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From: davidl@orca.UUCP (David Levine)
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: The Transporter; why it can't do that
Message-ID: <5@orca.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 2-Aug-83 12:32:11 EDT
Article-I.D.: orca.5
Posted: Tue Aug  2 12:32:11 1983
Date-Received: Wed, 3-Aug-83 10:21:20 EDT
References: bunkerb.216
Lines: 44

Once again we come to the bane of any series written by more than one person,
especially SF television series: the fact that some ignorant or hurried (or 
both) writer included a bonehead idea in one episode makes it part of The 
Mythos, and there's nothing we can do about that.  The worst example I know 
of of this sort of behavior was the Superman comic book in the 60's, when
several writers insisted on coming up with new super-powers at the drop of a
hat.  (Did you know that super-ventriloquism works in a vacuum?)  From the
invention of any new idea such as this, it must be considered in each new
situation.  This makes exciting new plots harder and harder to come by as good
solutions become easier and easier.  For this reason Superman has had to
"forget" many of the powers he picked up in earlier years.  This is also the
reason Larry Niven stopped writing the Known Space stories: with the
introduction of the Slaver stasis field, third quantum hyperdrive, Ringworld 
floor material, and shadow square wire (aka Sinclair monofilament and 
Stonecypher cable) it became increasingly difficult to come up with 
situations which couldn't be solved by some device he hadn't thought up 
earlier (this from the introduction to "Tales of Known Space," if I'm not 
mistaken).

There seem to be several solutions to the matter of "can the transporter 
restore a dead but recorded person":

	A) No.  Those incidents in the series of restoring the old to youth
	with memories intact and recording some signals while passing others
	through must be discarded as the errors of a few bonehead writers.

	B) Yes.  The implications of this technique of immortality have been
	covered in John Varley's excellent novel "The Ophiuchi Hotline."

	C) Yes, but it's too expensive for civilian use (see my previous
	article for my reasoning behind this).  This relieves us of having to
	restructure the Star Trek universe around the idea of matter
	duplication as a consumer service (my mind reels at the very thought)
	but does not prevent the technique's being used in an exceptional
	circumstance such as bringing Spock back from the dead.

There are more, of course.  I think that the usual series-TV approach of
conveniently forgetting or altering the past will most likely continue to be
used.  Due to the pressures of series TV inconsistencies are bound to creep in,
and the Star Trek legacy is pure series TV.  Recall the problems with
Gumato/Mugato and Vulcan/Vulcanian to present just two trivial examples.

  -- David D. Levine   (...decvax!teklabs!tekecs!davidl)        [UUCP]
                       (...tekecs!davidl.tektronix@rand-relay)  [ARPA]