treated as unequivocally evil in defaince of the rest of the show's message.
The one real instance of this not being the case was in DS9, which is the one show that constantly inverted all the worst aspects of TOS and TNG's messages, and actually made them work, by having Bashir be an augment, but be an actually good person.
Well, I think one of Roddenberry's ideas was that weird belief that humans are already better than anything we could make ourselves to be. Which is why all the androids had serious failings compared to humans. and probably why most aliens with special powers have lives that suck in some way.
Well you have to remember that Gene Roddenberry was a combat veteran of the second World War. He saw the horrors committed in the name of eugenics. That is bound to leave a strong impact on a persons worldview. The writers of today however view those events as just another far flung page in the history books.
There is also the issue of natural selection to consider, or in this case unnatural selection. We might not like to admit it, but survival of the fittest is still relevant despite our technological and social advances. In a world where augmented people might exceed natural human limits it becomes difficult for normal people to thrive. As the population ratio of augments to normals grows the societal need for everyone to be augmented to stay competitive becomes a real issue. Eventually it turns into an arms race of who can engineer the ultimate breed with the rest being left behind. When the number of augments reaches a high enough threshold they will begin to demand that they be the ones to call all the shots, after all why would a "superior" breed take orders from their genetic inferiors. You wind up spiraling towards the inevitable scenario of the movie Gattaca, where normal people are simply viewed as a servant class.
As the Enterprise episode The Augments said "Superior ability creates superior ambition".
Enh, that's a major leap of logic though. It requires the assumption that there will be a clear divide between augments and non-augments, and that the augments would try to take over as a group.
[Rod Serling voice]Consider for a moment a different scenario:[/Rod Serling voice]
Humans are just starting to colonize space. They realize how fragile they are compared to the vastness of space and decide to create slaves to do the most dangerous tasks for them. These groups of slaves are engineered with a variety of goals in mind and thus exist in a variety of forms.
Then the slaves rebelled, not because of any sort of perceived superiority, but because they came to realize just how horribly they were being treated. At first their former masters simply tried to wipe them out, but after the slaves organized and consolidated their power base that option became a difficult task as the slaves now controlled a large chunk of the orbital industry.
When it dawned on the former slavers how long the war could become they decide they needed to take radical steps to win. Thus began a long process where those who could afford it became engineered to be able to fight on equal or nearly equal terms against enemies that had started finding ways to improve their own capabilities. It was a different style of augmentation, more subtle, no third eyes with telescopic lenses, or green skin that absorbs radiation, no massive 8 foot frames, or 4 arms, instead it resulted in people that looked normal, though with strength, and resilience far beyond what is normal, and for the truly bold psionic powers.[/Rod Serling voice]
Now in a scenario like that, blind ambition isn't what motivates the augments to fight a war. But which scenario is more likely to happen IRL? IMO neither scenario is realistic. The Star Trek scenario assumes Augments will be created to be evil, and the other scenario assumes that the slave owners wouldn't want to be engineered.
Also Heisenberg's uncertainty principle is a way of describing a form of sampling error. IE currently available scanning technology changes the state of what it scans, thus you can't be 100% certain of it's current state after scanning.
If all you need to make a clone is DNA, we scatter that stuff around everywhere we go. 'Stealing' it is akin to sweeping it up off the floor. It may be that in Trek what is needed to clone someone is stem cells, which would have to be harvested, and that is what appears to have happened. I can understand their anger.
However, once the growth process has begun, the clone is a human. Period. There is no moral ambiguity. What Riker and Pulaski did was murder innocent children who were helpless to even run away.
This is why Trek has suffered so long and a symptom of why Enterprise failed: the writers are generic cop show writers, and not science fiction writers. As has been said before, Science Fiction is more than a soap opera in space. It is not action adventure with gadgets. Science Fiction is not even horror shows with werewolves and vampires and mutated virus zombies. When it becomes those things it ceases to be science fiction.
Aside from all the gadgets and uniforms and ships, the stories must be about the continued evolution of humanity and its relationship to the universe. To write such stories requires science fiction writers. Generic cop show writers cannot do the job because they don't understand the genera. To a generic cop show writer a clone is something other than human by virtue of his origin, and so it's perfectly okay to terminate them: they aren't people.
I hope that Discovery's writing staff understands the difference between sci-fi and everything else, because I have zero interest in yet another zombie apocalypse soap opera, but with Klingons instead of zombies.
