In the TNG episode "Where no one has gone before", the Enterprise-D went to the Triangulum galaxy.
Do you think the Federation just forgot about that? Or would they try to figure out how to replicate the experiment?
-
Related: Why can't surgery be done by transporter? – Kyle Jones Feb 9 '20 at 0:36
I'm sure they would have wanted to, but it's made abundantly clear at the end of the episode that it's not the Federation's warp enhancements that made the jump possible, it was the Traveller's abilities
PICARD: (to Kosinski) What did you do?
RIKER: It wasn't him. It never was. It was his assistant.
PICARD: What are you talking about?
RIKER: Kosinski wasn't the one controlling the warp experiments.
KOSINSKI: It was me!
RIKER: The equations he punched in were nonsense, just as we thought.
At the end of the episode the Traveller disappears and doesn't return until a later episode. In his absence they only have sensor readings (that aren't especially helpful) and Kosinski's worthless equations.
RIKER: The Traveller's gone, sir.
PICARD: Gone?
RIKER: He's phased completely out of existence. At least, out of our existence.
-
5IIRC, Kosinski's previous work on a different starship yielded some marginal improvement in engine efficiency, earning him some credibility, though most, if not all of what he was doing on Enterprise was, as you stated, nonsense. – Anthony X Feb 8 '20 at 20:37
-
6@AnthonyX - Yes, apparently he effected some small upgrades to some other ships and his equations later turned out to be the basis for Wesley's 'warp bubble' experiments so perhaps worthless is a bit harsh. – Valorum Feb 8 '20 at 20:46
-
1@AnthonyX An in-universe rebuttal was that the other starship was (allegedly; we only have the dialog to go off of) old and had less advanced engines, and thus there was a greater opportunity for improvement, while the Enterprise was more state of the art, and so improving it would take significantly more skill. – Acccumulation Feb 10 '20 at 2:47
-
You'd think when Wesley Crusher was done communing with The Traveller, post-"Journey's End" he could have helped a Federation out. Could have. – Jesse C. Slicer Feb 10 '20 at 17:16
-
Leonardo da Vinci may have considered Einstein's e=mc2 equation to be nonsense, but the A-bomb would still work regardless of comprehension. The Enterprise went to Triangulum, regardless of how. Would you like the read a book or see a movie that spawns from that event? – James Feb 17 '20 at 1:03
Do you think the Federation just forgot about that?
Why would you think that? The fact that it wasn't discussed explicitly in TNG doesn't mean it was ignored or forgotten. Just not featured in an episode.
Or would they try to figure out how to replicate the experiment?
Maybe. Those brainiacs at the Daystrom institute's Mars college (where Lea Brahms did her Ph.D. research) are looking into exotic propulsion theories all the time.
