milne@uci-icse (06/28/85)
From: Alastair Milne <milne@uci-icse> I usually take that frontispiece "... boldly go where no man has gone before" in about the same vein as the publishers' scribbles on the covers of paperbacks: if, by some accident, they come close to describing what's in the book, you're lucky. And it's true that Enterprise from time to time undertook explorations in previously untrodden (so to speak) territory. However, most of the time she had duties to fulfill as one of the 12 or 13 most powerful ships of the Federation's fleet. She could hardly do that while spending 5 years out of contact with anybody at all. Furthermore, how likely is it that anybody would send so expensive a ship and crew out simply to be a remote survey vessel? Or that StarFleet would entrust *all* diplomatic dealings with newly-contacted races to a crew whose primary orientation was military? Let Enterprise and her sisters establish first contact, but let the Federation's diplomatic corp do their job as soon as possible. Though as for the naming of the newly discovered planets, they seemed to follow a naming system using first the name of the constellation in which the sun was found, a Greek letter specifying the particular sun (possibly by absolute magnitude), and a number specifying the planet of that sun. So they could actually specify names for as-yet hypothetical planets. One wonders if all the constellation names were for those seen from Earth, or if other planets got their points of view represented as well. So I take it for granted that, though they may occasionally go where no human has gone before (boldly, I trust), they will usually be going where there are plenty of humans, and others, already. (Do you realise how many people must now think that "... to boldly go..." is acceptable English grammar?) Alastair Milne
crm@duke.UUCP (Charlie Martin) (07/01/85)
In article <2422@topaz.ARPA> milne@uci-icse writes: >From: Alastair Milne <milne@uci-icse> > > > I usually take that frontispiece "... boldly go where no man has gone ... > However, most of the time she had duties to fulfill as one of the 12 or 13 > most powerful ships of the Federation's fleet. She could hardly do that > while spending 5 years out of contact with anybody at all. Furthermore, > how likely is it that anybody would send so expensive a ship and crew out > simply to be a remote survey vessel? Or that StarFleet would entrust *all* > diplomatic dealings with newly-contacted races to a crew whose primary > orientation was military? England did just that through much of the wet-navy-in-sailing-ships period, just like it suggests in the Hornblower books. > > (Do you realise how many people must now think that "... to boldly go..." > is acceptable English grammar?) > If the British would'a thrown that norman fellow off the island in 1066, it *would* be acceptable grammar -- that whole "don't split infinitives" business is an execreble Latinism. (Please note that there is a joke encoded in the last sentance.) -- Charlie Martin (...mcnc!duke!crm)
richardt@orstcs.UUCP (richardt) (07/03/85)
>How likely is it that anyone would send so expensive a ship >off into nowhere for 5 years? Very. As a general rule, exploration ships fall into two classes: unarmed and armed. Unarmed exploration ships are usually designed so that they are so pathetic as to not be a threat to anyone. Marco Polo did this and it worked fairly well, albeit with a few backfires along the way. Armed explorers tend to be armed with the most powerful weapons that the society can hand to a non-military ship. When you already know of several hostile races in your neck of the galaxy, it is far better to assume that the natives will shoot first and ask questions later than to lose crews in the nether regions of the universe. For one thing, the appearance of an alien ship is usually a dead give-away as to its origin. Besides this, the Enterprise was travelling in regions which were known to have Klingon ships running around in them. In a situation where a nation is exploring out from a multinational border, esp. when one of the nations is hostile, the explorers had better be armed. Besides, human ships are always armed. Haven't you read any space opera? As for naming, I believe most of the visible stars have been named. I see no reason to assume that this trend will stop anytime in the future. Man, as a race, is arrogant. As long as StarFleet sticks to names of the form Starname-Planet_#, they're on well established ground. orstcs/richardt "If I'm human, what are *YOU*?"
friedman@uiucdcs.Uiuc.ARPA (07/03/85)
> Though as for the naming of the newly discovered planets, they seemed to > follow a naming system using first the name of the constellation in which > the sun was found, a Greek letter specifying the particular sun (possibly > by absolute magnitude), and a number specifying the planet of that sun. It was never stated where they got the constellation names and Greek letters, but the simplest explanation is that these were taken from Earth's constellations and the standard star-naming scheme in use on Earth, in which the brightest star (apparent magnitude) in a given constellation is alpha, the next is beta, etc. Of course, there were maverick names throughout the series. For example, one planet is called "Ingraham B". I like to think that "Ingraham" might be a gas giant with an inhabitable satellite in the second position from the giant.
