Uber-powered antimatter?

[WATCH-MAN]

My goodness. How many times have I said this now? The cloud creature is able to travel at warp speed. The cloud creature has mass. Ergo it must be using something analogous to warp drive to achieve this. It follows that the creature must also have a source of power for whatever mechanism it uses to travel at high warp, and that this reaction must be at least comparable to a matter/antimatter reaction or an artificial singularity (as these are the only power sources we see powering warp drives that I know of).

Now, whether this power source is a reaction the cloud creature utilizes, or a kind of super-capacitor it can charge up from an external power source (like a star, or a starship possibly), the energy present would be released when the creature is destroyed. That much energy suddenly released into the environment will behave very similarly to a matter-antimatter blast.

Even if the cloud creature »must be using something analogous to warp drive to achieve [...] warp speed« and »must also have a source of power [with a] reaction [...] at least comparable to a matter/antimatter reaction or an artificial singularity«, why should it have more energy available than a starship? An ounce of normal anti-matter and an ounce of normal matter annihilating each other are releasing only energy equivalent to round about 1 megaton. To rip away half the atmosphere of an Earth like planet, you need at least 100,000,000,000 megatons. 100 teratons of TNT were released by the Chicxulub impactor - and this was not remotely enough to rip away half the atmosphere of Earth. That means that the cloud creature - to contribute enough energy to enhance the anti-matter blast to be strong enough to rip away half the atmosphere - would have to have stored energy equivalent to more than 100,000,000,000 megatons. Even if its whole mass is converted into energy, it had to have a mass of at least 4,687,500,000 kg. (You are asked to check my calculations as I'm not the best mathematician.)

Is this plausible?

Furthermore the cloud creature had abilities that put into question if it »must be using something analogous to warp drive to achieve [...] warp speed« and »must also have a source of power [with a] reaction [...] at least comparable to a matter/antimatter reaction or an artificial singularity«

• • • • • • SPOCK:
        Conflicting data, Captain. It seems to be in a borderline state between matter and energy. Elements of both. It could possibly use gravitational fields for propulsion.
        
        • • [...]
        • • SPOCK:
        The deflectors will not stop it, Captain.
        
        • • SCOTT:
        That's impossible.
        
        • • SPOCK:
        I should have surmised this. For the creature to be able to use gravity as a propulsive force, it would have to have this capacity.
        
        • • [...]
        • • SCOTT:
        Captain, the creature's ability to throw itself out of time sync makes it possible for it to be elsewhere in the instant the phaser hits.

As for Spock not mentioning it, well, you're assuming he didn't mention refining the ship's fuel into a super-bomb when he reasonably should have. It's called inferring facts based on evidence. I infer that the cloud creature explodes and contributes most of the blast energy and Spock didn't mention this.

You conclude that they refined their fuel into a super-bomb (in a matter of hours or less) and used it to blow away the atmosphere and then never use it again requiring even more inferring of facts (on much weaker grounds than mine) and speculation.

Tell me, honestly, which is the simpler of those two inferences.

As one can assume that Sock knew that

• Kirk knew that an ounce of normal anti-matter and an ounce of normal matter annihilating each other are only releasing enough energy equivalent to 1 megaton and
• that Kirk knew that the detonation of photon torpedoes didn't affect the creature and
• that Kirk knew the ability of its ship to process anti-matter to super-anti-matter (as this is the premise of this argument),

it isn't so difficult to assume that he did not explained what should be obviously to Kirk.

But

• we do not even know that Spock knew that the cloud creature had stored energy equivalent to more than 100,000,000,000 megatons.
• We do not even know that this is the case at all.
• We do not know if Kirk knew this.
• And we do not know that Spock knew that Kirk knew this.

Furthermore it is not only a question of not saying something because Spock explicitly said that it is the matter-antimatter blast that will rip away half the planet's atmosphere. That's a positive statement. The assumption that it is not the anti-matter blast but the energy contributed by the cloud creature that rips away half the planet's atmosphere is not reconcilable with what Spock said. As super-anti-matter is still anti-matter, my explanation does not have this problem.



