Generations Trek Quotes

If we can't alter the tide of events, at least we can be nearby with towels to mop up.

Individually, every grain of sand brushing against my hands represents a story, an experience, and a block for me to build upon for the next generation.

With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably. -- Star Trek: The Next Generation

I never knew what a friend was until I met Geordi. He spoke to me as though I were human. He treated me no differently from anyone else. He accepted me for what I am. And that, I have learned, is friendship.

Flair is what makes the difference between artistry and mere competence. Cmdr. William Riker

There can be no justice so long as law is absolute. Even life itself is an excercise in exceptions.” “When has justice ever been as simple as a rule-book?” - Riker

Life's true gift is the capacity to enjoy enjoyment.

Commander William T. Riker: It's just that our mental pathways have become accustomed to your sensory input patterns. Lt. Commander Data: Hm. I understand. I am also fond of you, Commander. And you as well, Counselor.

With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied - chains us all irrevocably.

The game isn't big enough unless it scares you a little. Cmdr. William Riker

You can’t battle life,’ she said. ‘You have to learn to treat it like a waltz and your problems are your partner. Step lightly, try to keep time with the music and smile.

Data:I could be chasing an untamed ornithoid without cause.

Because there’s no such thing as a meaningless sacrifice, Mr. Hill. Because any positive act, no matter how hopeless or insignificant, is ultimately worthwhile.

I’d heard about cats watching TV from a friend whose cat loved Star Trek: The Next Generation. Whenever it heard that familiar music − Dah-Dah Dah Dah Dah-Dah Dah Dah − he’d come running into the room and jump on the sofa. I saw it happen a few times and it was hilarious. No joke. Pretty

If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home, and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here! It's wondrous...with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross; but it's not for the timid.

Data: My positronic brain has several layers of shielding to protect me from power surges. It would be possible for you to remove my cranial unit and take it with you. Riker: Let me get this straight--you want me to take off your head? Data: Yes sir

This time let's make sure history never forgets The name ENTERPRISE!

Deanna's job (as counselor) is to keep us from deluding ourselves.

The unexpected is our normal routine. Commander Riker

All TV is educational. The question is, ‘What are we teaching?

They may well have had a backup system, but if it crashed at the same time as their main system, then that's all she wrote,' Riker said. 'Excuse mee, sir' said Data. 'That's all who wrote?' 'It's merely an expression, Mr. Data,' said Picard. 'It means that was the end of it. There was nothing they could do.' 'That's all she wrote' repeated Data. He nodded. 'Yes, I see. She, in this case, doubtless referring to the human conceptualization of Fate, writing a final chapter, as it were, and putting a period to the-' 'Please, Mr. Data,' Picard said impatiently.

PICARD: Did you read that book I gave you? (Wesley reacts, barely concealing a grimace as he recalls.) WESLEY: Some of it. PICARD: That's reassuring. WESLEY: I just don't have much time. PICARD: (re the book in his hand) There is no greater challenge than the study of philosophy. (Wesley glances over at Picard's book) WESLEY: William James sure won't be on my Starfleet exams. PICARD: The important things never will be. Anyone can be trained to deal with technology, and the mechanics of piloting a starship. WESLEY: But Starfleet Academy-- PICARD: It takes more than just that. Open your mind to the past... to history, art, philosophy. And then... (re: the stars) ...this will mean something. (Wesley considers this, almost embarrassed as he realizes Picard does truly care about him.) Then: PICARD (continuing) Just consider James' wisdom: "Philosophy... is not a technical matter... it is our sense of what life honestly means... our individual way of feeling the total push and pressure of the cosmos." (then) That's what I want for you. From: STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION "Samaritan Snare" #40272-143 Written by Robert L. McCullough

Have you traveled through time?” “Yes,” Worf said, “but I do not recommend it.

I will always have doubts...But I will always overcome them.

