Intelligence is the Answer

[outlawpoet]

I'm new to Wars vs. Trek debates, and after reading SD.net, and some of the forums, I meditated on my evaluation of the two sides.

Upon doing so, I decided that while the Empire clearly is impossibly powerful in comparison to any Trek power, I would much rather be instantiated into the Star Trek universe than the Star Wars universe(even if the two universes were destined to collide sometime in my subjective future).

This is because it seems that there is simply so much more unexploited opportunity in the Star Trek Universe, where Star Wars, however upscale it's technologies, exists in a static environment. It's own literature makes this clear, despite the minimalism, and rather incoherent literary treatment, that the galaxy has stabilized both technologically and politically.

In order to really compare Trek vs. Wars, we need to extensionally create consistent versions of each. Wong has already done much of this work (for Wars at least) by determining technological basis and raw capability. For these analysis we largely ignore thematic elements(like Tarkin refusing to launch fighters to deal with X-Wing assault on DS-1, or Sisko pulling Deux ex Machina) because they can't be made into consistent handicaps for each side.

But there is at least one handicap which I don't think can be ignored, because of it's broad effect upon Trek evaluation. Which is the fact that all the characters in every Trek depiction appear to be borderline-retarded.

I'm not being facetious. I am hard pressed to find a single example of very intelligent behavior within Star Trek that doesn't occur effectively 'offscreen' in the form of two basic behaviors:

1. Fantastic Engineering Feats: for some reason, it's possible to do ridiculous things in miniscule amounts of time and technology. This is not limited to the Federation.

2. Applying a static 'unstoppable' strategy: throughout the series and movies, many characters, after being 'inspired' or otherwise prodded, develop a single strategy that is fantastically difficult to counter or analyse(in some cases(Picard Maneuver) this is true for YEARS afterwards).

Explaining this in a coherent way requires a dip into evolutionary psychology. In a very real way, humans exist at the minimum level of intelligence to support culture. We are extremely thinly modded chimpanzees, who are still in the process of working out the effects of our last major cognitive expansion of capability. (iirc, the last major species change, the supplantion of neadrathals, occured in the Pleistocene)

Suppose that culture were easier to support in our hypothetical Trek universe? This basically requires that the laws of physics be slightly different, something that would make technology much much simpler to work out. The best I can come up with is a slightly stronger coupling constant in chromodynamic forces. This would allow the formation of matter earlier in universal history, leaving the mean temperature much higher, and thus most reactions easier to initiate.

With technology more accessible, humans(and aliens) would have hit culture earlier (perhaps at homo erectus) and removed themselves evolutionary forces, freezing intellectual development at something like IQ 60.

This explains a lot of things, like why obvious engineering and technological solutions (arrays of warp cores? positive safety systems?) simply do not occur to Trek engineers. The systemic interactions are simply too complicated for them to be planned out in detail. (this also explains why 'super-intelligences' in the Trekverse are so unimpressive, except by comparison(Borg, Traveler, etc)).

Thus coming to our final point, what affect on the hypothetical Trek vs. Wars comparison?

I think, and I'll be working out the math in a moment, that it means that a modern intelligent human, instantiated into the Trekverse, would have a better chance than one instantied into the Warsverse, given an inevitable conflict in the future between the two.

The power-generation issue is a problem, of course, but I think that the vast capability of relatively small amounts of federation technology could be bootstrapped into not only Wars parity, but much more absolute power, as compared to the average absolute power you could attain in the Wars universe.

More as time permits.

[The Grim Squeaker]

Nice idea, problem is that we know that ST is our earth + 2 centuries, still if we suspend belief (Disregarding the fact that SW is supposed to take place in the far past ) the physics theory is interesting.

