Darth Vader inside a Cube

[Metrion Cascade]

This is hilarious. I'm talking to Darth Seinfeld. So any weapons fire at all causes an IDF malfunction that somehow results in spontaneous motion that wasn't caused by the weapon, and isn't coming from the engines? (I know it's not from the engines, because in some cases the ship is stationary, and if it's moving then the IDF already synchronized all internal motion with the ship's velocity.)

And this compares poorly to your alternate theory of "I'm just going to ignore the figures" how?

I'm saying Data was wrong. Just as you've said Spock was wrong about the Doomsday machine's neutronium hull, and that everyone on the E-A said they were going to the center of the galaxy and promptly went somewhere else. Then everyone got to this somewhere else, and kept saying they were at the center of the galaxy even though they all knew they weren't.

Every single time the ship is hit by any weapon? With such relatively tiny amounts of energy? And why the hell are the two even connected?

Everything on the E-D is connected. It's a shitty design.

I realize it's great fun to think this, but you're simply stating this highly inconsistent theory without trying to explain any of the inconsistencies:

A very weak weapon causes a malfunction, but far more powerful ones never cause worse malfunctions or permanent damage to the IDF.

An IDF failure somehow causes sudden motion that wasn't caused by the weapon, and isn't caused by the engines.

Nobody questions the design or tries to fix it.

The simpler explanation is that the IDF isn't designed to compensate for work done by anything other than the engines, and that beam weapons do work.

Why do you have to explain these? Because despite your statement that you didn't design the GCS, you're trying to design it (to an extent the writers didn't) with your argument. When you say "it's all interconnected," you are proposing a design flaw.

Why wouldn't the feedback go into a less essential system or one purpose-designed to prevent this? Why doesn't the malfunction last more than a second, and why doesn't it ever seem to get anyone's attention?

Because I didn't design the fucking thing. A bunch of idiots did.

Actually, since none of these systems exist and their workings have barely been designed at all, you can interpret their behavior to mean various things as to its theoretical design. I don't know how a lightsabre works and neither does anyone (or they'd build one), but I can extrapolate how it would work based on what I see it do. Which is precisely what you ARE doing, just with your anti-GCS slant.

We hardly ever (if at all) hear, "the inertial dampers took a beating, so let's look at them before we go to warp or change course or speed." If what you're saying is true, any weapons fire at all is reason to hold one's velocity - no course changes, no changes in speed - until the problem is investigated and repaired. I do consider the rocking an effect of how the shields work (they absorb what they can into the ship's EPS and the rest is transferred to the hull as work), but not an IDF malfunction that occurs at the drop of a hat.

Then you obviously can't do math. 2.1MJ of kinetic energy in a 4.5 million ton ship is precisely dick. Do the fucking math before you spout off your simple-minded smart-ass remarks. The only workable explanation comes from the ship's systems themselves screwing up.

If it's precisely dick (and accurate), then how does it cause the same malfunction as every single other weapon in the universe regardless of output? Why can the IDF handle enough energy to work on every gram of the 4,960,000 ton ship when going to warp, but not handle 2.1 MJ (precisely dick) of feedback - the equivalent of the work done in moving .0156% of the same mass a single FOOT? You call my questions smart-assed but make no attempt to answer them despite the fact that your laughable wanking of Starfleet incompetence mandates them being asked. No. 2.1 MJ didn't rock the ship. Nor did they cause an IDF malfunction. Why? Because the number is wrong. It doesn't make any sense even if by some miraculous stretch you're right about the IDF malfunction.

A design mistake that bad would be akin to wiring the antimatter containment straight to the shields.

Yes, and the designers are morons who did interconnect every goddamned system on the ship.

That's your assumption, which in this case you haven't even tried to back up. You "didn't design the goddamned thing" and refuse to try to explain your proposed malfunction (and hence your proposed design), but will defend it anyway.

It would actually make the shields such a liability that I'd rather have the bad guys hit the ship itself. At least then the IDF won't be the very first system damaged every single time we're hit.

Who said the ID system had to be damaged? I'm just talking about power system feedback which makes it hiccup.

And how does this feedback (which bears explanation since it's a far more complex proposition than mine) always cause the same "hiccup?" And why don't you try to explain how this "hiccup" causes sudden work on the ship to appear out of thin air?

It also bears repeating that this is assuming the figure was correct, which I don't assume even though this is very amusing.

Yet your alternate theory is that the shield is deliberately designed to handle incoming energy in the most damaging conceivable way

How is it damaging to try and (instead of just reflecting the energy) absorb some of it into systems designed to handle large amounts of energy?

[Darth Wong]

I'm saying Data was wrong. Just as you've said Spock was wrong about the Doomsday machine's neutronium hull, and that everyone on the E-A said they were going to the center of the galaxy and promptly went somewhere else. Then everyone got to this somewhere else, and kept saying they were at the center of the galaxy even though they all knew they weren't.

Wrong. In those cases, I showed how the claims made were simply not possible, and directly contradicted by observation. In your case, you dismiss a perfectly workable explanation on the basis of your assumptions that their tech must work a certain way. If you honestly think those are equivalent, you're either delusional or stupid.

Everything on the E-D is connected. It's a shitty design.

I realize it's great fun to think this, but you're simply stating this highly inconsistent theory without trying to explain any of the inconsistencies:

It is not a theory; it is an observation. Every single system on the ship is controlled by the same computer system, with no segregation whatsoever as we saw with the Ikonian computer virus. Power can be directly rerouted from any system to any other system, even from weapons into bridge consoles as we saw when the E-D was disabled by a "quantum filament". Lights often dim when the shields are hit. Deal with it.

A very weak weapon causes a malfunction, but far more powerful ones never cause worse malfunctions or permanent damage to the IDF.

Obviously, your massive ignorance of how power systems work is causing you to misinterpret my argument.

An IDF failure somehow causes sudden motion that wasn't caused by the weapon, and isn't caused by the engines.

No, there is no sudden motion, dumb-ass. If the ID system screws up, then its application of counter-forces to people on the ship screws up, and it jolts them around even though the ship hasn't moved.

Nobody questions the design or tries to fix it.

See holodeck. This is not new for the Federation.

The simpler explanation is that the IDF isn't designed to compensate for work done by anything other than the engines, and that beam weapons do work.

Through what means? Vapourizing material from a massless shield upon impact? Transfer of momentum even though the originating beam was fired from an insignificant miniscule fighter?

