Any one here seen the new Star Trek? From what I have been told, it was a pretty good film.
But what I am curious about are the usual Star Trek economic fallacies. So here’s my question for anyone here who has seen it - Is there unspoken central planning going on with a ridiculous ‘barter’ economy, or has it reverted to a more market friendly story like the original series was?
I have seen it and I kinda feel neutral about it. On one hand its a fine popcorn flick (the first in years I liked), on the other hand the story is …improveable. They don’t touch really economic issues. They show a bar, but you don’t really see that you gotta pay. What I really, really liked was that the interior of the spaceships was more..real. You saw the water-distribution system and other places that looked more like in a submarine or an offshore oil drilling station. Very practical “designs” in contrast to the more stylish bridge.Neros ship on the other hand was kinda odd inside, but that can be explained due to the fact that it was a big facility.
The concept of the villain was also very original imho, and also “libertarianish” (a little bit).
So, not much economics, but if you have an industrial fetish you might find some details you can enjoy (Randians?).
Even if not, go see the movie. Its at least worthwhile to watch it once on the big screen.
I saw it. I can’t believe Kirk so carelessly dumps all of that water on the ship. Doesn’t he understand scarcity? Particularly in outer space.
I think in terms of libertarianism as the message, you have to be a Star Wars fan over Star Trek. The movie was good though.
I haven’t seen the original series (unless the movies with the TOS cast count; but after seeing the 2009 one, I may just put reluctance aside & go full geek to see TOS), but from what I understand, Star Trek has generally given a sort of vague ,pluralistic explanation (or a variety of explanations) regarding both how the federation works, how the economy of the federation operates (as well as Earth), & how economies outside the federation operate (with, parallel & against the federation).
I absolutley think this vaugness is more so because of the writer’s involved maybe not being very well versed in economics (or enough to give fictional conjectures), let alone the implications of the central invention of the series, the replicator (which, from memory of various eps in TNG, provided a lot of technological progress towards transporting, holodeck, etc.), rather than laziness.
IMO, I think you could easily come up with a valid explanation basing the entire prospect of the economies in ST on the replicator, & I would probably dub it something akin to the replicator allowing humanity to achieve near-abundance, or non-physical scarcity, & things that are required to make things absurdly abundant (materials for replicators) would be the only true scarce things, & replicators would be a highly sought barter item (I remember on more than one ocassion where bargaining between the federation and a candidate federation planet, or non-federation parties involved the discussion of the enterprise giving replicator technology, as opposed to gold, credit, oil, etc.).
That isn’t to say that the replicator would become a currency, but in someway, I suppose information would become a currency itself.
I could probably give a better explanation if i took some time, but I rather shocked & surprised that economists and/or libertarians haven’t tackled ST for analyzation.
I think it would be fascinating to ST fans to see how austrain economic analysis and/or the libertarian viewpoint could better explain the government & economy of the ST universe as a whole, imo.
As for the mentioned pluralism earlier, I have seen on frequent ocassions the mentioning of other civilization’s currencies, but for the most part, 2 are constantly referred to:
1.) Federation Credits (the bartering system available to federation citizens)
&
2.) Gold Pressed Latnum (famously used by ferengis, but typically is the currency of choice for non-federation systems, citizens, criminials, etc.)
I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if some sort of free-market had to exist in such a universe where near-abundance is attainted, but whether that extends beyond the federation, or the worlds of federation, I wouldn’t be sure.
It seems that Earth itself seems to use Federation Credit’s as a “conviencence” or for formality, & even just for economic interaction with other Federation planets, but culturally, it seems Earth is a simple, voluntary barter system where currency is not required, but not illegal, either.
I wouldn’t be surprised if other cultures that happen to be federation members, also utilized a free-market barter economy on their specified planets, & relied more on federation credits when interacting with other cultures as well.
Ugh. My roommate wants to see this, but I just can’t go. I’ll feel too much like a geek. 
You blog about capitalism and left libertarians. YOU ARE A GEEK.
I was really kind of hoping I would have instigated a Star Trek vs Star Wars flame war, damn.
