Destiny must have self repair.

[kwlafayette]

I think that you make an awful lot of assumptions and don't spend nearly enough time paying attention to what's going on. The ancients have left all that information around, in the form of the database that Rush is going through. The proper response when you've been proven mistaken is "oh gee, I didn't see that, thanks" and not a bunch of snark.

And yet, you keep insisting that you are right.

The plain and simple truth is that you do not know what the Ancients intended. I don't know either; the difference between us is that I admit that.

[Krazeh]

It's been demonstrated at several points throughout the franchise that ancient technology is remarkably well built and can stand the test of time with little degradation. At this point there simply isn't sufficient evidence to be claiming that Destiny has an automated self repair system. Any thoughts about such a system are pure conjecture and you're relying on an awful lot of assumptions to try and prove your case.

Atlantis had even more powerful shielding, it was truly impenetrable. Yet after only 10,000 years vast sections of the city were flooded and there was lots of damage.

Atlantis' shield was under constant load with no way to recharge it's power source once the ZPMs were exhausted. It was inevitably going to run out of power eventually and fail.

[xxxevilgrinxxx]

And yet, you keep insisting that you are right.

The plain and simple truth is that you do not know what the Ancients intended. I don't know either; the difference between us is that I admit that.

This really isn't an argument. It's been stated, in Air 2. What's to argue about unless it's just to argue?

[kwlafayette]

It's been demonstrated at several points throughout the franchise that ancient technology is remarkably well built and can stand the test of time with little degradation. At this point there simply isn't sufficient evidence to be claiming that Destiny has an automated self repair system. Any thoughts about such a system are pure conjecture and you're relying on an awful lot of assumptions to try and prove your case.



Atlantis' shield was under constant load with no way to recharge it's power source once the ZPMs were exhausted. It was inevitably going to run out of power eventually and fail.

That just makes no sense to me. There are a few ancient devices that have been found, that were still operational. Some of them intentionally moth balled, some not. But in all the star gate series, no large complex systems like a ship has ever been found that was unmanned and still operational. You just have no basis to make that statement.

In fact, on at least two occasions, they found unmanned Ancient star ships, and they were not operational. The only fully operation ones they ever found were manned.

And once and for all, drop the "I know what the Ancients intended" shtick. You do not know what the Ancients intended. You will not know until Destiny's mission is finally revealed. The first step, is admitting you have a problem.

[Krazeh]

That just makes no sense to me. There are a few ancient devices that have been found, that were still operational. Some of them intentionally moth balled, some not. But in all the star gate series, no large complex systems like a ship has ever been found that was unmanned and still operational. You just have no basis to make that statement.

In fact, on at least two occasions, they found unmanned Ancient star ships, and they were not operational. The only fully operation ones they ever found were manned.

I'm fairly certain Atlantis was a large complex system and was for all intents and purposes unmanned. Admittedly it'd only be unmanned for 10,000 years but if you can manage that long without systems failing from wear and tear then you probably know a thing or two about making things to last for the long haul. As for other vessels they've found I seem to recall pretty much all of them had been in battles of one sort or another before being abandoned so would understandably have operational issues.

The fact remains that the franchise has demonstrated that the Ancients were more than capable of creating technology that could last for a vast number of years with no apparent need for maintenance or repair. There's plenty of justification to make the statement they did purely from the evidence the show has given us.

And once and for all, drop the "I know what the Ancients intended" shtick. You do not know what the Ancients intended. You will not know until Destiny's mission is finally revealed. The first step, is admitting you have a problem.

Hmm, i'm sure there's a certain irony to your last sentence. As for what the Ancients intended it seems pretty clear from the evidence the show has given us about the Destiny. Firstly we have the information Rush located in Air Pt 2, then we have the simple fact that if the Destiny was always intended to be a purely unmanned vessel why equip it with a stargate, or the systems necessary to maintain life, or living quarters? Why does it have terminals in a number of locations to allow access to the systems, or a chair control interface? For that matter why is it following behind seeder ships that are planting stargates on habitable worlds? What would be the point in any of that if they'd never intended on boarding the Destiny?

