STAR TREK: TNG - LIEUTENANT COMMANDER DATA
While not what you would call a Trekkie, I have been a big Star Trek fan since I was a little boy. I have watched the series and franchise grow into one huge monstrosity over the last 30 years and with the current direction the films are taking, I think it will last a lot longer. This is a series dedicated to the lovable space pioneers and the movies for which they starred. A lot of these caches are on a fairly busy road. I tried to place them where parking was good. Please watch children along this stretch and use good judgement. I hope you enjoy my latest entries.
Lieutenant Commander Data is a character in the fictional Star Trek universe portrayed by actor Brent Spiner. He appears in the television series Star Trek: The Next Generation and the feature films Star Trek Generations, Star Trek: First Contact, Star Trek: Insurrection and Star Trek: Nemesis.
Designed and built by Doctor Noonien Soong, Data is a sentient, fully functional 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. Data experienced ongoing difficulties during the early years of his life with understanding various aspects of human behavior 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. Though Data's striving for humanity and desire for human emotion is a significant plot point (and source for humor) throughout the series, he continually shows a nuanced sense of wisdom, sensitivity, and curiosity.
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.
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 (he describes himself as "Class of '78" to Riker in "Encounter at Farpoint", but that may refer to the stardate and not the year that he graduated) and then served in Starfleet aboard the USS Trieste.[7] He was assigned to the Enterprise under Captain Jean-Luc Picard in 2364. In "Datalore", Data discovers his amoral brother, Lore, and learns that Lore, not himself, was the first android constructed by Soong. Lore fails in an attempt to betray the Enterprise to the Crystalline Entity, and Wesley Crusher beams Data's 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 lifeforms. Data eventually deactivates Lore, and recovers, but does not install the damaged emotion chip.
The episode "In Theory" traces Data's literary roots to Isaac 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 The Bicentennial Man and Asimov's Robot series (which introduced the Three Laws of Robotics).
In "The Measure of a Man", a Starfleet judge rules that Data is not Starfleet property. The episode establishes that Data has a storage capacity of 800 quadrillion bits, (88.81784197 PiB) and a total linear computational speed of 60 trillion operations per second.
Data's family is expanded in "The Offspring", which introduces Lal, a robot based on Data's neural interface and who Data refers to as his daughter. Lal dies shortly after activation. Later, his mother Julianna appears in the episode "Inheritance" and reunites with Data, though the crew discovers she was an android built by Soong after the real Julianna's death, programmed to die after a long life. Faced with the decision, Data chooses not to disclose this to her and allow her the chance to continue on with her normal life.
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 sentient 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. However, those emotions proved difficult to control and Data struggled to master them. However, by the events of Star Trek: First Contact, Data managed to gain complete control of the chip, which includes deactivating it to maintain his performance efficiency.
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. However, Data previously copied his core memories into B-4, Data's lost brother who is introduced in the movie. This was done with the reluctant help of Geordi LaForge who voiced concerns about how this could cause B-4 to be nothing more than an exact duplicate of Data.
In the comic book miniseries Star Trek: Countdown (the official prequel to the reboot Star Trek film), Data, having successfully transferred his positronic pathways and memories into B-4, now commands the Enterprise-E in its mission to stop the Romulan Nero. Spock compares Data's "resurrection" with his own death and return years earlier