But your IQ 60 idea ignores "Ocams razor" (Simple better than convulted, and I know that this isn't the exact definition )- Why not just accept that the groups in ST are simply incompetent compared to many other groups, can't use their technology effectively usually or that the reason that Trek-nology can be modded so easily is it's unstability, the Original series had less advances/Treknobabble and didn't break down or explode like the infamous consoles or unstable Warp cores.

[Bounty]

2. Applying a static 'unstoppable' strategy: throughout the series and movies, many characters, after being 'inspired' or otherwise prodded, develop a single strategy that is fantastically difficult to counter or analyse(in some cases(Picard Maneuver) this is true for YEARS afterwards).

As for the specific "Picard Manoevre" : it was ingenious because only because it was used under the proper circumstances. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't believe anyone ever said the manoevre was considered a standard tactic, and it was very easily countered when Picard tried to use it on his own crew.

This explains a lot of things, like why obvious engineering and technological solutions (arrays of warp cores? positive safety systems?) simply do not occur to Trek engineers.

When trying to figure out why "obvious" solutions aren't used for engineering problems in Trekverse, I'd prefer to rationally explain them based on the technology shown, not by changing the entire universe to create wonderchimps with starships. But that's just me.

[brianeyci]

No. Stupid actions do not necessarily make the person retarded or mentally handicapped. There's enough people with so-called average intelligence in our world that do stupid things like believe in creationism to refute your point. There was a theory floated about awhile back that in order to compete technologically with other races, the Federation had to take "shortcuts" to technology, and don't entirely understand their own technology. This doesn't answer the question of why they ignore basic engineering principles like parismony and the design process, but if there was a catacalysmic event like a nuclear war which wiped out a sizeable portion of humanity's intelligent stock and resources, along with the injection of totally foreign technology from the Vulcans, it might explain why safety is disregarded and the scientific method is so badly implemented, because perhaps there were no institutions capable of educating the next generation of engineers and scientists and humanity was thrown to the brink of extinction.

The rest you can chalk up to incompetence and a communist style government which encourages laziness. Teaching small children Calculus might not be the best thing in the world if the children aren't disciplined or physically and mentally developed enough to study the material, and might actually make them have a false sense of intelligence, like many of the Trek protagonists have.

Brian

[brianeyci]

Oh as another note it would be interesting if there was support for my hypothesis in the form of mass culling of intellectuals instigated by the genetic supermen under the Princes like Khan. If Khan went through his kingdom killing off the wolves and leaving the sheep for him and his supermen to rule Stalinesque style, and if this pattern was repeated around the globe, it might explain the lack of things like properly trained engineers, who would have been first on the chopping block.

Brian

[Bounty]

If Khan went through his kingdom killing off the wolves and leaving the sheep for him and his supermen to rule Stalinesque style, and if this pattern was repeated around the globe, it might explain the lack of things like properly trained engineers, who would have been first on the chopping block.

The problem with this is that Khan's empire, while large (most of Asia, IIRC), wasn't worldwide. The US and Europe were not under his control, and even if he killed of the intelligensia of the nations under his control, there's still be a significant number of competent people left.

[brianeyci]

The problem with this is that Khan's empire, while large (most of Asia, IIRC), wasn't worldwide. The US and Europe were not under his control, and even if he killed of the intelligensia of the nations under his control, there's still be a significant number of competent people left.

The United States was decimated by nuclear attack was it not? Perhaps in the Trekverse, the communists had a more efficient economy somehow and were able to produce far more nuclear warheads, effectively devestating the United States except for a few small pockets of humanity, most large cities and universities, and so on.

But you're right though, there would still be competent people left as evidenced by ST:FC when a relative backwater had the technological competence to build a warp powered starship.

Brian

[Bounty]

The United States was decimated by nuclear attack was it not?

600 million dead worldwide after both the Eugenics wars and WW3, at least 30 million of those during the EW. No clear figures on how much of those were American.

[Glimmervoid]

The United States was decimated by nuclear attack was it not?

600 million dead worldwide after both the Eugenics wars and WW3, at least 30 million of those during the EW. No clear figures on how much of those were American.

