(Also available from Starland mirror site)
First, some comments from previous columns . . .
Murray Leeder: I have incontravertible proof that Shatner is no a vegatarian or anything of the sort. A while ago, a reporter asked him what he liked best in Calgary. He replied "Hy's Steak House". And take it from me, one does not go there for the salad bar!
Michael Apple: This is an interesting discussion of Bill Shatner. But it is definite that he is not a vegan. In his book, Star Trek Movie Memories, during the section on ST:TMP, he discusses how he was tortured by dreams of "pouty- lipped grilled cheese sandwiches" during his self-imposed dieting. A vegan wouldn't eat a dairy product like cheese.
Also, I'd just like to mention to Lisa Shock of Phoenix, AZ that it is perfectly safe for her to eat gelatin. Although it is publicly thought to be made from animal products, like animal hooves, it is actually made from. .. SEAWEED! :) I learned about this in a biology class last year.
Glenn St-Germain: Actually, Shatner was a spokesman for Loblaws, not Dominion. In my childhood in southern Ontario, the two were the biggest supermarket chains. Dominion had for several years the "mainly because of the meat" ad jingle, while Loblaws had "The Price is Right" as its slogan (presumably, the producers of the game show on CBS didn't mind, or were unable to do anything because the stores were Canadian.)
Michael Apple: Your comment to my initial answer to the "eddy problem" is noted, but I still think that the nav shields may have something to do with it. If you've seen Apollo 13, you can see that in space smaller particles are attracted to larger ones, so the debris from the explosion on Apollo stays close to the space capsule. If Voyagers nav deflectors are pushing the particles away, they might still stick close to the ship because of the graviational pull the ship has, based solely on its superior mass. The eddies might be caused by the counteracting forces of the shield pushing the particles away and the graviational pull of the ship's mass pulling them back. However, the nav deflectors might have a slight superior force, which is why the particles get left in the dust (sorry, I couldn't resist :) when Voyager leaves the nebula or cloud or whatever.
Phil: I still think we should get a real scientist opinion on this but I've been too busy finishing up the X-phile Guide to call Mitzi. I am experiencing dissonance from cross-fantasy interference, however. Seems very odd to me to try to prove that the nebula particles would behave in the real world as they behave on Voyager because other particles behave in a congruent fashion in a movie! (Does this seem ironic to anyone else? ;-)
Eddie Marshall of Hampshire, UK: Hmm, Isnt it possible there's a planet or something else with a gravitational pull just outside of the camera angle. In fact what if there are two, one either side of the camera's viewpoint. Ok it's a stretch but it's a possibility.
Samuel Regan of Manchester, England: I'm no fluid dynamicist, but I think the swirls are formed by the dust bouncing off the shields and then being drawn back in by Voyagers mass. This would also explain it changing colour:- the dust gains energy when it hits the shields, warms up, and glows more. The alernating of the sides of the swirls is caused by turbulence, which just makes it do that because of strange physical and statistical laws that no-one understands.
Or, it could be something to do with the subspace field used to reduce voyagers mass to allow the impulse drives to work better.
Or, it could just look good.
Ronan Mitchell: In ST6, either Uhura or Spock mentioned that all ships leave a trail of hot, ionised gas - thats how they managed to destroy the cloaked bird of prey. Could this be whats causing the disturbances in the gas cloud? Also, does'nt the Technical Manual mention that the impulse engines leave an exhaust? It looks as if the Voyager's travelling at impulse in the credits.
Phil: Could be but I believe the eddies swirl away from the front of the ship as well!
Roger Sorensen: The obvious reason [for the eddies], of course, is BILC. wink smirk A plausible reason is that, IF the cloud is dense enough, it will behave in a fluid fashion. The cloud itself constrains the motion of the particles. Wave your hand through some smoke and watch what happens. That effect would be accentuated if this is some sort of charged plasma cloud ('tis glowing after all). As Voyager's bow pushes the plasma out of the way, the plasma becomes slightly compressed - the electrically-charged particles then repel one another and the plasma rebounds into the (relative) vacuum in Voyager's wake.
Roger Sorensen: [Re: Jason Liu's comments about the Federation wanting its best ships-of-the-line at the big battles.] Given Galaxy's performance record - half the commissioned ships destroyed while in service - I'd question the assertion that Galaxy's the top o' the line. It appears to have been built with a kinder, gentler Federation universe in mind - but the "peaceful promise" of the decade preceeding TNG (Klingon allliance; Romulans still hiding out) got shattered by the Borg, the Dominion, the return of the Romulans, and those remaining Klingons who we're still acting like... well, Klingons. That was one of my personal nits with "Yesterday's Enterprise" - the Galaxy class as such probably would've never been been built.
