Data (Star Trek)

Data

Data on the bridge of the Enterprise-D
Species	Android
Home planet	Omicron Theta
Affiliation	United Federation of Planets Starfleet
Posting	USS Enterprise-D operations officer/second officer USS Sutherland commanding officer (temporary) USS Enterprise-E operations officer/second officer (films), commanding officer (Countdown comics)
Rank	Lieutenant Commander
Portrayed by	Brent Spiner

Lieutenant Commander Data (pronounced /ˈdeɪtə/ DAY-tə), played by Brent Spiner, is a character in Star Trek: The Next Generation television series and in the four subsequent The Next Generation films.

Designed and built by Doctor Noonien Soong, Data is a sentient android who serves as the second officer and chief operations officer aboard the starships USS Enterprise-D and USS Enterprise-E. His positronic brain allows him impressive computational capabilities.^[1] Data experienced ongoing difficulties during the early years of his life with understanding various aspects of human behavior^[2] and was unable to feel emotion or understand certain human idiosyncrasies, inspiring him to strive for his own humanity. This goal eventually led to the addition of an "emotion chip", also created by Soong, to Data's positronic net.^[3]

Data is in many ways a successor to the original Star Trek's Spock (Leonard Nimoy), in that the character offers an "outsider's" perspective on humanity.^[4]

Development

Gene Roddenberry told Brent Spiner that over the course of the series, Data was to become "more and more like a human until the end of the show, when he would be very close, but still not quite there. That was the idea and that's the way that the writers took it." Spiner felt that Data exhibited the Chaplinesque characteristics of a sad, tragic clown.^[5] To get into his role as Data, Spiner used the character of Robbie the Robot from the film Forbidden Planet as a role model.^[5] Commenting on Data's perpetual albino-like appearance, he said: "I spent more hours of the day in make-up than out of make-up", so much so that he even called it a way of method acting.^[5] Spiner also portrayed Data's evil brother Lore (a role he found much easier to play, because the character was "more like me"),^[5] and Data's creator, Dr. Noonien Soong. Additionally, he portrayed another Soong-type android, B-4, in the film Star Trek: Nemesis. Spiner said his favorite Data scene takes place in "Descent", when Data plays poker on the holodeck with famous physicist Stephen Hawking, who played himself.^[5]

Spiner reprised his role of Data in the Star Trek: Enterprise series finale "These Are the Voyages..." in an off-screen speaking part. Spiner felt that he has visibly aged out of the role and that Data was best presented as a youthful figure.^[6]

Depiction

Dialog in "Datalore" establishes some of Data's backstory. It is stated that he was deactivated in 2336 on Omicron Theta before an attack by the Crystalline Entity, a spaceborne creature which converts life forms to energy for sustenance. He was found and reactivated by Starfleet personnel two years later. Data went to Starfleet Academy from 2341–45 and then served in Starfleet. He was assigned to the Enterprise under Captain Picard in 2364, after two prior ship assignments. In "Datalore", Data discovers his amoral brother, Lore, and learns he was not the first android constructed by Soong. Lore fails in an attempt to betray the Enterprise to the Crystalline Entity, and Data beams his brother into space at the episode's conclusion.

In "Brothers", Data reunites with Dr. Soong (also portrayed by Spiner). There he meets again with Lore, who steals the emotion chip Soong meant for Data to receive. Lore then fatally wounds Soong. Lore returns in the two-part episode "Descent", using the emotion chip to control Data and make him help with Lore's attempt to make the Borg entirely artificial life forms. Data eventually deactivates Lore, and recovers, but does not install the damaged emotion chip.

The episode "In Theory" traces Data's literary roots to Issac Asimov's and Philip K. Dick's exploration of the nature of artificial intelligence and the nature of reality and humanity. The episode reflects the ideas created in such works as Bicentennial Man and Asimov's Robot Series (which introduced the Three Laws Of Robotics).

In "The Measure of a Man", Data is legally declared an autonomous individual, as opposed to Starfleet property.

In "All Good Things...", the two-hour concluding episode of The Next Generation, Captain Picard travels between three different times. The Picard of 25 years into the future goes with La Forge to seek advice from Professor Data, a luminary physicist who holds the Lucasian Chair at Cambridge University.

