1) What variation of the "Antares" model was this? I don't recall any other incarnation having such brightly lit engines (that actually made the ship look like a UFP ship for a change).
2) What class of ship was floating around in front of the asteroid? My immediate thought was "Sovereign!?!?", then the scene was over.
3) The use of EMH-1's as dilithium miners. Are we to assume that the entire asteroid was fitted out with (probably rather expensive) holo-emitters? And a computer to store and control the holograms? And what exactly is the use of a human form to a hologram mining dilithium? It only takes up extra 'gigaquads'. You could just as well have holographic mining robots.
4) The sentient hologram. So androids, exocomps and even nanites are regarded sentient, but holograms *designed as* being a crew member are not!?
Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
Not having seen the episode myself, I feel eminently qualified to be the first to answer.
1) It seems that the last witnessed incarnation of the Antares model was when it portrayed SS Xhosa in "For the Cause", so that's the likeliest configuration. In VOY, the ship only appeared in the form of stock footage of the early TNG configuration, IIRC, so there wouldn't have been a reason to tamper with the model. (Or was there one late-season VOY scene with a Xhosa-shaped ship? Have to go to Guardian of Forever and check.)
2) I've heard this reported as an Excelsior, without outcries of dissent.
3) Apparently extra holo-emitters aren't that expensive (and VOY used them lavishly as well, in "Basics" and "Killing Game"). And a humanoid-shaped hologram would be able to operate humanoid tools and vehicles, which is a rationale used by many sci-fi writers for the existence of androids. An extra pair of hands or a missing head would just complicate matters needlessly.
As for why the holograms would have the intricate detail of the EMH-1 design, it was probably cheaper and faster to utilize an unaltered design than to specifically create a simpler, leaner version.
4) Holograms are easier from the moral standpoint - you can get rid of the damning evidence of sentience with a single press of a button or a single voice command.
Timo Saloniemi
Posted by AndrewR (Member # 44) on :
Well, here is how I take it - they can't "kill" or decompile the HMH Mark 1 Doctors. They have to be kept 'alive'. So I would assume they have to give them something to do.
Maybe the only Doctors they have to do this with is from ships that had only ever activated their Doctors. The others could be just removed.
They could have always put them into something like what Picard and Co. put Moriarty in, in "Ship in a Bottle". I'm guessing though, that they have these extra pairs of hands - why not use them. I'm guessing they have an asteroid to mine, and they don't have to have 'life-support' for breathing 'beings'.
Where are the EMH Mark II's III's and IV's!?! I wonder if they used Beverly Crusher as a template for any of them!?! Or Dr. Pulaski!! LOL! Would non-majority-human ships have a 'human' looking Doctor?
Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
Just checked: the Xhosa version of the ship makes an appearance in "Live Fast and Prosper" ("Telsian ship"), and that doesn't seem to be stock footage. So this is most probably the configuration used in "Author, Author" as well...
Timo Saloniemi
Posted by Dat (Member # 302) on :
quote:Where are the EMH Mark II's III's and IV's!?! I wonder if they used Beverly Crusher as a template for any of them!?! Or Dr. Pulaski!!
Funny you should say that because I was reading many of the fan-submitted stories of the EMH and Zimmerman on Robert Picardo's official site. One of the stories had the Mark IV in the shape of Crusher (albeit a little more voluptuous). Another story had Picard and company test the new ECH prototype (from which Zimmerman created with inspiration from Voyager) with the image of Picard.
Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :
Well, we know that the EMH Mark 2 looked like Andy Dick from NewsRadio. Though, we only saw him on the Prommie, so we don't really know how long he lasted, or, indeed, if he was ever even distributed throughout the fleet.
The LMH was going to be based on Bashir, though that most likely got changed after he was outted.
If I was going to be stuck on a communications relay or something for months on end, I'd much rather have a holographic Crusher for company than a holographic Bashir. But that's just me.
Posted by Shik (Member # 343) on :
I bet you'd tweak her sex drive subroutine, too. But then, we all would.
A Picard ECH. Hmm. I never really liked the idea of modeling the physical characteristics on a real person, living or dead. Perhaps the template should be modifiable as needed, part of the more advanced models; we've already seen The Doctor change his form in "Life Line." Like Andrew said, how would, say, the crew of the T'Kumbra feel about having an ECrusherH or a EMH 1. Perhaps they'd prefer an ESelarH.
Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :
That makes sense. Especially in the case of the LMH, you'd think that you'd want the program to be customizable to the comfort of the crew. If you've got people from different cultures, who knows how someone might react to a particular type of doctor.
However, the Doctor's ability to change his appearance so easily seemed rather silly to me. Before that, they had always made it out to be quite difficult to alter the Doctor's program.
Posted by Topher (Member # 71) on :
Well, in 'Andromeda', for the avatar the ship searched through its database and created a form that it thought would be 'aesthetically pleasing'. Or, the lovely form of Lexa Doig Posted by Dukhat (Member # 341) on :
1.) The ship was most definitely a reuse of the Xhosa. The only difference was that the ship was black, while the Xhosa was a brownish-tan sort of color. But it's the same ship.
2.) It was an Excelsior. Period.
Posted by Raw Cadet (Member # 725) on :
The final scene of the episode, as I recall, drove me nuts. Now, it has been a while since I have seen "Author, Author," but, if I remember correctly, the holograms were using twentieth-century style mining equipment. Are we to believe in 400 years not one advance will be made in mining techniques, at least in the Federation? I must be specific, because even the Klingons used some sort of lasers to mine in "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country." And why would a biped, hologram or human, be used as a miner? Another poster mentioned androids and exocomps, and those, along with the automated lithium cracking station seen in "Where No Man Has Gone Before," seems to indicate there should be a mechanical means of mining that would be much more efficient than tunneling out an asteriod, installing holographic projectors, and equipping the projections with ancient tools.
Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :
Well, they probably consider the use of holograms to be an automated mining process. It'[s using a computer to do the work.
Though I find the idea that the miners ahad developed the same independance as the Doctor to be a silly notion. The whole thing about the Doctor was that he had developed into what he was because of the the people who gave him a chance and his own efforts.
Posted by Raw Cadet (Member # 725) on :
quote:Originally posted by Aban Rune: Well, they probably consider the use of holograms to be an automated mining process. It'[s using a computer to do the work.
I do not think they really considered it at all. It is yet another example of the (lack of) vision, often presented in Star Trek, that, other than mankind cruising through space in starships and generally getting along, almost nothing else changed between the twentieth and twenty-fourth centuries, even mining practices.
Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :
But, I think that was the whole point of the episode. The fact that Starfleet doesn't consider these holograms to be anything more than tools. Automation. Machines. They figure they can do whatever they want with them and program them for whatever needs to be done. The whole point was contrasting that view with what the Doctor was able to become.
Don't get me wrong... I didn't like the episode that much. I'm just saying, I think you missed the point of the Mark 1's being shown as tools.
Far worse than Starfleet's lack of innovation in the field of asteroid mining would be the fact that they seem to have a hard time learning their lesson when it comes to recognizing sentient technology. First Data, then the Enterprise D, now the good Doctor.
Posted by Raw Cadet (Member # 725) on :
quote:Originally posted by Aban Rune: But, I think that was the whole point of the episode . . .
What you say is a distinct possibility, but it would be a rather blunt, heavy-handed way for the episode's author(s) to express her/his/their viewpoint. Mind you, I did not miss the point of the episode (it would be pretty hard for one to do so), and what you say crossed my mind as a possible explanation for its archaic mining practices, but I desire more finesse and subtlety from a Star Trek episode. If what you say was, indeed, the author's(') intent, then we would have yet another example of later incarnations sacrificing the very essence of Star Trek [that being humans have improved], just to do something different or dramatic. For what you say to be true (and, again, I grant such a possibility) that would mean not only had Starfleet not learned anything from previous encounters with mechanical sentience (as you pointed out), they also went to great lengths to demean the holograms. Let us assume, logically, that mining tecniques have advanced by Star Trek's twenty-fourth century. That would mean someone went to the length of tunneling out an area, and forging ancient tools, just to put holograms in their place. Apparently the author of "Author, Author" thinks humans have regressed, not progressed.
All in all, it was a fairly disappointing episode (like you said), pretty much just a poor rehash of "The Measure Of a Man."
[ June 21, 2002, 22:36: Message edited by: Raw Cadet ]
Posted by Aban Rune (Member # 226) on :
It was a rehash episode. And maybe the reason that they were using mining epuipment that resembled present day tools was that laser drilling or whatever would have been dangerous given the mineral they were mining. Perhaps the heat would have detonated it.
Who knows. I was less concerned with the lack of imagination in the mining scene than I was with the fact that it was a pretty bad episode.
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