The worst abuse of the holodeck was an early episode where The Doctor creates a family. He comes home after work, he’s greeted by his wife, and kids. They sit down for dinner.
It was an idealized family like you’d see on a 1950’s sitcom like Father Knows Best.Totally harmless.
Well, the Ships crew just had to give the The Doctor a dose of reality. They wrote in conflict between family members and even gave a child an incurable disease. The Doctor was completely overwhelmed. IIRC the engineer had to wipe data and reboot the poor AI.
They completely forgot the holodeck was designed as escapist fun. You could could be James Bond or a detective that solves cases. Janeway had her Governess role based on romance novels. It helped her relax after making difficult decisions as Captain.
A non-sentient fake holodeck character that creates a fake holodeck family. What next: The Doctor’s kid spends all his time in the holodeck? Making a better fake holodeck family.
The writers also forgot that the simulations are for the benefit of the humans. When you are visiting some Vegas lounge, or playing a Dixon Hill mystery, when you leave the room, the other characters aren’t just sitting there like real actors. They aren’t there at all. Because they aren’t real! They’re not running in the background, talking to each other.
When no human is in the holodeck, nothing is happening (unless that is part of the program).
The Doctor becomes sentient in Season 1 of Voyager, due both to running for too long without a reset and modifications to his program. His holographic family are standard holograms, never said to be sentient.
The inconsistency with sentience is just that not all holograms are the same. They’re ultimately just computer programs, and the standard ones seem to be written without sentience specifically to avoid the moral dilemmas being discussed here. This is usually shown by them having perception filters which keep them from actually sensing anything they aren’t supposed to. When those go awry is when we see the few sentient holograms in the series.
Oh, and I’d point out than none of the Androids seen in TOS seem to be as sophisticated as Data, as they are all vulnerable to logic bombs, like any of the other AI in the series. I don’t think we ever see that as an issue with holograms.
That’s what they said but I don’t think it was true.
I don’t want to run down a rabbit hole of a hijack, but neither the Doctor, nor Moriarty, nor any holodeck character, ever became sentient. They just look sentient. (sarcasm: and the woke Starfleet can’t tell the difference. They probably think traffic lights are sentient. Picard: “Look! It’s trying to comunicate. Red. Green. Yellow. Red again, Data, what do you make of that?” Data: “Obviously sophisticated. We should be wary.” Deanna: “I sense no hostility, Captain. It seems to want us to wait.”)
The holodeck runs from the main computer. So if anything is sentient, it’s the Enterprise, “Dear.”
I think with Star Trek, we need to accept the premises of each episode as set forth in that episode. If the episode itself says that the holodeck creates sentient A.I., then we should discuss the actions of the characters on that basis. But if the episode doesn’t treat holodeck characters are sentient beings, then I don’t think it’s fair to subject the characters to criticism on that basis.
I’ll disagree. Next Gen (and on) respect continuity. In between Elementary, Dear Data and Ship In A Bottle, it was said Moriarty was “alive” the whole time. Two episodes before SIAB was The Quality of Life, with the sentient exocomps. Also in there was In Theory, where Data simulates being a boyfriend.
If one episode accepts that sentient programs exist, they all must.
They clearly don’t, so why pretend that they do? Maybe some group of episodes share a premise. But when it’s clearly evident that some episodes don’t, why fight it?
Because we’re Star Trek nerds! Anyone can simply watch a show. They task me, with their inconsistencies, and they shall have me! I’ll argue the direction the transporter controls slide, I’ll argue that the question of Data’s sentience should already have been decided, and I’ll argue the meaning of reality itself before I give them up! To the last, I grapple with thee. For hate’s sake, I spit my last nitpick at thee.
Well, Deanna probably has her wedding pictures in the computer somewhere.
Maybe the holodeck has access to medical records. Oh boy that’s a whole 'nother level of privacy invasion (it doesn’t seem the 24th century still has doctor/patient privilege). It made a pretty accurate model of Leah Brahms (at least with her clothes on). Still, there must be somethings the all-seeing computer doesn’t know.
Picard: “Look! It’s trying to comunicate. Red. Green. Yellow. Red again, Data, what do you make of that?” Data: “Obviously sophisticated. We should be wary.” Deanna: “I sense no hostility, Captain. It seems to want us to wait.”)