h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

An interesting paradox in Star Trek IV, if I can remember it correctly was that way in the star trek future on kirk's birthday, spock gives him some antique reading glasses for a present. later in the movie, the whole enterprise crew goes back in time to about the present day (from our perspective) and sells the glasses, supposedly so that they will change hands several times and get back to him for him to give to kirk on his birthday so that he could go back in time and sell them so that they'll change hands several times and then be a present again, and thus they'll keep going around and around, the only thing is, THEY GET OLDER EACH TIME THEY GO AROUND! So they're infinately old immediately?
http://www.mjyoung.net/time/stvoyage.html
Nerd42

Okay. First of all. I have to say that Star Trek IV is the BEST MOVIE EVER! (aging star trek crew goes back in time to 1985 to save humpback whales from extinction! I mean, come on! What's not to love?)


I have to say I love it when this type of thing happens in science fiction. Something that happened in the present-days' past is dependant on present day person(s) going back in time and 'altering' the past, so that the present as they know it will happen. Makes ya think, eh?

Ever read Prisoner of Azkaban? Same sort of time travel deal-y there. Good book too.

As for the glasses, what I'm wondering is if they were ever even made? Because if they are infinitely old, then that means that they have always existed and will always exist. So all they've ever done is travel from the time Kirk sells them to the anitques guy, to the time Dr. McCoy (I think it was McCoy, not Spock) gives them to Kirk for his birthday, and then when Kirk sells them again...and the whole cycle continues. The question is; where did the glasses really come from?

Okay. I think I've thoroughly confused myself and everyone else now.

Strange thing about Star Trek, the more illogical scientific messups there are, the more people love the show
Nerd42

Hehe. I suppose. But was that actually a mess-up in the Voyage Home?

i dunno. ever read "The Physics of Star Trek" that was a great book.

Nope...never knew the book existed. Sounds something like I would read...considering I've read "The Simpsons and Philosophy: the D'oh of Homer".
Is it about the original series or tng and the others as well?

it talks about every system on the Enterprise thought up to the time it was written - i know it talks about tng, not sure about dsn. i myself personally never actually seen any star trek program other than with kirk - well, unless you count christopher pike in the cage
Nerd42

I see.

Personally, I grew up watching Next Generation. I love the original series movies (I find the TNG-based movies a little lacking in...good writing)...but I've never been too into the original show itself. I enjoy the cheesiness of it though...but can never take it seriously.

Yes, this was a mess-up. Of course, it's a quite common mess-up, so we really shouldn't feel upset at Star Trek for doing it. For those more interested, the reason it's a mess-up is that as the glasses move forwards in time, their entropy increases (thanks to the Second Law of Thermodynamics), but if they infintely loop through time, they end up with infinite entropy. The only way they could loop and survive would be if they never acquired entropy, which would violate the Second Law.

Yes, one would assume that eventually they would break or be damaged...

Speaking of entropy: there is a song by Moxy Fruvous about entropy that I feel the need to share with anyone who actually knows what entropy is.

Entropy By Moxy Fruvous
http://www.fruvous.com/b-lyr.html#entropy

enjoy!

I recently watched that first pilot episode thing, you know, before Kirk there was capt christopher pike for one episode? that was so incredibally cheesy I had to laugh.
Nerd42

I think I've only ever seen bits of that ep.
Today I caught part of a first season TNG episode ("Ugly bags of mostly water"), and it seemed so campy and cheesy compared to the later stuff. I guess back then they were trying to imitate the original series' vibe.

On a side note: an exerpt from the script of "Trouble with Tribbles" episode was in my grade 9 english text book.

I think my favorite episode was "A Piece of the Action"
Nerd42

From TNG or TOS?

TOS. didn't know TNG had an episode by that name....
I came up with a playing card game based on the game made up by kirk in that episode.
Nerd42

I don't think it does have an episode entitled that...I just wasn't sure what series you were talking about. (I'm better with episode titles from the Simpsons, than Star Trek

Really? What is the game like?

really simple, based entirely on chance.
kinda like War.
Nerd42

Aha. War.
That's such a fun game. But it's quite silly in that it can be never-ending.


I just realized that that smiley is in fact holding a towel. All this time I thought it was a diploma! Which doesn't make any sense at all, really.

I consider phisbin to be rather better to War in that respect, because it is possible simply to tie, but at that point the game stops, and it's a tie, so that's it.
Nerd42