Posted on 02/24/2015 9:34:40 PM PST by Citizen Zed
As an example, Sisko's father runs a restaurant. Seats at that restaurant have to be a finite resource (because they require labor), so they would not be “free” to everyone—the owners get to choose whom they give it to. (That brings up the interesting question of whether the Federation would have anti-discrimination laws, but I digress.) Let's say Sisko chooses to feed people in his neighborhood; choosing to live in that neighborhood is the “price” his customers pay for his food. Similarly, Picard's brother makes real wine; since that requires real grapes and, again, labor, that would also be a finite resource (as opposed to synthehol, which is free to everyone). From the context, it seems likely that Picard the elder distributes his bottles to friends and family; a relationship with him is therefore the “price” of a bottle. However, he would likely also distribute bottles in “reputation trade,” so if you run an outstanding French restaurant, Picard would like choose to supply you with bottles. In return, as a courtesy to a great vintner, the Picards can likely get a table at every great restaurant in France whenever they like.
So in the Star Trek universe there are motivations to “make something of yourself”—you demonstrate that you are a worthwhile person, which would make others more inclined to befriend you (and thus give you the fruits of their labor) or jump you to the top of waiting lists for things like real wine, spots at a restaurant or a theater show, pieces of art, human-designed clothing, etc. It's clear that Starfleet personnel are very high status and thus are cosseted in most places and given first access to things of this type; this would be a huge motivation for joining Starfleet.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
Quite true. At its best, DS9 had a grubby realism that featured conflicting personalities, motives and aims at cross purposes, and surprising plot developments. In contrast, Star Trek and Star Trek Next Gen usually had at their heart a smug rectitude about their main characters and the Federation that limited dramatic potential.
No matter how "advanced" the society may become, I guarantee you that Kirk pulled down a lot more credits per year than ensign Chekhov.
And why wouldn't he?
He has the entire ship riding on his command and decisions.
He's not going to settle for the very same pay, for a MUCH more difficult job.
BTW, when the ship does need things of value, like dilithium crystals, the miners want cold hard cash, or something of tangible "worth" like females, as in "Mudd's Women".
They were prepared to cut Kirk out completely and deal directly with Mudd.
The Ferengis were Jews. To me it was blatant.
nailed it
except... star trek wasn’t exactly fiction.
it was communist fantasy
There a set of term i use for two styles of writing sci-fy..
thought experiments vs masturbation fantasies...
Star Trek the original series best writing was thought experiments .realistic hard choices and unhappy endings....
conversely Next Generation was idiotic masturbation fantasies
all the troubles of life were solved just because the writer decided to say they were solved
The replicators on Star Trek can make any material object, from food to clothing to sundries. Power is supplied by matter-antimatter reactions and is likewise abundant, having near-zero cost. Things that are infinitely abundant are infinitely cheap. What would have value in such a society?
One can imagine ideas and service would be the value commodities of the Star Trek universe. How would such a knowledge- and service-based economy work? Not sure.
I would bet 3000 quatloos against it being any kind of economic system that we would recognize.
Oh, wait...it's not real....
I have seen nonqualified teens at the planes on a submarine - dependants cruise.
Now, assuredly, there was a planesman standing by to advise and/or retake physical control, as necessary.
With the introduction of the replicator, anybody could make anything. Except Captain Kirk.He never had enough replacement parts.
When mankind’s every need is met with the push of a button, we’ll have utopia.
Believe it or not, we’re there right now. The singularity (google it)is happening as we speak. Hold on for a wild ride that’ll make your old heads spin.
Funny how for DS9 they had to reintroduce capitalism and money in the form of Quark, Ferngis and gold pressed latinum. A post scarcity society may be a utopian ideal, but it makes for poor drama.
Of course it is. What else would it be? It’s science fiction.
I can't remember the exact stories but a common future scenario shared by some writers is that the true scarcity in a post-material-scarcity society will be scarcity of creative jobs. Although everyone will be free (perhaps) to pursue creative hobbies, there will be a very limited number of meaningful creative jobs in society, and it will be employment itself that will be the number one scarcity.
In this scenario, everyone is able to live like a well-off retiree, travel where they want, live where they want, all needs and cares taken care of. But who actually runs things, and who actually organizes the jobs performed by all the robots and robotic devices... those are the scarce positions in life.
I think there's something to the idea. Not soon, certainly not for decades and maybe not for more than a century or two.
But eventually, with fusion power, nanotech, biotech and other technologies yet to be developed, we will reach a comparative golden age when we can use the phrase "post-scarcity".
The big questions are, will we ever get there and what kind of people will we be when we get there.
If muslims prevail on earth, we'll simply never get there. They will shut down the development and a true dark ages will be imposed.
If liberals prevail on earth, we still might get there but in the process be turned into such incredibly docile mental sheep that the question of who we are won't even be seriously asked.
DS9 was fairly good but B5 was way beyond though.
Although the Ferengi seemed to be patterned after the stereotype, that’s not how he went about choosing them. He paired up qualities and created his aliens around that.
Vulcans were logical and cold. Klingons were warriors and honourable. Andorians were paranoid and conniving. Ferengi were greedy and out for themselves.
They’ve tried to harken back to tradition in Next Generation to the era of the first woodships like the first Enterprise. On such ships, there were often young boy apprentices(or lads impressed into service from orphanages or pulled in off the streets) as old as 12 who after a time would helm a ship at the Captains discretion or would spell the older mates from time to time who may have needed a potty break. So I don’t fault the show and writers for attempting to echo those old traditions. (The movie Generations after the sequence where Kirk is sucked into the “energy ribbon”, segues into a scene on the enterprise D’s holodeck depicting being at sea on the old Enterprise, celebrating Warf’s promotion with a “dunking”)
The Next Generation episodes often had echo’s of the past wood sailing ship days where the captian often had an apprentice or favorite “boy” mate to run errands and messages often because the captain saw potential in the boy or perhaps just wished he had a son.(I’m not even going there with stories of more lurid goings on...though I know such stories were also true). A star ship captain with a Brit accent with authentic use of old naval terms with the use of polite formal sir names(”MISTER CRUSHER,set course for Capella! “Course laid in SIR”” “Engage engines at maximum warp””Aye Aye SIR!”) completes the connection between past and future.
I do generally agree that such young folk would not be allowed to do such things with today’s modern ships, planes, and subs. Now 17 or older teens trained by the US Navy...well that’s different.
I thought the first couple of seasons of Enterprise were very good. Until they introduced the idea of time travel, that is.
I think the things about the “Star Trek” world that drive the economy is cheap energy and the ability to transform elements from one form to another. You can create food from “nothing” and you can manufacture anything you need.
It has nothing to do with being communist.
If you were important, you could use the transporter”
You know in the past where Gout was once considered a “rich man’s” disease because he could afford the sources of Protein more readily than a common man could so he ate more of it. Imagine Elites starting to suffer “transporter phase dementia” or some such illness in greater numbers vs average joes, because the elites used transporters more than the average joes.
It brings up another subject. In well developed solar systems...wave guided matter transporters(we’re also talking about access to cheap unlimited energy sources) would be more efficient in delivering cargo to various planets in that solar system than the use of large carrier freighters.
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