Gallifreyan technology a thought.

[senko]

I was watching some of the episodes again and it got me thinking about Gallifreyan technology. Specifically the controls for it and how they work. That is a simple on/off looking switch can actually do dozens of different functions depending on how you push it, where your standing and even what your thinking when you do it. Turn it "on" when standing to the left and you get one effect, turn it on when standing to the right another, turn it on from below a third and so on. What do people think about this idea and it's impact on both miniaturisation and control functions?

[Stormcrow]

I think Moffat took the idea of "telepathic circuits" too far. The TARDIS was supposed to have intelligence but only a rudimentary consciousness; he gave it full consciousness and apparent sexual (yecch!) attraction with the Doctor. The sonic screwdriver was supposed to just be a tool with settings ("setting 2428D: reattaches barbed wire"); Moffat made it a "point and think" magic wand.

I'm not saying you can't imagine Time Lords coming up with this sort of technology; I'm just saying that I like retro switches, buttons, and levers better. Running around the console frantically manipulating controls is far more fun to watch than groping a rubbery panel and closing your eyes—or watching the Doctor flirt with his box (yecch!).

[Hedgewick]

There's an extended passage on this very subject in The Time Traveller's Companion that I really appreciate (pg. 84, "Minimal Interface, Infinite Complexity.") In essence, it suggests that when we see a Time Lord flipping toggles and pressing buttons on a TARDIS console, they are "writing a complex equation which affects the basic underlying structure of the TARDIS itself and a single control can have multiple functions depending on where in the mathematical sequence of operations it is utilized and at what time." It goes on to link this aptitude with the Psychic trait.

[senko]

Jul 19, 2017 14:32:27 GMT Stormcrow said:

I think Moffat took the idea of "telepathic circuits" too far. The TARDIS was supposed to have intelligence but only a rudimentary consciousness; he gave it full consciousness and apparent sexual (yecch!) attraction with the Doctor. The sonic screwdriver was supposed to just be a tool with settings ("setting 2428D: reattaches barbed wire"); Moffat made it a "point and think" magic wand.

I'm not saying you can't imagine Time Lords coming up with this sort of technology; I'm just saying that I like retro switches, buttons, and levers better. Running around the console frantically manipulating controls is far more fun to watch than groping a rubbery panel and closing your eyes—or watching the Doctor flirt with his box (yecch!).

Sorry I didn't mean telepathic in the sense of two beings communicating with each other e.g. "Raise the shields. Yes Sir." I meant it in the sense of the door lock in the doctors wife i.e flicking the switch when thinking of the smell of a field after rain gets a different effect than flicking the switch when thinking of the colour red. A strong mental image rather than a conversation if you see what I mean? You'd still be running around the room flicking  buttons and levers its just that pulling a lever when thinking of of a pile of treasure opens the doors while pulling it when thinking of of blank whiteness locks them. So the sonic screwdriver wouldn't be point and think but how your adjust the settings (order, direction, thoughts) all determine what setting you get e.g. you have to think of rushing blood while adjusting the knob's and dials to unlock setting 323E the laser bolt he used against the silence. Alternatively say you wanted to remove the safety interlocks on a "modern" TARDIS so you could do all those fun things like time rams and crossing your own timeline. That would be a long and very complicated series of buttons, levers and dials with repeated strong mental images as you used certain ones to confirm yes you did want to take them down not sticking your hand in go and thinking "remove interlocks".

Hedgewick
That's what I was thinking of where your standing, what your thinking, the order you hit the controls all have an effect on what a specific control does.

[Marnal]

We do [rarely] see the same switch being used to do the same thing multiple times in the show. In those cases, where one is standing seems to make no difference.

There are also cases where companions operate controls based on instructions they have been given but sometimes they have no idea what the control is supposed to do. So you don't have to be thinking about a specific function when you operate the control.

Indeed if all you need to do was think about the function you wanted and push a button the console would only need 1 button [or maybe one button on each panel so a crew of 6 could man it].

Now I DO think that the configuration of one control can affect the way another works. Much like how most digital watches have only 4 buttons but with those 4 buttons you can alter and reconfigure the watch extensively. Most of the buttons have several different things they do depending on what mode the watch is in.

It has long been my suspicion that the controls on the console are telepathically LABELED. So if your mind can tune in to a Gallifreyan thought channel you would see words [or maybe just ideas?] hanging above each control telling the operator what that control does. This would explain how other Time Lords can easily operate the Doctor's highly customized control layouts.

[knasser]

I don't think there's a need for controls to be telepathically labelled. I mean, it's a nice idea for humans but Time Lords are, well, Time Lords. I can well believe that there is some complex pattern underlying where they are all placed that we simply don't recognise as well. If I told you that controls along the top affect the TARDIS internals, or that time controls were every third doo-hickey and Space controls always blue, the whole thing would suddenly become far more understandable but to you but other onlookers would still find it incomprehensible. We don't know the pattern but the Doctor does.

(Though I believe the way he flies it probably ignores all the best practices that are taught at the academy. He's like that car driver who is always crossing his hands on the wheel. The custom look for the TARDIS control panel probably looks to other Time Lords much like that person who has every possible shortcut dumped on their computer desktop. It's probably hideous to them but the Doctor has got it JUST how he likes it.)

For imagining how the TARDIS controls work, I would recommend looking to Chorded Keyboards for inspiration. A Chorded Keyboard doesn't have a key for each letter and number. Instead, different combinations of keys have different meanings. This lets the keyboard do a wide range of things with very few keys:

blog.mattgauger.com/images/engelkey.jpg

It's the same principle as the CAPS LOCK on your keyboard. Depending on whether it is on or off, every other key has a different result. I'd say the TARDIS controls almost certainly work on the same principle. I mean they have to. Look at this dashboard for a passenger jet.

c8.alamy.com/comp/CX82WG/children-sitting-at-the-controls-in-the-cockpit-of-passenger-jet-at-CX82WG.jpg

Now imagine how much more complicated a Time and Space machine is that contains its own pocket dimension as well as the ability to reconfigure its shape and even pilot itself. War TARDISs even had weapons too! A control panel where every function had its own button would look like a wall and need one of those rolling library ladders to go up and down and along it, too! No, it must work like a chorded keyboard, imo. It's not what you press, it's what combination you press and when.

If you have one button, you only have two states = (On | Off)
If you have two buttons, you have FOUR states (On | Off) * (On | Off).
If you have three buttons, you have eight states.

The formula is 2 raised to the power of the number of buttons (e.g. 2^3 = 8)

By the time you get to ten buttons, you have 1,024 states. And that assumes that every control is just an On / Off rather than having multiple settings.

If the TARDIS has sixty controls (that looks about right to me looking at pictures), that's just over a quintillion possible combinations of controls. Easily enough even to control a Time and Space machine.

I don't believe the controls are telepathic. I agree with Stormcrow that Moffat took it a bit too far. All that's necessary is for the controls to do different things depending on how they are combined. Like your shift key on a computer keyboard. Oh, and someone with supra-genius intelligence to understand that pattern of those controls like a Time Lord.