Touche.
Go see the movie - I thought it was great. Way better than I thought it’d be.
Economics…scarcity…fallacies…WHO CARES? I don’t think anyone is basing their political–economic viewpoints on a damn Star Trek movie that is obviously based in science fiction. Why don’t we just talk about the fallacies of interstellar space travel. There’s no way a vessel the size of any of their star cruisers can cruise through a wormhole, or generate enough power to create several within one voyage.
And why are there even biological people on this ship? If we can cruise through the cosmos, creating black holes and whatever else, shouldn’t we all have at least completely artificial bodies, much less completely informational souls?
It’s like talking about the economic fallacies in a movie that has widespread fictitious devices which can create anything you imagine.
I often find that we lack a cultural connection with the rest of society. I think we need to focus on why freedom is awesome, not economically optimal.
I think culturally, it’s very important to point out & combat the underlying intellectual & anti-intellectual assumptions of state society.
That automatic humanistic & altruistic reactionary attitudes still exist as a way of rationalizing Statism still bothers me, & any media that reinforce this (however subtly), despite their entertainment value, still irks me a bit.
My ruminations aside, I do agree largely that it wouldn’t be worthwhile to fret & decry Star Trek for being a movie. Most of it is merely done for the “what-if” factor, & for being able to materialize these fantasies beyond a mere pad & pencil.
I still think it would be a fun exercise, & possibly a smart move in the marketing department, to analyze it & other media, as a backdoor for getting in libertarian viewpoints, even if only in aesthetics.
Speaking of backdoors, the women were objectified a little more than I would expect in a socialistic and egalitarian future. Skirts and go-go boots?
I enjoyed it, but the feminists like Roderick Long are probably boiling over with outrage.
But I thought feminism was all about females being able to choose to be objectified, not forced 
Indeed, however, I think it was more so due to who was writing star trek & when that influenced the amount of utopian, socialistic egalitarianism that ST is sometimes un-fairly assumed for (mostly due to TOS). I always found it a more telling sub-text of hyprocisy when supposedly in this egalitarian future, such as TOS, skirts & go-go boots were deemed an acceptable aesthethic choice somehow not founded in sexuality (more so the skirts, but TOS was made in the 60’s, afterall).
Rodenberry obviously desired more of an “advanced” egalitarian society, & TOS would probably reflect that, but one can see visibly after TOS, the show / series stepped further away from the original utopianism that TOS might’ve once called for.
I think what also influenced were the previous decades each show was founded in: TOS in the 60’s (from people who grew up in the 50’s: the affluent society, LBJ, etc.), TNG in the 80’s (feminism, pro & anti captialistic reactions to Reagan, technological advancements that in retrospect were rather retro, increased consumerism, etc.), DS9 in the 90’s (fallout from the 80’s, political centrism, etc.)
In TNG, despite the inital 1st season, there is actually quite a bit of a power-struggle between anti-egaltarian & egaltarian themes, which is why I thought the show was it’s strongest whenever the chracter Q popped up to challenge, in a sense, the entire show’s basis and/or vision of the 24 th century, or when characters themselves aknowledged that while the 24th century is far more advanced, & many old problems that used to plaque humans pre-24th century dissapeared, there are still problems merley because they are still humans, & in other cases, because they still cannot clearly define what human is (i.e. Data).
The height of this was obviously when the Borg came along, & the federation quickly became more militariastic (in ways justifiable, but the fallout is expertly addressed in the more ambitious DS9) in light of a stronger race that seeks to destroy culture & assimilate others against their will.
Interestingly, the writer’s pretty much eliminated what was a good counter-race to humans in Voyager by attempting to “humanize” the Borg, which worked in some ways, failed in others, & rendered the previously thought formidable threat into a lower threat & that somehow humans were inherently better (gotta love that humanistic semi-propaganda).