JAFFE@RUTGERS.ARPA (07/08/85)
From: duke!crm (Charlie Martin) In article <2422@topaz.ARPA> milne@uci-icse writes: >From: Alastair Milne <milne@uci-icse> > > > I usually take that frontispiece "... boldly go where no man has gone ... > However, most of the time she had duties to fulfill as one of the 12 or 13 > most powerful ships of the Federation's fleet. She could hardly do that > while spending 5 years out of contact with anybody at all. Furthermore, > how likely is it that anybody would send so expensive a ship and crew out > simply to be a remote survey vessel? Or that StarFleet would entrust *all* > diplomatic dealings with newly-contacted races to a crew whose primary > orientation was military? England did just that through much of the wet-navy-in-sailing-ships period, just like it suggests in the Hornblower books. > > (Do you realise how many people must now think that "... to boldly go..." > is acceptable English grammar?) > If the British would'a thrown that norman fellow off the island in 1066, it *would* be acceptable grammar -- that whole "don't split infinitives" business is an execreble Latinism. (Please note that there is a joke encoded in the last sentance.) -- Charlie Martin (...mcnc!duke!crm)
JAFFE@RUTGERS.ARPA (07/08/85)
From: friedman@uiucdcs.Uiuc.ARPA > Though as for the naming of the newly discovered planets, they seemed to > follow a naming system using first the name of the constellation in which > the sun was found, a Greek letter specifying the particular sun (possibly > by absolute magnitude), and a number specifying the planet of that sun. It was never stated where they got the constellation names and Greek letters, but the simplest explanation is that these were taken from Earth's constellations and the standard star-naming scheme in use on Earth, in which the brightest star (apparent magnitude) in a given constellation is alpha, the next is beta, etc. Of course, there were maverick names throughout the series. For example, one planet is called "Ingraham B". I like to think that "Ingraham" might be a gas giant with an inhabitable satellite in the second position from the giant.
JAFFE@RUTGERS.ARPA (07/09/85)
From: orstcs!richardt (richardt) >How likely is it that anyone would send so expensive a ship >off into nowhere for 5 years? Very. As a general rule, exploration ships fall into two classes: unarmed and armed. Unarmed exploration ships are usually designed so that they are so pathetic as to not be a threat to anyone. Marco Polo did this and it worked fairly well, albeit with a few backfires along the way. Armed explorers tend to be armed with the most powerful weapons that the society can hand to a non-military ship. When you already know of several hostile races in your neck of the galaxy, it is far better to assume that the natives will shoot first and ask questions later than to lose crews in the nether regions of the universe. For one thing, the appearance of an alien ship is usually a dead give-away as to its origin. Besides this, the Enterprise was travelling in regions which were known to have Klingon ships running around in them. In a situation where a nation is exploring out from a multinational border, esp. when one of the nations is hostile, the explorers had better be armed. Besides, human ships are always armed. Haven't you read any space opera? As for naming, I believe most of the visible stars have been named. I see no reason to assume that this trend will stop anytime in the future. Man, as a race, is arrogant. As long as StarFleet sticks to names of the form Starname-Planet_#, they're on well established ground. orstcs/richardt "If I'm human, what are *YOU*?"
milne@uci-icse (07/11/85)
From: Alastair Milne <milne@uci-icse> > >How likely is it that anyone would send so expensive a ship off > >into nowhere for 5 years? > Very. As a general rule, exploration ships fall into two classes: > unarmed and armed. > .... > Besides, > human ships are always armed. Haven't you read any space opera? What on earth has this response got to do with the question? Unless you equate weaponry with expense, it seems irrelevant. The point of the question was that Enterprise was one of the 12 or 13 most advanced ships in the fleet, and as such served a number of duties, of which exploration and experimentation (not necessarily synonymous) were only two. The Federation simply couldn't afford to send so powerful and useful a ship off on its own, out of all contact, for so long a period. A year perhaps, maybe two, and even then you'd see it seriously debated in Starfleet's upper offices. Enterprise is certainly far more than a scout ship, and the question involves much more than whether she should be armed -- which she is, of course, heavily. > As for naming, I believe most of the visible stars have been named. Do you indeed? (I assume you're talking about individual, non-systematic names like Rigel, rather than Beta Orionis). Assuming that by "visible" you mean what the unaided eye can see (from Earth) on a night with good seeing and no extraneous light to obstruct vision, then there are many more stars than have been named. Add a telescope, and you can just about forget the idea of individual, non-systematic names for every star (how many? 100,000? 1,000,000? 10,000,000? more?). Now widen your scope to every star in the galaxy, not just the restricted set we can see. Is the degree of horror becoming clearer? > Man, as a race, is arrogant. Not nearly as much as so many apologists would have us think. Besides, what relevance has this to naming the stars? > As long as StarFleet sticks > to names of the form Starname-Planet_#, they're on well established > ground. Naturally. This is the purpose of doing things by convention, systematically. Can you imagine the chaos (and the suicides by librarians) that would ensue if the individual names given by a thousand civilisations to over 10,000,000,000 stars were *all* in common use!!?? Besides, every time you discovered a new one, you'd have to invent a new, *distinct* name for it. Far better to have a system that has a slot already allocated for it. Spare the librarians. Alastair Milne