Edit: Just to go back to your first point about all the unmanned vessels they've found being inoperational, this kinda flies in the face of your argument about self-repair systems. If the Ancients had the technology to incorporate such a system into the Destiny why would they not include it, or an appropriately upgraded version, on thier later vessels? The vessels that were found all had power iirc so unless in each case the self repair system was also damaged then why were the vessels still damaged when they were found? And if the self repair system was damaged in each and every case then it doesn't seem to be very reliable and certainly not something to be counted on.

Oh, and if this alleged self-repair system is as important as you claim it to be wouldn't you expect there to have been some sort of warning flashing somewhere on a computer terminal when they arrived? I know if I had such a vitally important system I'd make sure it'd be damn obvious if it had failed.

[kwlafayette]

OK, seriously, if you have another plausible theory, let me know. "The ship has been in space for millions of years, without the ability to repair itself, but fortunately the only damage is superficial and no critical systems have been affected or broken on their own." is not a plausible theory.

So, you know the name of the ship. You know the ship has a star gate on it. You know the Ancients built the ship. You know there are life support systems on the ship. How in the great blue yonder does that tell you anything about when the Ancients intended to go there? Just explain that to me. EXPLAIN THE WHEN PART. That is all I ask.

There are 5 W's.

Who? Ancients.
What? A space ship.
When?
Where? Far far away.
Why?

When and why are entirely unknown.

[kwlafayette]

Edit: Just to go back to your first point about all the unmanned vessels they've found being inoperational, this kinda flies in the face of your argument about self-repair systems. If the Ancients had the technology to incorporate such a system into the Destiny why would they not include it, or an appropriately upgraded version, on thier later vessels? The vessels that were found all had power iirc so unless in each case the self repair system was also damaged then why were the vessels still damaged when they were found? And if the self repair system was damaged in each and every case then it doesn't seem to be very reliable and certainly not something to be counted on.

Oh, and if this alleged self-repair system is as important as you claim it to be wouldn't you expect there to have been some sort of warning flashing somewhere on a computer terminal when they arrived? I know if I had such a vitally important system I'd make sure it'd be damn obvious if it had failed.

There is no need for such a system on a ship with a full crew. Simple question of efficiency. Also with a crew, you are not going on thousand or million year missions.

You you still have not explained the when. If you do not know when the Ancients planned on going to Destiny, if you do not know the exact number that coincides with "far enough out in the universe", then how can you say whether or not Destiny was supposed to be unmanned this long? Just explain that one simple thing.

PS. The Asgard DID include such systems, but their ships had very minimal crews, or even just pilots with no one else on board.

[Krazeh]

OK, seriously, if you have another plausible theory, let me know. "The ship has been in space for millions of years, without the ability to repair itself, but fortunately the only damage is superficial and no critical systems have been affected or broken on their own." is not a plausible theory.

It's no less plausible than your theory that the ship includes a system that has not been evidenced in any way either on SGU or in any of the other franchise series. We have never seen any demonstration that the Ancients incorporated automated self-repair systems into any of their vessels. And to be honest I would expect critical systems to have a number of redundant backups and safeguards which, when you consider the Ancients ability to create highly reliable systems, would go some way to explaining how they're still functioning. Not to mention it's been stated on the show that the ships systems, including the computers, are failing and are nowhere near the operational levels they'd have been at when the ship was launched.

So, you know the name of the ship. You know the ship has a star gate on it. You know the Ancients built the ship. You know there are life support systems on the ship. How in the great blue yonder does that tell you anything about when the Ancients intended to go there? Just explain that to me. EXPLAIN THE WHEN PART. That is all I ask.

There are 5 W's.

Who? Ancients.
What? A space ship.
When?
Where? Far far away.
Why?

When and why are entirely unknown.