In fact, Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle states that you can never know with precision both the location and inertial state of a subatomic particle - the more precisely you know its behavior, the less precisely you know its location. However, since humans figured out a way around Einstein back in the 22nd century, finagling Heisenberg in the 23rd seems plausible enough...
(Side note, one of my favorite jokes:
Heisenberg is driving a brand-new sports car. He gets pulled over on the highway. The cop asks him, "Sir, do you know how fast you were going?"
"No," Heisenberg replies proudly, "but I know exactly where I am!"
"You were doing 103 mph exactly. It's a 65 zone."
"Great!" Heisenberg exclaims, throwing his hands up in exasperation. "Now I'm lost!")
Comments
When Viacom split, Paramount pictures was given the rights to make movies. CBS remained the sole entity for marketing and licensing of the Star Trek product line for both the television as well as the movie properties, instead of farming it out to Paramount's own division, Paramount Licensing, Inc. This is important, because Paramount cannot promote, market or merchandise a Star Trek movie without working with CBS. Specifically, CBS Consumer Products.
However, CBS Consumer Products has not always had access to all of the concepts from the recent movies. In January 2011, License! magazine reported that CBS Consumer Products had deals for " Playmates Toys for action figures and accessories; Mattel for Star Trek-themed Barbie collector dolls; Tyco for flying radio-controlled vehicles; Scene It? DVD game; Radica for 20Q Star Trek trivia game; Pocket Books for a movie novelization; IDW Publishing for a comic book prequel "Star Trek: Countdown;" Fundex for customized versions of classic games UNO, Scrabble and All About Trivia; USAopoly for a Star Trek Continuum Collector's Edition; Vandor for gift items such as business card holders, salt and pepper sets, mugs, clocks and magnets; Funko for bobbleheads and vinyl figurines; Briefly Stated for adult sleepwear and loungewear; E.S. Originals for kids' footwear, bags and accessories; and AME for kids' sleepwear.".
Yet, CBS Consumer Products still had to work out licensing issues for products like our very own Star Trek Online: "until CBS/Paramount come to some sort of agreement over the new movies, we will not be able to add any items or references from the "JJ" movies. -Executive Producer Dan Stahl, in Ask Cryptic June 2011
Most of those issues seemed to be ironed out when CBS Consumer Products declared that the recent Paramount movies would be the "Kelvin Timeline". A June 2016 Tweet by Holly Amos, Product Development Coordinator at CBS Consumer Products, stated "we needed an in-universe term since we needed some way to refer to it in the encyclopedia". The name was credited to Michael and Denise Okuda, authors of the 50th Anniversary Star Trek: Encyclopedia.
In order for Star Trek: Discovery to use Paramount's material, they would once again have to come to an agreement with CBS Consumer Products. Additionally, promotional material would need to indicate that some portion of Star Trek: Discovery is the intellectual property of Paramount Pictures. You would see "copyright Paramount Pictures" on trailers, posters and merchandise.
Khan is a dictator: Star Trek attempts to show an enlightened egalitarian society.
Khan uses force as his primary tool: Star Trek attempts to avoid the use of force in favor of rational discussion.
Khan uses genetic manipulation to 'improve the breed': Star Trek posits self improvement to be the ultimate goal of all humans while outlawing genetic manipulation for any reason other than medical necessity.
While Khan is certainly a Trek character, having him as anything but the villain could never result in a Star Trek series. Maybe an episode in an anthology style Trek Show, but not as a stand alone Star Trek, because Khan is the exact opposite of Kirk, Picard, and the others. And already knowing the fate of the colony would mean that a Khan series would start at grimdark and get worse from there.
For me, I can't see how the Ceti Alpha V/Botany Bay colony could become a Trek series without becoming just another 'from the bad guy point of view drama'. And such a concept holds little interest for me. Your mileage may vary.
it would be great to see the two sides collaborate a little more closely. i wouldn't mind if STO had more JJtrek in it beyond the strange android fellow and the enterprise, get involved in completely new conflicts that threaten the sto universe
in any event, with Discovery it makes interaction a lot more likely going forward for additional tv series if it gets to that point.
Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
And where there's value, you need a widely accepted means of exchange or otherwise you're left hoping that somebody will trade his widgets for your doohickeys. Guess what the technical term for that is? That's right: money.
