Gahhh!!! Frustration with debating with some Trekkies

[Star Wars 888]

Apparently, these ignorant Star Trek fans (I don't mean to offend all Star Trek fans, only some of them) try and counter the huge difference in reactor power (200 trillion gigawatts from an Acclamator vs about 15 billion gigawatts for the latest Enterprise) by claiming that the Star Wars figure is "gigawatts total" and the Star Trek figure is "giawatts per second".

They also think that the Star Wars Episode II Incredible Cross-Sections is "non canon and outdated" and take figure of speeches literally.

Oh, and they think that the Enterprise can survive a planet busting attack.

Sorry if this is an annoying rant, but that's one of the reasons (not the only one though) why I've joined this forum.

[Darth Hoth]

Apparently, these ignorant Star Trek fans (I don't mean to offend all Star Trek fans, only some of them) try and counter the huge difference in reactor power (200 trillion gigawatts from an Acclamator vs about 15 billion gigawatts for the latest Enterprise) by claiming that the Star Wars figure is "gigawatts total" and the Star Trek figure is "giawatts per second".

In other words, they are utter morons.

Tell them to go look up the difference between "power" and "energy". Or the difference between "joules" and "watts", if the other words are too difficult for them.

They also think that the Star Wars Episode II Incredible Cross-Sections is "non canon and outdated" and take figure of speeches literally.

Demand that they provide evidence for these assertions. They will be unable to.

Oh, and they think that the Enterprise can survive a planet busting attack.

Is it the Eminiar sonic weapon IN SPACE! or the "doomsday machine" that they are going on about? Both have been beaten to death around here, and, if I recall correctly, the last time was not too long ago. Search this forum for details.

Sorry if this is an annoying rant, but that's one of the reasons (not the only one though) why I've joined this forum.

Welcome, then.

[SapphireFox]

Apparently, these ignorant Star Trek fans (I don't mean to offend all Star Trek fans, only some of them) try and counter the huge difference in reactor power (200 trillion gigawatts from an Acclamator vs about 15 billion gigawatts for the latest Enterprise) by claiming that the Star Wars figure is "gigawatts total" and the Star Trek figure is "giawatts per second".

Do they think that the Acclamator produces all of its power ever in a single burst and nothing ever again? Seriously though BOTH figures effectively mean a constant output over time. They are actually shooting themselves in the foot in needing to say it takes a second get up to 15 billion gigawatts as opposed to a constant output of 200 trillion gigawatts at all times. Ask them if they have ever seen a reactor output that is listed as "power produced over reactor lifetime" without it actually being labeled specifically as such. NO? I didn't think so.

They also think that the Star Wars Episode II Incredible Cross-Sections is "non canon and outdated" and take figure of speeches literally.

They don't get to decide what is canon and what is not, only Lucas Film Limited gets to decide that. It doesn't matter how old the source is if it's still listed as canon by LFL then it IS canon. No if no ands or buts it is canon. They dont like it tell them to take it up with LFL.

Oh, and they think that the Enterprise can survive a planet busting attack.

I think will need more specifics to deal with that level of stupidity.

Sorry if this is an annoying rant, but that's one of the reasons (not the only one though) why I've joined this forum.

Don't worry it isn't annoying and welcome to SDN. I hope your stay will be long and fruitfull

By the way where exactly is this trekkie "debating" from? Could you send a link if possible.

[Star Wars 888]

In other words, they are utter morons.

Tell them to go look up the difference between "power" and "energy". Or the difference between "joules" and "watts", if the other words are too difficult for them.

I kept on trying to tell them this, but they'd simply keep on redirecting the argument in circles.

Demand that they provide evidence for these assertions. They will be unable to.

Well, they're really dense. Apparently earlier I used this Star Trek source to show the relatively low numbers for Star Trek, but then they made a pretty convincing case that said numbers weren't really canon. Then, one of them bragged about how photon torpedoes being 20 times the tsar bomb, which I ended up using against them since Star Wars space weapons are even more powerful than that.

Then, they kept on saying that I used a non canon source. They seem to have thought that I am still using that other source when I stopped using it quite a while ago.

In other words, they misinterpreted the sources that my figures came from, which may have been tolerable if it was a simple mistake, but I explained to them literally over 10 times how I'm using that canon Star Wars source and numbers that they themselves came up with, but they pretty much ignore me.

Is it the Eminiar sonic weapon IN SPACE! or the "doomsday machine" that they are going on about? Both have been beaten to death around here, and, if I recall correctly, the last time was not too long ago. Search this forum for details.

Yeah, they were bragging about the doomsday machine. I turned this around and, using their logic, said that Rebel star cruisers can withstand the death star's superweapon.

Welcome, then.

[/quote]

Thanks!

[Srelex]

Can we have a link?

[seanrobertson]

Apparently, these ignorant Star Trek fans (I don't mean to offend all Star Trek fans, only some of them) try and counter the huge difference in reactor power (200 trillion gigawatts from an Acclamator vs about 15 billion gigawatts for the latest Enterprise) by claiming that the Star Wars figure is "gigawatts total" and the Star Trek figure is "giawatts per second".

