74
votes
Accepted
Was Tuvok bluffing when he said that Voyager's transporters rendered the Kazon weapons useless?
This capability of the transporter was previously established in the TNG episode "The Most Toys". Data begins to fire a disruptor, but is caught in a transport beam as the weapon begins to ...
- 16.7k
65
votes
Why are there cargo ships in the Star Trek universe when they have replicators?
According to this earlier answer, which quotes the TNG Technical Manual, replicators need raw materials.
For instance,
raw stock for food replicators is stored in the form of a sterilized organic ...
- 19.1k
60
votes
In the Star Trek universe, are transporter effects visible and/or audible?
In the Enterprise episode The Andorian Incident, the use of the transporter is discussed as a method of rescue and T'Pol nixes the idea, saying this:
T'POL: The sound of the transporter alone would ...
- 3,282
58
votes
Accepted
Has there ever been an instance in Star Trek where someone beamed into a solid object?
Per the Memory Alpha Transporter Section on Accidents there is no occasion listed in which there was an accidental beaming into another object.
That said, the closest such accident I would suggest ...
- 24.5k
52
votes
In the Star Trek universe, are transporter effects visible and/or audible?
They are certainly visible. In A Piece Of The Action the character Kalo says "Don't worry, Boss. They can't do nothing till they're through sparkling. "
He previously saw Kirk and Spock's ...
- 16.5k
46
votes
Why teleportation isn't the primary intra-ship transport mechanism?
Because it isn't necessary. Intraship transport is relegated to medical and security emergencies. There are a limited number of transporters available and such energy is more vital to other services ...
- 211k
42
votes
Why can't surgery be done by transporter?
Medical procedures were explicitly done by transporter a handful of times, although none of them are really surgeries.
By the TNG era, transporters had safety features in them. One of those was the ...
- 6,480
38
votes
Has there ever been an instance in Star Trek where someone beamed into a solid object?
In the TNG episode "The Schizoid Man" (season 2), an away team was beamed to a planet while the Enterprise was either still using warp power or had briefly dropped out of warp long enough to use the ...
- 509
35
votes
Why can't surgery be done by transporter?
In the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Deadlock", a baby was delivered by "fetal transport", literally beaming the fetus out of the womb to save its mother from being gored to death by ...
- 53.1k
26
votes
Has there ever been an instance in Star Trek where someone beamed into a solid object?
The possibility is mentioned:
In "The Cage"
ONE: Now, you all know the situation. We're hoping to transport down inside the Talosian community.
SPOCK: If our measurements and readings are an ...
- 359
23
votes
Accepted
Why aren't transporters used more often in Star Trek Enterprise?
"The Communicator" in particular
Early dialogue indicates that the sensors on the ship simply aren't accurate enough to lock onto Malcolm's communicator; they only get a definite position ...
- 161k
23
votes
Accepted
Why is Reginald Barclay the only one to see the weird shapes in the transporter?
Barclay didn't see anything unusual during his initial transport to the USS Yosemite. The first time he saw one of the quasi-energy microbes in the matter stream was during his return trip back to the ...
- 88.7k
22
votes
Why teleportation isn't the primary intra-ship transport mechanism?
Starfleet vessels are just too small to merit the expenditure of energy on site-to-site transporters when simple turbolifts are sufficient.
Star Trek production illustrator Doug Drexler, when ...
- 652k
21
votes
Why can't surgery be done by transporter?
You're basically replacing one problem with one bigger problem.
Surgery is a complex thing, but it's a 400-year-old proven technique that has been extremely enhanced by the available technology.
...
- 14.7k
21
votes
In Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, how did Kirk and Gillian successfully beam aboard the Klingon ship together?
We regularly see characters beam up and down while carrying equipment and even organic life forms without getting molecularly fused to them, so the transporter can clearly deal with these situations.
...
- 9,078
21
votes
Accepted
Transporting of whales in The Voyage Home: what happened to the air in the tank?
We know from the film itself that the tank had sufficient volume to contain 400 tonnes of water as well as two large whales. What's not immediately obvious is that the tank is only half full, at least ...
- 652k
21
votes
Was Tuvok bluffing when he said that Voyager's transporters rendered the Kazon weapons useless?
Let me quote from the Memory Alpha page on transporters, emphasis mine:
Disabling active weapons
By the 24th century, the transporter had the capability to disable any active weapon during transport. ...
- 488
19
votes
Accepted
How did Worf's adoptive father know O'Brien's rank?
TL;DR: O'Brien's visible rank in "Family" is a continuity error, but he is assumed to have been wearing the proper rank insignia despite what we see on-screen.
Your confusion is understandable. Up to ...
- 62.7k
19
votes
At what point and why does it become (almost) impossible to transport through shields in the Star Trek Universe?
You posit two questions, so I'll answer them separately:
Why
First of all, consider the technology of the NX-01:
The defensive systems of the NX-class were also not as advanced as
those of ...
- 69.2k
17
votes
In Star Trek: the Original Series, does the original die in transportation?
I realize it's non-canon, but the novel Star Trek: Federation addressed this. In this excerpt, Zephram Cochrane is aboard Kirk's Enterprise in the 23rd century, and has recently had his first ...
- 5,134
17
votes
In Star Trek, why not use the transporter to extend life expectancy?
Because that would ruin the fun.
Bad response, but kinda the point. The show has to keep up drama, which can be hard in a post-scarcity future; "why don't you just spend money/energy?" sounds like ...
- 8,197
15
votes
Accepted
How did the transporter malfunction in "Star Trek: The Motion Picture"?
Transporters work by breaking down the subject into a matter stream, sending the matter stream from an emitter, and reassembling it on the other end. The TNG Technical Manual steps through an example ...
- 4,176
14
votes
Has any Star Trek material had a serious in-universe discussion about the philosophy of transporter technology?
It's brought up in the novel Federation, when
The man is initially confused how he got onboard the Enterprise, and is frustrated by the crewman who just keeps telling him he was 'transported'. He ...
- 4,546
13
votes
Does anyone in Star Trek have this fear about transporters?
Actually, yes, there were people within the Star Trek universe who had this particular fear.
The matter is fully confronted in the Next Generation graphic novel Forgiveness by David Brin:
There, he ...
- 45.4k
12
votes
What's the Star Trek transporter like from the point of view of the person being transported?
There are two times when we see a transport from the POV of the transportee.
From Voy: "Prototype" (unfortunately in monochrome due to the subject being a robot)
And TNG: "Realms of ...
- 652k
12
votes
Accepted
Has any Star Trek material had a serious in-universe discussion about the philosophy of transporter technology?
The Voyager episode Tuvix deals with a transporter accident which combines the most annoying parts of Neelix and Tuvok into a single person called Tuvix. It deals with the ethical ramifications of ...
- 13.5k
12
votes
Has there ever been an instance in Star Trek where someone beamed into a solid object?
While definitely non-canon, the "Choose Your Own Adventure" style book Star Trek: Phaser Fight includes a sequence that explores beaming into solid matter:
"Well, if you must," ...
- 51.2k
11
votes
Has any Star Trek material had a serious in-universe discussion about the philosophy of transporter technology?
The philosophy of transportation is discussed at length in the very early (maybe the first?) tie-in novel Spock Must Die by James Blish. The plot revolves around an evil duplicate of Spock created by ...
- 47.6k
11
votes
Why can't Transporter technology be used as a weapon?
In the Next Generation episode "Captain's Holiday", Picard instructs the Enterprise to use "Transporter code 14" - the use of the transporter as a weapon by dematerializing an object and simply never ...
- 4,393
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible