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transporter (Star Trek)
A transporter is a fictional teleportation machine used in the Star Trek universe. Transporters convert a person or object into an energy pattern (a process called dematerialization), then "beam" it to a target, where it is reconverted into matter (rematerialization). The term transporter accident is a catch-all term for when a person or object does not rematerialize correctly.
According to the book The Making of Star Trek, Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry's original plan did not include transporters, instead calling for characters to land the starship itself. However, this would have required unfeasible and unaffordable sets and model filming; transporters were devised as a less expensive alternative. Transporters first appear in the original pilot episode "The Cage". The transporter special effect, before being done using computer animation, was created by mixing glitter with water, then agitating the solution.
The spaceship in the famous science fiction film Forbidden Planet (widely recognized as a strong influence on Gene Roddenberry's design of Star Trek) featured a similar effect, but in that storyline it was an energy beam that protected the crew from G forces as the ship accelerated through the speed of light.
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Fictional history[edit]
According to dialogue in the Star Trek: Enterprise episode "Daedalus", the transporter was invented in the early 22nd century by Dr. Emory Erickson, who also became the first human to be successfully transported. Although the Enterprise (NX-01) has a transporter, the crew do not routinely use it (Captain Jonathan Archer once said that he wouldn't even put his dog through it), generally preferring shuttlepods or other means of transportation before falling back on the transporter. The crew aboard the 23rd century USS Enterprise frequently use the transporter. By the 24th century, transporter travel was very reliable and "the safest way to travel", according to dialogue in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Realm of Fear".
According to the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Homefront", Starfleet Academy cadets receive transporter rations, and the Sisko family once used a transporter to move furniture into a new home.
Despite its frequent use, characters such as Leonard McCoy and Katherine Pulaski are reluctant to use the transporter, as the characters express in the Next Generation episodes "Encounter at Farpoint, Part II" and "Unnatural Selection", respectively. Reginald Barclay expresses his outright fear of transporting in "Realm of Fear".
Capabilities and limitations[edit]
The shows and movie do not go into great detail about transport technology. The Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual claims that the devices transport objects in real time, accurate to the quantum level. The episode "Realm of Fear" specifies the length of a transport under unusual circumstances would last "... four or five seconds; about twice the normal time." This calculates the length of a typical transport as between 2 and 2.5 seconds and possibly less. Heisenberg compensators remove uncertainty from the subatomic measurements, making transporter travel feasible. Further technology involved in transportation include a computer pattern buffer to enable a degree of leeway in the process.
Since The Original Series, transporters' effective range is 40,000 kilometers[unverified], although thick layers of rock can reduce this range (TNG: "Legacy"). Transporter operations have been disrupted or prevented by dense metals (TNG: "Contagion"), solar flares (TNG: "Symbiosis"), and other forms of radiation, including electromagnetic (TNG: "The Enemy" & TNG: "Power Play") and nucleonic (TNG: "Schisms"). Transporters have also been stopped by telekinetic powers (TNG: "Skin of Evil") and by brute strength (TNG: "The Hunted"). The TNG episode "Bloodlines" features a dangerous and experimental "subspace transporter" capable of interstellar distances.
Starfleet transporters include a device that can detect and disable an active weapon (TNG: "The Most Toys"), and a bio-filter to remove contagious microbes or viruses from an individual in transport (TNG: "Shades of Gray"). The transporter can also serve a tactical purpose, such as beaming a photon grenade or photon torpedo to detonate at remote locations (TNG: "Legacy", Voy: "Dark Frontier").
While several characters have asserted that transporters cannot transport through a ship's shields, there are instances of this "rule" being broken through a technobabble solution (TNG: "The Wounded") or disregarded by the show's writers (Voy: "Caretaker", Star Trek: First Contact).
In Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Vice Admiral James T. Kirk and Lieutenant Saavik carry on a conversation during rematerialization. In Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Dr. Gillian Taylor jumps into Kirk's transporter beam during dematerialization, and rematerializes without any apparent ill effects.
People tend to face an appropriate direction when they rematerialize, although in "Manhunt" Lwaxana Troi rematerializes facing the back of the transporter platform. There is no canon explanation for how people maintain their footing when transporting from the evenly surfaced transporter platform to an uneven surface.