Dose that include the people that were killed to stop radiation damaged getting in to the gene pool (or some thing like that). The pro-human nut jobs on enterprise talked about a major? who went around the place killing them.

[Bounty]

The pro-human nut jobs on enterprise talked about a major? who went around the place killing them.

Col. Green. He killed "hundreds of thousands", and they were probably included in the count (since they were referred to as being killed "during the war"). He did live for several years after the cease-fire, though, so he may have continued his "pure human" program.

[outlawpoet]

No. Stupid actions do not necessarily make the person retarded or mentally handicapped. There's enough people with so-called average intelligence in our world that do stupid things like believe in creationism to refute your point.

This is true. The reason I'm forced into having this opinion is the fact that this seems to be universally true, with very few exceptions, for every race we see in Star Trek. This suggests a physical universal factor, rather than a quirk of human organization or history.

People in our current actual world exist upon a Gaussian curve, so stupid actions within the population are insufficient to set a upper bound. However, in Star Trek, not only do we never see ANY above-average intelligence examples save the classes I point out, the technology and social structures are both simplistic and incoherent. This is endemic of some limitation of total societal limitations.

If there were intelligent people in the Federation, at least one of them would have stolen a starship by now, given their lax security regulations, just by statistical chance. But in fact, any sufficiently complicated situation is entirely new to them. This is indicative of something, and I simply conclude it's a limitation of individuals.

It could also be some interactive limitation, such as perhaps the Kolmorogov complexity of objects in the Trekverse is higher, increasing communication costs. (and explaining treknobabble?) But that seems unneccesary and difficult to analyse.

[brianeyci]

There are criminals operating in the Federation. Queue in Baran, the Orion Syndicate and so on. Baran also operated an illegal starship. Quark steals shit all the time and breaks the law all the time.

Also we only see for the most part, humans in Starfleet.

Are you aware that your proposal violates parsimony? I've given alternative explainations to the stupidity, and you seem to ignore it.

Brian

[brianeyci]

And of course, the most obvious stolen starship in Star Trek.





Brian

[Bounty]

If there were intelligent people in the Federation, at least one of them would have stolen a starship by now,

Well, they have. The Maquis use stolen Fed raiders, Kirk stole his own ship (though he had the advantage of having high clearance within Starfleet)...

not only do we never see ANY above-average intelligence examples save the classes I point out, the technology and social structures are both simplistic and incoherent.

Because it's so fucking easy to run an interplanetary alliance and both build and further develop FTL starships

[Junghalli]

Suppose that culture were easier to support in our hypothetical Trek universe? This basically requires that the laws of physics be slightly different, something that would make technology much much simpler to work out. The best I can come up with is a slightly stronger coupling constant in chromodynamic forces. This would allow the formation of matter earlier in universal history, leaving the mean temperature much higher, and thus most reactions easier to initiate.
With technology more accessible, humans(and aliens) would have hit culture earlier (perhaps at homo erectus) and removed themselves evolutionary forces, freezing intellectual development at something like IQ 60.

I don't think we need to go that far. The Federation's incompetence can be explained by its psuedo-communist economy. In communism work is rewarded on an arbitrary basis instead of by actual results, which often leads to incompetence. For instance, the Soviet Union used to produce some of the heaviest diesel engines on the planet because the production quotas were by weight, so heavier engines meant the factory didn't have to produce as much. Since there's no competition people don't generally feel compelled to make high-quality goods, because they can produce shit and it'll still be acceptable because there's no alternative, so why go to all the trouble of making something better? And also in communist regimes (any dictatorial regime really) you have a tendency for people with the "right attitude" to get promoted over people who actually know what they're doing. It's OK if you don't have a clue, just make sure you talk loudly about how great things are.
As for the rest of the Trekverse powers
Klingons: boneheaded thugs who think charging riflemen with knives is "honorable".
Cardassians: third rate power doing technological catch-up with the others.
Borg: hive mind. Naturally uncreative form of intellect.
Dominion: fascists who've had their entire part of the galaxy as their personal playground for the last couple of centuries.
Romulans: probably the least boneheaded but too cautious to take advantage of it.

