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Old 10-29-2020, 03:43 AM
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Nate the Great Nate the Great is offline
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One of the TNG TV Tropes pages calls the Universal Translator "maybe above all the rest, the single biggest "don't think about this too much" technology in all of Star Trek."


PNQ: Opinions?


After all, as presented the UT has to be able to do the following:
1. Scan the language centers of the brains of everyone in range to form a translation matrix that can be used on the fly.
2. Listen to the speaker's voice to not only translate the words, but also create a copycat artificial voice so everyone doesn't sound like Stephen Hawking.
3. Not only translate based on universal linguistic principles (and let's not even get into how THAT works), but restructure the translation to sound more natural to the ears of the specific person wearing the combadge.

4. Create holographic projections of lips over everyone in range so the lips look like they're speaking the language of whoever is wearing the UT AND not conflict with the projections of the other combadges in range.
5. Obey rules specialized for each language on what to translate or not translate (i.e. say "bat'leth", not "sword of honor", say "Gul" not "Captain").
6. Mute the sound of the original words to not overlap with the computer-generated translation. Oh, and be able to do this for dozens of people in dozens of different places speaking dozens of languages SIMULTANEOUSLY.


Kinda makes the Babel Fish sound less implausible, doesn't it?
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