And do not think I have not noticed that you didn't provided an explanation, why it was necessary to drain the anti-matter from the ship's engines and transport it to the planet surface in a magnetic vacuum field, if they could have simply used a photon torpedo or a photon grenade. You also haven't answered the question why an ounce of normal anti-matter is supposed to affect the cloud creature when earlier the detonation of the anti-matter warheads of photon torpedoes did not. If 1,5 kg of normal anti-matter do not affect the cloud creature, why is an ounce of normal anti-matter supposed to affect it? This inexplicability puts your theory into question. Does it doesn't make more sense to assume that there had to be something different about the normal anti-matter used in photon torpedoes and the anti-matter used to finally destroy the cloud creature?

The irony of this line is amazing. This is exactly what you are doing! Every time myself or someone else pokes a hole in your theory, you just throw up your hands and say "wah, but maybe it was this, or that, or this" even though that speculation makes no gods-damned sense

To quote what Simon_Jester said to me:

• • • • »[...] your theory "fits all the data," in the sense that there are no inconsistencies with the evidence [...]«

[Eternal_Freedom]

My goodness. How many times have I said this now? The cloud creature is able to travel at warp speed. The cloud creature has mass. Ergo it must be using something analogous to warp drive to achieve this. It follows that the creature must also have a source of power for whatever mechanism it uses to travel at high warp, and that this reaction must be at least comparable to a matter/antimatter reaction or an artificial singularity (as these are the only power sources we see powering warp drives that I know of).

Now, whether this power source is a reaction the cloud creature utilizes, or a kind of super-capacitor it can charge up from an external power source (like a star, or a starship possibly), the energy present would be released when the creature is destroyed. That much energy suddenly released into the environment will behave very similarly to a matter-antimatter blast.

Even if the cloud creature »must be using something analogous to warp drive to achieve [...] warp speed« and »must also have a source of power [with a] reaction [...] at least comparable to a matter/antimatter reaction or an artificial singularity«, why should it have more energy available than a starship? An ounce of normal anti-matter and an ounce of normal matter annihilating each other are releasing only energy equivalent to round about 1 megaton. To rip away half the atmosphere of an Earth like planet, you need at least 100,000,000,000 megatons. 100 teratons of TNT were released by the Chicxulub impactor - and this was not remotely enough to rip away half the atmosphere of Earth. That means that the cloud creature - to contribute enough energy to enhance the anti-matter blast to be strong enough to rip away half the atmosphere - would have to have stored energy equivalent to more than 100,000,000,000 megatons. Even if its whole mass is converted into energy, it had to have a mass of at least 4,687,500,000 kg. (You are asked to check my calculations as I'm not the best mathematician.)

Is this plausible?

It is more plausible than your theory. For instance, if the cloud-creature is able to tap into subspace for it's power (entirely possible given that it has no apparent power source, which it must have had) that may well have accounted for the extra energy.

Furthermore the cloud creature had abilities that put into question if it »must be using something analogous to warp drive to achieve [...] warp speed« and »must also have a source of power [with a] reaction [...] at least comparable to a matter/antimatter reaction or an artificial singularity«

Part matter, part energy. That means it has some mass, which means it must use something akin to warp drive, since to move at light speed (never mind ftl) otherwise would require infinite energy.

As for Spock not mentioning it, well, you're assuming he didn't mention refining the ship's fuel into a super-bomb when he reasonably should have. It's called inferring facts based on evidence. I infer that the cloud creature explodes and contributes most of the blast energy and Spock didn't mention this.

You conclude that they refined their fuel into a super-bomb (in a matter of hours or less) and used it to blow away the atmosphere and then never use it again requiring even more inferring of facts (on much weaker grounds than mine) and speculation.

Tell me, honestly, which is the simpler of those two inferences.

As one can assume that Sock knew that

• Kirk knew that an ounce of normal anti-matter and an ounce of normal matter annihilating each other are only releasing enough energy equivalent to 1 megaton and
• that Kirk knew that the detonation of photon torpedoes didn't affect the creature and
• that Kirk knew the ability of its ship to process anti-matter to super-anti-matter (as this is the premise of this argument),

it isn't so difficult to assume that he did not explained what should be obviously to Kirk.

Then we can equally assume that Kirk was aware of the effect of the explosion of the bomb and a part-matter, part-energy creature that travels at high warp speed. You see how annoying this is?