Why do you have to explain these? Because despite your statement that you didn't design the GCS, you're trying to design it (to an extent the writers didn't) with your argument. When you say "it's all interconnected," you are proposing a design flaw.

I am observing a fact. And design flaws in the E-D are legion. It's not my problem that you refuse to admit that.

Actually, since none of these systems exist and their workings have barely been designed at all, you can interpret their behavior to mean various things as to its theoretical design. I don't know how a lightsabre works and neither does anyone (or they'd build one), but I can extrapolate how it would work based on what I see it do. Which is precisely what you ARE doing, just with your anti-GCS slant.

Except that I am basing my claims off observations and logic and knowledge of how things work, while you are just spluttering.

If it's precisely dick (and accurate), then how does it cause the same malfunction as every single other weapon in the universe regardless of output?

Thank you for proving my point; it's obviously a blip in the system, not a work function. If it was work being done by the beam, then a more powerful beam would cause a much more powerful jolt. Instead, we see that the effects are unpredictable; perfectly acceptable under my theory, while incomprehensible under yours.

Why can the IDF handle enough energy to work on every gram of the 4,960,000 ton ship when going to warp, but not handle 2.1 MJ (precisely dick) of feedback - the equivalent of the work done in moving .0156% of the same mass a single FOOT?

For the same reason that a real power amplifier can pump 1500 watts but be significantly affected by a fractional-volt deviation in power supply, dumb-ass. If you can't be bothered to know anything about how real technology works, don't be so arrogant as to challenge those who do.

You call my questions smart-assed but make no attempt to answer them despite the fact that your laughable wanking of Starfleet incompetence mandates them being asked.

And nowhere have you proven that any of my specific claims are "laughable" except to state your own increduliy. Nowhere have you demonstrated that you even understand the most fundamental principles of physics. Nowhere have you demonstrated that you know anything about technology, or power systems, or even Star Trek history, since you do your best Comical Ali impression by simply denying that all of the E-D systems are interconnected or that it was incompetently designed despite the vast array of evidence I provided on my website.

No. 2.1 MJ didn't rock the ship. Nor did they cause an IDF malfunction. Why? Because the number is wrong. It doesn't make any sense even if by some miraculous stretch you're right about the IDF malfunction.

It makes sense if you actually listen instead of trying so hard to prove you're right that you're willing to throw observations out the window and invent new magical undefined phenomena just to cling to a point that you cannot save any other way.

Yes, and the designers are morons who did interconnect every goddamned system on the ship.

That's your assumption, which in this case you haven't even tried to back up.

Bullshit. I have a giant fucking website with a huge canon database which extensively backs this up. If you're too goddamned stupid to read the site to which this board is attached before presuming to comment on what I have or haven't done, that's not my problem.

You "didn't design the goddamned thing" and refuse to try to explain your proposed malfunction (and hence your proposed design), but will defend it anyway.

I already explained the proposed malfunction; a power system feedback which causes a slight hiccup in the controller for the ID system. The problem is that this explanation obviously went right over your head.

And how does this feedback (which bears explanation since it's a far more complex proposition than mine) always cause the same "hiccup?" And why don't you try to explain how this "hiccup" causes sudden work on the ship to appear out of thin air?

Countless possible ways. For example, a power supply spike which affects the low-voltage sensors which are used to control the ID system (a foregone conclusion given that the lights sometimes visibly dim during shield impacts), thus feeding it bad data which causes a slight miscorrection from the ID system's forcefields and effectively jolts everyone around. Sorry, I didn't realize I had to spell this out for you like a small child; you try so hard to pretend you're actually knowledgeable.

How is it damaging to try and (instead of just reflecting the energy) absorb some of it into systems designed to handle large amounts of energy?

Deliberately absorbing energy into your systems rather than reflecting it means that your ship will heat up, dumb-ass.

[Metrion Cascade]

And we have seen 10 MJ phase pistols hit people and knock them back instead of vaporizing them, by some means or another. Take it up with Lt. Reed.

The inconsistency of this phenomenon means that it cannot be an intrinsic characteristic of the phaser.

Who's ignoring figures now? Reed was not only working with the phase pistol day-in day-out. Data was scanning alien technology he'd never seen before, while suffering memory loss. God knows what the Satarrans had to do to him to achieve that, and the only other time this happened he also forgot what the elements were and a nice chunk of his vocabulary.

There are even more powerful weapons in Wars that kill people with no more dramatic effect than them dropping dead (or an arm falling off, as the case may be), even if they're unarmored. Both are examples of a weapon's visible effects being out of proportion with its stated power, and both need similar explanation.

It doesn't make sense to me that these same weapons that get hot enough to explode rocks and ignite fuel oil, never cause people to literally vaporize or catch fire, but they don't.

Maybe because people are not particularly flammable. I can ignite fuel oil with a match; does that mean I can make you catch fire by putting out a match on your arm? As for shattering rocks, that hardly requires enough energy to vapourize a man. If you're going to claim that A > B, you need to provide better reasoning than "it doesn't make sense to me". Your personal incredulity is not an argument.

But your assumption that every single thing that can be done wrong with a ship was done with the GCS is? And I wasn't just referring to the people themselves, but their uniforms, etc. Seeing the people themselves burning is not what came to mind when I mentioned that.

So obviously something in these weapons (and God knows how many other sci-fi weapons) causes their effects to operate far differently than those of sunlight or lasers.

And yet there are many, many incidents in which phasers on maximum power create no such effects.

And others in which they do, even on lower settings.

[Darth Wong]

The inconsistency of this phenomenon means that it cannot be an intrinsic characteristic of the phaser.

Who's ignoring figures now? Reed was not only working with the phase pistol day-in day-out. Data was scanning alien technology he'd never seen before, while suffering memory loss. God knows what the Satarrans had to do to him to achieve that, and the only other time this happened he also forgot what the elements were and a nice chunk of his vocabulary.

And what does this have to do with more powerful phasers not necessarily having more of a "push" effect than weaker ones?

There are even more powerful weapons in Wars that kill people with no more dramatic effect than them dropping dead (or an arm falling off, as the case may be), even if they're unarmored. Both are examples of a weapon's visible effects being out of proportion with its stated power, and both need similar explanation.

SW weapons are a red herring here, since they operate on different principles.

But your assumption that every single thing that can be done wrong with a ship was done with the GCS is?

I'm getting tired of your insistence that this is just an "assumption". Read the fucking site, dumb-fuck.

And I wasn't just referring to the people themselves, but their uniforms, etc. Seeing the people themselves burning is not what came to mind when I mentioned that.