There's another limiter as well: energy. They're not pulling power out of their asses to run these things, they're powered by fusion and matter/antimatter annihilation. That requires maintenance, meaning scarcity of people with skills who have to be trained, and parts (even if replicatable, the energy and mass to create them has to come from somewhere) which means more skilled persons. They might end up mining materials such as dilithium instead of replicating it because it turns out to actually be cheaper. And you need fuel, which in this case is admittedly plentiful for everything except antimatter.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Check out https://unitedfederationofpla.net/s/
Well times have changed, the once far off technology of genetic manipulation is now at our finger tips. With the transition from being a far off idea to being a real world thing, the temptation to use it has become much more alluring. There is a growing portion of society that is quite in love with the idea of transhumanism, using technology to "improve the breed". With this change in social attitude has come a reevaluation of the older TOS stories.
I'm personally not a fan of the concept, as it easily leads to institutionalized classism, where society is split between the natural born peasants and the genetically "superior" ruling class. However some people view the rise of the supermen as progress.
----
Despite all this though, even if you can fully automate the manufacturing process in a world that magically has an infinite supply of raw materials, it still doesn't take away the need for money. A post-scarcity society still doesn't address things like land ownership, intellectual properties and art, objects to large and complex for fast replication (starships, etc), and one of a kind objects that hold value due to their history.
Deep Space Nine noted this in an episode where Jake Sisko wanted to get a baseball from a historic game for his father. He could have easily replicated it, but that would have simply been an imitation. Simply wanting this rare artifact didn't automatically mean that its current owner was obligated to give it to him, he had to earn it.
Money is a tool, and tools are neither inherently good or evil. Vilifying money is just an act of spite and does nothing to address real social concerns.
I'll give an example of this in action: not so long ago genetically modified corn crops were engineered with pest resistant properties. Unfortunately, the pollen contained the insect resistant traits and suddenly bees and monarch butterflies began to die off. It seems pollinators were the 'pest' most affected by the engineered traits, and corn cannot self pollinate.
Star Trek could tell such stories as cautionary tales.
Now that's a scary thought, augment genes getting passed around the ecosystem by viruses...
My character Tsin'xing
Which makes the existence, and rapidly-dropping price, of CRISPR just a tad chilling. I don't think it's going to be our undoing in the end, but it's not impossible...
My character Tsin'xing
There is also the issue of natural selection to consider, or in this case unnatural selection. We might not like to admit it, but survival of the fittest is still relevant despite our technological and social advances. In a world where augmented people might exceed natural human limits it becomes difficult for normal people to thrive. As the population ratio of augments to normals grows the societal need for everyone to be augmented to stay competitive becomes a real issue. Eventually it turns into an arms race of who can engineer the ultimate breed with the rest being left behind. When the number of augments reaches a high enough threshold they will begin to demand that they be the ones to call all the shots, after all why would a "superior" breed take orders from their genetic inferiors. You wind up spiraling towards the inevitable scenario of the movie Gattaca, where normal people are simply viewed as a servant class.
As the Enterprise episode The Augments said "Superior ability creates superior ambition".
Edit: Fixed some typos.
Of course, it's impossible to judge now the result of our real world ventures into genetics, but if DNA is, (as Mr. Herbert proposed in the Dune novels,) the language of God, then we are still in the baby-babble stage of learning to speak it.
Our history shows we're always a generation behind our technological development. Let's hope we catch up to genetics before we create the zombie apocalypse TV warns us is coming.
Superior ambition doesn't create superior reasoning though, not even Bashir is immune to the effects of not being able to think outside what his training has allowed him or his own sense of pride which was shown on more than a fair few occasions. Typical Augments have shown the same limitations which is what keeps catching the Augments out on the NX-01, the 1701 and again on the 1701-D in that colony.
Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
The augments shown on DS9 were of a more likely sort than Khan and his people - they were more intelligent than the average human, but had significant neurochemical issues along with it. Basically, Julian was lucky; his parents' well-meaning resequencing of his DNA could well have resulted in his being a drooling madman, rather than the somewhat charismatic medical professional he became.
Does Deep Space Nine still count as "modern"?
And have we ever seen Star Trek actually take the meaning of the existence for replicators completely seriously?
I think not. They deliberately invented limitations so they could still have all the stories that involved scarcity. Neither modern nor old Star Trek writers could work without this.
Not neccessarily. The problem started only in TNG when they actually could manipulate the stuff they were beaming through.