[outlawpoet]

Are you aware that your proposal violates parsimony? I've given alternative explainations to the stupidity, and you seem to ignore it.

Earlier in the thread someone appeared to invoke occam as well, and I confess I don't understand the objection. occam or parsimony refers to unneccesary complexity in hypothesis as compared to the evidence the hypothesis must satisfice, it isn't a general argument against complicated hypothesis.

You alternate explanations are interesting, but the appear to operate only against humans, and don't appear to be a sufficient condition to continue selecting against intelligent or competent decision-makers. The Eugenics Wars and the new Khanate simply could not act as a continuing pressure against intelligent humans, unless Khan used his apparently superior genetic science to project what genetic complexity would lead to intelligent humans, and removed it from the species pool.

Still leaving the incompetence of aliens, Borg, and genetically engineered humans, who presumably would be made as intelligent as the human genetic library permits.

[Bounty]

occam or parsimony refers to unneccesary complexity in hypothesis as compared to the evidence the hypothesis must satisfice, it isn't a general argument against complicated hypothesis.

But in this case, there *are* simpler hypothesis that explain isolated incidents of incompetence without having to resort to redrawing the universe. Borg lost the ability to innovate, Klingons are too conservative, the Jem'Hadar are glorified slaves kept dumb by their masters, perceived design flaws in engineering may come from restrictions or design philosophies we're not aware of...

[outlawpoet]

I don't think we need to go that far. The Federation's incompetence can be explained by its psuedo-communist economy.

Unfortunately, that can only operate as a selector for activities that are connected to structures primarily affected by government motivation. To continue with your communist Russia analogy, despite the institutionalized incompetence of their industrial and scientific sectors, Russia still produced brilliance in areas unrelated to those factors, such as Chess, Mathematics, and Art, who are somewhat outside both communist and capitalist motivational frameworks(at least at the moment, you might get rich in the future by being a great mathematician). Also, we had the development of rich and competent organization in those few areas where a command-control system like communism CAN generate good selection mechanisms, like small unit competence(Spetznatz, the Russian Space Program, etc) and self organizing selectors, like the Russian Mafia.

As for the rest of the Trekverse powers
Klingons: boneheaded thugs who think charging riflemen with knives is "honorable".
Cardassians: third rate power doing technological catch-up with the others.
Borg: hive mind. Naturally uncreative form of intellect.
Dominion: fascists who've had their entire part of the galaxy as their personal playground for the last couple of centuries.
Romulans: probably the least boneheaded but too cautious to take advantage of it.

They all seem to suffer from the same generalized intellectual deficit. The Romulans may have made the least mistakes(minus their ridiculous 'invasion' of Vulkan, and Nemesis events) but they remain at the same level.

As a side-note, I'm not sure why you would characterize a hive-mind as a naturally uncreative form of intellect. Creativity, as humans define it, is parallel or related association of new or novel concepts, which ought to scale as to the number of concepts and memories an association network can compare at a time. I would expect a symmetrically communicating hive-mind to be fantastically creative, and terribly slow.

[Ghost Rider]

If you don't really see why people are asking where the fuck you came up with your theory, I'll give a single pointer.

Show ANYWHERE in Trek, they've EVER indicated that their universe came about somehow differently.

Basically you are asking people to accept a theory wherein you change some of the fundamental laws to go "See, they are dumber because the universe made it so!"

So you need some extraordinary proof to demonstrate this has anymore value then "You see Kirk once went back into the past and found Eve and well after three days..."

