The_Raven on 18/11/2008 at 21:55
Maybe not, but I've always subscribed to the belief that science fiction should at least try and make things somewhat believable in terms of our current scientific understanding of the universe. Ignoring subspace signals and other stuff from Star Trek, I fail to see how a race so far away from ours could detect sound waves across such a vast area of vacuum. As Zylon mentions, Star Trek is notorious for this shit; I just found the whole thing to be incredibly contrived, even by Star Trek standards.
That said, I still enjoy the movie and its beloved "fish-out-of-water" antics.
ZylonBane on 18/11/2008 at 22:03
Quote Posted by The_Raven
I fail to see how a race so far away from ours could detect sound waves across such a vast area of vacuum
Your mental approach to the problem is so literal it's painful.
The_Raven on 18/11/2008 at 22:06
I only wish this was the only time when that ended up being a problem.
Funny, out of everyone, I would have expected Zylon to understand how much of a stretch the whole thing is. Anyway, I guess the only way to explain this one is by the "advanced technology is equivalent to magic" approach.
EDIT: Ah - a keyboard! How quaint!
Ulukai on 18/11/2008 at 22:17
Reality Check: Arguing about the plot of Star Trek 4 on the Internet.
doctorfrog on 18/11/2008 at 22:19
Yep, the internet sure wasn't ever made for Trek nerds to argue about things.
ZylonBane on 18/11/2008 at 22:23
Quote Posted by The_Raven
Funny, out of everyone, I would have expected Zylon to understand how much of a stretch the whole thing is.
Look, it's established that in the Star Trek universe remote-sensing technology exists that can not only target "life signs", but can do so down to the genetic level. Given this, it's not at all hard to imagine that an alien race with technology far in excess of the Federation would have even more advanced sensing technology, that would be able to, say, derive a real-time full-body scan of an individual lifeform. And since creating sound is a
physical act, this hypothetical scanning system would have no problem inferring the sounds that were being made -- and also the posture of the creature making the sounds, which in fact the probe does mimic in the movie.
Or to take a lower-tech solution, the technology exists
today to eavesdrop on distant conversations by bouncing a laser beam off a window near where the conversation is taking place. Extrapolate that to a couple of whales sounding off in an ocean.
If all this sounds too far-fetched to you, try reading up on interferometry, deconvolution, and other related very mathematical but very real applications. Not only is the thing you're having such a problem with utterly trivial by Trek's technological standards, it's almost within the realm of modern real-life technology.
The_Raven on 18/11/2008 at 23:26
Quote Posted by Zylon
...stuff...
Fair enough, I was aware of laser microphones previously; however, up until this point I was completely unaware of how they worked. My studies and interests don't normally take me into the realm of signal processing; so the concepts of interferometry, convolution, and deconvolution are entirely new to me. Now that I've glanced at the relevant wiki pages, I can at least understand at the basic level what is going on and its sound mathematical basis.
The really sad thing is that I haven't used calculus for years, so my current skill with derivatives and integrals is pitiful.
Scots Taffer on 18/11/2008 at 23:38
Good call on the thread title, Morte. Unlike Starreh, I don't suckle at the Abrams teat and see his teen-pandering as a massive failure in much of his work but hey, I'm not laughing while swimming in a pool filled with gold coins so I guess I'm the massive failure.
Quote Posted by Starrfall
First Contact is still my favorite. Which probably either gives me a lot of star trek credibility or takes it all away, I'm not sure.
First Contact is an amazing action movie for starters, it's a great sci-fi for seconds and if we need a third reason, it's the best dramatic plot of all the Star Treks since Khan with real investment in the characters.
I was a bit of a Trek nerd in high school, somehow managed to be unimpressed with DS9 (felt like Cheers set in a space station at times and Sisko had worse overacting diction than Kirk), liked parts of Voyager (seven of nine mmm), really liked a lot of TNG (minus the obvious seasonal lulls - it was the only Trek show I've seen all of, I think), never watched TOS (except for the occasional episode) and the theme tune of Enterprise was enough to put me off ever watching it. Though by that stage I was older and wiser than to waste time with shows of such wildly variational output as any Star Trek - we had Firefly by that stage.
The movies are a hilariously mixed bunch, I rank them as follows:
1. First Contact
2. Wrath of Khan
3. The Voyage Home
4. The Undiscovered Country
5. Generations
6. The Search for Spock
7. Insurrection
8. The Final Frontier
9. The Motion Picture
Nemesis (never seen)
This movie looks like I don't know what, a post-Heroes-and-The O.C. meets modern, frenetically-paced, incoherently-edited action-sci-fi, but at the same time it's an origin story with a decent cast and while Abrams has never totally wowed me, I've never thought any of his stuff was unmitigated shit - even Lost at its cockteasey contrived worst (in season 2) wasn't easy to hate, except for the fact that it had the most handsome passenger set of any airline in the world.
Stitch on 19/11/2008 at 00:44
Quote Posted by Starrfall
It looks like it's going to be exactly the movie it should be, meaning it will be awesome and only the sad over-expectant fanboys and people who don't like fun will complain.
not sure where you're getting this because it isn't from the abortion of a trailer I just endured
