Star Trek reading - Yes I'm a nerd...I get it.

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by Solitaire1

The following is my own view on the new Star Trek movie and its resulting timelines (I'll put it in a spoiler for those who've not seen the movie):

Spoiler:

The way the movie presented it, I think that there are the following timelines:

- When Nero and Crew (N&C) reappears the timeline splits in two and these are the results:

-- Timeline One: N&C does not appear. This is the original timeline.

-- Timeline Two: N&C reappears. The beginning of the movie takes place in this timeline.

- When Spock-Prime reappears, once again the timeline splits in two with the following resulting timelines:

-- Timeline One: Original timeline, neither N&C and/or Spock-Prime reappear.

-- Timeline Two: N&C does appear but Spock-Prime does not reappear. Again, the beginning of the movie takes place in this timeline.

-- Timeline Three: N&C and Spock-Prime both reappear. This is the timeline where the movie takes place.

To me, once N&C and Spock-Prime left the original timeline they can never return to it.

I am not sure I completely agree...

Spoiler:

I think it is fairly well established in Star Trek that simply going to the past does not in itself alter the timeline. At some point the person who went into the past has to do something to significantly alter the timeline. In the case of the movie, this clearly happens when Nero is responsible for the death of Captain Kirk's father. Lets say The Enterprise E had followed Nero back to the past and defeated him before he took this action, then they and Spock Prime could have returned to their original time line.

[WT Sharpe]

I'm not at all a Treckie, or Treker or whatever you want to call it.

It's just pure coincidence that I'm currently reading the updated version of The Physics of Star Trek by Lawrence M. Krauss.

Nothing more.

[JSWolf]

I'm currently reading Star Trek: Vanguard: Storming Heaven by David Mack. It's the 8th and final book in the Vanguard series. I can't say how the action is as I've not gotten that far, but given what I've read that David Mack has written, it's sure to be action packed with a lot of fatalities.

[WT Sharpe]

Stupid cat just hopped on the keyboard and deleted the whole freakin' message I was writing. Where are phasers when you need them? Or transporters, so I could transfer this cat to Pooh's house? Oh well.

Earlier today I finished reading The Physics of Star Trek by Lawrence M. Krauss, and I highly recommend this book, not only to fans of the series (all the series and the movies), but to all fans of science and science fiction as well. It was written in 1995, but the current version was updated in 2007 and has a forward by one of the shows most famous fans, Stephen Hawking. It contains explanations of where the Star Trek writers got it right, and examples of where they got it sometimes amusingly wrong.

One example of where they got it horribly wrong comes from one of my favorite episodes, "Wink of an Eye," in which Captain Kirk and crew encounter the Scalosian race who live life at such a highly accelerated pace that they are invisible to those who sense time's passage as we do. At one point, Kirk fires his phaser at one of them, who simply moves calmly out of the beam's way before it can reach her.

If phasers are pure energy and not particle beams, as the Star Trek technical manual states, the beams must move at the speed of light. No matter how fast one moves, even if one is sped up by a factor of 300 million, one can never move out of the way of an oncoming phaser beam. Why? Because in order to know it is coming, you have to first see the gun being fired. But the light that allows you to see this travels at the same speed as the beam. Put simply, it is impossible to know it is going to hit you until it hits you!

This book is thought provoking:

If you keep on extrapolating, you will find that the density required to form a black hole with a mass equal to the mass of the observable universe would be roughly the same as the average density of matter in the universe! We may be living inside a black hole.

The book covers the plausibility of teleporters, the energy requirements needed to accomplish warp drive, and much, much more. An interview with the author can be found here.

[Apache]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

One example of where they got it horribly wrong comes from one of my favorite episodes, "Wink of an Eye," in which Captain Kirk and crew encounter the Scalosian race who live life at such a highly accelerated pace that they are invisible to those who sense time's passage as we do. At one point, Kirk fires his phaser at one of them, who simply moves calmly out of the beam's way before it can reach her.

