star trek how does universal translator work

Universal translator

Universal translators from the 22nd through 24th centuries

A 23rd century shuttlecraft universal translator

The universal translator (also referred to as a " UT " or translator circuit ) was a technology used to decipher and interpret alien languages into the native language of the user. ( ENT : " Fight or Flight ", " Vanishing Point ", " Breaking the Ice "; TNG : " Home Soil " DS9 : " Little Green Men ")

• 2.1 Non-humanoids
• 2.2 Detection
• 2.3 Language structures
• 2.4 Environmental factors
• 3.1 See also
• 3.2 Background information
• 3.3 External links

History [ ]

An early Starfleet universal translator in 2151

On Earth , the universal translator was invented shortly before 2151 , and was still experimental at the time of the launch of Enterprise NX-01 . ( ENT : " Broken Bow ") The actual universal translator, which was used for deciphering unknown languages on the fly, was a handheld device with a keypad and display to which a communicator could attach at the top. ( ENT : " Precious Cargo ")

Despite its being able to translate alien languages in relatively short order, due to the UT's experimental nature, the use of a skilled linguist – in Enterprise 's case, Hoshi Sato – was still required, notably in situations where reading alien languages on the control panels, hatches, and displays were involved. ( ENT : " Sleeping Dogs ", " Vox Sola ")

A new language could quickly be translated in person-to-person encounters by having one speak his or her language until the universal translator gathered enough data to build a translation matrix . Sato also created the linguacode translation matrix in order to anticipate and speed up the translation of new and unknown languages. ( ENT : " In a Mirror, Darkly ")

A universal translator in 2155

Without the attachment, Starfleet communicators were still capable of translating preprogrammed languages, such as Akaali when Enterprise visited their world. ( ENT : " Civilization ") By 2155 , Ensign Sato's work on universal translator technology had made it possible for small translators to be clipped onto clothing, translating a variety of languages at once, allowing the conference discussing the Coalition of Planets to occur live in real time, without in-person or networked translators among delegates. ( ENT : " Demons ")

A Starfleet communicator's universal translator at work in 2256

By the 2230s , universal translators were fully incorporated directly into Starfleet communicators, directing translated audio at the recipient in the speaker's voice. When Lieutenant Philippa Georgiou made first contact with Saru , a Kelpien , she displayed her communicator – making it possible for the two to understand each other. ( ST : " The Brightest Star ")

In 2256 , Michael Burnham used the universal translator in her communicator aboard the Klingon Sarcophagus ship to eavesdrop on the orders of its commander, Kol . When she revealed herself using the translator to speak in Klingonese , Kol dismissed the technology as another attempt by the Federation to subsume the Klingon identity; Burnham instead explained that its purpose was to enable communication and allow the two species to come to peaceful terms. ( DIS : " Into the Forest I Go ")

Starbase Yorktown had a universal translator in the command center that was used to interpret Kalara 's plea for help in 2263 of the alternate reality . ( Star Trek Beyond )

In 2257 , Burnham explained to Siranna that the universal translator in her communicator was programmed with more than 1,000 languages, including the Kelpien language . ( DIS : " The Sound of Thunder ")

Universal translators were also built into the communications systems of most starships , including shuttlecraft . In 2257 , the universal translator onboard the USS Discovery still had occasional difficulty with translating the Saurian Linus 's language in to Federation Standard. A short time later, communications from a mysterious sphere caused the UT to malfunction, causing the individual crew members and ship's computer to be heard in a large number of languages and for the ship's displays to switch to a wide variety of written languages. These included Klingon , Arabic , German , Welsh , Spanish , French , Italian , Norwegian , Andorian and Tau Cetian . Owing to his language abilities, Commander Saru was able to affect repairs on the UT so the crew could understand each other and the ship's systems again. ( DIS : " An Obol for Charon ")

In 2267 , the UT from a Class F shuttlecraft had a wand-like design. ( TOS : " Metamorphosis ")

Spock modifying a universal translator

In 2267 , Captain Kirk and Commander Spock of the USS Enterprise modified one to communicate with an alien known as the Companion , in the Gamma Canaris region . Kirk explained to Zefram Cochrane that certain universal ideas and concepts were common to all intelligent life, and that the translator compared the frequencies of brain wave patterns , selected those ideas it recognized, and provided the necessary grammar. Kirk further explained that the device spoke with a voice, or the approximation of one, that corresponded to the identity concepts it recognized. The Companion was revealed to be female because the universal translator detected this facet of its identity from its brain wave patterns, and assigned it a female voice. ( TOS : " Metamorphosis ")

By the 24th century , universal translators had advanced to the point where a full-fledged UT could be built into the combadges worn by Starfleet personnel. The translation was so natural and seamless that beings unaware of them believed that others spoke their own language. ( VOY : " The 37's ")

The universal translator was able to translate a language used by sentient nanites into binary language . ( TNG : " Evolution ")

The Emergency Medical Holographic program contained the universal translator technology built-in to his program. The USS Voyager 's EMH was able to communicate with Noss when Tuvok and Tom Paris ' universal translators were offline. ( VOY : " Gravity ")

The Tars Lamora prison colony prohibited universal translators so that the prisoners couldn't communicate with each other. After finding the USS Protostar , Dal R'El and Rok-Tahk accidentally activated a combadge laying on the bridge floor which powered up the ship and activated the translator in the combadge, finally enabling them to understand each other. The two later carried the combadge with them so that they could communicate with Jankom Pog . However, they discovered that the translator couldn't allow them to understand Murf . ( PRO : " Lost and Found ")

After returning to Tars Lamora, Dal and Zero used a combadge to turn the Unwanted 's ankle monitors into universal translators. ( PRO : " A Moral Star, Part 2 ")

