posted
And yes, I do mean the FINAL word. There can be no question or debate.
I was rewatching "The Squire of Gothos" (TOS) the other day with the subtitles on and noticed that there was no capitalization or italicization in Kirk's line, "Uhura, notify the discovery on subspace radio." Which of course got me thinking about our old debate here on whether or not he was talking about a ship.
The intent of the line was to convey the meaning "report the discovery of the planet to Starfleet Command on subspace radio," as evidenced by the script. There was never any intent of a ship being invloved. The main pro-ship argument (championed prominently by TSN) worked from a grammatical standpoint and centered around the usage of the verb notify. (Commonly, "to gove notice to; inform") The contention was that the only correct grammatical meaning of the line was that the Discovery was being notified of something.
However, I recently discovered (no pun intended ) that this is not the case. Notify has another usage less common in America than in England, but which is still acceptable and can be found in any dictionary. It means "to give notice of; make known." For example, "notify the law" meaning announce it to the public. I have even found it noted that the American useage of which TSN and others speak is looked down upon in Britian, where the original meaning is still used commonly.
Therefore, I submit that there is nothing grammatically questionable about Kirk's line and the meaning is clear beyond interpretation. To "notify the discovery on subspace radio" means quite simply "declare/report/make known the discovery [of the planet] on subspace radio" and not "inform the Discovery [of the planet's discovery] on subspace radio.
-MMoM
-------------------- The flaws we find most objectionable in others are often those we recognize in ourselves.
Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
Please, God...let this idiotic discussion die.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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"Therefore, I submit that there is nothing grammatically questionable about Kirk's line and the meaning is clear beyond interpretation."
Except that, as you've just pointed out, the word has two meanings, leaving the statement technically ambiguous.
But of course, the solitary reason why anyone EVER interpreted it in a way OTHER than the original intent (which is clearly an unambiguously shown by the script and the novelization based upon it, as well as the fact that The Making of Star Trek and any other publications lack any reference to a Starship Discovery) was out of supposed "necessity" in order to explain a grammatical error. I have just shown that said grammatical error does not in fact exist, therefore there is zero justification for interpreting it in a way which so drastically deviates from the known intent of the writer.
Admit it, Herr Nix, you are a beaten man.
-------------------- The flaws we find most objectionable in others are often those we recognize in ourselves.
Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
And where did these subtitles come from? How old are they? Because I'm pretty certain they didn't have subtiles available on TV programmes in 1966.
posted
The point is even without the subtitles, the only reason people argued that they referred to the ship was because they believed it explained a grammatical error which any proper english speaker knows does not exist in the first place. Subtitles or no, the USS Discovery arguement has no evidence in it's favour, only ambiguity of grammar. While it is (apparently) known that the writers' intent was that they were referring to the discovery of the planet, not a ship called Discovery.
Aah, isn't grammar FUN! LOL...
-------------------- Garbled, confusing and quite frankly duller than an inflight magazine produced by Air Belgium.
Registered: May 2004
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posted
Though one can continue to believe that Starfleet had a vessel named Discovery at the time (seems an obvious name for a Starfleet ship, after all), Mim is correct in that there is no canonical reference to it in this episode.
-------------------- . . . ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.
quote:Originally posted by Lee: And where did these subtitles come from? How old are they? Because I'm pretty certain they didn't have subtiles available on TV programmes in 1966.
No they are recent subtitles. But, as mentioned in the old thread, someone checked the script and the novelisation (based on an earlier draft in which the word notify wasn't even used, but rather report) and "discovery" was not a proper noun in either.
The reason why I posted that screencap was mainly to illustrate the line itself, and also because there had been claims in the past that the subtitles had capitalized and italicized the word. So either they fixed it from the previous DVD release or it was bunk to begin with or the poster was talking about closed-captions or something.
-------------------- The flaws we find most objectionable in others are often those we recognize in ourselves.
Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
Does anyone actually believe, seriously, 100% believe in this USS Discovery ?
I mean, if you want there to be a USS Discovery in service at this time then that's cool. We only saw 1% of Starfleet (over estimate) so if you want a particular ship name you can have it.
But does anyone want to stand up for this USS Discovery as a 100% definite existant starship, rather than a vague, possible starship?
Or is this a non-issue?
-------------------- "My theories appal you, my heresies outrage you, I never answer letters and you don't like my tie." - The Doctor
Registered: Mar 1999
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Actually before I heard the line in the original I was convinced the stupid translators messed it up again, but when I heard the line just a couple of weeks ago it did sound more like a "spread the word" rather than "contact the Discovery"
I could be wrong, but I'm guessing the reason why Mim brought this up is for people who want to update their shiplists.
However, there's an easy answer to this question, and there always was: Was another ship mentioned in the episode? Was another ship shown in the episode? Did anyone say that they've been constantly sending reports to another ship? Did the script say that there was another ship? Did they mention another ship again anywhere else in the episode, except for this ambiguous line, which is obviously just the usage of poorly spoken English? To all of these questions, I believe the answer is no.
Registered: Jun 2000
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posted
Kobi: The subtitles are from the new season one boxset.
Dukkie: While i agree wholeheartedly with your sentiment, the point of this post was primarily to show that it wasn't even poorly spoken English. It was perfectly correct grammatically.
Rev: I care.
-MMoM
-------------------- The flaws we find most objectionable in others are often those we recognize in ourselves.
Registered: Jun 2001
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![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
) that this is not the case. Notify has another usage less common in America than in England, but which is still acceptable and can be found in any ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Confused]](confused.gif)
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