# Star Trek: Most annoying contradictions **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 3, 2001, 5:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491 "2001-09-03T05:36:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 11
**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:** [August 7, 2004, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/201 "2004-08-07T20:57:59Z")
> [@Number Six](#): > > it doesn’t typically make for good drama. You have obviously never eaten Klingon take out. ---
**Author:** ![HPL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3da27b/32.png) [@HPL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HPL)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/202 "2004-08-07T21:52:54Z")
> [@hlanelee](#): > > **Is there a restroom anywhere on the Enterprise?** Or anywhere else in the Star Trek universe. What provisions are made for waste management? It’s one thing to believe that the replicators make things come from nothing, are we to also accept that the byproducts go nowhere? I once got ahold of the TOS Technical manual and interesting enough, it showed the orginal enterprise having a toliet behind the bridge viewscreen(but you had to go down to the deck below to get to it). ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/203 "2004-08-07T23:22:22Z")
Also, in DS9 they regularly make reference to “waste extraction.” ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2004, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/204 "2004-08-07T23:43:27Z")
I think there’s a lot in there that would be appealing, **Diceman**. ---
**Author:** ![Lobsang](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobsang/32/4067_2.png) [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2004, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/205 "2004-08-08T01:01:54Z")
> [@Cap'n Crude](#): > > Believe it or not, this isn’t entirely untrue in real life. Take a look at a representation of our galaxy sometime. Everything rotates more or less in one horizontal plane, all in the same direction. While many stars are noticeably above or below this plane, they’re still oriented the same way. > All the planets in our home system are aligned with the same sense of up, and orbit in the same direction. Pluto’s orbital plane is at an angle to all the others, but it’s believed that Pluto was a runaway planetoid that was captured by Sol’s gravity. > > Astronomers used to have terms like “galactic North” and right ascension to describe the position of stars, and now use a coordinate system. Still, AFAIK most stars behave the same way rotation-wise, and the planets we’ve observed orbiting some of them are also in the same orientation. > > So yes, Virginia, there is such a thing as “up” in space. But starships _must_ at some time need to travel in the ‘x’ direction. such as when traveling from one of the planets ‘underneath’ the disc of the galaxy to one of the ones above it. Personally I think it would look very cool if the orientation of two or more ships in the tv shows and films were random. In First Contact doesn’t the enterprise arrive to the initial battle from below? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2004, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/206 "2004-08-08T01:46:44Z")
> [@matt\_mcl](#): > > Also, in DS9 they regularly make reference to “waste extraction.” Waste _extraction?_ What do they do, beam the poop out of your lower intestine? Jesus! Just gimme a couple of hours, and I can get it out myself, thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2004, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/207 "2004-08-08T01:50:44Z")
It’s a space station so they most likely use everything at their disposal (heh) and waste extraction probably refers to some sort of on-site recycling plant. ---
**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:** [August 9, 2004, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/208 "2004-08-09T17:43:26Z")
Still mulling the responses to my long “reinvention?” post above. In the meantime, I’ve thought of another annoying contradiction that I don’t think has been mentioned before: **The Universal Translator.** Yeah, I know, it’s a convention. But how the hell does it _work?_ Did Worf learn English to speak on the bridge of the Enterprise (and in Ops on DS9)? He wouldn’t really _need_ to, would he? Likewise Chekhov didn’t need to stop speaking Russian, though the accent suggests he’s using English. And so on. Okay, so why doesn’t it pick up “K-plagh!” when Worf (or Picard, or whoever) says it to somebody? Is it smart enough to recognize aphorisms and colloquial usage and leave those alone? My head hurts. ---