Although several androids, robots and artificial intelligences were seen in the original Star Trek series, Data was often referred to as being unique in the universe as being the only android known to exist (save the other androids created by Soong).

In the film Star Trek Generations, Data finally installs the emotion chip he retrieved from Lore, and experiences the full scope of emotions.

In the film Star Trek Nemesis, Data beams Picard off an enemy ship before destroying it, sacrificing himself, saving the captain and crew of the Enterprise.

Characteristics

Data is immune to nearly all biological diseases and other weaknesses that can affect humans and other carbon-based lifeforms. This benefits the Enterprise many times, such as when Data is the only crew member unaffected by the inability to dream and the only member to be unaffected by the stun ray that knocked the crew out for a day. One exception however was in the episode "The Naked Now" where Data was also a victim of the Tsiolkovsky polywater virus. Data does not require life support to function and does not register a bio-signature, in which case the Enterprise-D crew usually have to modify their scanners to detect positronic signals in order to locate and keep track of him on away-missions. Another unique feature of Data's construction is the ability to be dismantled and or dismembered and then re-assembled for later use. This feature is most evident in the episode "Time's Arrow" where Data's head being hundreds of years old (due to being dismembered in the past) is re-attached to his body in the future, and thus resuming its previous function from when it was dismembered.

Data however is vulnerable to technological hazards such as computer viruses, certain levels of energy discharges, ship malfunctions (when connected to the Enterprise main computer for experiments), remote control shutdown devices, or possession through technological means ranging from Ira Graves' transfer of consciousness into his neural net to an alien archeological probe that placed several different personalities into him. Being positronic and an artificial lifeform has made Data the most vulnerable crew member on The Enterprise to alien and or programming possession. Other aspects that separate Data from most humanoid life forms is the fact that he cannot swim unless aided by his built in flotation device, yet he is waterproof and can perform tasks underwater without the need to surface. Data is also impervious to sensory tactile emotion such as pain or pleasure. In Star Trek: First Contact the Borg Queen grafted artificial skin cells to him, and he was able to feel the pain of another Borg drone cutting his arm. (The Borg Queen later shows him an example of "pleasure" with his new skin cells.) Despite being mechanical in nature, Data is treated as an equal member of the mostly carbon based lifeform crew. However, being a mechanical construct, technicians such as Chief Engineer Geordi LaForge prove to be more appropriate to treat his mechanical or cognitive function failures. His positronic brain becomes deactivated, and then repaired and reactivated by Geordi on several occasions.

Data is physically the strongest, and information/calculation-wise, the most intelligent member of the Enterprise crew. He is able to survive in atmospheres which most carbon-based life forms would consider inhospitable, as well as in the lack of an atmosphere in the vacuum of space. However, as an android, he is the most emotionally challenged, and with the addition of Dr. Soong's emotions chip, the most emotionally unstable member of the crew. Before the emotions chip, Data was unable to grasp basic emotion and imagination, leading him to download personality subroutines into his programming when participating in holographic recreational activities (most notably during Dixon Hill and Sherlock Holmes holoprograms) and during romantic encounters (most notably with Tasha Yar and Jenna D'Sora). Yet none of those personalities are his own and are immediately put away at the conclusion of their usefulness in that given situation. Also, the abilities of Data's hearing are explained in the episodes The Schizoid Man and A Matter of Time where his hearing is more sensitive than a dog's and that he can identify several hundred different distinct sound patterns, but for aesthetics purposes limits it to about ten.

Because of Julianna Soong's inability to conceive children, Data has at least 5 robotic siblings (two of which are Lore and B4). Later on, his "mother" is revealed also to be his positronic sister as the real Julianna Soong died and was replaced with an identical Soong Type android, the most advanced one that Dr. Soong was known to have built. Data himself has built a daughter, which he named Lal (Hindi for "beloved"). This particular android exceeded her father in basic human emotion when she felt fear toward Starfleet's scientific interests in her. Eventually, this was the cause of a cascade failure in her neural net and she died as a result.

