[Spoiler] S5 "2001" - DHD theory: Scriptwriters losing it? [Long]

[PTeppic]

Season 5 "2001" spoiler
Season 1-4 misc. spoilers
I have just seen s5 episode "2001" for the first time. Interesting enough. But, it included a plot-device concerning the gate/DHD which seems to me (following the various discussions on this site, admittedly bullied by me) to be bordering on silly. Or certainly not in line with the various other things we have had explained. :eek7:

Basically, the episode said that without the DHD you can only dial planets within a certain radius (e.g. 300 light years), and that with the DHD you can overcome this and the stellar drift thing and dial the whole network.

My first reaction was unprintable. :blush: :evil: So, here's explaining myself, and hoping for some ideas from you happy campers.

Dialling within a certain radius. Could be caused by lack of power, but we didn't change that at the SGC and we could suddenly dial, after COTG. Sam pretty much explained this away in that episode as being due to the Stellar Drift. Specifically, we could now allow for it somehow in the dialling process. This was also mentioned as the second factor in "2001". BUT, how can the DHD possibly affect this? All the DHD does, as far as we know, is dials the address, and does the interface protocol to mimic engaged tones, or gate unavailable. We have a dialling computer to do that.

My previous assumptions for this have been that we take account of stellar drift by changing the six chevrons dialled, and the symbols dialled actually represent real places in space (or at least approximately) and ANY stargate at the centre (so it could change over thousands of years) will be reached by dialling those co-ordinates.

I could be made to grovel and eat my words yet. The scheme implied by "2001" could work if all stargate address were fixed, and didn't change over time, BUT, the DHD automatically did the translation for drift, but we have had to since allow for it in the dialling computer, and both just happen to manually dial the original glyphs on the actual gate. So, pretty much, as someone here suggested, the glyphs really are just symbolic. OR, perhaps, since the film (and subsequent episodes) have gone to the trouble of stating, the stargates were actually originally based at the mutual centre of the identified constellations. But, then, the hard part: does the protocol translate the "symbolic" address into a "real" address, also of chevrons? Does it convert it into the "real" format of the address, as perhaps a vector, or some other polar or cartesian co-ordinates?

I think we assume not, since they can happily dial manually with "limited" power from "anywhere" (Hadante, Heliopolic, Bedrosia [theoretically], Washington in 1969) without the DHD. So, you MUST be able to dial, even allowing for stellar drift, without the DHD. Or, they have been DARNED lucky in the places they picked for their DHD-free dialling. Anyway, the Nox don't use a DHD, and although they can do much I am not sure they can telepathically do the entire protocol stuff, even if they can do the manual dialling. [But don't quote me, I am in two minds, maybe they CAN do it all... :kisses:] Also, there are several examples of the team using co-ordinates they were given: Nox world, Cimmeria, the ha'tak at the end of series 1: all of these are presumed to be "raw" chevrons that were dialled; we aren't told they were amended to allow for drift, so can we presume they were okay. This would seem to support the (my?) theory that any drift differences affect the actually dialled co-ordinates, and Carter's team was just unlucky between the film and COTG. Remember, Daniel explained he spent time dialling with equal lack of success, WITH a DHD. {I was going to use Othalla as an example too of a raw address, but that could really be used either way!! }

Personally, I think the script-writers, normally very good at what they do, needed a plot-specific reason for the Aschen wanting something "reasonable technical" from earth, not trinium like "Between Two Fires", but, like the slightly older "Beneath the Surface" became gate addresses, and this was the best they came up with for them needing them! Like not having the DHD would stop them (with all their really advanced technology) from figuring it out? Right! Like expecting the suck-it-and-see US military not just trying all 39 symbols as the point of origin before Daniel came along - and remember they actually must have done so in 1945!

Did they just screw this one up, and make it contrary to the rest of the known facts :dead:, or is this actually the key to the whole thing? :alienooh:

 

[Ko'or Oragahn]

Screwed maybe...

 

[spider]

I suppose it's possible that the ancients knew of the potential for stellar drift, thus programed the DHDs to accomodate for that automatically so that their network wouldn't become obsolite.

As for why Daniel had no success with a DHD in "Children of the Gods", it could be that the few adresses he tried were bueried or had cover stones. Just guessing.

 

[PTeppic]

Exactly. Or simply didn't have gates. With only 39 glyphs to choose from, there are 2350 million possible combinations. With the best will in the world, only a tiny fraction will have gates on them.

We can perhaps also assume he was trying addresses from the cartouche in the Abydos map room - but of course without doing the stellar drift compensation. Which would potentially change all the symbols, not just a couple - but this is as per my previous understanding of the way the address system works (i.e. as evidenced by the previous 100+ episodes!)

 

[spider]

It just makes a lot of sense to me that the Ancients would have pre-programed the DHDs to accomodate for stelar drift automatically...I mean, we figured it out, and they were how much more advanced than us? How lucky would someone at our stage be to think up something relatively simple that a race like the Ancients' didn't...

 

[PTeppic]

It is certainly a relevant point/question.

Why would they leave the stellar drift to be done "manually" by the dialler.

To do so would effectively mean you are not dialling an address but a code for the destination gate. And therefore all Sam/Daniel's conversation about stellar drift would have been unnecessary.

OR, each gate address held would be matched against an historical list of all old addresses for each possible gate. But, this could obviously then lead to potential "clashes", if a gate expands into a position previously held by an earlier gate.... since the network would have no way of deducing which would be meant, it would have to drop-out of the protocol and signal "busy", effectively removing both gates from the network.

Probably the Ancients DID know about drift, as Carter realised, but, although she didn't say it, the network can cope, perhaps by each gate having its address changed, but not doing anything specific because it would have unnecessary side-effects.

Saying that, my current view of how it all works (as discussed at length in some of the threads here) does have a serious down-side, implicitly seen for other planets: at some point in the future the address for Earth will change, forever (well, until the next time!)... great opportunity for a plot (or fan-fic)