All manifestations of Star Trek had their good shows and their stinkers. Unfortunately, I can't remember much in the way of good shows in the "Enterprise" prequel. The cast was good. Scott Bakula is a very versatile actor, but the scripts were mediocre. He didn't have much to work with. Good potential unrealized.

One episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation was one of the finest pieces of genuine science fiction to ever hit the small screen (or large screen, for that matter). The episode's title was "The Measure of a Man" and it dealt with a computer scientist from Star Fleet arriving on the Enterprise to requisition Data. He planned to dismantle him, dump his memory core, and try to find out (literally) what makes him tick. His object was to use Data as a prototype in order to construct a whole army of Datas.

There were several real issues tackled here.

Data declined. He was especially concerned about the memory dump. Assured that his memories of past experiences would be reloaded, he feared that, although he would still have the factual memories, he would lose their "ineffable quality." He was then told that he had no choice in the matter. He was only a machine—the property of Star Fleet. This raised several fairly juicy questions. Was Data a life form, or just a machine? Does a sentient machine have civil rights? Is Data conscious, or does he (it) just appear to be? If he is, how can you be sure? If he isn't how can you really be sure of that? How do we know that anyone else is conscious? What is the nature of consciousness?

Another question was the desirability of building a race of "disposable people" who would do the dirty, dangerous jobs that "biological" humans didn't want to do. Picard to Guinan, when she used the term "disposable people":   "You're talking about slavery!" Guinan, looking meaningfully innocent: "Am I?"

This show was a doozey!

What makes this an especially good piece of science fiction? Considering the advances currently being made in robotics and artificial intelligence, these are very real questions that may—will—confront us sometime in the not too far distant future. It wouldn't hurt to give some thought to them before we actually encounter them.

Don Firth