So their uniforms are made of flame-retardant material; this inconceivable option had not occurred to you?

And yet there are many, many incidents in which phasers on maximum power create no such effects.

And others in which they do, even on lower settings.

Precisely, so it's INCONSISTENT, hence obviously not related to energy levels, hence your theory is dead. Game, set, and match.

[Cyborg Stan]

I realize it's great fun to think this, but you're simply stating this highly inconsistent theory without trying to explain any of the inconsistencies: <snip>

Star Trek Canon Database (Design)

And how does this feedback (which bears explanation since it's a far more complex proposition than mine) always cause the same "hiccup?" And why don't you try to explain how this "hiccup" causes sudden work on the ship to appear out of thin air?

TNG Season 5, ep 118 Cause and Effect : A decompressed shuttle bay is able to move the Enterprise-D a signficant amount in a short peroid of time. This, amoung other incidents suggest some kind of bizaare mass-lightening system.

In addition, the proposed theory would be that the ship actually does it to itself. You note that the ship interior shakes under impacts, where in space it should simply absorb the momentum instantly.

How is it damaging to try and (instead of just reflecting the energy) absorb some of it into systems designed to handle large amounts of energy?

Because systems can be overloaded. If a shield system attempts to absorb the energy, it means it's taking it into itself. Since most shield systems are inside the vessel, it's more or less giving a free ride for the destructive energy.

[Metrion Cascade]

I'm saying Data was wrong. Just as you've said Spock was wrong about the Doomsday machine's neutronium hull, and that everyone on the E-A said they were going to the center of the galaxy and promptly went somewhere else. Then everyone got to this somewhere else, and kept saying they were at the center of the galaxy even though they all knew they weren't.

Wrong. In those cases, I showed how the claims made were simply not possible, and directly contradicted by observation. In your case, you dismiss a perfectly workable explanation on the basis of your assumptions that their tech must work a certain way. If you honestly think those are equivalent, you're either delusional or stupid.

I dismiss the absolute, unquestionable validity of the 2.1 MJ figure as it was delivered by a damaged android analyzing alien technology through a computer that had been programmed to lie to the entire crew. While you state that an armory officer was wrong about a weapon he'd worked with for months, a larger example of which he actually helped build with spare materials onboard, because you assume that the 10 MJ he was referring to could only have been converted to heat on delivery. And no, your answers to the "center of the galaxy" and neutronium questions were not valid, not free from interpretation, or the best that were offered. You never addressed WHY the crew kept calling it the center of the galaxy when few if any of them had reason to lie. You denied the apparent reason for them to do so, without offering another one.

Why do you have to explain these? Because despite your statement that you didn't design the GCS, you're trying to design it (to an extent the writers didn't) with your argument. When you say "it's all interconnected," you are proposing a design flaw.

I am observing a fact. And design flaws in the E-D are legion. It's not my problem that you refuse to admit that.

Design flaws in something that doesn't exist are matters of endless interpretation. That some mistakes were made doesn't therefore mean every single mistake imaginable was made. A proposed design mistake still has to be apparent, and not inevitably contradict canon.

Actually, since none of these systems exist and their workings have barely been designed at all, you can interpret their behavior to mean various things as to its theoretical design. I don't know how a lightsabre works and neither does anyone (or they'd build one), but I can extrapolate how it would work based on what I see it do. Which is precisely what you ARE doing, just with your anti-GCS slant.

Except that I am basing my claims off observations and logic and knowledge of how things work, while you are just spluttering.

If it's precisely dick (and accurate), then how does it cause the same malfunction as every single other weapon in the universe regardless of output?

Thank you for proving my point; it's obviously a blip in the system, not a work function. If it was work being done by the beam, then a more powerful beam would cause a much more powerful jolt. Instead, we see that the effects are unpredictable; perfectly acceptable under my theory, while incomprehensible under yours.

I never said that the work a beam weapon did would be directly proportional to its total output. That would vary from beam to beam - a laser's effects are primarily thermal, while a tractor beam's effects are primarily kinetic, while a phaser on kill will remove an object from normal space-time.

Why can the IDF handle enough energy to work on every gram of the 4,960,000 ton ship when going to warp, but not handle 2.1 MJ (precisely dick) of feedback - the equivalent of the work done in moving .0156% of the same mass a single FOOT?

For the same reason that a real power amplifier can pump 1500 watts but be significantly affected by a fractional-volt deviation in power supply, dumb-ass. If you can't be bothered to know anything about how real technology works, don't be so arrogant as to challenge those who do.

But the energy from a weapon impact is not a variation in how the energy is being delivered (power being transferred by EPS) to the rest of the ship. It is a variation in quantity.

You call my questions smart-assed but make no attempt to answer them despite the fact that your laughable wanking of Starfleet incompetence mandates them being asked.

And nowhere have you proven that any of my specific claims are "laughable" except to state your own increduliy. Nowhere have you demonstrated that you even understand the most fundamental principles of physics. Nowhere have you demonstrated that you know anything about technology, or power systems, or even Star Trek history, since you do your best Comical Ali impression by simply denying that all of the E-D systems are interconnected or that it was incompetently designed despite the vast array of evidence I provided on my website.

It is you who think a heat engine works like an electric power amplifier, and you who assume that a given set of mistakes necessitates every other possible mistake being made.

No. 2.1 MJ didn't rock the ship. Nor did they cause an IDF malfunction. Why? Because the number is wrong. It doesn't make any sense even if by some miraculous stretch you're right about the IDF malfunction.

It makes sense if you actually listen instead of trying so hard to prove you're right that you're willing to throw observations out the window and invent new magical undefined phenomena just to cling to a point that you cannot save any other way.

Like your "some sort of exotic massless particles" in SW blasters?

Yes, and the designers are morons who did interconnect every goddamned system on the ship.

That's your assumption, which in this case you haven't even tried to back up.

Bullshit. I have a giant fucking website with a huge canon database which extensively backs this up. If you're too goddamned stupid to read the site to which this board is attached before presuming to comment on what I have or haven't done, that's not my problem.

You (rightly) demonstrate that every system is controlled by the computer, and that EPS power can be rerouted between systems very easily. This does not mean they are always connected to each other, and does not mean the computer has been programmed to connect the shields to the IDF whenever they're raised.

You "didn't design the goddamned thing" and refuse to try to explain your proposed malfunction (and hence your proposed design), but will defend it anyway.

I already explained the proposed malfunction; a power system feedback which causes a slight hiccup in the controller for the ID system. The problem is that this explanation obviously went right over your head.

Since when does a power surge cause a computer to miscalculate (and instantly resume normal functioning) instead of being physically damaged?

And how does this feedback (which bears explanation since it's a far more complex proposition than mine) always cause the same "hiccup?" And why don't you try to explain how this "hiccup" causes sudden work on the ship to appear out of thin air?

Countless possible ways. For example, a power supply spike which affects the low-voltage sensors which are used to control the ID system (a foregone conclusion given that the lights sometimes visibly dim during shield impacts), thus feeding it bad data which causes a slight miscorrection from the ID system's forcefields and effectively jolts everyone around. Sorry, I didn't realize I had to spell this out for you like a small child; you try so hard to pretend you're actually knowledgeable.

To clarify...you think the IDF is electrically powered, and you think it can jolt the crew separately from the ship instead of suddenly moving the whole thing without anyone feeling it?

How is it damaging to try and (instead of just reflecting the energy) absorb some of it into systems designed to handle large amounts of energy?

Deliberately absorbing energy into your systems rather than reflecting it means that your ship will heat up, dumb-ass.

If your own power generation is constant, and you can't store or re-radiate energy you absorb. Nor am I proposing that the shields must absorb all of the energy and reflect none of it.

[Metrion Cascade]

The inconsistency of this phenomenon means that it cannot be an intrinsic characteristic of the phaser.

Who's ignoring figures now? Reed was not only working with the phase pistol day-in day-out. Data was scanning alien technology he'd never seen before, while suffering memory loss. God knows what the Satarrans had to do to him to achieve that, and the only other time this happened he also forgot what the elements were and a nice chunk of his vocabulary.

And what does this have to do with more powerful phasers not necessarily having more of a "push" effect than weaker ones?

The effects are not directly proportional to the power setting. That phasers on kill remove a person's whole body from space-time doesn't mean phasers on stun will remove a proportionally smaller amount of matter. The lower setting delivers the beam's various components at different ratios.

There are even more powerful weapons in Wars that kill people with no more dramatic effect than them dropping dead (or an arm falling off, as the case may be), even if they're unarmored. Both are examples of a weapon's visible effects being out of proportion with its stated power, and both need similar explanation.

SW weapons are a red herring here, since they operate on different principles.

But your assumption that every single thing that can be done wrong with a ship was done with the GCS is?

I'm getting tired of your insistence that this is just an "assumption". Read the fucking site, dumb-fuck.

Point me to the page on the site canonically explaining that the IDF controller is always connected to the shields.

And I wasn't just referring to the people themselves, but their uniforms, etc. Seeing the people themselves burning is not what came to mind when I mentioned that.

So their uniforms are made of flame-retardant material; this inconceivable option had not occurred to you?

All the clothes any one was ever wearing when they were hit in Trek were flame retardant? Fair enough. There are "phaser burns" in varying degrees, but not described well enough to determine what sort of heat phasers at lower settings deliver.

And yet there are many, many incidents in which phasers on maximum power create no such effects.

And others in which they do, even on lower settings.

Precisely, so it's INCONSISTENT, hence obviously not related to energy levels, hence your theory is dead. Game, set, and match.

Cute. I was saying each effect is not necessarily proportional to total energy output.

[Metrion Cascade]

And how does this feedback (which bears explanation since it's a far more complex proposition than mine) always cause the same "hiccup?" And why don't you try to explain how this "hiccup" causes sudden work on the ship to appear out of thin air?

TNG Season 5, ep 118 Cause and Effect : A decompressed shuttle bay is able to move the Enterprise-D a signficant amount in a short peroid of time. This, amoung other incidents suggest some kind of bizaare mass-lightening system.

Oh, I'm certain there's mass lightening. That's supposedly what the subspace fields generated by the impulse and warp engines are for. But you still have to apply some force to move that mass.

In addition, the proposed theory would be that the ship actually does it to itself. You note that the ship interior shakes under impacts, where in space it should simply absorb the momentum instantly.

How is it damaging to try and (instead of just reflecting the energy) absorb some of it into systems designed to handle large amounts of energy?

Because systems can be overloaded. If a shield system attempts to absorb the energy, it means it's taking it into itself. Since most shield systems are inside the vessel, it's more or less giving a free ride for the destructive energy.

By absorbing, I mean the shields transfer some of the energy they receive to the EPS system (in the same form as all the other energy), and either that energy is stored in batteries, or the ship's own power generation decreases until the energy from the shields is used. An overload would be an overabundance of outside energy that is too much for the shields to transfer to the EPS, or too much for the EPS itself. Not to say that all of the energy should be absorbed, but not all of it can be reflected either.

[Sarevok]

TNG Season 5, ep 118 Cause and Effect : A decompressed shuttle bay is able to move the Enterprise-D a signficant amount in a short peroid of time. This, amoung other incidents suggest some kind of bizaare mass-lightening system.

In that incident another ship was on a collision course with the Enterprise. Data tried to use the tractor beam to move the incoming ship away but failed. The Enterprise was hit in the nacelle and blew up.

Fortunately the Enterprise was caught in a time loop so this incident continued to repeat untill Data realised that the tractor beams won't work and instead filled the shuttle bay with gas which when decompressed pushed the Enterprise away.

This would suggest some serious reduction in mass. The exact values are unknown but this indicates that there is some form of "mass lightening" system on Federation starships.

[Metrion Cascade]

TNG Season 5, ep 118 Cause and Effect : A decompressed shuttle bay is able to move the Enterprise-D a signficant amount in a short peroid of time. This, amoung other incidents suggest some kind of bizaare mass-lightening system.

In that incident another ship was on a collision course with the Enterprise. Data tried to use the tractor beam to move the incoming ship away but failed. The Enterprise was hit in the nacelle and blew up.

Fortunately the Enterprise was caught in a time loop so this incident continued to repeat untill Data realised that the tractor beams won't work and instead filled the shuttle bay with gas which when decompressed pushed the Enterprise away.

This would suggest some serious reduction in mass. The exact values are unknown but this indicates that there is some form of "mass lightening" system on Federation starships.

I think we all agree on this.

[Sarevok]

think we all agree on this.

However while we may agree with this we do not take mass reduction into account when performing calculations on Star Trek ships.

[Metrion Cascade]

think we all agree on this.

However while we may agree with this we do not take mass reduction into account when performing calculations on Star Trek ships.