You you still have not explained the when. If you do not know when the Ancients planned on going to Destiny, if you do not know the exact number that coincides with "far enough out in the universe", then how can you say whether or not Destiny was supposed to be unmanned this long? Just explain that one simple thing.

You're right, we don't know exactly when the Ancients were planning on boarding the Destiny which means we have to take our clues from what the show tells us and what the creators have said about it. Now the show, as indicated in the quote from Air Pt 2, implies that the Ancients had originally intended to board at some point in the past but probably ascended before they got round to it. More damning however is Joseph Mallozzi who in his blog states that the Ancients abandoned the Destiny project which was orginally put in play millions of years ago; this, imo, very strongly implies that the original plan would have been for the Ancients to have boarded the Destiny long ago but due to an unknown reason decided to abandon it instead.

What I would like to know at this point tho is what evidence you have for the Ancients always having planned for the Destiny to have been unmanned this long. I mean it's you who are arguing a point that goes against the common understanding of the situation so let's hear your evidence for your claims.

There is no need for such a system on a ship with a full crew. Simple question of efficiency. Also with a crew, you are not going on thousand or million year missions.

Or maybe the Ancients just never created or used such a system? After all there has so far been no evidence for it in any of the 3 Stargate series as far as i'm aware.

PS. The Asgard DID include such systems, but their ships had very minimal crews, or even just pilots with no one else on board.

And we have no idea when the Asgard started using those systems or whether they and the Ancients shared a similar philosophy when it came to constructing technologies. In short you can't use the fact that one species has a certain technology as a basis to claim that another species will, or should, also have that technology.

[Puddle-Jumper]

Atlantis had even more powerful shielding, it was truly impenetrable. Yet after only 10,000 years vast sections of the city were flooded and there was lots of damage.

Atlantis was at the bottom of an ocean with its power dwindling, Destiny is in the vaccum of space constantly getting recharged... plus the shield started to retract when the atlantis expedition arrived, and it didn't have enough power to keep all of the shield up and to power the systems etc

Atlantis doesn't have any auto repair systems that we've seen, and considering how much damage was done in the five years of SGA you'd think they would have kicked in... Destiny was probably intended to be boarded by the ancients after 10 years or 50 years or something of the likes, its pretty logical to assume that the ancients had a life expectancy greater then ours, so the same team that sent the ship out would still be alive and well even after 50 years, but perhaps the plague arose in that time, or the ancients had other priorities we're unaware of...

And plus the thing thats shouting at everyone in the face... the ship is basically falling apart! Theres no auto repair! Every system in the ship is running at far below peak capacity, we know this for a fact... Im sure they stocked it full of robots so that when they got there they could do any repairs, keep in mind the ancients would have had the masterlock key too so they would be able to assess all the damage immediately and since they know everything about the ship they'd know exactly how to fix it and they'd just program the robots to do so. (assuming theres more then 1)

[kwlafayette]

We have never seen any demonstration that the Ancients incorporated automated self-repair systems into any of their vessels.

This is the first time we have seen a vessel that the Ancients intended for long term unmanned operation. As for why they did not include such systems on everything they built, I can only speculate. I imagine such systems are not cheap or easy, so the same reason they didn't have all city ships I guess.

[kwlafayette]

And plus the thing thats shouting at everyone in the face... the ship is basically falling apart!

That is the thing, the ship is not falling apart, not by any stretch of the imagination. No critical systems have failed, and they show no indication of ever doing so. The drives just had their first failure in 5 million years, and that was a deliberate act of sabotage. The shields, all is good there. The computers, no hint of parity errors or anything. Navigation, tip top. Database, fully intact.

If you can name one critical system that is falling apart, please do so.

In short, all damage that we have seen is superficial, and does not in any way affect the long term viability of Destiny.

[HaMm3r]

Man kwlafayette, you are really good at getting people riled up with your theories. I agree that on the forefront it seems like Destiny could not have survived all this time without some sort of repair mechanism, but there's just no way to know that for certain. The repair robot sure seemed like it would fit with your theory, but it required too much manual direction, unless the Icarus crew doesn't really understand how to operate it yet. Again, we just don't have enough facts.