They also think that the Star Wars Episode II Incredible Cross-Sections is "non canon and outdated" and take figure of speeches literally.

Oh, and they think that the Enterprise can survive a planet busting attack.

Sorry if this is an annoying rant, but that's one of the reasons (not the only one though) why I've joined this forum.

Welcome

I dunno about the "latest Enterprise". Fans tend to think the E-E is more powerful than its predecessor; if that's so, the differential couldn't be all that great. And since we have a pretty good idea of the E-D's maximums*, those extend to the E-E as well.

*Check out Mike's estimates here. His figures indicate the warp core can't put out more than 30,000 terawatts (actually, not even that much, to be precise ).

The E-D channeled an appreciable amount of its power with that deflector dish blast in "Best of Both Worlds" -- you know, that last ditch effort to destroy the Borg ship? LaForge said that weapon would be more powerful than photon torpedoes and phasers; ergo, a full spread of photon torpedoes would likely nail a target with far less than 30,000 TJ. That'd put each torpedo at a maximum effective yield of just over a megaton ... a bit shy of Tsar Bomba, let alone even a light turbolaser shot

The low megaton-ranged photorp is pretty consistent with a bunch of other things in Trek; e.g., using hundreds of torpedoes to shatter a 5 km wide asteroid. If torpedoes yielded in the 50 megaton range, Riker underestimated the effectiveness of his weapons over a hundred-fold

As far as any Enterprise surviving a planet-shattering attack ... *shrugs* I didn't know looney bins offered Internet access to patients. Do your opponents even try to explain why they think that's so? The ONLY thing that remotely corroborates that stupid idea is that the E-nil survived a few hits from the Doomsday Machine. That's easily explicable; the DM recognized that tiny little Enterprise didn't warrant planet-killing firepower and dialed down its attacks commensurately.

[Star Wars 888]

Can we have a link?

The thread lasted for quite a while, and then went inactive for quite a while. Then somebody bumped it, and the debate started again. I'll admit that I may not have done that well in the later part of the earlier session, but in the later part of the later session I IMO was pwning them.


KMC forums, sci fi section. I got banned from that forum because the mods thought I had a sock, but in reality someone was trying to frame me (the other temporary bans I got were IMO unfair as well, and I can explain if anybody cares to hear). I've tried emailing them and appealing, but they haven't responded yet.

[SapphireFox]

Yeah, they were bragging about the doomsday machine. I turned this around and, using their logic, said that Rebel star cruisers can withstand the death star's superweapon.

That is the superweapon they were talking about? Bah! The ignorant morons must have never watched the episode for themselves. In the episode Commodore Dekker himself stated that it wasn't a deathstar type of planet destruction but instead he said that it was slicing the planet up into bite size chunks to feed on using an anti-proton beam. This makes the doomsday machine more like a World Devastator rather than an all powerful deathstar. Since it is an anti-matter weapon it makes sense that it would be extremely effective against an unshielded planet, but against a shielded ship it would be likely no more powerful then any other particle weapon that used normal matter.

[IvanTih]

Bah,just show them firepower of SW ships and remember EU is cannon.

[Srelex]

The usual responses to that:

"OMG IT CLAHSES WITH TEH MUUVIEZ111!"

"DEH EU IZNT KANNON! GEORGE LOOKASS SED SO!"/"I DONT CARE IF ITZ KANNON KUZ ITS KRAP!"

[DrStrangelove]

The usual responses to that:

"OMG IT CLAHSES WITH TEH MUUVIEZ111!"

"DEH EU IZNT KANNON! GEORGE LOOKASS SED SO!"/"I DONT CARE IF ITZ KANNON KUZ ITS KRAP!"

That's when you drop Roddenberry's It's not star trek 'til I say so quote, and remind them of the awesome firepower demonstrated in ST:V

[Srelex]

Well, you gotta be careful with that, because in the same movie you have the Ent travelling to the center of the galaxy in a few hours. Or you could have people arguing that it was all a dream Kirk had while camping.

[DrStrangelove]

Well, you gotta be careful with that, because in the same movie you have the Ent travelling to the center of the galaxy in a few hours. Or you could have people arguing that it was all a dream Kirk had while camping.

But everyone with half a brain knows the center of the Milky Way is full of supermassive black holes, so the statement is hyperbole

[The Vortex Empire]

Well, you gotta be careful with that, because in the same movie you have the Ent travelling to the center of the galaxy in a few hours. Or you could have people arguing that it was all a dream Kirk had while camping.

It clearly didn't travel to the center of the galaxy. The movie didn't show a supermassive black hole with stars orbiting it at crazy speeds, so it wasn't the galactic core. As Darth Wong said, if a movie says the characters are going to Mexico, but when they get there they're clearly in the Arctic, they didn't go to Mexico.

[Srelex]

Well, the answer I'd see a particularly zealous trekkie come up with is that the Milky Way in the STverse is different than ours. How do you answer that?

