In Russian (I’ve been told) the phrase “black hole” is a gross obscenity that means exactly what you think it does. But, since it describes the physical reality so exactly, they use it anyway.
Leave Uhura out of this!
(bolding mine)
You know the funny thing is that here in Quebec, the French title for Star Trek TOS is Patrouille du Cosmos.
Tsar Trek
And here I was almost hoping that someone actually made epsisodes of **IKV BortaS **.
BTW, what’s the origin of this “In Soviet Russia, [noun] [verb] you!” catchphrase-formula? Some old Yakov Smirnoff gag?
Not really. Black hole in Russian means the same it means in English. I think the way the rumor you are referring to got started was – a Russian physics professor was righting a paper on the things and thought that calling them black holes was vulgar (him being a smart out-of-this-world type of a guy) so in the paper he referred to them as “black openings” instead, which caused everyone much amusement and created the in-joke of black hole meaning something more then a mysterious celestial body. It may be an urban legend however, I haven’t seen a cite for the story anywhere on the web.
Gag, nothing. That was pretty much his entire routine.
Smirnoff’s *entire * routine: “America is totally different from Soviet Russia. In America, you can always find party. In Russia, Party always finds you!”
He’s still packing 'em in down in Branson.
This part intrigued me…
:dubious:
Now that part’s a joke too, right? Or did the author throw in a genuine bit of weird Red Army trivia? (I’d guess “joke,” but with Soviet stuff, I can never be completely sure…)
Actually, I think that it is true. ISTR that a certain model tank got the medal.
What’s with the apostrophe in Star’s?
In Russia, apostrophe withs YOU!
Apparently, though, there’s commie-pinkos running the UFP.
There’s more. A lot more. Somebody has too much time on their hands.
Food & matter replicator tech would seem to reduce/eliminate the problem of poverty from the bottom up.
Unlimited #s of habitable/terraformable planets solve the living space problems.
Fusion & antimatter for energy.
By Kirk’s first tour on Enterprise, gemstones were considered worthless. (Remember the “Halloween” episode?)
Sheer technological muscle would make wealth & poverty alike largely obsolete.
In SDMB, “Tsar Trek” joke beat YOU! 
Exactly. If you have a magic black box(replicators, warp engines, transporters), there’s no limit to the things you can do.