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VaBeachGuy

Data and contractions

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I just noticed another contraction by Data in Devils Due. Right at the beginning he's talking to the Ghost of Christmas Past and he says "There's more of gravey then of grave about you."

 

Anyone else catch little things like this or am I just too picky? LOL

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I just noticed another contraction by Data in Devils Due. Right at the beginning he's talking to the Ghost of Christmas Past and he says "There's more of gravey then of grave about you."

 

Anyone else catch little things like this or am I just too picky? LOL

Yes,I tend to do that...

 

But, I can forgive him for accidentally using a contraction or two.

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oh really? I'll have to go re-watch it. I never noticed that. But then again, I never notice anything like that, then someone points it out and I'm like whoa, I can't believe I missed that!

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Does it count if he is Quoting someone?

Well since he is quoting someone and he is doing this verbatim, he of course would use contractions, but then that makes you wonder...why can he not do this when he is not quoting someone???

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Does it count if he is Quoting someone?

Well since he is quoting someone and he is doing this verbatim, he of course would use contractions, but then that makes you wonder...why can he not do this when he is not quoting someone???

Just a guess but wouldn’t it be in the programming or does Data function differently then I am imagining he would, other than like a PC runs programs? If he runs programs the same as I think he does then a contraction would signify a malfunction, but if the running program were a quoting subroutine, it would be allowed (?)

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It was something in his programing that prevented him from being able to use contractions at all. It was one of the things that set him apart from being "human". Of course Data being played by a human means it's a little harder to keep 100% of humanity out of the character. At times over the past 15 years I've found myself saying Data's lines to myself as he is saying them looking for contractions, to his credit there were very few slip ups.

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Your right, I remember so man times Spiners acting caused me to easily suspend my disbelief and he became Data.

Yeah, me too.... :rolleyes: :lol:

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I was always just so amazed that he was able to NOT use contractions! Thats hard to do!

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I do not believe that it is as difficult to do as most of you make it out to be. Once you are used to deleting concretions to your speech patterns it can actually be difficult to reintroduce them.

Especially if you have been writing short stories featuring a certain android for almost two years. B) B)

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I do not believe that it is as difficult to do as most of you make it out to be. Once you are used to deleting concretions to your speech patterns it can actually be difficult to reintroduce them.

Especially if you have been writing short stories featuring a certain android for almost two years.  B)  B)

LOL!!! Or you watch every epsode that centers around him, watch the movies, read said short stories, and novels. You do tend to delete contractions from your normal speech patterns.

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It was something in his programing that prevented him from being able to use contractions at all. It was one of the things that set him apart from being "human". Of course Data being played by a human means it's a little harder to keep 100% of humanity out of the character. At times over the past 15 years I've found myself saying Data's lines to myself as he is saying them looking for contractions, to his credit there were very few slip ups.

I don't think he can't use conteactions because of programing more lack of programing he can't contract on his own but if he's quoteing then someone else has done it for him

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I do not believe that it is as difficult to do as most of you make it out to be. Once you are used to deleting concretions to your speech patterns it can actually be difficult to reintroduce them.

Especially if you have been writing short stories featuring a certain android for almost two years.  B)  B)

LOL!!! Or you watch every epsode that centers around him, watch the movies, read said short stories, and novels. You do tend to delete contractions from your normal speech patterns.

:blink: Please sell crazy somewhere else..we are all stacked up here.

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Maybe he doesn't use contraction because he is programmed to use perfect English...

 

But, well, when he try, he can...Or was it something to do with his emotion chip...

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Data may not use contractions, but Mr. Brent Spiner does. :)

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So Data uses contractions sometimes. Maybe Song gave Data that ability but he jusr never used it much. As you remember, Data could also dream but he did not dream until later on in the series.

Edited by Data

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So Data uses contractions sometimes. Maybe Song gave Data that ability but he jusr never used it much. As you remember, Data could also dream but he did not dream until later on in the series.

That could be true, the dream program was only supposed to be activated when his programing reached a certain level of development. True, it got activated sooner due to the incident in Birthright Part I. Maybe that is the case, like the dreams, the ability to use contractions was already there. I know I saw a thread here recently speaking about how they noticed that he could easily speak French which does use contractions in the proper speech pattern...so if that is the case and he has no problems there, then maybe in some form he does and can use that ability though he is/was not aware of it.

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I don't think it's a matter of him having the ability and not knowing it, it's just a matter of the actor slipping from time to time and the directors not catching it. It was something added to his character to make him seem even less "human", though I don't know that it was needed for the character.

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I was just watching "In Theory" and spotted 2 contractions within the same scene.

 

Data says "I'll join you..." and "You're not my mother!"

 

I wonder how many accidental contractions there were throughout the whole 7 seasons.

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I just rewatched "All Good Things..." and I noticed that Datas uses contractions a few times. Of course, it can be said that becasue this was in one possible future, Data had learned how to use contractions, or, since the whole thing was created by Q, that it's not really our Data, and so does not count.

 

Also, how come Lore could use contractions?

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If anyone else knows of other "Contraction" episodes post them here. There is one episode where Data uses a contraction and it was on purpose so I wouldn't consider that to be an example. That episode was Future Imperfect and it was the done when Riker was on the bridge and was just figuring out that he was being fooled and none of what he was experiencing was real.

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In The Big Goodbye, Data uses a lot of contractions on the holodeck when Bev asks where Picard is.

 

"He's on ice." "He's being grilled."

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maybe with the holodeck, he has a program, where he follows a script, maybe he uploaded The Christmas Carol and is just reciting the words, has it ever been said he cant quote contractions if they are in a program,

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maybe with the holodeck, he has a program, where he follows a script, maybe he uploaded The Christmas Carol and is just reciting the words, has it ever been said he cant quote contractions if they are in a program,

328208[/snapback]

It has been said that he can't use contractions at all, the way he would use them has never been addressed to my knowledge. Just that he does not have the ability to use them at all.

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It seemed a little odd that an android with immense strength and who was capable of trillions of calculations a second couldn't use simple terms and words.

Edited by The King

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My brother recently went on a search for nitpick lists for TNG, because he kept swearing he heard him use contractions on several episodes. I told him that yes he did... and my best guess was that it was either a slip up when the episode was written or that Brent accidentally said the words as a contraction.

 

I do know that the episode that was in question at the time my brother decided he HAD to search it out was "The Offspring".

 

I wish I remember which site he visited, but it listed a bunch of instances.

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It was one of the ways that the producers were able to make him more "mechanical" without doing a lot of make-up or special effects. If you recall back to Encounter at Farpoint he also couldn't whistle properly either.

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