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From: merchant@dartvax.UUCP (Peter Merchant)
Newsgroups: net.startrek
Subject: Re: Enterprise Gravity
Message-ID: <3491@dartvax.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 16-Aug-85 08:49:40 EDT
Article-I.D.: dartvax.3491
Posted: Fri Aug 16 08:49:40 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 20-Aug-85 04:01:22 EDT
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Distribution: net
Organization: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
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> I'm sitting here watching "Where No Man Has Gone Before," and 
> something Kirk said during the encounter brought to mind a point
> that has bothered (or maybe amused) me for a long time.
> Just as they moved into the barrier, he said, "Gravitation on
> automatic."  A bit later, one of the damage reports was, "Gravitation
> down to 0.8."  Now, the folks who gave us Star Trek seemed pretty
> eager to show us all the wonderful gadgets they had come up with
> in the 23rd century, such as phasers, transporters, warp drive,
> etc.  Now why wouldn't they talk about something as mind boggling
> as gravity control?  And, even better, in all the times we've
> seen the Enterprise badly damaged isn't it funny that the
> gravity never goes out?  That'd be a scene of quite some
 .
 .
 .
> to have planned for the possibility.  But, to the contrary, the
> design of the Enterprise seems to have completely ignored the fact
> that the crew might at times have to deal with zero G.
> 
> Anyone have any speculations on the subject?
> 
> 
> Lewis Barnett,CS Dept, Painter Hall 3.28, Univ. of Texas, Austin, TX 78712
> 


Hmm...well, let's see.  Perhaps the Enterprise itself creates the gravity?
I'm no physicist, but from what I half-remember from such things if you have
enough mass you have gravity.  Let's see...would anti-matter have lots of
mass?  How about the ship itself (I know, I know, the Enterprise isn't THAT
big)

Perhaps, though, the antimatter is causing enough gravity to keep everyone
secured to the ground so that only small "gravity machines" are needed to
keep the gravity at full.  Even if these machines are blown up, gravity will
only go down to, say, .8?  Which means unless the Enterprise loses all it's
antimatter, it will continue to have gravity.

I'm sure there are holes in this theory big enough to drive a starship through.
C'mon, though!  You never saw a loss of gravity!  Let's get some scientists to
figure out how to do it so that the only way to ding the gravity is to destroy
the starship.

(Actually, the reason that the gravity never left is probably because it would
have been too difficult/expensive to show.)
--
"Don't be fooled by the radio                      Peter Merchant
 the TV or the magazine."