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Star Trek TNG is as close to 'white mirror' as we'll ever get. A universe where human nature advances alongside technology. It's obviously way more far fetched

by drewrv 10y ago

Star Trek TNG is as close to 'white mirror' as we'll ever get. A universe where human nature advances alongside technology. It's obviously way more far fetched and the show hasn't aged well though.

jacquesm 10y ago
I don't find Star Trek believable at all, starting with the 'Warp Drive'. As soon as you add a device like that to a plot it becomes impossible to see it as a possible future.
- monocasa 10y ago
  I mean... NASA has a team that works on how to warp spacetime in order to provide apparent propulsion.
- paublyrne 10y ago
  I don't think it was supposed to be believable. It's a utopian society, reflecting the time in which it was conceived. The idea that society would be become more liberal, more socialistic, more tolerant by having greater access to information and not wanting for material goods is the more interesting one. We will be able to see if that's true over the next hundred years. The Warp Drive is just a plot device, so that the humans can interact species from other, distant worlds.
  - throwanem 10y ago
    > I don't think it was supposed to be believable. Roddenberry surely intended it to be. It was the show he'd wanted to make all along, or a great deal closer to it than the original, in any case; since his death and especially since the show wrapped, many early screenwriters have described, in various fora, the extent to which he'd try to enforce the logical consequences of his political philosophy, such as the disappearance of workplace interpersonal conflict, a libertine attitude toward sexual activity, and such enduring peace both internal and external as to render unnecessary the maintenance of a military organization. After Roddenberry's ill health made it impossible for him to exert creative control, and especially after his death in 1991, TNG-era Trek evolved toward a more plausible portayal of its characters and societies.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
- TheGrimDerp1 10y ago
  http://www.universetoday.com/130649/nasas-em-drive-passes-peer-review-dont-get-hopes/ http://www.universetoday.com/130649/nasas-em-drive-passes-pe... Not terribly far fetched, just need more pylons.
- tedunangst 10y ago
  You can reimagine most episodes without it. They're not visiting different planets in a spaceship, just different cities connected by a monorail. Er, hyperloop.
  - mjevans 10y ago
    More accurately, making flying air-carrier visits to different parts of Earth.
  - jagermo 10y ago
    Or use wormhole technology to connect planets via a hyperloop like in "Pandoras Star". Interesting read how humanity would conquer other systems if space travel was irrelevant.
    - LeoPanthera 10y ago
      This is basically the plot of Stargate SG-1.
      - jagermo 10y ago
        Less ancient aliens, more political backstabbing. And SG1 had that horrible starship spinoff
jbpetersen 10y ago
That's assuming we're headed towards being The Federation and not The Borg.
- oldmanjay 10y ago
  Given that humanity's track seems to be toward ever greater diversity, it's hard to imagine we'd become a one-dimensional archetype species.
  - 794CD01 10y ago
    In what was is human diversity increasing? Broadcast television has been causing the decline of regional accents and increasing cultural homogenization for decades. Many obscure languages are dying out in favor of consolidation at the regional or national level. In the past, humans were naturally diverse simply because there were so many distinct communities that hardly ever interacted with each other. Nowadays you might be exposed to many times more diversity than the average medieval peasant ever was but there's nothing contradictory about that happening as the total amount of diversity in the world continues to decrease.
    - oldmanjay 10y ago
      You'll have a hard time convincing me that a world with several orders of magnitude more humans is somehow less diverse than the times with fewer humans unless you somehow remove the ability to process arithmetic from my brain.
      - bbctol 10y ago
        Wait, how does more humans = more diversity? I would think any abstract measure of diversity would be based on average differences, or standard deviations away from the mean. Obviously, the absolute extremes are greater with more people, but it seems entirely logical to say diversity has decreased as the number of people increase.
        deleted 10y ago

by drewrv 10y ago

Star Trek TNG is as close to 'white mirror' as we'll ever get. A universe where human nature advances alongside technology. It's obviously way more far fetched and the show hasn't aged well though.

jacquesm 10y ago

I don't find Star Trek believable at all, starting with the 'Warp Drive'. As soon as you add a device like that to a plot it becomes impossible to see it as a possible future.

monocasa 10y ago
I mean... NASA has a team that works on how to warp spacetime in order to provide apparent propulsion.
paublyrne 10y ago
I don't think it was supposed to be believable. It's a utopian society, reflecting the time in which it was conceived. The idea that society would be become more liberal, more socialistic, more tolerant by having greater access to information and not wanting for material goods is the more interesting one. We will be able to see if that's true over the next hundred years. The Warp Drive is just a plot device, so that the humans can interact species from other, distant worlds.
- throwanem 10y ago
  > I don't think it was supposed to be believable. Roddenberry surely intended it to be. It was the show he'd wanted to make all along, or a great deal closer to it than the original, in any case; since his death and especially since the show wrapped, many early screenwriters have described, in various fora, the extent to which he'd try to enforce the logical consequences of his political philosophy, such as the disappearance of workplace interpersonal conflict, a libertine attitude toward sexual activity, and such enduring peace both internal and external as to render unnecessary the maintenance of a military organization. After Roddenberry's ill health made it impossible for him to exert creative control, and especially after his death in 1991, TNG-era Trek evolved toward a more plausible portayal of its characters and societies.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
TheGrimDerp1 10y ago
http://www.universetoday.com/130649/nasas-em-drive-passes-peer-review-dont-get-hopes/ http://www.universetoday.com/130649/nasas-em-drive-passes-pe... Not terribly far fetched, just need more pylons.
tedunangst 10y ago
You can reimagine most episodes without it. They're not visiting different planets in a spaceship, just different cities connected by a monorail. Er, hyperloop.
- mjevans 10y ago
  More accurately, making flying air-carrier visits to different parts of Earth.
- jagermo 10y ago
  Or use wormhole technology to connect planets via a hyperloop like in "Pandoras Star". Interesting read how humanity would conquer other systems if space travel was irrelevant.
  - LeoPanthera 10y ago
    This is basically the plot of Stargate SG-1.
    - jagermo 10y ago
      Less ancient aliens, more political backstabbing. And SG1 had that horrible starship spinoff

jbpetersen 10y ago

That's assuming we're headed towards being The Federation and not The Borg.

oldmanjay 10y ago
Given that humanity's track seems to be toward ever greater diversity, it's hard to imagine we'd become a one-dimensional archetype species.
- 794CD01 10y ago
  In what was is human diversity increasing? Broadcast television has been causing the decline of regional accents and increasing cultural homogenization for decades. Many obscure languages are dying out in favor of consolidation at the regional or national level. In the past, humans were naturally diverse simply because there were so many distinct communities that hardly ever interacted with each other. Nowadays you might be exposed to many times more diversity than the average medieval peasant ever was but there's nothing contradictory about that happening as the total amount of diversity in the world continues to decrease.
  - oldmanjay 10y ago
    You'll have a hard time convincing me that a world with several orders of magnitude more humans is somehow less diverse than the times with fewer humans unless you somehow remove the ability to process arithmetic from my brain.
    - bbctol 10y ago
      Wait, how does more humans = more diversity? I would think any abstract measure of diversity would be based on average differences, or standard deviations away from the mean. Obviously, the absolute extremes are greater with more people, but it seems entirely logical to say diversity has decreased as the number of people increase.
      - deleted 10y ago