(My favorite line from Captain Picard of Star Trek: The Next Generation is, “I have made some fine mistakes in my life.” It is so humble, wise, and self-confident, all at once.)

The arbiter of a demanding wargame rendered the word "mismatch" as "challenge" in his language.

I have to set an example, now more than ever. Facing death is the ultimate test of character. – Cmdr. William Riker

You can't guide someone into adulthood. The experiences are unique to each person. Deanna Troi

I don't like people much, and I like doctors even less.

Can I just sit here for a moment? Human contact, and all that. There’s one thing you don’t get much in Starfleet—a hug. They ought to have a couple of people in charge of hugs, just to dispense them randomly.

One evening I came home and there on the couch I found my husband, Tom, with a freshly fledged crow sitting calmly in his lap. They were busy watching Star Trek: The Next Generation; since Captain Jean-Luc Picard was in the middle of an absorbing monologue, they hardly registered my arrival, but finally they both glanced my way, Tom looking a bit sheepish, the crow nibbling bits from a can of gourmet cat food. I thought of something Bernd Heinrich wrote, inspired by his raven studies, "Living with another creature, you naturally feel closer to it the more activities that can be shared, especially important activities like watching TV.

Deep Space Nine was a Star Trek for the complex, conflict-ridden post–Cold War era. Whereas The Next Generation captured a shining moment of utopian optimism, Deep Space Nine was the thud of reality intruding upon fantasy. It

There are times, sir, when men of good conscience cannot blindly follow orders. You acknowledge their sentience but you ignore their personal liberties and freedom. Order a man to hand his child over to the state? Not while I am his Captain.

Wesley Crusher: Say goodbye, Data. Lt. Cmdr. Data: Goodbye, Data. [crew laughs] Lt. Cmdr. Data: Was that funny? Wesley Crusher: [laughs] Lt. Cmdr. Data: Accessing. Ah! Burns and Allen, Roxy Theater, New York City, 1932. It still works. [pauses] Lt. Cmdr. Data: Then there was the one about the girl in the nudist colony, that nothing looked good on? Lieutenant Worf: We're ready to get under way, sir. Lt. Cmdr. Data: Take my Worf, please. Commander William T. Riker: [to Captain Picard] Warp speed, sir? Captain Jean-Luc Picard: Please.

The captain regarded his bridge and its people and their task with the stateliness of a bird on a bough. Not a bird of prey, though, this captain. This one could soar in any direction, whichever way duty demanded. Not a large man or even an imposing one—a task he left to his first officer—the captain was at times unobtrusive, the bird hiding in the foliage, watching, never seen until those great wings suddenly spread. Those around him knew this could happen at any moment, this sudden peeling off across the bridge panorama like a lean sky thing. Even in repose, his presence kept them alert.

And that is why people think that computers don’t have minds, and why people think that their brains are special, and different from computers. Because people can see the screen inside their head and they think there is someone in their head sitting there looking at the screen, like Captain Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation sitting in his captain’s seat looking at a big screen. And they think that this person is their special human mind, which is called a homunculus, which means a little man. And they think that computers don’t have this homunculus. But this homunculus is just another picture on the screen in their heads. And when the homunculus is on the screen in their heads (because the person is thinking about the homunculus) there is another bit of the brain watching the screen. And when the person thinks about this part of the brain (the bit that is watching the homunculus on the screen) they put this bit of the brain on the screen and there is another bit of the brain watching the screen. But the brain doesn’t see this happen because it is like the eye flicking from one place to another and people are blind inside their heads when they do the changing from thinking about one thing to thinking about another.

