# Do phasers disintegrate people anymore? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [January 30, 2017, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618 "2017-01-30T23:00:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2017, 1:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/21 "2017-02-07T01:25:04Z")
nvm ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2017, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/22 "2017-02-07T02:41:57Z")
> [@beowulff](#): > > The Tantalus field? I suspect that if you searched hard enough you would find all of it’s victims inside of big tanks of water, guarded by blind Chinamen. The hell does that come from, Judge Dee? ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2017, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/23 "2017-02-07T02:46:52Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > The hell does that come from, Judge Dee? [A must see.](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0482571/) ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2017, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/24 "2017-02-07T03:14:48Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > Was the Mirror Mirror disintegration panel a true disintegrator, or just some interdimensional transporter. Did it send whoever “to the cornfield”, as it were? It locked them in the Phantom Zone. 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2017, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/25 "2017-02-07T03:20:44Z")
Every time I see the dude in “Conspiracy” get zapped, I hear Mrs Shazam say “Oooh! Lieutenant Commander Remmick’s exploded!” :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2017, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/26 "2017-02-07T04:44:34Z")
> [@beowulff](#): > > The Tantalus field? I suspect that if you searched hard enough you would find all of it’s victims inside of big tanks of water, guarded by blind Chinamen… Dude, the preferred nomenclature is “vision-impaired Asian-Federation citizens.” ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2017, 5:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/27 "2017-02-07T05:45:08Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > It locked them in the Phantom Zone. 🆒 I have a feeling it sends its targets to a parallel universe. Whether or not our laws of physics even apply in that universe was never confirmed. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2017, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/28 "2017-02-07T22:48:02Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > Whether or not our laws of physics even apply in that universe was never confirmed. Does Macy’s tell Gimball’s? -A Rule of Acquisition. ---
**Author:** ![Cartooniverse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cartooniverse/32/3084_2.png) [@Cartooniverse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cartooniverse)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2017, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/29 "2017-02-08T19:49:50Z")
\*\*Nitpick: It’s Gimbel’s. As Unca Cecil said decades ago, " Girls don’t get intimate with boys who’re illiterate. ". 😃 Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![Kinthalis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kinthalis/32/16084_2.png) [@Kinthalis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kinthalis)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2017, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/30 "2017-02-08T20:00:52Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > If the disintegration setting really did break down molecular bonds, it should do it for all compounds, correct? So instead of the water and carbon dioxide, etc, in your body, you have a cloud of hydrogen and carbon and oxygen, which starts to disperse. > > And if there is any source of ignition, all that carbon and hydrogen will immediately “recombine” with the oxygen. Could get a mite toasty standing close. > > If it broke atomic bonds, well, that’s a different story. All of a sudden you have a huge cloud of electrons and protons in close proximity. That would be…interesting. > > Was the Mirror Mirror disintegration panel a true disintegrator, or just some interdimensional transporter. Did it send whoever “to the cornfield”, as it were? Wouldn’t messing with molecular bonds release a ton of energy all by itself. Isn’t that how chemical reactions, like burning rocket fuel, work? I’d imagine disintegrating a human being would be like setting off a human shaped pile of TNT. And breaking atomic bonds would turn a human into an atomic bomb, taking out everyone within a mile radius. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2017, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/31 "2017-02-08T20:37:58Z")
> [@Cartooniverse](#): > > \*\*Nitpick: It’s Gimbel’s. It sounds better in the original Klingon. ---
**Author:** ![Wheelz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wheelz/32/5718_2.png) [@Wheelz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wheelz)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2017, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/32 "2017-02-08T22:46:51Z")
> [@Dale\_Sams](#): > > Well they still haven’t shown ( other than Conspiricy ) someone with similar wounds to a shotgun blast or sniper death. > > But TOS did show dead bodies after the cloud monster got them. That was kind of gruesome. There was a TNG episode in which the floor of one of the decks disappeared for an instant and then reappeared (or “went out of phase” or some sciency-sounding mumbo-jumbo), causing people to fall and then become fused into the floor. It wasn’t graphic, but the trapped bodies sticking waist-up from the floor was possibly the most disturbing image I can recall seeing on Star Trek. ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2017, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/33 "2017-02-09T04:27:40Z")
> [@Wheelz](#): > > There was a TNG episode in which the floor of one of the decks disappeared for an instant and then reappeared (or “went out of phase” or some sciency-sounding mumbo-jumbo), causing people to fall and then become fused into the floor. > It wasn’t graphic, but the trapped bodies sticking waist-up from the floor was possibly the most disturbing image I can recall seeing on Star Trek. In the first two movies…the transporter accident in TMP (rated G!!) is terrifying. Then in TWOK there are the ear slugs and all the various burn wounds. Sheesh. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2017, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/34 "2017-02-09T05:00:43Z")
> [@Wheelz](#): > > There was a TNG episode in which the floor of one of the decks disappeared for an instant and then reappeared (or “went out of phase” or some sciency-sounding mumbo-jumbo), causing people to fall and then become fused into the floor. > It wasn’t graphic, but the trapped bodies sticking waist-up from the floor was possibly the most disturbing image I can recall seeing on Star Trek. In the first pilot, Spock says “If our readings are an illusion also, one could find oneself materialized inside solid rock.” I always thought that two objects can’t occupy the same space at the same time. 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2017, 5:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/35 "2017-02-09T05:13:12Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > I always thought that two objects can’t occupy the same space at the same time. 😕 Remember that the basic building block of everything is nothing. ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2017, 11:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/36 "2017-02-09T11:09:17Z")
Breaking out the ol’ TNG Technical Manual brings up some interesting points, and surprisingly technobabble-free, relatively speaking—it somewhat cryptically mentions that, for hand phasers, when the “disruption” settings begin ([Power level 8 out of _16_](https://www.phasers.net/2360/settings.htm)), " 50% of affected matter transitions out of the continuum." Presumably this would mean subspace, and that shunting mass or energy into it might not be noticeable to someone in normal space. Granted, 50% of matter being vaporized in normal space is still a lot, but it’s possible that in higher power levels (or in older, TOS-era phasers), a _much_ higher percentage of the target’s mass is disintegrated straight into another dimension, minimizing the negative explosive effects to a shooter at pistol-fight distances. Still, on much higher phaser settings (everything above 11 is defined, in-canon materials, as an “explosive/disruption effect”), this would still be dangerous. Level 16 is stated “Catastrophic geological displacement, as approximately 650 m[sup]3[/super] of rock (of average density 6.0 g/cm3) is explosively decoupled by a single discharge,” of a power level of “1.55 x 10[sup]6[/sup]” [Energy units being used here are not immediately clear.] over .28 seconds. I guess what I’m saying is…I _still_ get annoyed by “The Siege of AR-558.” ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2017, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/37 "2017-02-10T00:35:32Z")
In ST: Enterprise, phasers make a nice round hole all the way through aliens. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [February 10, 2017, 3:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618/38 "2017-02-10T03:36:49Z")
If nothing else, total disintegration probably drains the power pack way too fast. Overkill for most purposes. If you want gruesome, the most realistic depiction of a disintegrater would have it turn people into something like large lumps of bloody hamburger. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-phasers-disintegrate-people-anymore/778618.md?page=1)