"One Man??" Topic

Thinking of the opening words.

"Where no man has gone before."

V

"Where no one has gone before."

Why the change? And is it any better?

"One small step for mankind." Springs to mind. Yet Trek predated it 3 years. Perhaps Star Trek was an influence? Wouldn't be surprising, however the NASA chaps may have been a tad too old to be likely viewers?

No man, of course stands for mankind, as in humans.

Changing it on man/woman grounds would therefore be ridiculous. Though that's always been my assumption.

Roddenberry would know best, as he was there for both. Which makes it even more odd.

I doubt he was excluding women in 66, while having women in the crew. So I'm confident he meant man, as in mankind, perfectly reasonable.

So why the change?

The Spot paradox…

No. (PS as it was first used in a film, I now remember. Can't remember which, let me know.)

But, maybe, sort of?

Other species in general? More likely.

However, this is also ridiculous.

"Where no species has gone before."

"… except the one that we encounter there on a weekly basis."

I'm stumped.

Maybe it just means the federation? But that's not clear either.

I'm back to thinking some people complained, not knowing, or wanting to acknowledge their own collective terms.

Hu?

No this happened in the 80s.

I am sure that the changing views of men and women were the reason for the change. Where no man has ever gone now sounded sexist to those who did not know it meant mankind.

The change was made solely for the purpose of appeasing ignoramuses who didn't realize that "Man" has been a generic English term for human beings of both sexes, or collectively as referring to all humanity, for over a thousand years. But when the ignorant are upset over something of which they are ignorant, far be it from Hollywood to try and educate them.

"…where no man has gone before," was clearly understood in the day to be a generic term for "any human being, male or female." Nobody questioned it or thought it meant any different for two decades… and then the ignorant nitwits started gaining control and had to be appeased (not that any of them probably ever watched the show, or ever would).

These are the same nitwits who claim that Uhura was "just the receptionist."
No she wasn't. She was the Communications Officer of a starship— a high-ranking commissioned officer in charge of ALL the communication functions, personnel, and equipment for the entire ship. In at least one episode she is shown physically repairing the intricate and complicated internal components of her control station— giving her a level of knowledge and expertise beyond that of a modern day electrical engineer. She is shown giving orders to crew members and work details. In several episodes she is engaged with decoded encrypted messages and enemy transmissions— the Lieutenant was a one woman Bletchley Park.

It wasn't the show that was sexist. It was these nitwit viewers who couldn't see past "Hailing frequencies open" to an extremely competent officer doing a very complicated job. All they saw was "black woman secretary" because THEY were the bigots defining her in diminishing ways.

Why we do anything to kowtow to these losers, I will never understand.

Leave our language alone, ya' bunch'a ignorant vape-headed ninnies!

/rant

I imagine Roddenberry thought he was moving with the times, he was always cutting edge like that and what might now be described as 'liberal'. But I suspect the OP knows this and just likes stirring things up.

Pretty much with Martin. Roddenberry was a trendy leftist, and this got more pronounced with time. By "Next Generation" the current vocabulary wars were in full swing, and he stuck by his side.

Which is why almost all the Star Trek DVDs in the house are classic Trek.

They got to our (Australian) national anthem too.

Australia is young, if we were one, we wouldn't have a group wanting to change perfectly good things.

Just like trying to magic away 100+ years of history, "no man" seems to be the more common slogan used on t-shirts and the like.

If it ain't broke.

Hmm…

It was TNG first, then the movies that followed.

Looking at it "where no man has gone before," shouldn't it be "where man has not gone before." "No man" doesn't sound plural. But it does sound part of a plural.

Perhaps that paradox works like that Chewbacca defence?

It's fine when people were at home, but come the movies and all the brains everywhere, cinemas began to complain.

+1 Parzifal.

For a rant that was very well stated!

It was well executed example of future-proofing. They saw possible weakness in that motto, and fixed it before it became an issue.

While their exact reasoning is arguable, it was likely meant to include every being of every category that exists, or may exist in the future.

It was a vast improvement over the humancentric and slightly patriarchal "man" version (Yes I know that it refers to man, as in humankind, but it still has issues of culturel implication and past usage, that "one" avoids completely).

Parzival, That you dismissed the "Where no species has gone before." reading as ridiculous shows a lack of imagination. It doesn't refer to the times where they encounter someone, it refers to all the places where they go that no sapient has explored, of which there were many. They gloss over a number of them, but there are a bunch of times where they scan an "uncharted nebula", which while boring, does count.

A lack of imagination??? Phasers at 30 paces, my good man!

On the contrary. "Species" is a stupid term in context, because all other species in Star Trek besides humans are entirely made up!

There is only one intelligent species capable of imagining, building and flying spacecraft (or writing television shows about the same)—
MAN!

