# Star Trek Transtator - What Should It Do? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 7, 2014, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029 "2014-08-07T13:40:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Osiris\_the\_1st](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9de0a6/32.png) [@Osiris\_the\_1st](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Osiris_the_1st)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2014, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/21 "2014-08-07T19:00:14Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > Meaning it works in conjunction with the Heisenberg compensators? :dubious: No that’s the quantum flux capacitor. Both the QFC and HBs are part of the transporter system. ---
**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:** [August 7, 2014, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/22 "2014-08-07T19:33:02Z")
> [@Osiris\_the\_1st](#): > > No that’s the quantum flux capacitor. **[Voice of Chakotay]:** No way! That would create an irreparable temporal rift, and then we’d **all** be screwed! :mad: ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [August 7, 2014, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/23 "2014-08-07T21:24:56Z")
Fucking transtators, how do they work? ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/24 "2014-08-08T04:07:53Z")
If I knew that, I’d be writing my Nobel-winning paper this very moment! ---
**Author:** ![Hail\_Ants](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dc4da7/32.png) [@Hail\_Ants](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hail_Ants)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/25 "2014-08-08T05:15:32Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > Somewhere I read that dilithium had a 4 dimensional structure that enabled it to power the warp drive and control the matter/anti-matter interactions. (Or something like that) [Nerd hat on] The dilithium crystals have (obviously) fictional properties which allow matter & anti-matter to be combined but with a controlled release of their tremendous energy. And I only ever remember the ‘transtator’ being mentioned in _A Piece of the Action_. And given Kirk’s[humorous final line of dialog](https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PL5Kfl6mxKvjGEhuVqn4ynas8SlJy3ppcw&v=FbBuNGVDNCM&feature=player_detailpage#t=69) I assumed they weren’t really too worried about it (i.e. it was just a piece of funny, throwaway techno-babble)… ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/26 "2014-08-08T05:41:21Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > _In re_ “Piece of the Action,” I find it really hard to believe that scientists operating at a 1920s level of technology would find it possible to understand, let alone duplicate, how a transtator would function, regardless of how “bright” and “imitative” they might be. > > As I mentioned elsewhere, I’d be a lot more worried about the phasers left at the Ekosian SS weapons lab. We have canon for this happening in the 1970s, though. According to _Voyager_’s “A Future’s End,” the microchip is actually based on tech from the 29th century. It may be a primitive version, but it’s good enough to interface with 24th century tech to some degree, allowing a bright 20th century scavenger to stop a transport in progress and do a destructive download of significant portions of Voyager’s memory banks. He also uses his computer to interface with a 29th century portable hologram emitter. (Though, granted, Voyager does the same thing with 24th century tech.) So it’s always been my headcanon that, just like quds are some advenced version of bits, transtators are advanced versions of transistors. There must exist tech that is like transistors for “Further’s End” to work, and the transtator is the only future tech that fits. ---
**Author:** ![Hail\_Ants](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dc4da7/32.png) [@Hail\_Ants](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hail_Ants)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/27 "2014-08-08T07:31:30Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > We have canon for this happening in the 1970s, though. According to _Voyager_’s “A Future’s End,” the microchip is actually based on tech from the 29th century. It may be a primitive version, but it’s good enough to interface with 24th century tech to some degree, allowing a bright 20th century scavenger to stop a transport in progress and do a destructive download of significant portions of Voyager’s memory banks. He also uses his computer to interface with a 29th century portable hologram emitter. (Though, granted, Voyager does the same thing with 24th century tech.) Well to begin with, its kind of accepted that amongst Star Trek fandom \*Voyager \*was the, ah, least best series. I remember that episode, it was ok but (as usual for the series) rather silly and illogical. They also hit the reset button at the end, again something \*Voyager \*did way way too often. I also found it a little unnecessary & corny to have Ed Begley Jr. play a thinly-veiled evil version of Bill Gates. > [@](#): > > So it’s always been my headcanon that, just like quds are some advenced version of bits, transtators are advanced versions of transistors. There must exist tech that is like transistors for “Further’s End” to work, and the transtator is the only future tech that fits. You’re close. ‘Transtator’ is simply a bastardized, pseudo-futuristic sounding, made-up word based on ‘transistor’. Transistors were still ‘high-tech’ back in the 60s… ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 8:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/28 "2014-08-08T08:05:08Z")
The transtator is a single-use time machine, that allows the user to travel back in time thirteen seconds, to correct a single mistake. Unfortunately, it was activated by Captain Scott Bakula one day during a lunch break, when he realized that he had asked for ranch dressing on his space salad (instead of his preferred Green Goddess). With the device now useless for its (admittedly limited) intended purpose, Starfleet engineers took it apart to learn what had made it tick, so to speak. The knowledge they obtained in this exercise enabled the creation of all Starfleet technology from transporters and matter replicators to warp drives and computers capable of developing a crush on a sufficiently high-ranking line officer. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/29 "2014-08-08T08:16:58Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > Somewhere I read that dilithium had a 4 dimensional structure that enabled it to power the warp drive and control the matter/anti-matter interactions. (Or something like that) I recall that one; and trilithium has _five_ dimensions. And there was an entire higher-dimensional periodic table to go along with dilithium; just like there’s di- lithium and tri- lithium, there’s di- and tri- fluorine for example. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 11:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/30 "2014-08-08T11:12:53Z")