The mass reduction is relative to normal space. A weapon fired at a ship should enter the same subspace field that's reducing the ship's mass. Once inside that field, it encounters a ship that, relative to it, has not been mass-reduced. If you believe the IDF is doing the work, the IDF is also inside the subspace field, and for it the ship still masses 4,960,000 tons.

[Darth Wong]

I dismiss the absolute, unquestionable validity of the 2.1 MJ figure as it was delivered by a damaged android analyzing alien technology through a computer that had been programmed to lie to the entire crew.

And do you also dismiss every other MW-range figure spoken on Star Trek? The E-D shook from 400MW blasts in "Survivors" that only lasted a fraction of a second; is this also because of "damage" to Data's brain?

While you state that an armory officer was wrong about a weapon he'd worked with for months, a larger example of which he actually helped build with spare materials onboard, because you assume that the 10 MJ he was referring to could only have been converted to heat on delivery.

No, I actually don't give two shits about "Enterprise" because I don't think it should be considered canon. Star Trek's use of figures has become far worse since the Age of Braga. Voyager supposedly features a terawatt alien hand weapon, for fuck's sake. And there is always the possibility that a hand weapon really WOULD jolt the Enterprise; its systems are so fragile that they were afraid to enter an inert 5km wide asteroid because they were afraid of its magnetic and gravitational fields (see "Pegasus").

And no, your answers to the "center of the galaxy" and neutronium questions were not valid, not free from interpretation, or the best that were offered. You never addressed WHY the crew kept calling it the center of the galaxy when few if any of them had reason to lie. You denied the apparent reason for them to do so, without offering another one.

Oh really! So the fact that the centre of the galaxy looks nothing at all like what they encountered means nothing to you? Or are you just so ignorant that you don't realize it's simply impossible for that to be the centre of the galaxy? Or that a technology which takes 70 years to travel 70,000 light-years cannot reasonably be expected to travel 50,000 light years in a few hours?

Design flaws in something that doesn't exist are matters of endless interpretation. That some mistakes were made doesn't therefore mean every single mistake imaginable was made. A proposed design mistake still has to be apparent, and not inevitably contradict canon.

And you have not shown how it contradicts canon. Moreover, everything is a matter of interpretation, but my interpretation is based on fact while you simply splutter. You have not named any canon facts to back up your theory over mine; you simply deny my theory because you don't like it.

I never said that the work a beam weapon did would be directly proportional to its total output. That would vary from beam to beam - a laser's effects are primarily thermal, while a tractor beam's effects are primarily kinetic, while a phaser on kill will remove an object from normal space-time.

A tractor beam is a completely different kind of beam than a phaser beam. Don't change the subject. I see that now you're adding even MORE bullshit on top of your theory: now they can adjust the proportion of a phaser beam which contains this magical "push" element of yours? And when do they make this adjustment? How do they do it, when the only controls on a Type II phaser adjust the power level?

But the energy from a weapon impact is not a variation in how the energy is being delivered (power being transferred by EPS) to the rest of the ship. It is a variation in quantity.

You honestly don't understand the concept of reactive power, do you?

It is you who think a heat engine works like an electric power amplifier, and you who assume that a given set of mistakes necessitates every other possible mistake being made.

Stating your assumption as fact. Nowhere is there the slightest suggestion that shields are a heat engine, and in fact, there is onscreen canon support for the theory that they absorb and then retransmit energy directly (just look at the way they light up, for example). Moreover, it is irrelevant since the INERTIAL DAMPER system is what I'm comparing to the power amplifier, and such a system WOULD contain something like a power amplifier in its major components.

Like your "some sort of exotic massless particles" in SW blasters?

Phasers have an exotic massless particle too; the difference between you and me is that I accept what massless particles do, and one of the things they DON'T do is convert their energy content directly into kinetic energy IN VIOLATION OF CONSERVATION OF MOMENTUM, dumb-ass. The beam has a very small amount of momentum; if it applies an impulse far greater than that upon contact, then it has just violated one of the most fundamental laws in physics. Your theory, as usual, is based on ignorance and a lot of hand-waving.

You (rightly) demonstrate that every system is controlled by the computer, and that EPS power can be rerouted between systems very easily. This does not mean they are always connected to each other, and does not mean the computer has been programmed to connect the shields to the IDF whenever they're raised.

The fact that it can be rerouted with keyboard commands means that it IS interconnected at the power-system level, and that stupid computer programming comment is a ridiculous strawman.

Since when does a power surge cause a computer to miscalculate (and instantly resume normal functioning) instead of being physically damaged?

It happens all the time in real life, idiot. Power spikes and sags can cause data corruption in the computer. They can also cause briefly inaccurate readings from powered sensors, depending on how they work.

To clarify...you think the IDF is electrically powered, and you think it can jolt the crew separately from the ship instead of suddenly moving the whole thing without anyone feeling it?

Since the ID system is not a propulsion system and the only physically intelligible way it can work is to apply force to people in order to counteract the effects of acceleration, it is painfully obvious that it MUST apply force to people separately of the ship without moving the whole ship around. What the fuck do YOU think the ID system is?

If your own power generation is constant, and you can't store or re-radiate energy you absorb. Nor am I proposing that the shields must absorb all of the energy and reflect none of it.

If you "absorb" high-kiloton or megaton-level energy, you vapourize. The laws of thermodynamics do not allow you to magically convert the incoming energy into a low-entropy storage medium such as matter and antimatter. The only way for the system to process the energy itself is to radiate it out as quickly as it receives it, or to have some kind of monster heat sink. And even if this were true, it would only exacerbate the problem of disrupting the ship's power systems, rather than supporting your theory about phasers having a magical "push" component which violates conservation of momentum.

You have not provided a shred of evidence to support your theory over mine, so all you do is splutter that my theory is not absolutely proven. I particularly like the way you use "not free from interpretation" as some kind of disproof of validity. In case no one ever sat you down and explained this to you, you have to show how the interpretation is WRONG.

[Spanky The Dolphin]

Why has she not been VIed yet?

[Howedar]

Rarely is a person VIed for a single thread.

[Connor MacLeod]

Why has she not been VIed yet?

If we VI'ed every person on this board for sheer ignorance or some measure of stupidity exhibited, not only would that dilute the overall point of having the title, but a substantial number of regulars on this board (in my humble opinion) would be amply deserving of the label.

[Slartibartfast]

Since when does a power surge cause a computer to miscalculate (and instantly resume normal functioning) instead of being physically damaged?