We are it. And as far as we know, we are the ONLY such species in our neck of the galaxy. Oh, we might find something out there… but so far, there's no actual sign of such beings. (I discount UFO reports as either being hoaxes, wild fancy by bored hicks, mis-seeings of common atmospheric mirages, and secret aircraft and drone tests by various military services— most notably, the US.)

"Species" in this context is also an idiotic term. "Species" has a meaning, and a very specific meaning— that of a unique type of life capable of reproduction with other similar forms of life and bearing nearly identical DNA codes, separable largely only into specific individuals or direct family groups— father, mother, offspring, siblings.
It does not mean "whomever." Nor does it grant any sort of communal sameness among species, nor any existence of rights or privilege (or subjection to immoral prejudicial behavior) to the same.

Oh, yes, they were trying to say "but we have Vulcans in the crews! And other ENTIRELY FICTIONAL creatures!"
Yes, they do. But that's not what the show is about. The show is about humanity— Man— reaching for the stars and discovering what's out there. The additional fictional (nonexistent) characters are in fact covered by the phrase "Man" both in being what is encountered, but also being, in the end, stand-ins for human abilities, quirks, and attitudes. They are, in context, as much "Man" as any human.

Spock is logical, analytical and unemotional because he represents thereby the logical, analytical processes of the human brain— he is the dramatic vessel by which Kirk's own thought in those areas are expressed. McCoy is emotional, empathetic, sympathetic, moral, and most of all compassionate to be the voice for those same instincts and thoughts from Kirk. They are the angels on the shoulder, the yin and the yang of Kirk.

Thus, it actually isn't relevant to the theme of the series that Spock is an alien. He does not voice alien ideas— he voices human ones. He is as much "man" as any other figure on the ship.

When we go into the TNG era we see other fictional beings represented as characters on the various ships and space stations— but they are still, in the end, just human beings— aspects of humanity, as equally covered by "Man" as anyone. Yes, even Data is just another aspect of humanity— a source to reveal both the best of it and the worst of it.

But even at that, it is a lack of imagination to not see that "Man" serves the thematic purpose of the show, and can and does indeed encompass any and every sentient being (or group of beings) presented on the show. "Species" is unneeded— "Man" already does the job.

No, sir, I do not lack in imagination. I exceed in it. I do not need to have words misused in order to appease some silly notion of "equanimity" among things which do not exist. It's a silly, illogical, nonsensical change. QED.

"Space. The final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Her five year mission— to explore strange, new worlds; to seek out new life and new civilizations; to boldly go where no man has gone before!"

That's poetry, right there. It needs no alteration. It is not and never was unclear, nor restrictive, nor dismissive of anyone. It needed no change, save the one altering the time from "five year" to "ongoing." Otherwise, every bit of it covered anything one could imagine.

And that's where I stand. Disagree if you wish, but "lacking in imagination?"

Actually, the "before" is a preposition, and a sentence should never end in a preposition. We should end it with "gone." Why didn't anyone fix *that* mistake? Sigh. No love for the grammars. ;-)

Because Star Trek uses time travel.

"One," sounds a bit red to me also.

If "man" is mankind, then "one" must be another large grouping. Democratic groups are usually split, so are not "one", hense my gripe about the national anthem.

Australia is a young democracy. Not a communist country with "one" mindset. We are free, usually. Don't get me started on voting.

So there's that angle too.

Kirk: "To boldly go where no man has gone before!"

Others in the space bar: "Okay, Kirk, we get it, but give it a rest! You certainly weren't the first guy ever to get it on with a green Orion slave woman, so enough with the constant boasting!"

;-)

"Before" is an adverb, both primarily and as used in the quote. It can be used as a preposition, but it then case it is not, as it is an expression of time independent of other considerations— it has no possible object noun— instead it is solely modifying the verb (or in this case the entire verb clause).

When used as a preposition, "before" must have an object, in which case it literally means "previous to" whatever the object is:
"We arrived before him." "The alarm will go off before sunrise."

There is no object to modify in the clause: "where no man has gone before."
"Before what?" has no answer in this case, which shows there is no object and therefore "before" is not a preposition in this usage.

Remember your adverb purposes— to establish when, where, or how an action occurs (or to what degree and state): "We've been here before."

The test is to turn the statement into a question:
"When has man not gone there?" "Before." If it answers the question, the word is an adverb in the sentence construct.

Or watch this: YouTube link

Wait a minute.

Some one (no pun intended) must have written a thesis on this.

Leave our language alone, ya' bunch'a ignorant vape-headed ninnies!

Egad! Harrumph! By Jove!

Oh, my stars and garters!🤷
"One small step for Man, one giant leap for Mamkind". (And I'm not referring to one of Mick Foley's secret identities.

Back when pronouns were nothing but a grammatical construct, and not a wide open barn door for confusion and outrage.

According to Armstrong, he actually said, "That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for Mankind." The "a" got lost in the static.

Man being short for human, ok.

Man being Armstrong, also ok.

Win, win there.