But

• we do not even know that Spock knew that the cloud creature had stored energy equivalent to more than 100,000,000,000 megatons.
• We do not even know that this is the case at all.
• We do not know if Kirk knew this.
• And we do not know that Spock knew that Kirk knew this.

Furthermore it is not only a question of not saying something because Spock explicitly said that it is the matter-antimatter blast that will rip away half the planet's atmosphere. That's a positive statement. The assumption that it is not the anti-matter blast but the energy contributed by the cloud creature that rips away half the planet's atmosphere is not reconcilable with what Spock said. As super-anti-matter is still anti-matter, my explanation does not have this problem.

Your explanation is still lacking. With no mention of super-anti-matter, as you would have us accept, one has to assume that the antimatter used is completely normal. Out of universe, we can chalk this up to SF writers having no sense of scale, and (in the 60's) a much looser understanding of antimatter and high-yield blasts than what is freely available today. In-universe, well, my explanation fits this and doesn't require speculation or rationalisation beyond this episode.

On another note, whilst Spock is intelligent, knowledgeable and logical, what he is not is infallible. It is possible he overestimated the blast. We never see the effects of the blast. We see Enterprise rocked by a detonation, but no more severe than a phaser blast or disruptor hit. Jus tlike the TDiC example, we have only Spock's assessment, before the fact, that "half the planet's atmosphere was ripped away."

And do not think I have not noticed that you didn't provided an explanation, why it was necessary to drain the anti-matter from the ship's engines and transport it to the planet surface in a magnetic vacuum field, if they could have simply used a photon torpedo or a photon grenade. You also haven't answered the question why an ounce of normal anti-matter is supposed to affect the cloud creature when earlier the detonation of the anti-matter warheads of photon torpedoes did not. If 1,5 kg of normal anti-matter do not affect the cloud creature, why is an ounce of normal anti-matter supposed to affect it? This inexplicability puts your theory into question. Does it doesn't make more sense to assume that there had to be something different about the normal anti-matter used in photon torpedoes and the anti-matter used to finally destroy the cloud creature?

Did you completely miss the discussion about whether the E-Nil's torpedoes carried antimatter warheads? From TOS we have no indication they do, so it's possible that they were using some other warheads (we know that as recently as the mid 2100's in the Romulan War they were still using nukes, for example). Even if they did use antimatter, if an ounce is sufficient than 1.5 kilos is overkill. There are also the reasons Simon pointed out, which you (again!) chose to ignore. And you have the audacity to call me out for "not providing an explanation?" You have some balls, sir, that much I will admit.

As for why it affected the creature, oh I dunno, because it was a megaton-range explosion? Which, unlike the torpedo detonations, took place in an atmosphere which will turn the flood of gamma rays into a atmospheric shockwave and a heat flash? Just saying "but torpedoes did nothing" proves precisely sod-all when the torpedoes are in going off in space and the bomb goes off on a planet, in an atmosphere, and while the cloud-creature surrounds the bomb. Those circumstances make all the difference.

The irony of this line is amazing. This is exactly what you are doing! Every time myself or someone else pokes a hole in your theory, you just throw up your hands and say "wah, but maybe it was this, or that, or this" even though that speculation makes no gods-damned sense

To quote what Simon_Jester said to me:

• • • • »[...] your theory "fits all the data," in the sense that there are no inconsistencies with the evidence [...]«

Right, I am calling you on this right gods-damned now. You WILL quote other posters correctly and IN FULL or I will go to the mods about you being a dishonest debater. What Simon said, in full was:

"The problem is that while NOW your theory "fits all the data," in the sense that there are no inconsistencies with the evidence...

You have comically failed the "simplest theory" test now. Because now the choice is between "super-antimatter and a super-treaty that everyone inexplicably follows and doesn't even think about breaking, including people who have never heard of the treaty and spit on the very concept of treaties" and... "no super-antimatter."

You will apologize and concede this point immediately.

[DaveJB]

On another note, whilst Spock is intelligent, knowledgeable and logical, what he is not is infallible. It is possible he overestimated the blast. We never see the effects of the blast. We see Enterprise rocked by a detonation, but no more severe than a phaser blast or disruptor hit. Jus tlike the TDiC example, we have only Spock's assessment, before the fact, that "half the planet's atmosphere was ripped away."