Admiral Leonard H. "Bones" McCoy: How old do you think I am, anyway? Lt. Commander Data: 137 years, Admiral, according to Starfleet records. Admiral Leonard H. "Bones" McCoy: Explain how you remember that so exactly! Lt. Commander Data: I remember every fact I am exposed to, sir. Admiral Leonard H. "Bones" McCoy: [looking at both sides of Data's head] I don't see no points on your ears, boy, but you sound like a Vulcan. Lt. Commander Data: No, sir. I am an android. Admiral Leonard H. "Bones" McCoy: Hmph. Almost as bad.' 'Data: [uses a device in his arm to open a door] Open sesame! You could say I have a magnetic personality. [laughs at his joke] Data: Humor! I love it!' 'Lt. Commander Data: Spot, you are disrupting my ability to work. [he puts Spot to the floor, but she jumps back on Data's desk] Spot: Meow. Lt. Commander Data: Vamoose, ye little varmint!

Finally there would be total unity within the Federation, the first step toward people’s being at home on any planet instead of only one. The principle from the old United States, basically; it didn’t matter if you were raised in Vermont and lived in California. You were still home, still American. If your name was Baird or Yamamura or Kwame, you weren’t necessarily loyal to Scotland, Japan, or Ghana, but to America. A few decades of space travel, and the statement became “I’m a citizen of Earth,” and no matter the country. This ship was that kind of first step. Whether born on Earth or Epsillon Indii VI, you were a citizen of the Federation. The children on this colony Enterprise would visit the planets of the Federation and feel part of each, welcome upon all. This starship was the greatest, most visionary melting pot of all, this spacegoing colony. Unique. Hopeful. Risky.

I am female. I was born that way. I have had those feelings...those longings...all of my life. It is not unnatural. I am not sick because I feel this way. I do not need to be helped. I do not need to be cured. What I need, and what all of those who are like me need, is your understanding and your compassion. We have not injured you in any way, and yet we are scorned and attacked. And all because we are different. What we do is no different from what you do. We talk, and laugh. We complain about work, and we wonder about growing old. We talk about our families and we worry about the future. And we cry with each other when things seem hopeless. All of the loving things that you do with each other-- that is what we do. And for that we are called misfits, and deviants, and criminals. What right do you have to punish us? What right do you have to change us? What makes you think you can dictate how people love each other?

The river’s isolation and secrecy, however, were only part of what made it superlative. There was also its vertical drop. The Colorado’s watershed encompasses a series of high-desert plateaus that stretch across the most austere and hostile quarter of the West, an area encompassing one-twelfth the landmass of the continental United States, whose breadth and average height are surpassed only by the highlands of Tibet. Each winter, storms lumbering across the Great Basin build up a thick snowpack along the crest of the mountains that line the perimeter of this plateau—an immense, sickle-shaped curve of peaks whose summits exceed fourteen thousand feet. As the snowmelt cascades off those summits during the spring and spills toward the Sea of Cortés, the water drops more than two and a half miles. That amounts to eight vertical feet per horizontal mile, an angle that is thirty-two times steeper than that of the Mississippi. The grade is unequaled by any major waterway in the contiguous United States and very few long stretches of river beyond the Himalayas. (The Nile, in contrast, falls only six thousand feet in its entire four-thousand-mile trek to the Mediterranean.) Also unlike the Nile, whose discharge is generated primarily by rain, the engine that drives almost all of this activity is snow. This means that the bulk of the Colorado’s discharge tends to come down in one headlong rush. Throughout the autumn and the winter, the river might trickle through the canyonlands of southern Utah at a mere three thousand cubic feet per second. With the melt-out in late May and early June, however, the river’s flow can undergo spectacular bursts of change. In the space of a week, the level can easily surge to 30,000 cfs, and a few days after that it can once again rocket up, surpassing 100,000 cfs. Few rivers on earth can match such manic swings from benign trickle to insane torrent. But the story doesn’t end there, because these savage transitions are exacerbated by yet another unusual phenomenon, one that is a direct outgrowth of the region’s unusual climate and terrain. On

