Because it was a metaphor for the US speed limit being 55 for fuel efficiency standards after the 70s oil crisis, and they sort of extended that to be about climate change.
Then when it turned out to be too limiting (har har), they invented "cleaner burning’ warp engines. Which would be an obvious next logical step anyway if old warp drives were literally ruining the universe.
In The Culture, one ship remarked that the other guy arrived “with the subspace equivalent of black smoke and loud bangs.” That was a nice way to tell some engine designs were a tad outdated.
Yeah, but the writers felt hogtied by that decision later on. So they just said that warp engine design changed so that it was no longer harmful.
It was a problem until it wasn’t.
Because it was a metaphor for the US speed limit being 55 for fuel efficiency standards after the 70s oil crisis, and they sort of extended that to be about climate change.
Then when it turned out to be too limiting (har har), they invented "cleaner burning’ warp engines. Which would be an obvious next logical step anyway if old warp drives were literally ruining the universe.
In The Culture, one ship remarked that the other guy arrived “with the subspace equivalent of black smoke and loud bangs.” That was a nice way to tell some engine designs were a tad outdated.
That’s the difference between Star Trek and solar punk: star trek has a technical solution when something is inconvenient