From: puter@no1home.nashvil.ingr.com (PuterDude)
Subject: Re: romance of DATA on Star Trek
Keywords: introspection
Organization: None, today. Thank you.
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 1992 16:15:16 GMT

>> underdog@leland.Stanford.EDU (Dwight Joe) computes...
>>
>>[stuff about the episode "In Theory" of Star Trek: The Next Generation
>>and how the android Data tried out a romance with a human deleted]
>>
>>>My friend John momentarily thought, "I know Data.  He seems really familiar."
>>
>>>It's too bad that John can't just turn himself off like a machine,
>>>which feels no pain.
>>
>>	I liked this episode, and share what John feels. But, the 
>>realtionship didn't last in the first place because Data couldn't "feel".
>
>I disagree.  What I meant to say is that Data is only _now_ beginning
>to learn about how to "feel".  He is almost 30 years behind his
>human counterparts; they started learning from the minute that they
>were born.  It is almost too late in the game to learn.

Uh, Data cannot learn to feel. Although this is a VERY moot point
to your post (which I apologise), it is one that I replied to below.

>But I mean Data in the figurative sense.  There are people who
>wound up with the short end of the stick in life, and they really
>are starting from a disadvantage from which it is almost impossible
>to recover.  Unlike Data, who can live forever, human beings can't
>and thus can't make up for lost time; it's gone forever.

It is _never_ to late to try. In my book, there is never the word
"impossible". My roots stem from below-poverty level surroundings.
The only feelings I encountered were _bad_. And it took awhile to
actually experience the good ones. Now that I have them, I'll fight
to the death to keep them.

>  (Data
>can live forever, and after 3 decades he'll learn how to "feel".)
>Being 30 years behind for a human being basically means losing 
>the "game" of life.
>
>Game over.  Insert new coin.

(Puter pulls a quarter out of his pocket and inserts it into a slot)

Sorry to discuss a moot point. Data does not feel. He will never learn
how to. He is missing the proper hardware. It was accidentally given to
his brother Lore. In "Hero Worship" he also states that he cannot feel
because he is an android which was filmed much later than "In Theory".

I understand when you talk about people being short-changed, but when
you talk about Data, he will never feel. It's not something to be
learned. 

Anyway, I guess this should have really gone to rec.startrek. I apologise.

>>	Always remember that each emotion has an opposite. You have to
>>know pain, sorrow, and loneliness to REALLY appreciate love, joy, and
>>happiness. Without knowing one, the other has no meaning.
>>	Yes, it would be nice to NOT have the bad feelings, but then
>>the good feelings wouldn't be so special anymore.
>
>Yep.
>
>But sometimes, the "good" stuff never shows up.  John thinks so.

"Never" is relative. It just seems like forever. He's gotta hang in
there. The "good" stuff is all around. It's best found inside.
Believing that "good" stuff will come really helps, too.

-- 
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