The Voyager Conspiracy - S6-E9
Factual error: When the alien contacts Voyager after his catapult jump, he states that he is 5,000 light years away. Despite the distance, he and Janeway have a real time conversation. With this incredible communications technology, Voyager (which is at this point less than 55,000 light years from the Alpha Quadrant) should be able to have several back and forth conversations a day with Starfleet.
Plot hole: In this episode Kes states that she has to decide now whether to have a child or not because Ocampa women can only get pregnant once and deliver one child. If that was the case they would have died out a long time ago, or never even evolved, as two people only getting one offspring would reduce the population to 50% of the original figure each generation.
The Doctor: Watch your tongue... Or I'll remove it.
Trivia: Rain Robinson has a model of a DY-100 on the window sill in her office. In 1996 (also the year this episode is set), Kahn left Earth in the SS Botany Bay, a DY-100 class starship.
Question: Is there any technology featured in Star Trek Voyager, or other Star Trek series for that part, that seemed futuristic in the late 20th century, but are now reality?
Answer: If you include the original Star Trek series (1966) then there are several. The communicators used in the original series were before (and said to inspire) mobile phones. We currently do have teleportation technology but it currently only works on things the size of a few molecules. A "Cloaking device" also exists; it's a fabric that bends light through it, though it currently only works in infra-red. The Hypospray is real and was patented in 1960 - six years before the original series aired - it's actually called the Jet Injector. Faster Than Light travel is still a few decades off, but there are several real-world theories that look promising, including one that is remarkably similar to the method used in the Star Trek Universe called the Alcubeierre Drive that involves manipulating spacetime ahead and behind the ship and the ship "riding" it. Medical techniques and technologies have also advanced considerably; prosthetics particularity and we routinely have robots performing surgeries where absolute precision is needed. The "Shield" used in the series have a few primitive versions around. The Phasers used in the series are used but are not very powerful (nor will they ever be as powerful as the Star Trek version the laws of physics gets in the way) but rail-guns (using magnets to spin then propel a projectile) and particle accelerators like the Large Hadron Collider have been around for a while. The Replicator would require a nuclear fusion reactor and a nuclear fission reactor in something the size of a large oven and the Holo-deck wouldn't work at all based on our current understanding of physics so those are both still science fiction at the moment, but who knows!
Answer: 3D printers can be seen as sort of a Replicator.
Separate from membership, this is to get updates about mistakes in recent releases. Addresses are not passed on to any third party, and are used solely for direct communication from this site. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Check out the mistake & trivia books, on Kindle and in paperback.
Suggested correction: It's also possible that it's simply required of Ocampan women to give birth the first time they go through it, and can then experience it again.
Greg Dwyer
Nothing in the dialogue suggest Ocampa's can have additional children. While we can speculate about fictitious species, it's still a plot hole due to writing. Kes states she's going through the "elogium" which is a time of change where her body prepares for fertilization. She then explicit states the "elogium" only occurs once. While the doctor compares it to puberty, the elogium is both sexual maturity and "heat", that is, the time a female is ready for fertilization.
Bishop73
But it doesn't ever state the normalcy of birthing for Ocompans. Perhaps sextuplets is the norm?
Kes frequently used the word "child." If it was normal to give birth to more than one, she would know this and should say "children."
Bishop73
Do not forget that this is all done through the universal translator. For all you know the Ocompan word for child and children is the same so the translator cannot tell the difference.