[outlawpoet]

But in this case, there *are* simpler hypothesis that explain isolated incidents of incompetence without having to resort to redrawing the universe. Borg lost the ability to innovate, Klingons are too conservative, the Jem'Hadar are glorified slaves kept dumb by their masters, perceived design flaws in engineering may come from restrictions or design philosophies we're not aware of...

This is true. But I'm attempting to give a general mechanism because the universal constant of both poor to low intelligent behavior, and very cheap but rare technological innovation seems too incredible to ascribe to an enormous series of coincidences.

How would you explain the existence of fantastically easy technological innovation(like Geordi's many ten minute inventions) in the face of institutional stupidity?

[outlawpoet]

Show ANYWHERE in Trek, they've EVER indicated that their universe came about somehow differently.

1. The episode where Q takes Picard back to the 'beginning of life on earth' conflicts with the current best theories of abiogenesis. That this may have been the way the science writer thought it happened is for our purposes irrelevant.

2. Stellar Mechanics appear to operate substantially differently than they do in our universe, unless you believe that every time we see stars undergoing global changes in small timescales it's because they are a kind of star we have yet to discover?


3. The historical timeline of the Trek Earth already differs significantly from our own.

4. Monstrous amounts of energy available to relatively fragile and tiny beings. It's possible, I suppose, that Q is really a 500 meter diameter annihilation engine that chooses to project himself as a humanoid, but there are other examples(including Riker being given Q powers, Buxbridges?) that are more consistent with a higher global temperature and different physical constraints.

Basically you are asking people to accept a theory wherein you change some of the fundamental laws to go "See, they are dumber because the universe made it so!"

Yes. Actually to be precise, I'm positing that the Trek universe is an easier place to get things done, thus they didn't have a need to evolve to be any smarter.

[brianeyci]

Earlier in the thread someone appeared to invoke occam as well, and I confess I don't understand the objection. occam or parsimony refers to unneccesary complexity in hypothesis as compared to the evidence the hypothesis must satisfice, it isn't a general argument against complicated hypothesis.

Your hypothesis that the physical laws of the universe are different in such a way that explains the stupidity of certain actions on the Trekverse violates parsimony, because there are other explainations for stupidity rather than yours which do not require a changing of the physical laws of the universe.

You alternate explanations are interesting, but the appear to operate only against humans, and don't appear to be a sufficient condition to continue selecting against intelligent or competent decision-makers. The Eugenics Wars and the new Khanate simply could not act as a continuing pressure against intelligent humans, unless Khan used his apparently superior genetic science to project what genetic complexity would lead to intelligent humans, and removed it from the species pool.

There was also the part about the Vulcans injecting advanced technology into a devestated world and the Federation perhaps trying to play catch up and therefore not understanding the fundamentals of their technology, but I guess you skipped that.

It is still a far more elegant theory than yours, and has circumstantial evidence to support it in the canon, while yours has nothing.

Still leaving the incompetence of aliens, Borg, and genetically engineered humans, who presumably would be made as intelligent as the human genetic library permits.

1. Khan not finding the override is a matter of training, not because he was stupid. He was poorly trained, indeed not trained at all but self-trained, in the operation of a starship.

2. The Borg are stupid yes, but it is a cultural stupidity. In fact, because the Borg use assimilation to maintain control, one could argue that a limiting of the higher brain functions on individual drones is absolutely necessary for the collective to continue functioning. Therefore individual drones are in a sense, stupid because of the technological limitations of assimilation, and this can be extended to the whole collective, which follows a preset number of unalterable directives in its programming.

3. Incompetence of aliens can be explained by cultural, technological, poor training and other factors.

Your general stupidity argument is so irritating that I ask you to provide examples of specific stupidity, and it will be trivially easy to explain these instances without appealing to your general stupidity mechanism.

Brian

[brianeyci]

1. The episode where Q takes Picard back to the 'beginning of life on earth' conflicts with the current best theories of abiogenesis. That this may have been the way the science writer thought it happened is for our purposes irrelevant.