Finding the right mentor is not always easy. But we can locate role models in a more accessible place: the stories of great originals throughout history. Human rights advocate Malala Yousafzai was moved by reading biographies of Meena, an activist for equality in Afghanistan, and of Martin Luther King, Jr. King was inspired by Gandhi as was Nelson Mandela. In some cases, fictional characters can be even better role models. Growing up, many originals find their first heroes in their most beloved novels where protagonists exercise their creativity in pursuit of unique accomplishments. When asked to name their favorite books, Elon Musk and Peter Thiel each chose “Lord of the Rings“, the epic tale of a hobbit’s adventures to destroy a dangerous ring of power. Sheryl Sandberg and Jeff Bezos both pointed to “A Wrinkle in Time“ in which a young girl learns to bend the laws of physics and travels through time. Mark Zuckerberg was partial to “Enders Game“ where it’s up to a group of kids to save the planet from an alien attack. Jack Ma named his favorite childhood book as “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves“, about a woodcutter who takes the initiative to change his own fate. … There are studies showing that when children’s stories emphasize original achievements, the next generation innovates more.… Unlike biographies, in fictional stories characters can perform actions that have never been accomplished before, making the impossible seem possible. The inventors of the modern submarine and helicopters were transfixed by Jules Vern’s visions in “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” and “The Clippership of the Clouds”. One of the earliest rockets was built by a scientist who drew his motivation from an H.G. Wells novel. Some of the earliest mobile phones, tablets, GPS navigators, portable digital storage desks, and multimedia players were designed by people who watched “Star Trek” characters using similar devices. As we encounter these images of originality in history and fiction, the logic of consequence fades away we no longer worry as much about what will happen if we fail… Instead of causing us to rebel because traditional avenues are closed, the protagonist in our favorite stories may inspire originality by opening our minds to unconventional paths.

One night in 1987, Carmack saw the ultimate game. It occurred in the opening episode of a new television series, Star Trek: The Next Generation, when the captain visited the ship’s Holodeck,

Unfortunately, Bretorius had found mediocrity too high a bar. He had advanced in the fleet the old-fashioned way: he’d stuck around so long they had to give him a command, or muster him out.

We are known to be anti-authoritarian, anti-institutional, and notoriously anti-religious—more likely to quote Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Monty Python, or Star Trek than the Bible.

We hold up iPhones and, if we’re relatively conscious of history, we point out that this is an amazing device that contains a live map of the world and the biggest libraries imaginable and that it’s an absolute paradigm shift in personal communication and empowerment. And then some knob says that it looks like something from Star Trek: The Next Generation, and then someone else says that it doesn’t even look as cool as Captain Kirk’s communicator in the original and then someone else says no but you can buy a case for it to make it look like one and you’re off to the manufactured normalcy races, where nobody wins because everyone goes to fucking sleep.

It had taken time for him to realize that no one was truly self-sufficient, and that those who thought they were merely took refuge in a form of weakness, the weakness of being unable to ask for help and guidance and thus find greater strength in reliance on close friends and comrades.

Tomorrow Was Yesterday” dealt with the discovery by the Enterprise of a giant “universe” or “generation” ship—that is, a slower-than-light spaceship that would take generations to reach its destination because they lacked the power to traverse the vast distances between the stars any faster. The Voyager was a colony ship that had been launched from Earth hundreds of years previously, but only now were Federation ships catching up to it, the Enterprise being the first. Unfortunately, after hundreds of years, the people inside had forgotten that they were aboard a spaceship—instead they believed their enclosed world to be the totality of existence. Part of the reason for this stemmed from a mutiny in their long forgotten past, a mutiny that had left the Voyager’s population divided into two armed camps. The elite were descendants of the well educated, and they had a high standard of living in their part of the ship. The downtrodden oppressed were descendants of the mutineers. Now, the Voyager was a giant sphere, or cylinder. Artificial gravity was provided by spinning the ship to create centrifugal force; therefore, from a shipside point of view, down was outward, up was toward the center. The upper levels in the center of the ship were where the control room was located

Luck’s more like it.” “Luck is a kind of talent.

Once a scientist, now Moriarty had found his true calling: he was a sorcerer. And all it had cost him was the memory of color.