[Wyrm]

So the Milky Way has a different structure and therefore can be much smaller than ours? The lack of supermassive black holes seems to indicate a galaxy deficient in the mass necessary to generate it, yet the density seems no different from ours, thus it is small.

My god, its the Trekkie "Small SW Galaxy" argument turned on its head.

[Batman]

Nonsense. Just because TFF's depiction of the centre of the galaxy is totally incompatible with the Milky Way as we know it but WOULD work for a way smaller galaxy doesn't mean the Trek galaxy is way smaller, it's because of, um, Q, who made all neutrinos male and electrons chartreuse thus allowing a large galaxy for a far smaller mass. Yes. That's it. *nod nod*
Oh, and quantum.

[DrStrangelove]

Well, the answer I'd see a particularly zealous trekkie come up with is that the Milky Way in the STverse is different than ours. How do you answer that?

Since it is so different they need to prove its the same size as the real one

[Death Motif]

Apparently, these ignorant Star Trek fans (I don't mean to offend all Star Trek fans, only some of them) try and counter the huge difference in reactor power (200 trillion gigawatts from an Acclamator vs about 15 billion gigawatts for the latest Enterprise) by claiming that the Star Wars figure is "gigawatts total" and the Star Trek figure is "giawatts per second".

I'm not really sure where their argument is centered. The entire power output of a Trek type Warp Core reactor is used in the production of Warp Plasma. That plasma is either piped directly into the Warp Nacelles or diverted to the EPS conduits to provide power to the rest of the ship. Consequently, ignoring their argument for the moment, this turns the problem into more of a hi-tech plumbing problem involving the flow-rate of the plasma. This of course is measured in units of power per second.

The flow rate is obviously variable as we witness the flow rate increase (signaled by the speed of the moving lights in the warp reactor) as the ship increases it's warp speed ever higher toward some theoretical maximum. Apparently this is to allow the flow of more plasma into the warp nacelles to maintain the warp field when traveling through space at ever higher velocities. That said, we never see those rates of power production during non warp operations. This implies that there are limits to the flow rate that the EPS system can handle. Everything tied into the EPS system must somehow convert that energy back into some other form of conductive power (not everything is powered by warp plasma), and that increasing the flow beyond certain tolerances would overload the systems (how many times have we watched EPS conduits blow out during the show?).

Personally, this sounds like a terrible way to design a power/distribution system to me. It would be the equivalent of piping coolant from a modern reactor (please keep in mind that reactor coolant, in addition to being very hot, is also VERY radioactive) throughout the entire ship and providing local steam generators to convert it into usable power for nearby equipment. Needless to say, at a minimum, this would be a dangerous prospect. The real question is the efficiency of the system as a whole. How much power is actually lost in such a system.

Based on just the jail break scene on the Death Star in the original Star Wars, it is readily apparent that the people of the SW universe are accustomed to small (possibly portable) reactors. This suggests a clear advantage in power generation for the SWU. Not only that, but it also suggests that they place appropriately sized reactors near the equipment intended to use them, rather than piping energy from some large distant source.

Clearly the SWU has an advantage in power technology miniaturization. That suggest that other technologies are similarly enhanced as compared to the STU. It's probably redundant to say that SW ships would own ST ships...even the small ones.

I certainly understand your consternation with ideologues (Star Trek doesn't have exclusive claim to them). You cannot convince them of anything, nor can you use facts against them (they would have to be actively "listening/paying attention" which of course they will not do). It's one of the reasons I don't like to get into too many political discussions.

I make no special claim to be knowledgeable to anything Star Trek or Star Wars, only RW reactors. The only real source of documentation I have read comes from the Star Trek Technical Manual, and occasional Wiki articles.

[Death Motif]

*Check out Mike's estimates here. His figures indicate the warp core can't put out more than 30,000 terawatts (actually, not even that much, to be precise ).

That's definitely one of the best examples I've seen for "reverse engineering" the requirements for a fictional technology. Too bad it's too technical to be used as an effective argument against the ideologues.

[Picard]

Warp core is 12.75 billion gigawatts or 12 750 000 terawatts according to "True Q" script (writers apparently messed up joules and watts). So forget Wong.

[Batman]

The Warp core is stated to be by a character who can't even get his units right. That's dialogue, and dialogue that's already faulty. Why don't you show us where the Big E actually did something requiring that much power.

[SeaTrooper]

Warp core is 12.75 billion gigawatts or 12 750 000 terawatts according to "True Q" script (writers apparently messed up joules and watts). So forget Wong.

That may have been in the script, but was it actually aired? I ask because this seems orders of magnitude greater than anything they have even mentioned or demonstrated before. Guess I'll have to go back and watch that episode again, just to see what the context was.

[Wyrm]

If it were aired, it's far more likely that the line was a mental hiccup than anything else. I say this because the SI prefix "giga-" means "billion" — ie, 12.75 gigawatts means 12.75 billion watts. If we're going to admit a fallible speaker, let's not assume that he's not able misspeak in other ways, shall we?

[Batman]

It was aired that way. It's Data's infamous GW/s quote. And we all know that Data is never wrong (and never uses contractions)