Talk:Threshold (Star Trek: Voyager)

Two different topics in one comment

1) I really don't know why the Infobox got that extra bit of weirdness in it (the thinner font and the other problems) after I shortened the caption. On that matter, I decided to leave well enough alone, I do not want to break it any further then it is.

2) Once again, I think the criticism section of this article should go because there seems to be no point to it that I can see. Is a YouTube video reliable citations anyway?

P.S. I hope people find my plot synopsis acceptable.

Lots42 04:14, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

I'm going to strongly disagree with point 2) above. Having just seen this episode for the first time, I was moved by the fact that it was so absurdly bad, so I looked to wikipedia about it. I found criticism section to be very useful, relevant, and informative. Removing it would be shortsighted. There is only the issue that one of the links (concerning decanonization) is no longer valid, and should be updated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.58.3.184 (talk) 02:53, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Unfair criticism ?

The article states: "As well as this, the episode illustrates a fundamental misunderstanding of the basic principles of evolution, depicting it as a force ongoing within an individual member of a species, in the manner of a mystical force. In actuality, for evolution to occur there must be not only mutation, but differential reproduction and natural selection through long term population of an environment by numerous individuals"

I think this is an unfair criticism. After all, cells divide within an individual and undergo differential reproduction. It's not true that the DNA sequence is identical in every cell in your body. When you get cancer, that's certainly not the case in the tumour cells, where mutations switch off the normal inhibiting of cell division. As a result, the cancer cells are more successful at reproducing, and natural selection has unfortunate consequences for you. However, on a more positive note it is also the case that the operation of the immune system, where antibodies adapt in order to fight off new pathogens, is a clear example of evolutionary processes acting within the individual, and over quite a short time period! It involves rapid mutation (of the part of the antibody that binds on to the pathogen, and needs to find the correct shape in order to bind), with natural selection (the antibodies that bind more successfully are further replicated). Every time you get a cold, and you get over it in a few days, you should reflect that it is evolution happening in your own body that cured you. (I got most of this from the excellent popular science book "Darwin in the Genome" by Lynn Caporale). Perhaps the writers of the episode were not aware of all this, as they later admitted to it being a bad episode, but I would say that by sheer luck maybe they were more plausible than they thought. It is not unheard of that a Sci-Fi writer by power of the imagination anticipates scientific developments.

Alan1507 00:11, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

The thing about that though, is that the example you cite is a positive change within your body to make you adapt to the environment. By definition, that is indeed what evolution is (Whereas cancer is not a form of evolution whatsoever, and is rather just a simple mutation- all evolution is the result of a mutation but not all mutations are evolutions). Tom Paris actually managed to evolve into something that not only is less suitable to his environment, but rather into a creature that can't even get a basic need out of his environment (he needed a certain kind of atmosphere). This is the exact opposite of evolution. The random mish-mash of a lizard monster was created out of complete ignorance of the basic DEFINITION of evolution. 140.129.62.51 (talk) 15:03, 4 September 2008 (UTC)