this post was submitted on 28 Dec 2025
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Risa
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Star Trek memes and shitposts
Come on'n get your jamaharon on! There are no real rules—just don't break the weather control network.
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In Star Trek, their run-of-the-mill, rarely discussed deflector is doing way more work than anything in the Star Wars universe. The one exception is the world-ender planet lasers which have been a big plot point in too many films and STILL have no plausible means to exist IN THEIR OwN UNIVERSE!
The one thing Star Wars has over Star Trek is absolutely absurd levels of energy generation and storage. The thing about the construction of light sabers that impresses people in-universe is the Khyber crystal, not power cell running it which apparently is a palm sized terawatt fusion generator. That is why ships like the X-wing are still useful in combat. Even at their size, they can carry enough firepower to punch through a lot of armor and force shields.
Excellent point!
In a universe where magic is real.
Let's be very clear, "magic" exists in StarTrek, too: Q is literal god-level magic. There are telekinetics, empaths, and hiveminds. At least one species has the capacity to mentally create realistic illusions taken from a subject's mind, while others will keep you trapped in your own nightmares for what feels like centuries. Hologram programs are solid and are, multiple times, shown to have the capacity to achieve sapience. In star trek, the magic follows rules. Usually not very well-thought-out, but the feeling that there is an explanation behind any phenomenon is the core conceit of the "exploration" fantasy of Star Trek.
So, saying "in a universe where magic exists" belies the real difference: "in a story where the explanation of phenomena is not a priority, only the spectacle and metaphor of the phenomenon matters."
The giant space lasers are never explained, because their explanation would not suit the desires of the storytellers.
That's just sufficiently advanced technology.
Something, something, midi-chlorians.
There's a lot of hand waving involved, but I feel like they're at least fleshed out more than the wormhole aliens or the Caretakers.
Those movies didn't happen. La la la I can't hear you.
Ah, but unfortunately, the great Lucas, in his infinite, unquestioned wisdom, managed to establish that the force is ALSO simply a sufficiently-advanced evolutionary response to a pre-existing fundamental force of the universe, mediated by whatever the fuck "midichlorians" are supposed to be. You're missing the rest of the quote, which is telling: "sufficiently-advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic". The biconditional applies here: "magic is indistinguishable from sufficiently-advanced technology".
You can't draw a line. Just because the random layperson of Tattooine has no explanation for the force, doesn't mean that there isn't one. Just because we're told that there are truths humans can't comprehend which allow the Q to break every law of reality, that doesn't mean that their powers appear or act in any way less-miraculous. The difference is that, in Star Wars, the writing of the science fantasy demands the mysticism (which is why midichlorians are such bullshit), while the science fiction of star trek demands an explicable nature, even if we don't get all of the answers.
Edit: Also, are you trying to argue that literal psychic abilities are somehow technology? They literally give as much explanation for those in star trek as they do the Force in star wars.
E2: Biconditional, not "bidirectional"
You just pulled "th bidirectional" out of your ass.
If by "my ass", you mean "the transitive property of equality", then sure. My ass is a turing-complete logical computation engine.
"Indistinguishable" means that, for all tests available, the signal of A = the signal of B.
Or were you asking me to explain what a bidirectional relationship is?
EDIT: AHH, Sorry, Bi-conditional
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_biconditional