The "Mark VII" transporter is capable of handling unstable biomatter (DS9).
According to the TNG Technical Manual, the transporter cannot move antimatter, but this rule has been broken a few times[unverified].
"It remains unclear why the transporter rooms exist. On numerous occasions, characters have been transported to and from various locations, such as the bridge or cargo holds of the ship, or any location on a planet or other vessel. This implies that there is no need for the transporter room, and also raises the question of why people on the ship must first walk to the transporter room instead of simply being transported from where they are. In addition, the 6 circles on the platform are generally used as targets for the subjects to stand on, but they do not appear to represent any limitation of the hardware to six or less people. People have been transported carrying others, in a coffin style transport, and once animals, hay, and other inanimate objects." This is explained in the TOS episode, "The Day of the Dove". Spock and Scotty had said that doing a transport like that could be risky. They could "beam into a deck" or an inanimate object and get stuck there.
For special effects reasons, in TOS, people generally appear immobilized during transport, with the exception of Kirk in the episode That Which Survives. However, by TNG, characters can move within the confines of the transporter beam while being transported.
Transporter psychosis[edit]
Transporter psychosis is caused by a break down of neurochemical molecules during transport. There were cases of transporter psychosis reported as early as the mid 22nd century, however it wasn't officially diagnosed until 2209 in Delinia II. The invention of multiplex pattern buffers all but eliminated the condition. (TNG: "Realm of Fear")
Transporter psychosis affects the body's motor functions, autonomic systems and the higher reasoning centers of the brain. As a result, the victim suffers from paranoid delusions, multi-infarct dementia, hallucinations (somatic, tactile, and visual), and psychogenic hysteria. Peripheral symptoms include sleeplessness, accelerated heart rate, diminished eyesight leading to acute myopia, painful spasms in the extremities, and in most cases dehydration. (TNG: "Realm of Fear")
There is no known treatment.
There is an episode of Star Trek: Voyager when Seven of Nine must travel back and forth through time to catch Bransen and one of Seven's other selves succumbs to transporter psychosis.
Philosophical questions[edit]
The discontinuity of the transported object causes theoretical problems in the metaphysical field of identity.
There are several different problems. One problem, akin to the Ship of Theseus problem, has two parts. First, could someone survive in a dismantled form and survive being "reassembled" using new atoms, or do we need the same atom being transported in a dismantled, piecemeal way? When Captain Kirk is beamed to a planet from the Enterprise, he is disassembled on the sub-molecular level and then reassembled at the destination to create an identical "Kirk." Star Trek canon suggests that the actual atoms are transported through space and reassembled at the final location, but in the real world (and in other sci-fi stories) it would likely be more efficient to simply transmit the information about the atoms themselves and recreate the person using matter already at the destination, assuming the enormous technical hurdles common to both are overcome.
It should be noted that while most humans have distinct memories of events that happened years ago, technically speaking they weren't "there," or at least the atoms that comprise their bodies now were not the atoms that comprised their bodies then. Simple, natural biochemical and physical interactions mean that our bodies are constantly ejecting (mostly through sweat, respiration and excretion) and accepting (mostly through ingestion and respiration) atoms that we are constructed from. The concept of a transporter simply means that instead of occurring over a long period, all your atoms are being replaced immediately.
Another issue arises if a duplicate is made during the transportation process: that is, if the information recorded is used to create not one but two identical copies of the source person. In the TNG episode Second Chances, a duplicate of Commander Riker is created. These scenarios in philosophical literature are called branching-cases, and conflicts with the view that identity is a one-one relation, not a one-many relation. It is interesting to note, however, that from the point of view of quantum mechanics, creating an identical copy of an object is impossible. See quantum teleportation and no-cloning theorem.
Derek Parfit in his book Reasons and Persons (1982) uses teletransportation examples to test different intuitions regarding personal identity.
In recognition of these philosophical questions, the Star Trek: Enterprise writers had Emory Erickson allude to these in the dialogue of "Daedalus."
Trivia[edit]
- According to the Star Trek: TNG Technical Manual, the three touch-sensitive light-up bars on the Enterprise-D's transporter console were an homage to the three sliders used on the duotronic transporter console on the original Enterprise in The Original Series.