As for the timing of the Ancients return, you're right in that there's no way to know when they planned to return. Perhaps that time is yet to come. However, I think it's fairly safe to say that whenever their scheduled return date was/will be, they aren't going to show up because they ascended before they made it back to the ship.

I suppose another possibility might be that the Ancients did return to Destiny, sometime long ago, and did whatever they planned to do, but then decided to let her continue her way. I know Rush said they were never there, but he's been mistaken before, so nothing he concludes can be considered concrete fact.

[Krazeh]

This is the first time we have seen a vessel that the Ancients intended for long term unmanned operation. As for why they did not include such systems on everything they built, I can only speculate. I imagine such systems are not cheap or easy, so the same reason they didn't have all city ships I guess.

Which gets us to the point that your entire claim is purely speculative. You've not provided any in-universe evidence that can support your claims and only have baseless conjecture and your own personal belief that they must be a self-repair system. That is not grounds to be making the claim that such a system must exist.

That is the thing, the ship is not falling apart, not by any stretch of the imagination. No critical systems have failed, and they show no indication of ever doing so. The drives just had their first failure in 5 million years, and that was a deliberate act of sabotage. The shields, all is good there. The computers, no hint of parity errors or anything. Navigation, tip top. Database, fully intact.

If you can name one critical system that is falling apart, please do so.

In short, all damage that we have seen is superficial, and does not in any way affect the long term viability of Destiny.

Taken from Earth:

RUSH: No, look, look, this ship is old and damaged. The computers aren't registering half the things they're supposed to. I want manual confirmation before activating any system that comprehensive.

Doesn't sound like the computers are doing all that great to me. As for other systems they may not have failed yet but it's been stated that they're operating well under their original levels. Power reserves, FTL, weapon systems are all running at reduced capability, with the weapon systems in particular being a particular issue. So much so that they nearly blew up the ship when they were using it in the events of Space. It's also been mentioned that power conduits within the ship are damaged and vast areas of the ship are inaccessible due to damage. To claim that the ship is intact apart from superficial damage completely disregards all the evidence we have seen in the show about the state of the Destiny.

[Krazeh]

Man kwlafayette, you are really good at getting people riled up with your theories.

To be honest there's nothing particulary wrong with this theory in principle; what is frustrating is his apparent inability to realise that if you wish to claim that unseen systems exist you need more than conjecture and your own personal belief if you wish to present it as a credible viewpoint. If he actually managed to provide some in-universe evidence to support his claims then he'd probably find more people would be willing to go along with it and/or consider it as a valid possibility.

[Puddle-Jumper]

That is the thing, the ship is not falling apart, not by any stretch of the imagination. No critical systems have failed, and they show no indication of ever doing so. The drives just had their first failure in 5 million years, and that was a deliberate act of sabotage. The shields, all is good there. The computers, no hint of parity errors or anything. Navigation, tip top. Database, fully intact.

If you can name one critical system that is falling apart, please do so.

In short, all damage that we have seen is superficial, and does not in any way affect the long term viability of Destiny.

O'NEILL: So, how is it going out there, really?

YOUNG: I don't know what Rush has told you, but we may not have much time left. The ship's very old - it's falling apart.

O'NEILL: Fix it.

First off, life support that was failing when they got aboard.. then theres the fact that the power generator systems are so badly damaged that they don't even have enough energy the power the shield enough the keep the atmosphere in all over the ship, we saw in battles with the blues that using the weapons too much means the ship could very well explode... theres all those holes that have been poked in it... You'd think they'd have been the first target of any potential auto repair system that the ship had? The power conduits literally all over the ship are extremely badly damaged, that is far from superficial damage, that to me seems like very very bad damage, the computers work and the doors open, the gate is good and the ship can still go, but that doesn't mean its superficial damge...

Just because the main systems still function, doesn't mean that they're not damaged, heavily damaged even, infact everything we've seen shows that putting the main systems under any stress at all could result in them failing