August 30, 2024 is here: Star Trek DS9 - "Past Tense"

[AlexB23]

Hello folks. Tomorrow is August 30, 2024. That day is important in Star Trek lore, as that is two days before the September 1, 2024 riots in San Francisco. I watched this Deep Space 9 episode. I will probably get the last season of Star Trek: Deep Space 9 done in September, 2024 (the start date of the Bell Riots). My guys, @Vambram and @Kylie might like this one.

Episode summary:
In the episode "Past Tense" (1995), a teleporter anomaly accidentally sends Commander Sisko, Dr. Bashir, and Jadzia Dax back in time to a pivotal moment in Earth's history [on August 30, 2024]. The episode received critical acclaim for analyzing U.S. social issues in a science fiction context, but also for addressing various societal issues such as homelessness, poverty, and technology. For myself, 2024 was a long time in the future, but 2024 is now here, and this year even has artificial intelligence tech that is almost as smart as Star Trek's computers in the 2300s.

Life Anecdote:
When watching the Bell Riots episode for the first time in 2014 or 2015, 2024 was 9-10 years away, and 1995 was only 19-20 years ago. Now, 1995 is almost 30 years ago, and September 2024 is only three days away. Currently watching Deep Space 9 again to the end for the first time in my life, as I didn't understand the societal complexities of the show as a teen 9 years ago (gave up the show halfway twice in 2014 and 2017).

Source:

Past Tense (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Screen capture of the episode from 1995.

Relevant News:

https://www.sfchronicle.com/totalsf/article/star-trek-predicted-sf-2024-crisis-19722416.php

[Geek Mode deactivated]

 

[Bradskii]

Screen capture of the episode from 1995.
View attachment 354015

Nice to see that the US finally went metric. A chilly 15 degrees C.

 

[AlexB23]

Nice to see that the US finally went metric. A chilly 15 degrees C.

Ahh, 59 degrees F. It will be 20 degrees C on August 30, 2024 in real life San Fran. Perfect weather, but still chilly. I prefer 24 C. Also, it would be nice if the US went metric in real life.

 

[Bradskii]

Still officially in winter here. And it's 30 C...

 

[AlexB23]

Still officially in winter here. And it's 30 C...

Dang, 30 C is way too hot. Sounds totally like global warming, my brother, as El Nino is over now. Yes, I am a Christian, but have believed in global warming since first learning about it in 2010-12 or so from reading a National Geographic magazine, back when Nat Geo was actually good and not filled with ads and US politics. It got up to 35 C a few days ago in my area (Wisconsin), and it was August 24-25. In Wisconsin, the high will be 26 C today.

Plus, 99% of scientists back global warming, so it is real.

 

[Hans Blaster]

[Geek Mode deactivated]

Deactivation failed.

 

[AlexB23]

Deactivation failed.

Yep, Geek Mode deactivation fault detected.
Fault code = 20240830.1
Running diagnostics: [||||||||||||||||] 100%

Conclusion: May continue to geek out for the rest of this period of time in August and early September 2024 that corresponds to the Star Trek: DS9 timeline.

 

[AlexB23]

Woo, just finished Deep Space 9 today on September 1, 2024 at 21:00, the final season guys. It was good. @Aldebaran , did you watch Star Trek: DS9? We met in one of the threads today.

 

[Aldebaran]

Woo, just finished Deep Space 9 today on September 1, 2024 at 21:00, the final season guys. It was good. @Aldebaran , did you watch Star Trek: DS9? We met in one of the threads today.

Yep!
I remember how you said you were watching it before. Glad you made it to the end!

 

[AlexB23]

Yep!
I remember how you said you were watching it before. Glad you made it to the end!

Thank you. It was a wild ride. Are there any other good Star Treks that you recommend? I have watched TNG in 2014, VOY in 2015, TOS in that year, DS9 (tried once in 2015, again in 2017, finally started it over and completed 2024), all of Picard, and Discovery up to 2023 or so. This just reminded me that I need to see if the final season of Discovery is released yet on DVD.

The library around a few hundred feet away from me has DVDs that are free to rent, and release roughly ~6 months after streaming, cos I do not need Paramount+, if Star Trek is pretty much the only thing I watch from Paramount Studios, besides classic movies. Also, I am blessed to live near a library.

Woo, final season of Discovery was released on DVD on August 27, 2024. Got 64 Trekkies ahead of me in the queue, so it might not be until November or December of this year, or even January 2025 until the discs are here, unless there are multiple boxes of them.

 

[Aldebaran]

Thank you. It was a wild ride. Are there any other good Star Treks that you recommend? I have watched TNG in 2014, VOY in 2015, TOS in that year, DS9 (tried once in 2015, again in 2017, finally started it over and completed 2024), all of Picard, and Discovery up to 2023 or so. This just reminded me that I need to see if the final season of Discovery is released yet on DVD.

