Star Trek (TNG): Force of Nature

[bronnt]

Honestly, if they wanted to make a message about environmentalism and conservation, why not set-up rules that make people run the ship more efficiently? I'm sure it's not a big draw, but how often do they just leave lights on in rooms that they aren't using?

As it is, the message really poorly translates to the audience. "This fictional technology we made up is causing damage in a fictionally scientific way, so we have to establish limits that actually don't matter for plot purposes and will be continually ignored when they're inconvenient for the story." But if your message is just to tell people not to be wasteful, show the characters making an effort not to be wasteful in small ways.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

Fascinating? No.

But it is interesting.

[CharlesPhipps]

Honestly, if they wanted to make a message about environmentalism and conservation, why not set-up rules that make people run the ship more efficiently? I'm sure it's not a big draw, but how often do they just leave lights on in rooms that they aren't using?

As it is, the message really poorly translates to the audience. "This fictional technology we made up is causing damage in a fictionally scientific way, so we have to establish limits that actually don't matter for plot purposes and will be continually ignored when they're inconvenient for the story." But if your message is just to tell people not to be wasteful, show the characters making an effort not to be wasteful in small ways.

I mean, the corporations made up the whole, "Don't be wasteful" thing because nothing any individual or even groups of individuals do can impact the environment. It is entirely something only affected by governments and corporations.

And I don't get the "entirely fictional technology affects fictional setting" argument--because that argument says NOTHING Star Trek could say about ANYTHING matters.

[CrypticMirror]

I mean, the corporations made up the whole, "Don't be wasteful" thing because nothing any individual or even groups of individuals do can impact the environment. It is entirely something only affected by governments and corporations.

A tactic that has backfired badly on them, because once consumers got used to not being wasteful in their daily lives we started asking hard questions about the corporations waste themselves and punishing those that were. It failed to quell the environmental movement, but instead turbocharged it and made everyone feel like they had a stake in it. If they'd just let the groups like Greenpeace and so on talk about it in global and impersonal terms, there would have been far less buy-in from the ordinary member of the public, but by putting it on the individual member of the public it made it everyone's problem to solve and everybody, including those who are naturally resistant to groups like Greenpeace and other environmental campaigners, got involved and that fed back up the chain. The message coming down from corporate these days is don't worry about it, you can't change it personally, as they try to dispirit the public mood. Don't be a sucker and fall for it. Make personal changes, demand corporate support those changes and make their own too. We're all on this wee globe the gether.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I'm not really familiar with a "don't be wasteful" PSA agenda from corporations. Is there anything more specific someone can point to to give more context?

[CharlesPhipps]

I'm not really familiar with a "don't be wasteful" PSA agenda from corporations. Is there anything more specific someone can point to to give more context?

It's a complicated chain of events but basically since the 1970s there was a bunch of corporate sponsored ads against not littering, recycle bottles, and so on designed to make corporations look environmentally responsible when analysts pointed out none of this would do anything to help the environment. It was a PR move to get them to avoid changing anything about their production and waste.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

I'm not really familiar with a "don't be wasteful" PSA agenda from corporations. Is there anything more specific someone can point to to give more context?

It's a complicated chain of events but basically since the 1970s there was a bunch of corporate sponsored ads against not littering, recycle bottles, and so on designed to make corporations look environmentally responsible when analysts pointed out none of this would do anything to help the environment. It was a PR move to get them to avoid changing anything about their production and waste.

Now that you mention it, yeah, the recycle-reduce-reuse campaigns.

Definitely a gangster's tactic, like Capone running soup kitchens. On one level, personal efficiency on the consumer level helps resolve the economic externality of inefficiency that corporate models run on. Supply chain models can't manage to sell everything they produce and they will account for this by supplying more as long as returns to scale are positive.

[CharlesPhipps]

Recycling notably uses pretty much more energy in the long term and cleaning out soda cans to reuse it is impossible.

Recycling plastic just more or less destroys it.

[McAvoy]

I like the concept of the episode. But pretty useless if you don't use the episode gojng forward.

I mean wouldn't it be interesting if Voyager while going warp 9.975 through a species space and that species already knows about the damage it can do? But Janeway is arguing that their ship doesn't do that. But the aliens don't believe them. But is believed when Voyager can travel through a highly sensitive area without issue. Janeway gives the tech away for free.

Makes for a good episode if just ends that whole idea.

[CharlesPhipps]

I like the concept of the episode. But pretty useless if you don't use the episode gojng forward.

I mean wouldn't it be interesting if Voyager while going warp 9.975 through a species space and that species already knows about the damage it can do? But Janeway is arguing that their ship doesn't do that. But the aliens don't believe them. But is believed when Voyager can travel through a highly sensitive area without issue. Janeway gives the tech away for free.

Makes for a good episode if just ends that whole idea.

I actually thought it WAS something that explained a oddity of Star Trek: why Star Trek's ships were normally going at Warp 5 or whatever instead of going Warp 9 everywhere. What's the point of not going maximum speed in SPACE.

Which is another problem of the metaphor. Space is HUGE so the idea of any one area having maximum damage is silly.