Spot

Spot is Data's pet cat and a recurring character in the show. Spot appears in several episodes during TNG's last four seasons, first appearing in "Data's Day". Spot also appears in Phantasms, Star Trek: Generations and Star Trek: Nemesis.

Despite the name, Spot is not actually patterned with spots. Spot originally appears as a male Somali cat, but later appears as a female orange tabby house cat,^[7] eventually giving birth to kittens (TNG: "Genesis"). The authors of the Star Trek Encyclopedia jokingly speculate that these inconsistencies can be explained by the idea that Spot is a shape-shifter or victim of a transporter accident (depending on which edition of the Encyclopedia one reads).

Data creates several hundred food supplement variations for Spot and composes the poem "Ode to Spot" in the cat's honor (TNG: "Schisms"). (The poem was actually written by Clay Dale, the visual effects artist.) A computer error later causes some of the ship's food replicators to create only Spot's supplements and replaces portions of a play with the ode's text (TNG: "A Fistful of Datas").

In "Genesis" (TNG) the morphogenetic virus "Barclay protomorphosis syndrome" temporarily mutates Spot into an iguana-like reptile.

Spot is notoriously unfriendly to most people other than Data. Commander William Riker once received serious scratches while trying to feed Spot (TNG: "Timescape"). Geordi La Forge borrowed her to experience taking care of a cat, but she knocked over a vase and teapot and damaged his furniture (TNG: "Force of Nature"). When Data asked Worf to take care of Spot, Worf proved to be allergic to her and sneezed in her face, angering her (TNG: "Phantasms"). However, she did get along with Lieutenant Reginald Barclay, thus when Data had to leave on a mission at the same time Spot's kittens were due, he persuaded Barclay to take care of her (TNG: "Genesis").

After Data died, it was mentioned in a deleted scene of Star Trek: Nemesis that Worf is now taking care of her on board the Enterprise.

In the last season of TNG, Spot was played by a tomcat named Tyler, who had served as an understudy for several years and who appeared on Animal Planet's "Pet Star" in the 2000s.

Scholarly and fan reception

Fans and scholars have compared Data to Spock from the original series - in the TNG pilot, Data is told by Dr. McCoy that, while his ears are not pointed, he speaks "just like a Vulcan" - though Data's desire to comprehend and emulate humanity contrasts with Spock's disdain for his perceived human shortcomings. Spiner later appeared with Leonard Nimoy in a scene in the episode "Unification" (Part II), where Data and Spock compared their ideologies: Spock stated that some Vulcans aspire all their lives to achieve what Data had been given by design, and Data replied that, in choosing a fully Vulcan way of life, Spock was rejecting his half-human heritage, in effect abandoning what Data had sought for all his life. Spock further said that he had "no regrets" for his humanity, though Data noted that "no regrets" is a human expression.

In another vein, robotics engineers regard Data (along with the Droids from the Star Wars movies) as the pre-eminent face of robots in the public's perception of their field.^[8]

In an interview with TV Guide, Brent Spiner said he received more fan mail than the other principal actors; he characterizes the letters as "romantic mail." He considers most of these letters as being "really written to Data; he's a really accessible personality."^[9]

The Beat Fleet, a Croatian hip hop band, wrote a song called "Data" for their latest album Galerija Tutnplok dedicated to Data.^[10] The release of this album coincided with reruns of Star Trek: The Next Generation being shown on Croatian Radiotelevision.

On April 9, 2008, Data was inducted into Carnegie Mellon University's Robot Hall of Fame during a ceremony at the Carnegie Science Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.^[11]

The singer Voltaire wrote a song called "The Sexy Data Tango", which is comprised completely of robotic innuendo having to do with Data.

Footnotes

References

• Lois H. Gresh & Robert Weinberg, Chapter 6, "Data" The Computers of Star Trek. New York: Basic Books (1999): 105 - 125

External links

• Data at Memory Alpha (a Star Trek wiki)
• Data's biography at the official Star Trek website
• [1] a review of the Star Trek: Countdown comics, with Cpt Data
• An Android for All Seasons. Star Trek's science consultant Andre Bormanis about the creation of Data.
• Spot at Memory Alpha (a Star Trek wiki)
• Data at the Internet Movie Database
• Data at Memory Beta