If phasers are pure energy and not particle beams, as the Star Trek technical manual states, the beams must move at the speed of light. No matter how fast one moves, even if one is sped up by a factor of 300 million, one can never move out of the way of an oncoming phaser beam. Why? Because in order to know it is coming, you have to first see the gun being fired. But the light that allows you to see this travels at the same speed as the beam. Put simply, it is impossible to know it is going to hit you until it hits you!

The book covers the plausibility of teleporters, the energy requirements needed to accomplish warp drive, and much, much more. An interview with the author can be found here.

Maybe she saw him start to depress the fire button?
You know, like Ciun did in the Movie The Destroyer.
Apache

[afv011]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Stupid cat just hopped on the keyboard and deleted the whole freakin' message I was writing. Where are phasers when you need them? Or transporters, so I could transfer this cat to Pooh's house? Oh well.

Earlier today I finished reading The Physics of Star Trek by Lawrence M. Krauss, and I highly recommend this book, not only to fans of the series (all the series and the movies), but to all fans of science and science fiction as well. It was written in 1995, but the current version was updated in 2007 and has a forward by one of the shows most famous fans, Stephen Hawking. It contains explanations of where the Star Trek writers got it right, and examples of where they got it sometimes amusingly wrong.

One example of where they got it horribly wrong comes from one of my favorite episodes, "Wink of an Eye," in which Captain Kirk and crew encounter the Scalosian race who live life at such a highly accelerated pace that they are invisible to those who sense time's passage as we do. At one point, Kirk fires his phaser at one of them, who simply moves calmly out of the beam's way before it can reach her.

If phasers are pure energy and not particle beams, as the Star Trek technical manual states, the beams must move at the speed of light. No matter how fast one moves, even if one is sped up by a factor of 300 million, one can never move out of the way of an oncoming phaser beam. Why? Because in order to know it is coming, you have to first see the gun being fired. But the light that allows you to see this travels at the same speed as the beam. Put simply, it is impossible to know it is going to hit you until it hits you!

This book is thought provoking:

If you keep on extrapolating, you will find that the density required to form a black hole with a mass equal to the mass of the observable universe would be roughly the same as the average density of matter in the universe! We may be living inside a black hole.

The book covers the plausibility of teleporters, the energy requirements needed to accomplish warp drive, and much, much more. An interview with the author can be found here.

This one has been sitting on my TBR pile for a while, I will have to get to it soon!

[jbcohen]

I need to pick up another Star Treck novel in the near future. I remember reading one a few years back and Piccard said his signature prase in the book "Make it so." And I could just hear Patrick Stewart and his booming voice in the back of my head, makes reading the books that much better.

I was think the other day about some of the signature phrases from the series - "You can't push it any faster than that", "Make it so number one", "And we could finally get home" says Catherine Janeway, "Humpf" says T'Pol.

[afv011]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Earlier today I finished reading The Physics of Star Trek by Lawrence M. Krauss, and I highly recommend this book, not only to fans of the series (all the series and the movies), but to all fans of science and science fiction as well.

I finished the book myself last night. Very interesting book, although the physics can get a bit thick at times. I would also recommend it to any trekkie or sci-fi enthusiast.

[JSWolf]

The chart has been updated.

http://8of5.blogspot.com/p/trek-lit-reading-order.html

[afv011]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

The chart has been updated.

http://8of5.blogspot.com/p/trek-lit-reading-order.html

Man, it's hard to catch up!

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by afv011

Man, it's hard to catch up!

Not really. I'm almost caught up. I will be once I read the new Titan novel Fallen Gods.

[ebusinesstutor]

For older Star Trek books, here are some of my favourites:

Yesterday's Son and Time For Yesterday
Prime Directive
Vendetta

[jbcohen]

I tend to like star treck novels simply because I can visualize the characters.

[afv011]

Originally Posted by jbcohen

I tend to like star treck novels simply because I can visualize the characters.

Yes, that's a good reason. You don't have to wander through 1/3 of the book to get to know the character, or then wonder "who is this"?

[taosaur]

I have some curiosity about DS9/Voyager era Trek books, but it's so hard for them to climb the TBR list.