Miki Marciniak of Clinton Township MI: I would think that once the particles bounce off the ship they would then bounce off each other and that could cause the swirling effect?
Mike Konczewski of Havertown, PA: You pointed out that Kurn lost his place on the High Council and used that as an example of how Worf had been dishonored by Gowron. If I remember correctly, Kurn didn't give specific reasons for being thrown off the council. It seems as though Gowron is not exactly honorable himself. He surreptisiously had Kurn thrown off the council, knowing that it would cause Worf pain.
I would submit that Gowron can't disaccomadate Worf again. Since Gowron is the man who cleared Worf in the first place, he would "lose face" to have to admit that he was wrong. It is simpler for Gowron to publicly ignore Worf and cause him problems indirectly.
Joe Vrablik: Given episodes where first contact is made and several quotes throughout the series (namely the V'Ger episode "Time and Again"), I gather that the prime directive applies only to PRE-WARP societies.
Glenn St-Germain of Edmonton, Alberta: Is it not unreasonable to assume that in the space of 100 years, the definition of the "Prime Directive" may well have changed? Kirk's time was one in which there as a great deal of exploration, a great deal of first-contacts being made. Presumably, a civilization which had reached the spaceflight stage would therefore be no longer covered by the Prime Directive -- and I seem to recall reading a ST novel which had this as a major point. (Yes, I know the novels aren't canon...).
A century later, the Federation has expanded pretty much as far as it can, and is no longer an exploratory force. We can conjecture that somewhere along the way, in the 100 years between TOS and TNG, someone somewhere decided to interfere with some planet's civilization, getting away with it under the pretext that since the civilization had spaceflight technology, the prime directive was not applicable -- so the powers-that-be changed the meaning of the Prime Directive.
Okay, it's a stretch, but it does explain how the Prime Directive can change in the space of 100 years...
Phil: I believe that "The Dauphin" indicates the Federation has explored 19% of the Galaxy. Is there really nothing left to explore?
Elena Taussig of Lenox, MA: About the question "when has Janeway broken the prime directive," the easiest thing is to go straight back to the beginning! In "Caretaker," destroying the array did more than just kill their only chance of getting home and send the series in motion, it was also involving herself in the internal affairs of the Kazon and the Ocampa. I agree, it was sort of their fault that the Kazon ship hit the array and disabled the self-destruct program in the first place, but still...
Another Prime Directive question: In Starfleet directives, is it more important to protect one's crew (or save a crewmember) than it is to keep the prime directive?
Phil: Well, supposedly, the Prime Directive take prescedence. It is--after all-"prime." But Picard certainly didn't see it that way in "Justice!"
Marian Perera: In last week's Ask the Chief column, Rob van Hulst asked why Odo was gooed back into a changeling. Here's why :
Odo as Solid :
1) breaks his leg in "The Ascent"
2) is awkward and tongue-tied with Arroya in "Apocalypse
Rising"
3) drinks, broods and feels sorry for himself, also "A.R."
4) tries to turn into a bird and gets hurt in some episode
I can't remember.
Odo as Liquid :
1) makes a great German Shepherd in "Little green men"
2) has a wild affair with a mystery woman in "A Simple
Investigation"
3) beats up the Jem'hadar in "To the Death"
4) keeps Quark on yellow alert, all the time.
Now I ask you, which of these Odos would you pay to see?
Ronan Mitchell: About Odo - it actually happened by accident: in the episode where Garak, Dax, Odo and Sisko go back in time to Terok Nor, Bashir tells him that "You're not as solid as you think" - that a changeling enzyme in his body had been re-activated allowing him to get his powers back.
Ronan Mitchell: About the question on Majer Barrats daughter: The most likely episode I can think of is the classic episode "Miri" because William Shatner's daughter appeared in the episode. Makes sense that the other actors children would also.
Ronan Mitchell:Maybe the process can't actually be repeated that easily - think about it: In the film Spock worried about making a mistake when he was calculating how to get home...so maybe there are so many things that can go wrong that most people would not actually try it unless it was a life or death situation,as occoured in the movie? I admit that it's as likely as Elvis running for president but it's the best I can do... :)
On to the questions . . . .
Samuel Regan of Manchester, England: During a battle in star trek you sometimes hear one of the bridge crew reporting "gravity has failed on decks x,y and z" . Why aren't all the people on those decks turned into 1mm thick red pancakes when the ship then manuvers hard? Surely the inertial dampening system is part of the gravity production system.
Phil: Surprising enough, gravity doesn't fail that often on Trek! I can only think of one mention in the entire seven season run of NextGen. In addition, according to the Technical Manual, the inertial damping field and the artificial gravity generators are two separate systems!
