It does raise a ton of questions, though. If 24th-century medical science can easily revive a person who’d been frozen with primitive 20th-century cryonics, why did they ever “give up” on people dying of things in sickbay? Stick them in the freezer and ship them to a better facility on a starbase. Have emergency freezers in shuttles or escape pods would also make sense.
That’s nothing. It’s established that the transporter can keep you alive indefinitely in the pattern buffer, make an exact copy of you and turn you back into a child.
The transporter is a death machine. They established that in the episode with the two Rikers created by some interaction between the transporter and the field around the planet, leaving one stranded. Normally it kills you and creates a duplicate. You’re actually dead while your doppelganger takes your place.
Scotty jury-rigged it that way with him and another guy, and the other guy didn’t make it. Dr M’Benga also did it for his daughter, and he had to refresh the system periodically and make sure nothing else messed with it while she was in there.
It can work, but it’s unreliable and/or has heavy maintenance requirements.
It was also being used in the flashback episode where M’Benga and Chapel were medics on the front lines of the Klingon war, they were using an evacuation transporter to store critically wounded soldiers who couldn’t be patched up with the equipment they had on hand. Led to a difficult moral dilemma where they needed to clear the buffer to accept more incoming wounded in need of treatment.
The more routine it gets in the show, the harder it is to explain its absence.
Not enough people recognize the transporter is an immortality engine. Thank you for being this important point to light. It would actually solve the Lower Decks question if how do the officers come back to life instead of the black mountain and screaming koala.
This is almost canon thanks to Lower Decks where Lt. Shaxs died heroically in one episode and then a few episodes later was back at his post, with one lower-ranking crewman explaining it to the other with a simple “he’s bridge crew” and a shrug.
I always thought of the Culture as the Federation, but super-hardcore. In the Culture, individuals can just upload their mind to a new, undamaged body if they’re sufficiently injured that repair isn’t an option. Even just popping the head off is enough to revive someone if they don’t have a backup and can catch it in time. If the repairs will take a while, they can drop into a simulated reality to do something else while they wait. Some individuals get tired of living and decide to just end it – no backup. Others get tired of living and have themselves warehoused until something interesting happens somewhere down the line.
But if they made Trek like that, I don’t think 80’s television audiences could have handled it. I’m not certain 21st century TV audiences are ready for that.
It does raise a ton of questions, though. If 24th-century medical science can easily revive a person who’d been frozen with primitive 20th-century cryonics, why did they ever “give up” on people dying of things in sickbay? Stick them in the freezer and ship them to a better facility on a starbase. Have emergency freezers in shuttles or escape pods would also make sense.
That’s nothing. It’s established that the transporter can keep you alive indefinitely in the pattern buffer, make an exact copy of you and turn you back into a child.
The transporter is a death machine. They established that in the episode with the two Rikers created by some interaction between the transporter and the field around the planet, leaving one stranded. Normally it kills you and creates a duplicate. You’re actually dead while your doppelganger takes your place.
It’s also established on Voyager that it’s severely time-limited and can’t be used for lengthy periods! Also, wormholes obey the laws of music.
Scotty did it for 75 years with more primitive equipment.
Poor Franklin!
Scotty jury-rigged it that way with him and another guy, and the other guy didn’t make it. Dr M’Benga also did it for his daughter, and he had to refresh the system periodically and make sure nothing else messed with it while she was in there.
It can work, but it’s unreliable and/or has heavy maintenance requirements.
It was also being used in the flashback episode where M’Benga and Chapel were medics on the front lines of the Klingon war, they were using an evacuation transporter to store critically wounded soldiers who couldn’t be patched up with the equipment they had on hand. Led to a difficult moral dilemma where they needed to clear the buffer to accept more incoming wounded in need of treatment.
The more routine it gets in the show, the harder it is to explain its absence.
Not enough people recognize the transporter is an immortality engine. Thank you for being this important point to light. It would actually solve the Lower Decks question if how do the officers come back to life instead of the black mountain and screaming koala.
Only the bridge crew gets immortality.
This is almost canon thanks to Lower Decks where Lt. Shaxs died heroically in one episode and then a few episodes later was back at his post, with one lower-ranking crewman explaining it to the other with a simple “he’s bridge crew” and a shrug.
That’s why I said it. :)
I always thought of the Culture as the Federation, but super-hardcore. In the Culture, individuals can just upload their mind to a new, undamaged body if they’re sufficiently injured that repair isn’t an option. Even just popping the head off is enough to revive someone if they don’t have a backup and can catch it in time. If the repairs will take a while, they can drop into a simulated reality to do something else while they wait. Some individuals get tired of living and decide to just end it – no backup. Others get tired of living and have themselves warehoused until something interesting happens somewhere down the line.
But if they made Trek like that, I don’t think 80’s television audiences could have handled it. I’m not certain 21st century TV audiences are ready for that.