The library around a few hundred feet away from me has DVDs that are free to rent, and release roughly ~6 months after streaming, cos I do not need Paramount+, if Star Trek is pretty much the only thing I watch from Paramount Studios, besides classic movies. Also, I am blessed to live near a library.

Woo, final season of Discovery was released on DVD on August 27, 2024. Got 64 Trekkies ahead of me in the queue, so it might not be until November or December of this year, or even January 2025 until the discs are here, unless there are multiple boxes of them.

View attachment 354127

You didn't mention Enterprise. Didn't you ever see that series? It takes place in the time period between the movie "First Contact" and TOS. It was the last "classic" series.

 

[Hans Blaster]

You didn't mention Enterprise. Didn't you ever see that series? It takes place in the time period between the movie "First Contact" and TOS. It was the last "classic" series.

Good catch. I rather like Enterprise. It has some clunkers (like all broadcast Treks so [I've only seen the first season of Discovery among all of the P+ shows, from when it aired on CBS in 2020], but overall it is quite good.

For Alex:

Seasons 1&2 have a "new to exploring" vibe to them that is quite enjoyable. It reminds of what Voyager might have been if the mission was on purpose. Very much less of the "Kirk/Picard and the Enterprise sent on a diplomatic mission" sort of vibe.

Season 3 takes a very different turn and becomes a "mission story" when a new threat to Earth comes out of nowhere (including not from the ST canon) and the Enterprise spends the whole season trying to prevent destruction of Earth.

Season 4 features many 2-3 episode stories that reference previously mentioned things from the earlier series (including one joke from a DS9 episode, but I will say no more and avoid the spoiler) and pushes the story plausibly toward the formation of the Federation.

Given the "prequel" constraints of fitting into an existing cannon, it does quite well at that without major revisionism. (Better I would say than the Star Wars prequel trilogy.)

 

[AlexB23]

You didn't mention Enterprise. Didn't you ever see that series? It takes place in the time period between the movie "First Contact" and TOS. It was the last "classic" series.

Ooh, I forgot about that one. Watched it in the summer of 2017, and I remember Enterprise and Captain Archer (set in the 2150s). It was a good one. No idea why folks hated on ENT, but the show was good.

We need a Star Trek show that set between First Contact (2063) and Enterprise (2151), maybe the year 2100 or so, where warp engines were not at warp 5, but also not slow like warp one. In other words, we need a Warp 3 starship.

An aside about the flawed warp speed scale:
Also, about the warp scale, we need a revised system of warp*, as in a system below. Using a warp system as in the TOS (w^3) or TNG system (w^3.3) system does not work well for higher speeds. Of course, warp 10 could still be infinity, but we would not have warp 9.975 for the USS Voyager, we would have something closer to warp 8. For instance, if there was an emergency on a planet 10 light years away, a ship could run at the revised warp 9 for a few hours before the engine overheats and still make it to the planet on time. Normal cruising speeds could be at warp 6 or 7, instead of warp 7 or 8 as in the TNG series.

*On my free time, I made a similar scale to the one below, but using powers of 12, just for kicks, in case I might write a short sci-fi plot about an alien civilization that has FTL (faster-than-light travel) in 2060, three years before humans did, and humans in that sci-fi story would not have FTL until the 2200s or so.

The TOS scale is in blue, while the TNG scale is in orange. My own revised warp scale is that straight line in green. Star Trek should hire me as the warp scale guy.

Source about distance to Aldebaran (Arabic: الدَّبَران, lit. 'The Follower'): Aldebaran - Wikipedia

Hypothetical Revised Warp scale	Speed (c)	Time from Earth to Aldebaran
1	1	65 years
3	10	6.5 years
5	100	7.8 months
7	1,000	24 days
9	10,000	57 hours

 

[Darktriad]

Yeah I remember this one. Star Trek Picard redid the cannon on this because clearly having a bunch of homeless in sanuacry cities and letting them take over run down skyscrapers. Would look much worse in actual 2024 considering what's now going on.

Of all the Star Trek eps I never thought this one would so perfectly nail the year it was in and yet it did.

 

[AlexB23]

Yeah I remember this one. Star Trek Picard redid the cannon on this because clearly having a bunch of homeless in sanuacry cities and letting them take over run down skyscrapers. Would look much worse in actual 2024 considering what's now going on.

Of all the Star Trek eps I never thought this one would so perfectly nail the year it was in and yet it did.

Yep, I was thinking about this episode, as I watched it. Luckily, 2024 is not as bad as in the episode, but it is bad.

Star Trek: Picard also had an episode set in April 2024 that was made in 2022. Dang, and now both episodes are in the past. Time keeps on flyin' brother.