They’ve expressed a well thought-out, reasonable desire to die.” “And?” “And I think that should be respected.” “Does that mean acted upon? Come on, doctor, don’t make me grill you.” “You mean, would I do it? Captain, let me put it this way. I’ve found that suffering can be mental and that it does no one any good.” “Would you,” he repeated, “do it?” She straightened her shoulders. “Yes.

Geordi liked to call Data’s subdominant hemisphere—the part of his brain that was organic, the part of his personality that let him be subjective.

Hemingway wrote, ‘The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places.

Mach das Heute immer zum Wertvollsten, was du hast, denn das Heute kehrt niemals wieder

The twenty- third century is an odd place to begin a book about events that were set in motion in the early seventeenth century. I am a historian, retired career military officer, and priest. As a historian I believe the truth, even when uncomfortable or damning, should be told. I take as inspiration a statement by Sir Patrick Stewart, in his role as Captain Jean Luc Picard, in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “The First Duty.” In the story Picard tells Cadet Wesley Crusher, “The first duty of every Starfleet officer is to the truth, whether it’s scientific truth or historical truth or personal truth! It is the guiding principle on which Starfleet is based.

It is possible to commit no mistakes and still loose. That is not a weakness. That is life.

THERE! ARE! FOUR! LIGHTS!

My favorite line from Captain Picard of Star Trek: The Next Generation is, "I have made some fine mistakes in my life." It is so humble, wise, and self-confident, all at once.

She's really beating the stuffing out of him. What do you think we should do?" "Sell tickets." - Riker and Worf

Grieving for their future, men and women often took their own lives. Others died when they could not maintain the feverish pace of the march. While the mortality rate of slaves during the Second Middle Passage never approached that of the transatlantic transfer, it surpassed the death rate of those who remained in the seaboard states. Over time some of the hazards of the long march abated, as slave traders - intent on the safe delivery of a valuable commodity - standardized their routes and relied more on flatboats, steamboats, and eventually railroads for transportation. The largest traders established 'jails,' where slaves could be warehoused, inspected, rehabilitated if necessary, and auctioned, sometimes to minor traders who served as middlemen in the expanding transcontinental enterprise. But while the rationalization of the slave trade may have reduced the slaves' mortality rate, it did nothing to mitigate the essential brutality or the profound alienation that accompanied separation from the physical and social moorings of home and family. ... [T]he Second Middle Passage was extraordinarily lonely, debilitating, and dispiriting. Capturing the mournful character of one southward marching coffle, an observer characterized it as 'a procession of men, women, and children resembling that of a funeral.' Indeed, with men and women dying on the march or being sold and resold, slaves became not merely commodified but cut off from nearly every human attachment. Surrendering to despair, many deportees had difficulties establishing friendships or even maintaining old ones. After a while, some simply resigned themselves to their fate, turned inward, and became reclusive, trying to protect a shred of humanity in a circumstance that denied it. Others exhibited a sort of manic glee, singing loudly and laughing conspicuously to compensate for the sad fate that had befallen them. Yet others fell into a deep depression and determined to march no further. Charles Ball, like others caught in the tide, 'longed to die, and escape from the bonds of my tormentors.' But many who survived the transcontinental trek formed strong bonds of friendships akin to those forged by shipmates on the voyage across the Atlantic. Indeed, the Second Middle Passage itself became a site for remaking African-American society. Mutual trust became a basis of resistance, which began almost simultaneously with the long march. Waiting for their first opportunity and calculating their chances carefully, a few slaves broke free and turned on their enslavers. Murder and mayhem made the Second Middle Passage almost as dangerous for traders as it was for slaves, which was why the men were chained tightly and guarded closely.

Of the Star Trek: The Next Generation future, Captain Picard once said: “The acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force in our lives. We work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity.” That is the future that we must build together.