2. Stellar Mechanics appear to operate substantially differently than they do in our universe, unless you believe that every time we see stars undergoing global changes in small timescales it's because they are a kind of star we have yet to discover?

3. The historical timeline of the Trek Earth already differs significantly from our own.

4. Monstrous amounts of energy available to relatively fragile and tiny beings. It's possible, I suppose, that Q is really a 500 meter diameter annihilation engine that chooses to project himself as a humanoid, but there are other examples(including Riker being given Q powers, Buxbridges?) that are more consistent with a higher global temperature and different physical constraints.

None of this is evidence that there is a physical law preventing the protagonists in Trek from acting intelligently.

Yes. Actually to be precise, I'm positing that the Trek universe is an easier place to get things done, thus they didn't have a need to evolve to be any smarter.

So in other words you are saying that somehow the mechanism of natural selection would have favoured the stupid rather than the most intelligent creatures?

There is a mountain of physical evidence for you to overcome. The humans in Star Trek look exactly like the humans in our reality, and their brain size is the same. It is supposed to be an alternate universe, so everything is the same as in our reality unless there is explicitly stated difference. For example the events in their reality in 1800ish would be the same as our reality in 1800ish, unless there was an explicit difference stated in the show.

This is almost as bad as the Darkstar "humans are different in the SW verse than our universe" hypothesis based on the X-Ray of Darth Vader's neck bones showing a total vertebrae replacement.

Brian

[Ghost Rider]

Show ANYWHERE in Trek, they've EVER indicated that their universe came about somehow differently.

1. The episode where Q takes Picard back to the 'beginning of life on earth' conflicts with the current best theories of abiogenesis. That this may have been the way the science writer thought it happened is for our purposes irrelevant.

Uh right, because that changes the physical universe to favor dumber people?

2. Stellar Mechanics appear to operate substantially differently than they do in our universe, unless you believe that every time we see stars undergoing global changes in small timescales it's because they are a kind of star we have yet to discover?

Favors dumber people again how?

Also demonstrate how much different not just making broad proclaimations because that's nothing more then cherry picking.

3. The historical timeline of the Trek Earth already differs significantly from our own.

No shit, dumbass. But this favors stupidity again, how?

This one is truly reaching amongst all four of trying to show that because their UNIVERSE is different, and not simply EVENTS.

4. Monstrous amounts of energy available to relatively fragile and tiny beings. It's possible, I suppose, that Q is really a 500 meter diameter annihilation engine that chooses to project himself as a humanoid, but there are other examples(including Riker being given Q powers, Buxbridges?) that are more consistent with a higher global temperature and different physical constraints.

Given we've seen Q use technology, there is a rather interesting debate wheter Q is a being of energy or not.

All in all you've cherry picked particular events that favor you, but given relativly little objective evidence that favors your position.

So please.

Show a piece of objective proof that Trek is following different laws then our own on a scale that would be irrefutable.

Basically you are asking people to accept a theory wherein you change some of the fundamental laws to go "See, they are dumber because the universe made it so!"

Yes. Actually to be precise, I'm positing that the Trek universe is an easier place to get things done, thus they didn't have a need to evolve to be any smarter.

And I stand corrected...this takes the cake of sheer wall of ignorance.

Nowhere did you show that any of this leads to people being dumber but merely have just postulated that this gives your hypothesis credence.

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

It's also entirely possible that the benefits of slightly unstable engineering philosophies may be worth the risk in the Trekverse. The Klingons may initally have created warships barely held together so they could fit as many big guns on them as possible, and the other powers decided that the small chance of the ships blowing up at the slightest touch was outweighed by the need to remain competitive with all the other major powers around them. Or perhaps adding safer warp containment systems would simply end up costing far too much for some reason we don't know, such as the required efficiency of transfer between the anti-matter pods and the core which might be compromised by easy disabling and ejection of the warp core.