 

[Rebecca Jo]

Have you watched all 13 Trek movies? I did that this summer, just finished on Labour Day.

I have one or two more special features to watch from Discovery's final season. (That's the first thing I watch now when new Trek seasons come out on DVD/Bluray.)

You could also try Star Trek Continues (Youtube). Really good fan-made production!

 

[AlexB23]

Have you watched all 13 Trek movies? I did that this summer, just finished on Labour Day.

I have one or two more special features to watch from Discovery's final season. (That's the first thing I watch now when new Trek seasons come out on DVD/Bluray.)

You could also try Star Trek Continues (Youtube). Really good fan-made production!

Congrats on getting all of the Star Trek movies in. I do not remember which ones I have watched, but I remember one about Voyager 6 or something and the 2009 one and 2013 one. So, I might as well start chronologically from the first movie again.

I typically do not watch special features as I only care for the actual shows and movies, and can not sit through actor interviews that much. Looks like the last few months of 2024 and the start of 2025 will be filled with Star Trek for me as well. Got to watch those 13 movies.

Star Trek is my favorite franchise (along with Star Wars, but screw the Star Wars: The Acolyte, not gonna watch that one), though Discovery went a little woke, but was still okay, as the show is 16+ or so.

 

[Aldebaran]

Congrats on getting all of the Star Trek movies in. I do not remember which ones I have watched, but I remember one about Voyager 6 or something and the 2009 one and 2013 one. So, I might as well start chronologically from the first movie again.

I typically do not watch special features as I only care for the actual shows and movies, and can not sit through actor interviews that much. Looks like the last few months of 2024 and the start of 2025 will be filled with Star Trek for me as well. Got to watch those 13 movies.

Star Trek is my favorite franchise (along with Star Wars, but screw the Star Wars: The Acolyte, not gonna watch that one), though Discovery went a little woke, but was still okay, as the show is 16+ or so.

The ones from 2009 and 2013 are from the "post-classic" era when JJ Abrams took over the franchise. I'm shocked that you haven't seen any of the other movies since the one about Voyager 6 (Star Trek: The Motion Picture), which was the very first movie. Now there's #2 through #10 to watch. Trust me, you're in for a treat!
Star Trek 2 is seen by many as the best one, with #5 being the worst. But they're all worth seeing.
Watch them in order. 2, 3, and 4 are closely connected as one continuous storyline.

One other thing though. Before you watch #2, go back to the TOS episodes and watch "Space Seed" again first. It will help make movie #2 make a lot more sense. It establishes the premise.

 

[AlexB23]

The ones from 2009 and 2013 are from the "post-classic" era when JJ Abrams took over the franchise. I'm shocked that you haven't seen any of the other movies since the one about Voyager 6 (Star Trek: The Motion Picture), which was the very first movie. Now there's #2 through #10 to watch. Trust me, you're in for a treat!
Star Trek 2 is seen by many as the best one, with #5 being the worst. But they're all worth seeing.
Watch them in order. 2, 3, and 4 are closely connected as one continuous storyline.

One other thing though. Before you watch #2, go back to the TOS episodes and watch "Space Seed" again first. It will help make movie #2 make a lot more sense. It establishes the premise.

I might have seen a few, but this was back in the mid-2010s. So, I guess once finished with Discovery, I will have to grab these discs from the library in order, and at least rewatch "Space Seed". Also, I somewhat remember a guy named Khan Noonien Singh, maybe cos I watched The Wrath of Khan.

My DVD player is gonna get a workout. I remember the JJ Abrams ones, and those were good also.

Also, what do you think about a potential revision for the Warp speed scale? Would logarithmic (warp 1 = 1c, warp 3 = 10 c, warp 5 = 100 c, etc) make more sense compared to powers of 3 or 10/3?

 

[Aldebaran]

I might have seen a few, but this was back in the mid-2010s. So, I guess once finished with Discovery, I will have to grab these discs from the library in order, and at least rewatch "Space Seed". Also, I somewhat remember a guy named Khan Noonien Singh, maybe cos I watched The Wrath of Khan.

My DVD player is gonna get a workout. I remember the JJ Abrams ones, and those were good also.

Also, what do you think about a potential revision for the Warp speed scale? Would logarithmic (warp 1 = 1c, warp 3 = 10 c, warp 5 = 100 c, etc) make more sense compared to powers of 3 or 10/3?

Star Trek 2 was the Wrath of Khan, so you probably saw it. The TOS episode "Space Seed" is the one where the Enterprise originally found Khan and left him and his crew on Seti Alpha 5.
That warp speed scale is a little out of my league and comprehension. It sounds like you're more familiar with Star Trek technology and science than I am.