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From: rjnoe@ihlts.UUCP (Roger Noe @ N41:48:31, W88:07:13)
Newsgroups: net.startrek
Subject: Re: Star Trek II question
Message-ID: <340@ihlts.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 2-Feb-84 10:58:03 EST
Article-I.D.: ihlts.340
Posted: Thu Feb  2 10:58:03 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 8-Feb-84 00:46:43 EST
References: <16217@sri-arpa.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Naperville, IL
Lines: 41

>	Why couldn't Kirk use the transporter to dematerialize the Genesis
>	device into its component atoms?
>					Phil Chin

Good question, indeed.  But first I have to say that I'm fairly sure that
Kirk did not offer to beam survivors of the Reliant on board the Enterprise.
Little matter here, because I think he told Uhura to signal them "Prepare
to be boarded" and I know they weren't going to use ropes and swing over
(cutlasses in hand).  They had to have transporter power and be within
range to use it.

I suppose (as others have suggested) that there might not have been enough
power to beam the whole Genesis device.  It would weigh considerably more than
a few people, and it's a pretty good bet to say that power required for the
transporter is roughly proportional to the mass being transported.  And
destroying Genesis with Reliant perhaps would have set it off.  David
Marcus said that Kirk could not just go over there and shut it off.  The
implication was that even David couldn't do it, i.e. a physical impossibility.
Except for running, that only left the transporter.

There have been times that something has been beamed out to space at "widest
possible angle of dispersion".  But does that necessarily mean that a
solid flies apart into zillions of pieces, resembling more of a gas?
Nomad was transported whole and promptly destroyed itself ("Sterilize!").
The humanoid body that Redjac (Jack the Ripper) had taken control of was
beamed out, where the body undoubtedly died rather quickly.  Redjac itself
would live for a long time regardless of what happened to that body.
There are other examples.  But nowhere do we have a real reason to believe
that the transporter could really pull things apart.  Matter transportation
is quite a problem in itself, but transmutation is much less conceivable.
We know that Starfleet does not have this capability in the Star Trek time
frame.  All the Enterprise could have done would be to transport the
Genesis device out to maximum transporter range (in TV Star Trek, that was
something like 25 Mm) which was not far enough.  The energy could be better
used at achieving "best possible speed", well under the speed of light.

But of course none of these explanations approach the real reason that Kirk
could not have beamed away Genesis.  The real reason being that this way,
being forced to run and without enough power to make it, makes for a
dramatic scene and allows Spock to die in a way that befits the character.
		Roger Noe		ihnp4!ihlts!rjnoe