Ever heard of the Pentium?
Just the fact that overclocking causes a processor to miscalculate, not necessarily get fried

Fixed quoting...it does come from her

[CaptJodan]

I would just like to point out that in "Survivors" the value stated during the episode was 400 gigawatts, not megawatts.

Worf : "Shields are down. Captain, they hit us with four hundred
gigawatts of particle energy!"
Picard : "Damage?"
Worf : "Superficial. But I am having trouble reassembling the shields."
[Vessel fires again]
Worf : "Shields down. There is thermal damage to the hull."
Data : "The warship is capable of striking us with far more powerful
bursts."

Granted, I did take this from GK's site, but I believe the quote at least is accurate, if nothing else. Just a small correction. (Which I think Wong already knows anyway)

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Since when does a power surge cause a computer to miscalculate (and instantly resume normal functioning) instead of being physically damaged?

Ever heard of the Pentium?
Just the fact that overclocking causes a processor to miscalculate, not necessarily get fried

Quoting error. The above was from Metrion Cascade, I think. And Jodan, I don't think you have anything to worry about. IIRC, the same thing about Survivors was in Wong's database

[Darth Wong]

I would just like to point out that in "Survivors" the value stated during the episode was 400 gigawatts, not megawatts.

That was the blast that brought down their shields. In the previous engagement, the ship fired megawatt-range bursts that did no damage but still caused the usual light-dimming, bridge shaking effect.

[Durandal]

I would just like to point out that in "Survivors" the value stated during the episode was 400 gigawatts, not megawatts.

Worf : "Shields are down. Captain, they hit us with four hundred
gigawatts of particle energy!"
Picard : "Damage?"
Worf : "Superficial. But I am having trouble reassembling the shields."
[Vessel fires again]
Worf : "Shields down. There is thermal damage to the hull."
Data : "The warship is capable of striking us with far more powerful
bursts."

Granted, I did take this from GK's site, but I believe the quote at least is accurate, if nothing else. Just a small correction. (Which I think Wong already knows anyway)

The quote is essentially meaningless. Watts are a unit of power, not energy.

[Metrion Cascade]

And no, your answers to the "center of the galaxy" and neutronium questions were not valid, not free from interpretation, or the best that were offered. You never addressed WHY the crew kept calling it the center of the galaxy when few if any of them had reason to lie. You denied the apparent reason for them to do so, without offering another one.

Oh really! So the fact that the centre of the galaxy looks nothing at all like what they encountered means nothing to you?

I've never heard of a Khan Noonien Singh or lost any friends in the Eugenics Wars or bought any computers made by Chronowerks. These things are still canon. It's another reality.

Or are you just so ignorant that you don't realize it's simply impossible for that to be the centre of the galaxy? Or that a technology which takes 70 years to travel 70,000 light-years cannot reasonably be expected to travel 50,000 light years in a few hours?

Still no explanations. Here are some possibilities. Warp highways (natural phenomena that make warp drive a hell of a lot faster than it would be on its own, and don't last more than a few decades). If you did consider Enterprise canon, this would explain the five minutes it took to get to Kronos in the pilot (and God knows how many other ridiculous travel times in Trek). Another possibility - Sybok was crazy, referring to some spiritual center instead of the literal center, and the unbrainwashed crew members decided to humor him to stay alive.

Design flaws in something that doesn't exist are matters of endless interpretation. That some mistakes were made doesn't therefore mean every single mistake imaginable was made. A proposed design mistake still has to be apparent, and not inevitably contradict canon.

And you have not shown how it contradicts canon. Moreover, everything is a matter of interpretation, but my interpretation is based on fact while you simply splutter. You have not named any canon facts to back up your theory over mine; you simply deny my theory because you don't like it.

I never said that the work a beam weapon did would be directly proportional to its total output. That would vary from beam to beam - a laser's effects are primarily thermal, while a tractor beam's effects are primarily kinetic, while a phaser on kill will remove an object from normal space-time.

A tractor beam is a completely different kind of beam than a phaser beam. Don't change the subject. I see that now you're adding even MORE bullshit on top of your theory: now they can adjust the proportion of a phaser beam which contains this magical "push" element of yours? And when do they make this adjustment? How do they do it, when the only controls on a Type II phaser adjust the power level?

The individual power levels have never been described in units of measure but in terms of function - "stun, heavy stun, kill, vaporize, etc." Each setting could have the beam's components in different ratios without the user having to set them directly. And yes, hand phasers and phaser rifles are insanely complex weapons (or more than one weapon in a single housing) that can fire beams, pulses, cones, have been called particle weapons (First Contact), and can even carry solid objects in the beam (Borg nanoprobes).

To clarify...you think the IDF is electrically powered, and you think it can jolt the crew separately from the ship instead of suddenly moving the whole thing without anyone feeling it?

Since the ID system is not a propulsion system and the only physically intelligible way it can work is to apply force to people in order to counteract the effects of acceleration, it is painfully obvious that it MUST apply force to people separately of the ship without moving the whole ship around. What the fuck do YOU think the ID system is?

I'm not saying the IDF moves anything relative to itself. Not the people, not the ship. I'm saying it spreads the work from the propulsion systems to every atom inside the ship, person or not. How many non-crewmember objects and parts of the ship aren't strong enough to stay in one piece (or in place) without inertial dampening? Bioneural gelpacks in Ziploc bags, pots and pans in the galley, books on shelves, Data's cat, potted plants, cargo containers that we never see tied down (the Navy has classes on securing loose items), plastic computer consoles and chairs on hinges, flimsy phaser cases that wobble when you remove the weapon. Maybe the structural integrity field takes care of bulkheads and those six-inch-thick nacelle struts, but not every single console and unsecured inanimate object. For the IDF to individually target every atom in a thousand people and nothing else when internal security sensors can't do it without commbadges is a hell of a trick.

If your own power generation is constant, and you can't store or re-radiate energy you absorb. Nor am I proposing that the shields must absorb all of the energy and reflect none of it.

If you "absorb" high-kiloton or megaton-level energy, you vapourize. The laws of thermodynamics do not allow you to magically convert the incoming energy into a low-entropy storage medium such as matter and antimatter. The only way for the system to process the energy itself is to radiate it out as quickly as it receives it, or to have some kind of monster heat sink. And even if this were true, it would only exacerbate the problem of disrupting the ship's power systems, rather than supporting your theory about phasers having a magical "push" component which violates conservation of momentum.

I don't mean all the weapon's energy, and I don't mean it can be turned to antimatter (although batteries have been mentioned). I'm saying that shields can't reflect all of the energy delivered to them, and what they absorb has to go somewhere. I think that somewhere is the EPS. Let's say the shields transfer 50 GW to the EPS from a weapon hitting them, just for example. Why can't the warp core decrease in power output to maintain the EPS temperature (I hope it's not running at full capacity all the time), and then return to previous levels when the 50GW are used up and the EPS starts cooling off? If this were the case, shield damage could be a result of:

- too much energy for the shields to reflect and reradiate and absorb (there must be capacities for each)
- energy in a form the shields can't reflect, reradiate, or absorb

Damage to the ship's other systems caused by damage to the shields could be in the form of:

- too much energy for ship's service EPS to handle (consoles go boom, lights go out)

[Darth Wong]

I've never heard of a Khan Noonien Singh or lost any friends in the Eugenics Wars or bought any computers made by Chronowerks. These things are still canon. It's another reality.

Oh, I see. You're employing the "it's not our reality so we can pretty much ignore everything we know about physics and cosmology" cop-out. Why didn't you say this right at the beginning so we could simply ignore your bullshit and be done with it?

Still no explanations. Here are some possibilities. Warp highways (natural phenomena that make warp drive a hell of a lot faster than it would be on its own, and don't last more than a few decades). If you did consider Enterprise canon, this would explain the five minutes it took to get to Kronos in the pilot (and God knows how many other ridiculous travel times in Trek). Another possibility - Sybok was crazy, referring to some spiritual center instead of the literal center, and the unbrainwashed crew members decided to humor him to stay alive.

The latter possibility (which is basically what I'm saying; that they were not at the centre of the galaxy) has the distinct advantage of not requiring that we invent any new phenomena. You really don't understand Occam's Razor, do you?

The individual power levels have never been described in units of measure but in terms of function - "stun, heavy stun, kill, vaporize, etc." Each setting could have the beam's components in different ratios without the user having to set them directly. And yes, hand phasers and phaser rifles are insanely complex weapons (or more than one weapon in a single housing) that can fire beams, pulses, cones, have been called particle weapons (First Contact), and can even carry solid objects in the beam (Borg nanoprobes).

Bullshit. They have to be modified to do these various things you cite (and I'd love to see the source for somebody firing Borg nanoprobes out of a phaser); it is not an easy user adjustment. We've seen the controls on a hand phaser, and they're nothing more than "power up" and "power down" buttons. When they want to do something more interesting, they have to monkey around with its innards, as we saw Picard doing in STFC when Lily interrupted him (ah yes, another example of a claim which I make and can back up, while you have yet to back up any of your claims with evidence, sources, etc).

I'm not saying the IDF moves anything relative to itself. Not the people, not the ship. I'm saying it spreads the work from the propulsion systems to every atom inside the ship, person or not. How many non-crewmember objects and parts of the ship aren't strong enough to stay in one piece (or in place) without inertial dampening? Bioneural gelpacks in Ziploc bags, pots and pans in the galley, books on shelves, Data's cat, potted plants, cargo containers that we never see tied down (the Navy has classes on securing loose items), plastic computer consoles and chairs on hinges, flimsy phaser cases that wobble when you remove the weapon.

I love the way you say basically the same thing I'm saying but you're so thick-headed that you think you just fashioned a rebuttal

Get it through your cemented skull: the ID system cannot spread out the effects of acceleration without applying force to everything in the ship. And yes, this includes the chairs and tables; why wouldn't it?

Maybe the structural integrity field takes care of bulkheads and those six-inch-thick nacelle struts, but not every single console and unsecured inanimate object. For the IDF to individually target every atom in a thousand people and nothing else when internal security sensors can't do it without commbadges is a hell of a trick.

This is perhaps the dumbest point you've made yet. Why does the ID system have to "individually target every atom in a thousand people" in order to apply a force to them all? Take a thousand people, put them on the ground, and gravity applies force to all of them. Does it "individually target every atom"? No, it simply applies a force which happens to affect all of those atoms. No deliberate targeting of individual atoms is required.

I don't mean all the weapon's energy, and I don't mean it can be turned to antimatter (although batteries have been mentioned).

Ah yes, batteries which don't vapourize from instantly absorbing a few megatons

I'm saying that shields can't reflect all of the energy delivered to them, and what they absorb has to go somewhere.

And what I'm saying (repeatedly, but it doesn't seem to be penetrating your wall of ignorance) is that any bleedthrough might affect the power systems, thus causing disruption of shipboard systems thanks to the E-D's lack of component isolation.

I think that somewhere is the EPS. Let's say the shields transfer 50 GW to the EPS from a weapon hitting them, just for example. Why can't the warp core decrease in power output to maintain the EPS temperature (I hope it's not running at full capacity all the time), and then return to previous levels when the 50GW are used up and the EPS starts cooling off?

Why can't it do so instantly and perfectly, with no blip whatsoever in the power transmission system? You honestly can't figure out the answer to that question for yourself?

If this were the case, shield damage could be a result of:

- too much energy for the shields to reflect and reradiate and absorb (there must be capacities for each)
- energy in a form the shields can't reflect, reradiate, or absorb

Duh. How does this support your claim that phasers can ignore conservation of momentum by magically converting some of their energy directly to far more movement in the target than their actual momentum would create?

Damage to the ship's other systems caused by damage to the shields could be in the form of:

- too much energy for ship's service EPS to handle (consoles go boom, lights go out)

And you honestly can't figure out why the inertial damper system might be affected by any of this heavy disruption of power which makes lights blink out and bridge consoles explode

PS. I'm going to assume that the points you chose not to answer were due to you simply not having an answer.

[Metrion Cascade]

I've never heard of a Khan Noonien Singh or lost any friends in the Eugenics Wars or bought any computers made by Chronowerks. These things are still canon. It's another reality.

Oh, I see. You're employing the "it's not our reality so we can pretty much ignore everything we know about physics and cosmology" cop-out. Why didn't you say this right at the beginning so we could simply ignore your bullshit and be done with it?

No. I'm saying that there are obvious contradictions, some of which you accept as part of the story and some you don't.

Still no explanations. Here are some possibilities. Warp highways (natural phenomena that make warp drive a hell of a lot faster than it would be on its own, and don't last more than a few decades). If you did consider Enterprise canon, this would explain the five minutes it took to get to Kronos in the pilot (and God knows how many other ridiculous travel times in Trek). Another possibility - Sybok was crazy, referring to some spiritual center instead of the literal center, and the unbrainwashed crew members decided to humor him to stay alive.

