astronomy

The Wounded Sky

The Wounded Sky is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand The Wounded Sky rather than just read about it. In short: The Wounded Sky is a 1983 Star Trek novel (Pocket Books #13) by Diane Duane, featuring James T. Kirk as captain of the USS Enterprise.

Key takeaways

The Wounded Sky belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect The Wounded Sky to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of The Wounded Sky from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Wounded Sky is a 1983 Star Trek novel (Pocket Books #13) by Diane Duane, featuring James T. Kirk as captain of the USS Enterprise. The author would four years later adapt the novel's plot for the teleplay of the first season Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Where No One Has Gone Before".

Plot The Enterprise, equipped with a radical new "inversion drive" which allows the ship to bend spacetime and transit immense distances instantly, is sent on a mission to the Magellanic Clouds just outside the Milky Way, in order to place navigation beacons for future extra-galactic voyages using the new technology. The inversion drive is a product of the "creative physics" practiced by the natives of the Hamal star system, a race of crystalline spider-like beings. The chief designer of the drive is aboard, advising Captain Kirk, as the Enterprise makes its first "jump", after outmaneuvering a Klingon squadron which was sent to capture the new technology. Unknown to anyone on the starship, however, the use of the drive destabilizes spacetime itself on a fundamental level, creating a rift or tear through which another, external universe penetrates and begins to mix with the Enterprise's own, with rapidly spreading, potentially fatal consequences for all life everywhere. The denouement of the novel follows as Captain Kirk and the Enterprise crew, experiencing bizarre, dream-like experiences of other times and worlds during the use of the drive, realize that something is dreadfully amiss. Arriving near the rift and observing the destruction it inflicts on nearby star systems, they discover that the price for traveling distances that would take centuries to cover with warp drive may be the loss of their own universe. Deliberately using the drive one, final time, they cross the "boundary" between external "reality" and their own collective inner consciousness, where they must together draw on mental, emotional and spiritual strengths to heal the wound that they have caused. The novel deals intensively with the question of whether reality is an objective thing in and of itself, or a product of conscious perception by humans and other intelligences. Like Duane's other Star Trek novels, it incorporates both real physics and speculative extensions thereof to support the plot. Like most of Diane Duane's TOS-era novels, this one includes several scenes in the ship's recreation room, one of which quotes a Star Trek filk song based on John Denver's "Calypso".

References

External links The Wounded Sky at Memory Alpha

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with The Wounded Sky

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what The Wounded Sky claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to The Wounded Sky before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about The Wounded Sky ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of The Wounded Sky

In research: The Wounded Sky appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses The Wounded Sky in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: The Wounded Sky is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1983 American novels, 1983 English-language novels, American science fiction novels, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for The Wounded Sky outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study The Wounded Sky in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what The Wounded Sky means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain The Wounded Sky out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is The Wounded Sky in simple terms?

The Wounded Sky is a 1983 Star Trek novel (Pocket Books #13) by Diane Duane, featuring James T. Kirk as captain of the USS Enterprise.

Why does The Wounded Sky matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study The Wounded Sky?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on The Wounded Sky.