The ships, ever bigger, ever more powerful, ever more majestic, were the badge of spirit for mankind. At least... sailors think so. For bakers, it's the bread that rises in their ovens that mankind should pay attention to.

Upgrades,” Bok said thoughtfully. “What a concept, making people buy the fixes to make their purchases work a little closer to the way they were supposed to . . .

Those who are positive they know everything suppress and destroy those who disagree. But those who know they don’t know explore and build and seek after wisdom.

Admittedly, the modern teenager was a bit of a mystery to Jones. But he did know one thing: they were wired together like the Borg, constantly calling, e-mailing, texting, social-networking.

To whom do mad gods pray? Englishmen?

But. But, but, but ... She was tired of looking. The unending choice had become repetitive. Big worlds, little worlds, inhabitable, uninhabitable, what difference did it make? The variety was so endless that, paradoxically, it made them seem very much the same.

The Golden Rule remains the best guidance in these matters,” said Picard. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

More often than not, it was the hand of the needy and uncertain that extended the olive branch. History had shown the truth of that over and over again.

Exercise was the rent the body charged for granting the mind space.

It's not uncommon for dead climbers on mountains to become important land marks in the trek up the mountain for the next generation of climbers. 'Turn left past the guy in the red jacket,' will be the role your corpse plays in enabling others to summit

Directly behind her were Santiago, a Cuban woman with a neurotic tendency toward perfectionism, and Peralta, the group’s top shot and ranking smartass. Trailing them were Boyle, a nebbishy type who was great at cooking up explosives, and Diaz, a taciturn woman who had lost her home and her entire extended family when the Borg destroyed Deneva.

You two don’t spend enough time around real people,” Vaslovik sighed. “Spite, gentlemen. Sour grapes. Whoever—whatever—this was, he had gotten clean away and someone shot him in the back just as the doors were swinging shut behind him. That’s a lot of anger, a lot of hate.

Sometimes, he decided, the important question was not “What happened?” but “How did it happen?

You want to know something, Professor?” he asked. “I’ve never been lucky. Not in that way.” “Hmph,” Vaslovik said, almost smiling. “You’re probably a better person for it.

It’s like the redshirt who sacrifices himself at the beginning of a Star Trek episode so that the viewer knows the monster isn’t foolin’ around. People like me have been redshirts for generations of storytelling. “Just

So far,” McAdams admitted. “That could change. I just can’t shake the feeling that something, someone, wants us to believe in a version of reality that would make our lives much easier. One thing I’ve learned, Commander, is that whenever something looks easy, it’s probably a lie. Life isn’t that convenient. It’s … complicated.

I watched my dad as he watched an episode of Star Trek–The Next Generation. He was totally wrapped up in the show, having seen this episode enough times that he was lip-syncing the commands Captain Picard was shouting, while gripping the arms of his chair as if he were sitting in the Captain’s seat.

DATA: As you wish. Jenna. Are we no longer a couple? JENNA: No, we're not. DATA: Then I will delete the appropriate programme.

A wise man is capable of determining his weaknesses and working to address them,

How could there be any part of space that "belonged" to any specific species, because space had always been and would always be, long after the races that had staked their claims had vanished.

Next Generation was immensely popular at the time, and I was still riding high on the success of Stand by Me. They couldn’t understand why I was so intimidated by these actors – my face was splashed across the cover of every teen magazine in print. Why was I so intimidated? I was a 16 year-old geek, with a chance to meet The Big Three from Star Trek. You do the math.

Develop the patience to stick with your dedication to absolute world-class output, even if over a lifetime you only generate a single masterpiece. To achieve this feat alone will have made your life's journey a worthy trek

Someone once told me that time is a predator that stalks us all our lives. I’d rather believe that time is a companion who goes with us on the journey, and reminds us to cherish every moment, because they’ll never come again.

We cherish individual liberty and diversity, but we also see the value in common pursuits.

Your Honor, the courtroom is a crucible. In it we burn away irrelevancies until we are left with a pure product, the truth for all time.