All in all, however, considering that those in the 24th century may have had to emerge from from harsher times (there are frequent allusions throughout Star Trek of world war III in the 21st century, totalitarian regimes & a dark ages throughout the 22nd, & a slow reconstruction throughout the early 23rd & progress towards the 24 th in the later 23rd, despite ocassional flops like eugenics wars, etc.), it wouldn’t surprise me if the previous egalitarianistic themes of ST were rendered unrealistic, especially if one of the central themes of the human in the 24th century in ST is to “better themselves”.
All types of scenarios could concievably influence the human race towards either more cultrually conservative or culturally liberal tendencies, but per the vaugness of the workings of ST, it seems to be a mixture of both, resulting in some sort of combination of both, but I don’t think it would too much a stretch to say that people on Earth of the 24th century have much more of a culturally libertarian outlook compared to now.
What would happen to those who don’t or refuse to? An advanced civilization would have to reoncile choosing between denial or acceptance of natural selection, without going to either extremes (i.e. full on humanistic socialism or eugenical totaltarianism, both of which were challenged in the ST universe itself as acceptable options).
The vaugness of how the federation works, etc., however, probably survive to help keep available writing options fresh when it comes to writing, which would be a very practical rebuttal against my crystal balling of the cogs of ST 
.
On a last note, I haven’t read any of the Star Trek novels, which most likley expand the universe both in general & detailed ways, so I wouldn’t be surprised if some authors had already attempted to retcon some vaugness of how everything works in the 24the century.
I would find out for myself, but frankly, I wouldn’t have nearly enough time to skim rather unimportant Star Trek books (compared to other things, at least) lol.
Yeah I agree, Gene Roddenberry probably intended a pluralistic future - largely a reaction to cold war politics IMO. You have the Russian Chekov and the Japanese Sulu, former enemies of the US fully integrated into a starship crew.
Starting with the later movies, some of the ‘you cant turn back the clock’ type socialism started to creep in. Why, in the future, we’ll be so advanced why would we need money? Despite TNG being my favorite of the series, the economic fallacies were obvious and reoccuring. One poster said dont worry about , just a TV show, etc; but I think ‘what if’ visions of the future in fiction are a good reflection of mankind’s view of the state.
Short skirts are a homage to the TOS. It was 60s, after all Not that they wore minis all the time. Looking back now, female characters don’t seem as strong or interesting compared to recent years TV, but having female officers, especially black female officers (as well as Asians) was quite a revolution for its times.
Why can’t one enjoy both? Even though they’re set in space, they’re very different, stylistically and ideologically.
You won’t read any complaints from me. [:D]
Haha, all the guys say that
but dont you realise? if they are wearing mini-skirts then they aren’t wearing catsuits! or space-bikinis!
Is it good Star Trek? No. There is no Star Trek morality in it. No prime directive. No the Federation does not torture. Nothing. In the 1960s having a Slavic, an American Black, and Japanese might have been cutting edge, but today you need East Asians, South Asians, South Americans, Africians ect. The crew make up based on 60s USA was really poorly thought out. The use of Polynesian face tattoos on the bad guys, the Romulans, was also racist in my view. In short the things that separated Star Trek from other SciFi are totally missing. I also thought the concentration on military academies on Earth and some sort of Vulcan academy was fascistic.
Is it good SciFi. No. Cheap CGI special effects, 20th(not even 21st) century items seep into the sets. In SciFi movies if the sets are dark, it means they did not spend money on it, and so it was with the cheapy sets on the Romulan ship on this star trek. Very little attention was paid to the science behind the SciFi so you get a lot of yapping about the importance of red matter. The drill the Romulans use to blow up planets seems to have been use in satires like the Pink Panther and Austin Powers movies. When they parachute onto the drill I had to think, parachutes? That Swiss guy Fusion Man who jumps out of airplanes with foldable wings has better equipement that works in real life today. The sci fi was in general unimaginative and sloppy.
Is it good action. Yes, it was one of those pirates or indiana jones movies only shot on a more or less cheapy sci fi set. Much of the action was silly for example when baby kirk trashes a vintage corvette sowing his wild oats. That was really tasteless and stupid.
The movie was released in May as it could not compete head to head with the new Transformers movie. I saw the trailer before Star Trek came on, the transformers trailer was better than the star trek movie.