I don’t get why we’re assuming the Iotians have only a 1920s tech level. They have a 1920s _culture_ (or at least a copy of one) but there could be ultrasophisticated factories operating in the background cranking out the cars and weapons and furnishings. Within a few years of this episode, and with annual visits by Starfleet, I could see the Iotians cranking out plausible copies of phasers and communicators and whatnot and all wearing Starfleet-ish uniforms and organizing their society along military lines. They may turn out to just be a live-action version of that “Shore Leave” planet. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/31 "2014-08-08T13:10:02Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > I don’t get why we’re assuming the Iotians have only a 1920s tech level. They have a 1920s _culture_ (or at least a copy of one) but there could be ultrasophisticated factories operating in the background cranking out the cars and weapons and furnishings. Within a few years of this episode, and with annual visits by Starfleet, I could see the Iotians cranking out plausible copies of phasers and communicators and whatnot and all wearing Starfleet-ish uniforms and organizing their society along military lines. They may turn out to just be a live-action version of that “Shore Leave” planet. Yeah, that’s what I was thinking, too. It was the culture and governing set up like the 1920s Chicago. Kirk/Spock/McCoy talked about how good they were at imitation also. So, anyways… I heard back from Trek insider Larry Nemecek (has wriiten several books, wife wrote for VOY, and is in the New Adventure online series), and he is thinking along the same lines as **Balance** So, I’ll just venture that it simply doesn’t seem to be a glamorous enough tech to get much attention. Tho the tech is enables has gotten all sorts of it. I’m cool with that. ---
**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:** [August 8, 2014, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/32 "2014-08-08T13:31:26Z")
> [@AncientHumanoid](#): > > Yeah, that’s what I was thinking, too. It was the culture and governing set up like the 1920s Chicago. Kirk/Spock/McCoy talked about how good they were at imitation also. Yes, but when the _Horizon_ visited 100 years earlier, their level of development was only at the beginnings of industrialization (1750–1800), as was stated by Kirk in the turbolift before beaming down. Another hundred years or so (assuming the length of their year is roughly equal to that of Earth’s) to reach the level of the 1920s would be just about right. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/33 "2014-08-08T13:36:17Z")
Always with those negative waves, Moriarty. ---
**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 8, 2014, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/34 "2014-08-08T13:57:47Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > I don’t get why we’re assuming the Iotians have only a 1920s tech level. Oxmyx, or one of the other Bosses, says, “Hey! That’s THE BOOK…books that showed us how to make radios and stuff…” The radio Kirk takes apart to trip the guy has vacuum tubes and transformers; he unwinds the wire to make his trip wire. I see no reason why the first contact crew could not have given then technology above “zinc plated vacuum tube”, and would think they did, but field effect transistors were described in the 1920’s, when the technology did not exist to make them. Perhaps the Iotians were using vacuum tubes as the easiest thing to manufacture. They might know how to make transistors, but have not caught up with the necessary technology. ---
**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:** [August 8, 2014, 2:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/35 "2014-08-08T14:16:46Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Oxmyx, or one of the other Bosses, says, “Hey! That’s THE BOOK…books that showed us how to make radios and stuff…” I don’t want no more cracks about **The Book!** :mad: ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/36 "2014-08-08T15:41:01Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > Yes, but when the _Horizon_ visited 100 years earlier, their level of development was only at the beginnings of industrialization (1750–1800), as was stated by Kirk in the turbolift before beaming down. Another hundred years or so (assuming the length of their year is roughly equal to that of Earth’s) to reach the level of the 1920s would be just about right. That’s how it might have appeared to the _Horizon_ crew, but I can picture Iotian technical infrastructure being massively advanced but not used until and unless a cultural impetus comes along, at which point they begin copying it rapidly and accurately. They didn’t necessarily need to learn how radio worked as a concept, they just copied _radios_ as described in whatever texts they got from _Horizon_. Besides, they didn’t “reach” the 1920s in the sense of having to experience something like the Gilded Age and World War I first; they copied the 1920s as described in The Book, about which there will be no cracks. Maybe after a few centuries of constant gangsterism and with no new cultural imports to assimilate and copy, they’d slide back into what looks to outsiders like a pre-industrial state. Thing is, it wouldn’t shock me if the Iotians already had tech that was as good or better than the transtator; it just hadn’t occurred to them to apply it to phasers and communicators and whatnot. I gather that was likely to change rapidly, but hopefully by the time they begin displaying Federation-level tech, they won’t care as much about grabbing a piece of the Federation’s action. ---
**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:** [August 8, 2014, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/37 "2014-08-08T15:50:50Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > I can picture Iotian technical infrastructure being massively advanced but not used until and unless a cultural impetus comes along, at which point they begin copying it rapidly and accurately. Why on Earth (so to speak) would they revert to such a primitive society if they were already much more technically advanced? That’s not being imitative, it’s being batshit crazy!\* \*Though I will admit, none of the Iotians we saw seemed to be perfectly balanced. ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/38 "2014-08-08T16:06:26Z")
What about self sealing stem bolts? What the hell are those things good for? ---
**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:** [August 8, 2014, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/39 "2014-08-08T16:19:06Z")
> [@Shakes](#): > > What about self sealing stem bolts? What the hell are those things good for? Bolting stems? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [August 8, 2014, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029/40 "2014-08-08T16:58:13Z")
Transtator discussion pretty much done. Feel free to continue the Iotian discussion. I see validity in every argument posted so far. See? This is what makes Trek Doping fun. Except for Brian Ekers.😛 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/star-trek-transtator-what-should-it-do/695029.md?page=3)