Jeff Frederick: Supposedly the incident in which the Stargazer was lost took place 6 or 7 years before Picard took command of the Enterpirse. So what did he do during that time? Did he have another command? Fly a desk somewhere? A long leave of absense? What was he up to? Somebody tell me please.
Phil: According to the official chronology, the Stargazer was lost in 2355 and Picard assumed command of the Enterprise-D in 2363. As far as I know, there is no canonical source that specifies what Picard did during those years. (Aside from fight off a court-martial prosecuted by Captain Phillipa Louvois!)
Jeff Muscato: What's the deal with supplemental logs anyway? Even if you're adding to a previous log about a mission, shouldn't you still say the date of the addition when making the addition? That way later peoples know how long the mission took and when which parts of it happened (of course the computer probably logs the time and date, like in Aquiel, but then why do we *ever* hear the stardate with log entries?)
Phil: Personally, I've always felt the "Captain's Log: Suppliment" was just a cheap way to do a log without having to figure out what the stardate should be! To me, it's just plain cheesy and, yes, I would think that the computer would stamp the log entry in the first place!
Jason Barnes: I heard a rumor that Worf is leaving DS9 next season. Is that true?
Phil: I spoke at a convention in Tulsa, OK, the summer before Worf came on board DS9. Dorn stated that he had signed a three year contact--governing the fourth, fifth and sixth seasons. The last word that I've heard is that the sixth season will probably be DS9's last. The creative staff is hopeful for a seventh season but it will be up to Paramount and all the actor's contracts are up for renewal!
Matthew Chiappardi: What did you think of the season finale for "The X-Files"? Also, has their been any resistance to the idea for your 'X-Files' guide since the others guides you did were for 'Star Trek' series and movies, Paramount product, and 'X-Files' is a 20th Century Fox product?
Phil: Without reproducing my entire review of it int he X-phile Guide, I'll just say that--in the first place--I doubt anyone believes that Mulder is dead! (He already died once at the end of season two. Hmmm.) And--in the second place--creators typically try to shake everything up at season boundaries. All in all I thought the episode was a bit long on atmosphere and short on plot. I am somewhat concerned that if the creators keep up the pattern of "this is true, no it's not, that's true but it isn't" that there will come a point when everything becomes so opaque that the tone of the show will turn nihilistic. (Everything is nonsense. Nothing makes sense.) Unfortunately, nihilism doesn't produce emotions that are beneficial in TV Land because it breeds ridicule and apathy. But . . . I thought the episode was well done--as always--and it will be interesting to see what the creators of the X-Files have up their sleeves for the fifth season. (Personally, I thought "Small Potatoes"--the "monkey babies invade small town episode"--was the high point of the season!)
Corey Hines, Hamilton, ON: I just rented First Contact today and I was looking for the appearance of Voyager. I was looking but I couldn't find it. I may think I saw it when they show the beginning of the battle when they show the Defiant. I can see a ship with nacelles that's similar to Voyager but I couldn't see the ship completely. The only way I can confirm this is to wait for the letterboxed edition to be released. Is this the spot? Or is there somewhere else where Voyager is seen?
Phil: Have no idea! Haven't rented it yet! Anybody?
Kevin Weiler: I was just wondering about your books to come. Will you be putting any movies in your new books, (I've noticed the files have grown a lot) and how about First Contact, where will you put that?
Phil: My agent Steve will probably be proposing the next Nitpicker's Guide in the next few weeks. Once we get a go-ahead, I'll answer this question!
Ed Watson of Downingtown, PA: Just a quick question. I've heard you mention your TV station situation before and I'm curious about it. Now, I realize that not all places in this country have cable yet, but personally, I have not watched "over the air" television since the mid 70's. Is the no cable you can have, or at least a satellite dish? I just have a tough time envisioning someone with his own web page standing at the TV fiddling with the rabbit ears! That's a paradox if I ever heard of one.
Phil: Voyager is broadcast on a low power UHF station in Springfield that is not carried by cable! The local television guides don't even list the station's programming. (Although from what I understand of recent regulations, the local cable company will be required to start carrying it and I would imagine when that happen the television guides will follow suit.) I lived eight miles north of town so the signal is pretty weak. I could get a big satellite dish but there's really no good place to put it on my property since it's mostly woods. I could get a DSS system and demand that they turn on UPN since I can't get it locally but at this point, I have a friend who is taping them for me so I'm not really that thrilled with spending $30.00 a month for more programming to waste my time! ;-) I do have an antenna in the attic with a video booster so I get the five major stations rock solid (NBC, CBS, ABC, FOX, PBS) and that was fine until Paramount decided they wanted to be goofy and start their own network. Ah well. A nearby neighbor says that he gets UPN very well but he has an antenna on a forty foot pole with boosters all over the place!
Have a great weekend, everybody!
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Copyright 1997 by Phil Farrand. All rights reserved.