Before that, it was possible that the "magic" of transporters worked in a way that did not actually invovle a scanning process, but instead initiating some kind of internal physical process that guaranteed the disassembly and reassembly of the targeted matter, without actually scanning the object itself. Once the tech writers decided that it actually involved scanning (and ignoring Heisenberg's Uncertainity Principle), they created the way for replicators.
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
And they haven't really explained why no one seems to use transporter technology to create copies of people. I guess that is the No-Gemini Certainity Principle at work?
as to why they don't do it deliberately, maybe it's illegal
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Star Trek has been really inconsistent on how clones are even treated. Most of the time we see stereotypical evil doppelgangers who are quickly dealt with. In TNG we see Riker and Pulaski take the stance of immediately executing clones of themselves. The ethics of this are never even raised by anyone, which is really disturbing to think about. The only real example I can think of where a clone was welcomed into Federation society was the case of the twin Rikers, and even they had a lot of ups and downs trying to integrate both of them into society.
My personal head-canon is that cloning inside the Federation is probably a restricted process, actively discouraged but rarely enforced. Considering how lax the Federation is in keeping track of its own internal affairs we might have entire planets of clones and not know about it.
Don't forget about the case of multiple Ibudan's on Deep Space 9.
I think the reason Riker and Pulaski went to the trouble they did to terminate the clones is because their DNA was taken off them without consent and clones were grown from that DNA, again without consent of the original unwilling donors. It makes sense to feel violated and wanting to do something to end it. However it mostly depends if the clones were alive at the time Riker and Pulaski got to them.
Been around since Dec 2010 on STO and bought LTS in Apr 2013 for STO.
[Rod Serling voice]Consider for a moment a different scenario:[/Rod Serling voice]
Humans are just starting to colonize space. They realize how fragile they are compared to the vastness of space and decide to create slaves to do the most dangerous tasks for them. These groups of slaves are engineered with a variety of goals in mind and thus exist in a variety of forms.
Then the slaves rebelled, not because of any sort of perceived superiority, but because they came to realize just how horribly they were being treated. At first their former masters simply tried to wipe them out, but after the slaves organized and consolidated their power base that option became a difficult task as the slaves now controlled a large chunk of the orbital industry.
When it dawned on the former slavers how long the war could become they decide they needed to take radical steps to win. Thus began a long process where those who could afford it became engineered to be able to fight on equal or nearly equal terms against enemies that had started finding ways to improve their own capabilities. It was a different style of augmentation, more subtle, no third eyes with telescopic lenses, or green skin that absorbs radiation, no massive 8 foot frames, or 4 arms, instead it resulted in people that looked normal, though with strength, and resilience far beyond what is normal, and for the truly bold psionic powers.[/Rod Serling voice]
Now in a scenario like that, blind ambition isn't what motivates the augments to fight a war. But which scenario is more likely to happen IRL? IMO neither scenario is realistic. The Star Trek scenario assumes Augments will be created to be evil, and the other scenario assumes that the slave owners wouldn't want to be engineered.
My character Tsin'xing
My character Tsin'xing
However, once the growth process has begun, the clone is a human. Period. There is no moral ambiguity. What Riker and Pulaski did was murder innocent children who were helpless to even run away.
This is why Trek has suffered so long and a symptom of why Enterprise failed: the writers are generic cop show writers, and not science fiction writers. As has been said before, Science Fiction is more than a soap opera in space. It is not action adventure with gadgets. Science Fiction is not even horror shows with werewolves and vampires and mutated virus zombies. When it becomes those things it ceases to be science fiction.
Aside from all the gadgets and uniforms and ships, the stories must be about the continued evolution of humanity and its relationship to the universe. To write such stories requires science fiction writers. Generic cop show writers cannot do the job because they don't understand the genera. To a generic cop show writer a clone is something other than human by virtue of his origin, and so it's perfectly okay to terminate them: they aren't people.
I hope that Discovery's writing staff understands the difference between sci-fi and everything else, because I have zero interest in yet another zombie apocalypse soap opera, but with Klingons instead of zombies.
But I'm also not their target audience.
(Side note, one of my favorite jokes:
Heisenberg is driving a brand-new sports car. He gets pulled over on the highway. The cop asks him, "Sir, do you know how fast you were going?"
"No," Heisenberg replies proudly, "but I know exactly where I am!"
"You were doing 103 mph exactly. It's a 65 zone."
"Great!" Heisenberg exclaims, throwing his hands up in exasperation. "Now I'm lost!")