**Author:** ![Balduran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cc9497/32.png) [@Balduran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balduran)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/209 "2004-08-09T18:01:43Z")
> [@Number Six](#): > > On the subsequent series, they just don’t make a show of people using the restroom, as it doesn’t typically make for good drama. But they talk about them all the time. Pretty much every episode they mention the “captain’s log”. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/210 "2004-08-09T18:50:21Z")
> [@King Rat](#): > > Is there or is there not money in the 24th century? In “The Trouble With Tribbles” a tribble costs a few “credits.” But in ST4 at the pizza place Kirk tells Gillian that they have no money in the future. He must have meant they didn’t use money in the sense of currency and coins. Presumably by his time there’ll be money of account only, used via debit cards. Remember in ST6 Scott says he’s just _bought_ a boat. And there are references to wages and pay in a few places throught all the series. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/211 "2004-08-09T18:57:07Z")
In TOS, whenever there was a scene with officers from other starships, they had _different_ emblems on their shirts. The swoosh and star emblem of the Enterprise officers was supposed to be specific to that ship. But in the movies and later series, the Enterprise’s individual ship-symbol seems to have become a general symbol for the entire Starfleet operation. ---
**Author:** ![Ephemera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8baadc/32.png) [@Ephemera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ephemera)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/212 "2004-08-09T19:04:00Z")
The Enterprise arrowhead emblem was adopted by the fleet in recognition of Kirk and crew’s accomplishments. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/213 "2004-08-09T19:13:22Z")
> [@HPL](#): > > I once got ahold of the TOS Technical manual and interesting enough, it showed the orginal enterprise having a toliet behind the bridge viewscreen(but you had to go down to the deck below to get to it). I have the original set of plans for the Enterprise, from about 1968 or so. The bathroom is indeed behind the screen, but I don’t remember having to leave the deck to get there. There are stairs near there also - very reasonable, since it would be stupid to make the bridge accessible by turbolift only. The plans also show where the bowling alley is. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [August 9, 2004, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491/214 "2004-08-09T19:38:33Z")
> [@Cervaise](#): > > Okay, here’s a question for all you Trek buffs (anyone who’s still hanging with the thread, that is): > > **Would you be open to a new series** (after a suitably respectful pause for breath following the inevitable death of _Enterprise_) **that “reinvents” the show to take all these issues into account? Or is the accumulation of canon just too much to overcome?** I’m responding as someone who watched every episode of TOS when it originally aired, and who found it better than expectations - one of the few series I’ve ever thought this about. And I suffered through the third season. The things that made TOS great from a 1966 perspective to me were - it was the first series that tried to get the science a bit right. They won me when they showed they realized that you couldn’t go faster than light by going just faster. Don’t belittle this - Space 1899 didn’t get it right three years later. - The McCoy, Spock - Kirk trinity. This is a very traditional serial fiction mechanism (Doc Savage had something similar with Monk, Ham and Doc) and it worked very well. - Technobabble not being used to solve plot problems. Consider the difference between the new series inventing another capability of the transporter to solve the plot vs. Kirks using the Constellation to blow up the Doomsday machine. That (thanks to Spinrad) is good problem solving sf. - Using real sf writers to inject some new ideas. ST these days is so ingrown. Look at how many of the best stories from ToS were from sf writers - Sturgeon, Gerrold, Spinrad, Bloch, even Jerry Sohl. Oh, and that guy named Ellison. - No soap opera plots. I know, most series do this these days, but another reason ToS was better than Lost in Space of Time Tunnel was that Kirk actually solved problems. - Optimism. Don’t discount the benefit of a rosy future in a time of troubles, which 1966 was. I wouldn’t watch a series about the Federation falling apart. I can read the news if I want to be depressed. - Humor. Except for the DS9 Tribbles show, the attempts at humor in the more recent shows were feeble. I’m not just talking about humor on the funny plots, like Piece of the Action. Kirk saying “My son the doctor” at the end of the Changeling was funny. What they use for money and where the bathrooms are is minor. Unless they get into the spirit of what made ToS great, they should just leave the franchise alone, and not screw it up anymore. But I might be a Trek geezer at this point. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-most-annoying-contradictions/79491.md?page=10)