The latter possibility (which is basically what I'm saying; that they were not at the centre of the galaxy) has the distinct advantage of not requiring that we invent any new phenomena. You really don't understand Occam's Razor, do you?

The individual power levels have never been described in units of measure but in terms of function - "stun, heavy stun, kill, vaporize, etc." Each setting could have the beam's components in different ratios without the user having to set them directly. And yes, hand phasers and phaser rifles are insanely complex weapons (or more than one weapon in a single housing) that can fire beams, pulses, cones, have been called particle weapons (First Contact), and can even carry solid objects in the beam (Borg nanoprobes).

Bullshit. They have to be modified to do these various things you cite (and I'd love to see the source for somebody firing Borg nanoprobes out of a phaser); it is not an easy user adjustment. We've seen the controls on a hand phaser, and they're nothing more than "power up" and "power down" buttons. When they want to do something more interesting, they have to monkey around with its innards, as we saw Picard doing in STFC when Lily interrupted him (ah yes, another example of a claim which I make and can back up, while you have yet to back up any of your claims with evidence, sources, etc).

The only episode I can name regarding phaser rifles is VOY "In The Flesh." There is another episode in which a member of Species 8472 gets aboard, but I can't remember the name. And of course, the ship's phasers do it several times, including "Scorpion, Part 2."

I'm not saying the IDF moves anything relative to itself. Not the people, not the ship. I'm saying it spreads the work from the propulsion systems to every atom inside the ship, person or not. How many non-crewmember objects and parts of the ship aren't strong enough to stay in one piece (or in place) without inertial dampening? Bioneural gelpacks in Ziploc bags, pots and pans in the galley, books on shelves, Data's cat, potted plants, cargo containers that we never see tied down (the Navy has classes on securing loose items), plastic computer consoles and chairs on hinges, flimsy phaser cases that wobble when you remove the weapon.

I love the way you say basically the same thing I'm saying but you're so thick-headed that you think you just fashioned a rebuttal

Get it through your cemented skull: the ID system cannot spread out the effects of acceleration without applying force to everything in the ship. And yes, this includes the chairs and tables; why wouldn't it?

Yes, this is what I mean. As opposed to only moving the people.

Maybe the structural integrity field takes care of bulkheads and those six-inch-thick nacelle struts, but not every single console and unsecured inanimate object. For the IDF to individually target every atom in a thousand people and nothing else when internal security sensors can't do it without commbadges is a hell of a trick.

This is perhaps the dumbest point you've made yet. Why does the ID system have to "individually target every atom in a thousand people" in order to apply a force to them all? Take a thousand people, put them on the ground, and gravity applies force to all of them. Does it "individually target every atom"? No, it simply applies a force which happens to affect all of those atoms. No deliberate targeting of individual atoms is required.

I'm saying the IDF can't target only the people and can't target individual atoms, as a rebuttal to:

Since the ID system is not a propulsion system and the only physically intelligible way it can work is to apply force to people in order to counteract the effects of acceleration, it is painfully obvious that it MUST apply force to people separately of the ship without moving the whole ship around. What the fuck do YOU think the ID system is?

I don't mean all the weapon's energy, and I don't mean it can be turned to antimatter (although batteries have been mentioned).

Ah yes, batteries which don't vapourize from instantly absorbing a few megatons

I'm saying that shields can't reflect all of the energy delivered to them, and what they absorb has to go somewhere.

And what I'm saying (repeatedly, but it doesn't seem to be penetrating your wall of ignorance) is that any bleedthrough might affect the power systems, thus causing disruption of shipboard systems thanks to the E-D's lack of component isolation.

I think that somewhere is the EPS. Let's say the shields transfer 50 GW to the EPS from a weapon hitting them, just for example. Why can't the warp core decrease in power output to maintain the EPS temperature (I hope it's not running at full capacity all the time), and then return to previous levels when the 50GW are used up and the EPS starts cooling off?

Why can't it do so instantly and perfectly, with no blip whatsoever in the power transmission system? You honestly can't figure out the answer to that question for yourself?

I'd say that this is what happens when the ship is hit and no damage is reported. And I didn't say the power system wouldn't suddenly have more power from the shields to deal with. I'm saying that it would, and to prevent this from damaging the EPS, the warp core would slow down its power output. The ship's power systems must be designed for power transients to handle going to (or dropping out of) warp, firing weapons, raising shields, etc.

If this were the case, shield damage could be a result of:

- too much energy for the shields to reflect and reradiate and absorb (there must be capacities for each)
- energy in a form the shields can't reflect, reradiate, or absorb

Duh. How does this support your claim that phasers can ignore conservation of momentum by magically converting some of their energy directly to far more movement in the target than their actual momentum would create?

I never said this had anything to do with phasers. And if you won't accept that (yes, even contradictory to real physics) there are energy beams and fields in Trek and other sci-fi that move things without transferring momentum, that generate artificial gravity and cancel it out, feel free.

Damage to the ship's other systems caused by damage to the shields could be in the form of:

- too much energy for ship's service EPS to handle (consoles go boom, lights go out)

And you honestly can't figure out why the inertial damper system might be affected by any of this heavy disruption of power which makes lights blink out and bridge consoles explode

Every single time, even with overloads that don't affect anything else?

[Metrion Cascade]

Bullshit. They have to be modified to do these various things you cite (and I'd love to see the source for somebody firing Borg nanoprobes out of a phaser); it is not an easy user adjustment. We've seen the controls on a hand phaser, and they're nothing more than "power up" and "power down" buttons. When they want to do something more interesting, they have to monkey around with its innards, as we saw Picard doing in STFC when Lily interrupted him (ah yes, another example of a claim which I make and can back up, while you have yet to back up any of your claims with evidence, sources, etc).

Silliness I forgot to address in this paragraph:

- that the controls on a hand phaser are arranged in a straight line doesn't mean they're a linear power scale.
- there must be more controls on a hand phaser than we've seen, since Data rather easily set one to wide beam in TNG "Arsenal of Freedom" without dismantling it.
- that a hand phaser only has this "up/down" setting (and apparently wide beam too) says nothing about phaser rifles, which have far more controls. We have also seen these weapons set on wide beam without being taken apart (VOY "Basics Part I"), and even, with a few taps on the controls, set to kill the next person who fired them (VOY "Basics Part II," "Worst Case Scenario").