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The Federation has Replicators and the Transporter. They are almost the only type of society that makes sense in the setting.

by XorNot 3y ago

Ekaros 3y ago
Do they transport for example Ores or building materials out of planets? Who actually builds all the stuff that can't be replicated? And can they just quit their job or take personal time off when ever they want? Also if you really think that everything goes through replicators, what does that mean for energy expenditure? If done on planets where does all the energy go? And don't everyone else have those two things too? So why did Cardassia need mining outpost?
- hnlmorg 3y ago
  Replicators were always described as being energy hungry. In some instances slave labour was “cheaper”. In other instances they used the “this material cannot be replicated” loophole. Such as the drug that the Dominion were addicted to.
  - XorNot 3y ago
    Which also doesn't make sense: you can't replicate the drug, but it hardly implies you also can't replicate the factory which makes it, for example. Just how far up the "can't do that" chain do you go? The thing is, the mechanism of the Replicator is less important then what it represents: productivity with zero human labor input. We don't live in that world - we have trouble conceiving of that world. But that's essentially the whole promise of AI: robots which can build more robots, which can then build products for us. At some point, your whole civilizations pipeline becomes "energy + robot labor". And once you get the first part of the Dyson swarm up and running, energy is infinite - at least in human terms.
    - hnlmorg 3y ago
      I agree but Star Trek was never intended to be hard Sci-Fi. Sometimes it even breaks from its own cannon (and I’m not just talking about Discovery/Klingons. Almost all of the alien species have undergone revision over the years). So I’m ok with replicators being a lazy plot device. It’s not like there aren’t countless others, like transporters, the usage of large mother ships rather than lots of smaller vessels, universal translators, 3D geometry presented in 2D, every species being bipedal, etc. The point behind Star Trek is that it presents the best of humanity rather than the worst — which is what most other popular sci-fi stories focus on.
hnlmorg 3y ago
So did the other species mentioned.
BirAdam 3y ago
The Klingons and the Federation both make sense in a world that is post scarcity: war as religion, or science/adventure as all-consuming hobby. Thing is, as you noted, most other civs make very little sense.

The Federation has Replicators and the Transporter. They are almost the only type of society that makes sense in the setting.

by XorNot 3y ago

The Federation has Replicators and the Transporter. They are almost the only type of society that makes sense in the setting.

Ekaros 3y ago

Do they transport for example Ores or building materials out of planets? Who actually builds all the stuff that can't be replicated? And can they just quit their job or take personal time off when ever they want? Also if you really think that everything goes through replicators, what does that mean for energy expenditure? If done on planets where does all the energy go? And don't everyone else have those two things too? So why did Cardassia need mining outpost?

hnlmorg 3y ago
Replicators were always described as being energy hungry. In some instances slave labour was “cheaper”. In other instances they used the “this material cannot be replicated” loophole. Such as the drug that the Dominion were addicted to.
- XorNot 3y ago
  Which also doesn't make sense: you can't replicate the drug, but it hardly implies you also can't replicate the factory which makes it, for example. Just how far up the "can't do that" chain do you go? The thing is, the mechanism of the Replicator is less important then what it represents: productivity with zero human labor input. We don't live in that world - we have trouble conceiving of that world. But that's essentially the whole promise of AI: robots which can build more robots, which can then build products for us. At some point, your whole civilizations pipeline becomes "energy + robot labor". And once you get the first part of the Dyson swarm up and running, energy is infinite - at least in human terms.
  - hnlmorg 3y ago
    I agree but Star Trek was never intended to be hard Sci-Fi. Sometimes it even breaks from its own cannon (and I’m not just talking about Discovery/Klingons. Almost all of the alien species have undergone revision over the years). So I’m ok with replicators being a lazy plot device. It’s not like there aren’t countless others, like transporters, the usage of large mother ships rather than lots of smaller vessels, universal translators, 3D geometry presented in 2D, every species being bipedal, etc. The point behind Star Trek is that it presents the best of humanity rather than the worst — which is what most other popular sci-fi stories focus on.

hnlmorg 3y ago

So did the other species mentioned.

BirAdam 3y ago

The Klingons and the Federation both make sense in a world that is post scarcity: war as religion, or science/adventure as all-consuming hobby. Thing is, as you noted, most other civs make very little sense.