# Enterprise-Terra Nova **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 24, 2001, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225 "2001-10-24T02:06:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![JustPlainBryan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/57b2e6/32.png) [@JustPlainBryan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JustPlainBryan)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/21 "2001-10-25T21:29:24Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sofa King \* > **I have a feeling that the Bad Astronomer is clenching his teeth at the idea of a slower-than light colony ship travelling 20 light years to another planet–in nine years. Maybe it’s a subjective thing, like all Treknobabble, or perhaps I missed the full explanation.** IIRC, the Colony ship launched after the discovery of warp travel, in which case they would have been cruising along at Warp 1.5 or 2 to Terra Nova. ---
**Author:** ![King\_Rat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/7bcc69/32.png) [@King\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/King_Rat)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/22 "2001-10-25T21:31:19Z")
I had trouble buying the idea that after 70 years everyone forgets or suppresses the fact that they are humans from Earth. And surely their language wouldn’t regress to the point of saying things like “Is your belly empty?” But these are quibbles. I am just happy that there are new ST episodes. What’s this business about the Canadian version? It’s on here in NYC Wednesday nights. ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/23 "2001-10-25T21:44:19Z")
Ah, fourteen only in spirit, I’m afraid. The colony ship is a big problem, in my mind. I was under the impression that _this_ ship, the NX-01, is the first sustained FTL vehicle humans have. Cochrane’s invention wasn’t perfected before then, right? I suppose you could postulate a colony ship that uses warp technology to slightly exceed the speed of light, but then that introduces still more confusion, like the fact that warp cores were good enough to run for nine years straight before _Enterprise_. And then there’s the question of (the Trek version of) Rigel, its location now known to be closer than Terra Nova but somehow not discovered… Eh, who cares? I still like it. I could be wrong, too. ---
**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:** [October 25, 2001, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/24 "2001-10-25T21:49:40Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by King Rat \* > \*\* > > What’s this business about the Canadian version? \*\* The C-Band satellite feed for Canadian UPN affiliates is analog and without commercials or previews. It is on T5, transponder 16. ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/25 "2001-10-25T21:50:17Z")
I think **Cliffy** corrected me before I even wrote that in [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=95098). He says Starfleet has plenty of _ships_, but not many _starships_. That makes sense to me. ---
**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:** [October 25, 2001, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/26 "2001-10-25T21:53:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sofa King \* > \*\* NX-01, is the first sustained FTL vehicle humans have. Cochrane’s invention wasn’t perfected before then, right? > > \*\* Cochrane invented FTL in the movie \* First Contact \*. His flight prompted the Vulcans to contact humans. Cochrane started the program to build the Enterprise engine capable of warp 4.x, whatever. Archer’s daddy, shades of Tom Swift, finished Enterprise. ---
**Author:** ![JustPlainBryan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/57b2e6/32.png) [@JustPlainBryan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JustPlainBryan)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/27 "2001-10-25T22:15:53Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sofa King \* > \*\* NX-01, is the first sustained FTL vehicle humans have. Cochrane’s invention wasn’t perfected before then, right? > \*\* The magic number for the discovery of Warp travel is 2063. Apparently 2 years after this momentous event, the _Valient_ was launched to explore deep space, but was never heard from again (maybe because subspace communication wasn’t discovered yet?). Between this time and the time of Enterprise there apparently was an explosion of different ships that are FTL. The problem with all these ships was that they were too slow to do any meaningful exploration, sort of like triremes. Then all of a sudden comes this man-o-war like ship, the Enterprise, that is actaully capable of _truly_ exploring deep space with an as yet unheard of Warp 5 capability, and some decent armor to boot, and that’s where we are at the moment. (About the whole Valient thing, this was in a TOS episode, “Where no Man Has Gone Before”, where the Enterprise encounters the Valient after it had apparently gone outside of the galaxy, and its crew had mutated into godlike creatures. Of course B & B might just well ignore this entire episode and change the timeline yet again!) ---
**Author:** ![Achernar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e274bd/32.png) [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/28 "2001-10-25T22:29:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sofa King \* > **I was under the impression that _this_ ship, the NX-01, is the first sustained FTL vehicle humans have.** Recall in “Strange New World”, when Travis mentions flying through an ion storm at Warp 2. I’m under the impression that until this point, humans have been flying somewhere around Warp 2. ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/29 "2001-10-25T23:13:16Z")
> [@](#): > > I had trouble buying the idea that after 70 years everyone forgets or suppresses the fact that they are humans from Earth. And surely their language wouldn’t regress to the point of saying things like “Is your belly empty?” But these are quibbles. I am just happy that there are new ST episodes. The place reminded me a bit of [Pitcairn Island](http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/pc.html). Pitcairn is populated by the descendants of the HMS _Bounty_ mutineers (and their Tahitian wives). The place is apparently _really_ inbred–the total population is 47 (the “labor force” as of 1997 consisted of “12 able-bodied men”). The government council has ten members, which is proportionately equivalent to the United States having 60 million Congressmen. Anyway, they speak English and “Pitcairnese” (a “mixture of an 18th century English dialect and a Tahitian dialect”). Granted, they’ve been there longer than 70 years–over 200, in fact–but hey, TV tends to compress chronologies. Back to Terra Nova–while the colonists clearly took a lot of casualties, the colony still seemed awfully small–50-something people, wasn’t it? And somehow I got the impression that there weren’t that many of them to begin with, even before the radioactive ( 😕 ) asteroid hit. I’d think that an interstellar colony would have maybe a few _thousand_ people, not just a couple hundred, but what do I know. I guess the Jamestown colony and Plymouth Bay didn’t really start with that many people, either. ---
**Author:** ![SPOOFE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/30 "2001-10-25T23:20:20Z")
> [@](#): > > I had trouble buying the idea that after 70 years everyone forgets or suppresses the fact that they are humans from Earth. And surely their language wouldn’t regress to the point of saying things like “Is your belly empty?” But these are quibbles. I am just happy that there are new ST episodes. It was mentioned that only the children had survived, resulting in jarbled memories of their parents, and their culture/heritage, and their language. ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/31 "2001-10-25T23:28:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by JustPlainBryan \* > **the Colony ship launched after the discovery of warp travel** Well now, THAT bugs me. Cochrane discovered warp travel while the Earth was recovering from World War III, supposedly a conflict that devastated much of the planet and killed millions. So where did they find the resources to build a colony ship? ---
**Author:** ![CyberHippy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dec6dc/32.png) [@CyberHippy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CyberHippy)\ **Post date:** [October 25, 2001, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/32 "2001-10-25T23:30:39Z")
I think the explanation for the “we’re not human” problem wasn’t time, it was the fact that only children survived the radiation and they made up their own stories to explain what had happened - it was a misinterpretation of what was being said that led them to believe that “humans” had caused their misery. This is supported by the strange dialect. On preview, looks like SPOOFE saw the same thing… I think they’re working up a series of plots that will lead to the creation of the “Prime Directive” by way of having the members of this Enterprise crew alter the course of various worlds. I imagine we’ll be seeing Terra Nova several years later sometime, with a bit more culture and possibly some adapted technology from the ruins. My main gripe with Enterprise so far is the whole thing of having the captain on every away-mission. Does this man distrust his own crew so much that he has to have his hands in every adventure? ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2001, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/33 "2001-10-26T00:36:55Z")
Well, Kirk led just about every away mission on TOS, and the producers of the new show have made no secret about going back to many aspects of the original show for this one. It’s also worth noting that NX-01 (or whatever it is) has only around 80 crewmembers, not the hundreds we’re used to. Besides, it’s just a TV show. The ratings would suffer if, in every episode, Archer said, “Ensign Fodder, go down and count trees while I hover weightless in the shower.” Or, hmmm, a naked Scott Bakula… I guess the ratings would suffer with **some** demographics. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![JustPlainBryan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/57b2e6/32.png) [@JustPlainBryan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JustPlainBryan)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2001, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/34 "2001-10-26T02:43:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jab1 \* > \*\* > > > [@](#): > > > > \*Originally posted by JustPlainBryan \* > > **the Colony ship launched after the discovery of warp travel** > > Well now, THAT bugs me. Cochrane discovered warp travel while the Earth was recovering from World War III, supposedly a conflict that devastated much of the planet and killed millions. So where did they find the resources to build a colony ship? \*\* umm…ummm… okay okay. This is completly from my butt, so if it smells funny, I warned you. Yes, that’s true, WW3 killed alot of people and devastated the world in ways unimaginable, but remember only 37 million people were killed, out of a potential 6 billion or more, and the earth is a big place (remember in “First Contact” Ressurection City was square in the middle of a very green forest, which means the earth’s ecology wasn’t as bad off at this time as we tend to think). The conflict itself seems to have occurred before Cochrane’s discovery and did not completely finish until 2079 (The Post Atomic Horror occurred on or about 2079). I’m thinking that the war started just a year or two before Cochrane’s discovery. This would explain why he had all his resources still intact at Resurrection City (since it’s completely possible the US may have hidden him and his work in the middle of a refugee camp turned city). When Cochrane discovers warp travel and the Vulcans spot him, the war gets delayed temporarily, as the world suddenly realizes it is not alone. Prematurely, all the world’s resources are concentrated to begin “this new age of humanity” with the world’s first starship. With litle to no help from the Vulcans, we retrofit an existing spaceship with warp nacelles and call it the Valient. It would take only about a year or two because the nacelles were already built (the nacelles on the Phoenix), and quite possibly the ship as well (maybe it used to be a freighter that could travel from the Earth to the Moon). So the Valient launches, with great optimism, to explore the unknown and then is never heard from again. We are shaken up by this, the Vulcans put on a “we told you so” kind of attitude, and war resumes in some parts of the world. It is during this time that the Post Atomic Horror begins and doesn’t completly end for some time. Meanwhile, the Vulcans and whatever parts of the world are not at war begin to work on the rebuilding of Earth and to explore space in the right way. By the early 2080s the conflict is completly over and Earth enters the Golden Age where poverty, disease, and starvation are eliminated, with a little help from the Vulcans. Then again, B & B may just screw with the timeline again and invent some other sequence of events! ---