To be fair, the remastered version of the episode does include a shot (pic) that pretty clearly indicates that the blast was far, far in excess of the ~1MT yield you'd expect from an ounce of antimatter.

Just to make one last attempt to show why this whole "super antimatter" idea is so absurd, allow me to list the theories that have been presented on the issue:

1. Eternal_Freedom's theory, which is that the creature's death resulted in a massive release of energy. This is not directly supported by anything in the episode, but at the same time it does not actively contradict anything, nor require any assumptions about similar incidents outside of the episode. The major issue is why the antimatter was used instead of a photon torpedo, but this could be explained as either them still using nuclear warheads (probably in the low kiloton range), or the jury-rigged bomb being chosen for reasons of stealth and ensuring that the creature was near the bomb when it exploded, as it was able to move at superluminal speeds and might potentially have flown off into space before a torpedo reached the surface.

2. The theory that I presented near the start of the thread, which is that the antimatter explosion caused a chain reaction in the planet's crust and/or atmosphere, resulting in the huge blast that we saw. Again, this is not directly supported by anything in the episode, but neither is it contradicted by anything. It has the same issues about why a photon torpedo wasn't used, but the same explanations still apply - though in the interests of fairness, I'll actually admit that Eternal_Freedom's theory probably makes more sense than my own, since mine would mean they could have just beamed the bomb down into the general vicinity of the creature and detonated it from orbit, removing any need for Kirk and Garrovick to risk their lives.

3. WATCH-MAN's theory that the Federation uses "super antimatter" that is trillions of times more potent than an equivalent quantity of the antimatter normally used for photon torpedoes and warp cores. Not only is this not directly supported by the episode, since neither Spock nor Kirk make any mention of this antimatter being unusually potent, it requires assumptions about refining technologies and arms treaties that have no support whatsoever anywhere else in the entirety of Star Trek, and falls apart when you consider other instances where this "super antimatter" should logically have been used, but was not. Not only that, but this theory also suffers the same problem as mine, namely the fact that there was no logical reason for Kirk and Garrovick to beam down if they were capable of producing such a gigantic explosion.

Oh, and in the absence of any reply to the screenshots I posted, I'm going to to interpret that as a concession on the whole "30% of the planet's crust was destroyed and we just couldn't see it because the clouds were too thick" argument.

[Tribble]

Oh, and in the absence of any reply to the screenshots I posted, I'm going to to interpret that as a concession on the whole "30% of the planet's crust was destroyed and we just couldn't see it because the clouds were too thick" argument.

Not quite. As I said earlier, it's possible the ships destroyed 30% of the crust without the viewer seeing it due to the crust being "vaporized" (i.e. either being thrown out of the ST universe if you go by the TM or being converted into neutrinos of you go by Darth Wong). Of course, this doesn't help the uber-powered antimatter argument in the slightest because the beam weapons would have been doing most of the work.

[DaveJB]

That would eliminate the need for ejecta, but it still doesn't come close to matching what we see in the episode. Even if a third of the crust were cleanly vaporized, we should be able to see the glowing sea of molten lava that makes up the planet's mantle. I don't doubt that it was a devastating bombardment, but "30% of the crust destroyed" is just too far out of sync with what we see to take the dialogue completely at face value.

Plus, it still runs into the problem of not being consistent with the rest of Trek, "The Pegasus" in particular. If phasers were that powerful, they wouldn't have needed their whole load of torpedoes to destroy the asteroid; one phaser blast would have vaporized the bulk of the asteroid, and then a couple of torpedoes would have been sufficient to obliterate the wreckage of the Pegasus (bearing in mind that at this point they just thought they were dealing with part of the engineering section, not the whole ship).

[Simon_Jester]

It remains conceivable that such murderous organizations as the Obsidian Order and the Tal Shiar might have some advanced, unknown weapon useful only for planetary bombardment. Phasers that supposedly work by some means other than direct energy transfer are good for this, and we might imagine a specially tuned phaser-type weapon that works very well against rocks but very poorly against starships.

However, this does not mean such a weapon exists, and there are counterarguments (did the Federation simply choose not to pursue this technology, and thus not have it available to vaporize whole asteroids on short notice?)