**Author:** ![MEBuckner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mebuckner/32/2896_2.png) [@MEBuckner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MEBuckner)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2001, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/35 "2001-10-26T02:56:12Z")
> [@](#): > > Besides, it’s just a TV show. The ratings would suffer if, in every episode, Archer said, “Ensign Fodder, go down and count trees while I hover weightless in the shower.” I guess the ratings would also suffer if the crew weren’t so, well, slapdash about things. If they acted like late 20th Century, early 21st Century NASA, they’d be doing just like the Vulcan said–they’d spend six weeks in orbit around every new planet, sending down robot probes and doing instrument scans from orbit. Eventually, they’d send down a landing party or an Away Team or whatever it is they’re calling them at that point in Starfleet history, who probably would wear pressure suits, “just in case”, and who would spend about 30 minutes on the surface. After a few missions like that, they’d send down some guys with a dune buggy, who’d putter around for a few miles from the landing site. (Did I mention that the landing site would be deliberately chosen to be as dull as possible? Some nice flat plain somewhere.) Every move of the surface teams, especially on the early missions, would be choreographed and basically controlled from orbit. (“Okay, I’m gonna pick a flower now.” “Roger, you’re go for picking a flower.”) They damn sure wouldn’t be running around smelling the flowers and camping out in tents and telling ghost stories over campfires and stuff. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Bad\_Astronomer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f05b48/32.png) [@The\_Bad\_Astronomer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Bad_Astronomer)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2001, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/36 "2001-10-26T03:51:09Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Sofa King \* > **I have a feeling that the Bad Astronomer is clenching his teeth […]** Ya know what? I _really_ like the show. I was marginally disappointed when they were contrived into a situation where the aliens had to trust them and the humans had to rscue an alien, but I thought the rest of the show was great. Have you noticed how little fighting and action there is sometimes? It’s not boring, just paced, which I find refreshing. It’s interesting to watch, and I am constantly reminded that to the characters, all this stuff is _new_. ---
**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:** [October 26, 2001, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/37 "2001-10-26T04:00:41Z")
Glad you liked it, Sir. The Forced-To-Rescue-Each-Other literary device pretty well had to come up. Not much else would do except an arranged marriage, (and only their Mother’s would love them) or take turns slapping Westley around, and that’s the wrong series. ---
**Author:** ![whiterabbit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/cab0a1/32.png) [@whiterabbit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whiterabbit)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2001, 11:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/38 "2001-10-26T11:32:01Z")
I find it odd – and I liked Voyager – that this show so far is pulling off the sense of this huge, unknown galaxy so much better than Voyager ever did. They really don’t know what’s out there, and they’re acting pretty dumb about it sometimes. I get the feeling that all the stuff they don’t know about has the real potential to bite them in the ass. I like this show far, far more than I thought I would. ---
**Author:** ![jab1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ee7513/32.png) [@jab1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jab1)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2001, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/39 "2001-10-26T18:51:37Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by whiterabbit \* > **this show so far is pulling off the sense of this huge, unknown galaxy so much better than Voyager ever did. They really don’t know what’s out there** _Voyager_ had a tour guide: Neelix. As quirky and interesting as Neelix was, it was a mistake to have him there to tell them that the solar system they’re about to enter is home of some mean motherfuckers. It’s more fun to watch Our Heroes find out for themselves. (The previous episode would have been spoiled if someone had told Trip, “Don’t touch the telepathic pebbles!”) ---
**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:** [October 26, 2001, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225/40 "2001-10-26T19:31:57Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jab1 \* > \*\*it was a mistake to have him there to tell them that the solar system they’re about to enter is home of some mean motherfuckers. \*\* That’s an interesting point. It was easy enough to come up with something new to Neelix, but as a general rule, yeah, it would have been more interesting if everything was a mystery to them. Recurring bad guys would still be bad, and they got out of Neelix’s area of experience, but in the general theme of lost in the unknown, yeah, Neelix was a flaw. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/enterprise-terra-nova/89225.md?page=3)