In 2384 , the living construct impeded the universal translators on the Protostar and the Starfleet ships that it had infected, keeping the Protostar crew from understanding each other and the USS Dauntless 's crew from understanding Vice Admiral Kathryn Janeway 's orders to abandon ship . However, Gwyndala 's knowledge of languages allowed her to communicate with everyone else while Janeway was able to speak with both Dal and Gwyn as the two spoke Federation Standard . Hologram Janeway eventually managed to get the ship's translators back online. ( PRO : " Supernova, Part 1 ")

In 3190 , Dr. Kovich brought a variety of historic universal translators to the DMA task force charged with seeking to establish successful communication with Species 10-C . The table included 2150s-style communicator with attachment and 2155-style lapel clip-on, a mid-23rd century communicator and two mid-23rd century wand-style translators, and combadges from the 2360s , 2370s , and 2390s . Kovich used them to illustrate that the universal translator had been so successful because it sought out shared familiar concepts between speakers, such as spoken language. ( DIS : " The Galactic Barrier ")

In 3191 , translator technology was incorporated into the replicated Breen refrigeration suits used by a Discovery away team onboard Ruhn's dreadnaught . By this time, the universal translators were capable of translating the Breen language for the most part, allowing the team to communicate with the Breen that they encountered undetected. Although there were some context issues with the translations due to some words not being in the database, Captain Michael Burnham 's xenoanthropology experience allowed her to fill in the gaps. ( DIS : " Lagrange Point ")

Limitations [ ]

Non-humanoids [ ].

The universal translator's capabilities were focused on interpreting the brain patterns of humanoid lifeforms.

For entirely non-humanoid lifeforms, such as a cytoplasmic lifeform which attached itself to B'Elanna Torres , the universal translator was completely stymied, though with some, such as a symbiotic lifeform encountered by Enterprise NX-01 in 2152 , it could still provide some help. ( VOY : " Nothing Human "; ENT : " Vox Sola ")

At one time while Neelix was negotiating with a xenon-based lifeform , the UT went off-line and Arturis saved him from embarrassment by translating the alien's words. ( VOY : " Hope and Fear ")

Detection [ ]

Uhura forgoes use of automated speech translation, while the computer attempts to translate the receiving message

The universal translator could be detected when it was used to process language in communications.

In 2293 , Commanders Chekov and Uhura were forced to revert to manually translating their speech using a paper dictionary into Klingon in order to surreptitiously get them past the border. Uhura successfully used broken Klingonese to describe the USS Enterprise -A as a freighter , the Ursva , headed to Rura Penthe to deliver "supplies, medicines and things". Chekov stated that paper dictionaries were necessary because the use of universal translator would have been recognized. ( Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country )

Language structures [ ]

The universal translator was not instantly successful with every language it encountered.

Even by the late 24th century, it was only capable of translating the literal words of the Tamarians into English, but was unable to translate the Tamarians' metaphorical manner of speaking into understandable speech. ( TNG : " Darmok "; LD : " Kayshon, His Eyes Open ")

It took several hours of analysis before the universal translator aboard Deep Space 9 could establish a translation matrix for the Skrreean language . ( DS9 : " Sanctuary ")

When a recording of a Dominion -Federation negotiation was played in native-language mode, Jack had found the translator missed capturing a Passive voice transitive in Dominionese , revealing what had been translated as a statement was actually a request. ( DS9 : " Statistical Probabilities ")

Cardassian universal translators had to be manually adjusted in order to properly translate the Breen language . ( DS9 : " Strange Bedfellows ")

Environmental factors [ ]

Locating a Ferengi UT

Ferengi translators started out as hand-held devices in the 22nd century . ( ENT : " Acquisition ") By the 24th century, they had become small devices inserted into the ear . These later models could be easily disrupted by various types of interferences such as solar flares , ionic interference , or beta radiation . They could potentially be fixed by a Ferengi smacking their head, as Quark , Rom and Nog attempted to do upon their arrival to Earth. They contained reset buttons that could be accessed by something small, such as a hairpin . ( DS9 : " Little Green Men ")

Appendices [ ]

See also [ ].

• Linguistic database
• Recording-translating device
• Translation algorithm
• Translation matrix

Background information [ ]

The universal translator is one of many Star Trek technologies that exist primarily as conventions to aid storytelling. The UT enables the vast majority of dialogue between characters to be written (and delivered) in English, to the convenience of viewers and writers alike. Writers do not have to devise a new language for each new alien of the week that speaks on-screen, and viewers do not have to watch for subtitles .

Another storytelling conceit is that the device makes non-English speakers appear as if they're speaking English (i.e. lip movements match English language pronunciation). This "convention" is particularly obvious in episodes like DS9 : " Little Green Men " as well as ENT : " Unexpected ", " Civilization ", " Acquisition ", and " Precious Cargo ", in each of which the universal translator is off-line for periods of time. Were the device real, it would more likely have an effect similar to watching a movie dubbed into another language.

The draft proposal Star Trek is... mentioned this concept:

During the writing of " The Corbomite Maneuver " (the first regular installment of Star Trek , following the pilot episodes " The Cage " and " Where No Man Has Gone Before "), the universal translator underwent some further development. Jerry Sohl , the writer of "The Corbomite Maneuver", later explained, " We were originally going to have [each crew member] carry a language translator, which would fit on the wrist like a beeper, and no matter what area of the universe they were in, the thoughts that the people were thinking would automatically be translated into English as they spoke. We got rid of that idea, and assumed that everybody did speak English. " ( The Star Trek Interview Book , pp. 127-128)

External links [ ]

• Universal translator at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
• Universal translator at Wikipedia
• 1 Daniels (Crewman)

Star Trek | Universal Translator Tech Is Nearly Here – So Are Its Challenges

Star Trek’s Universal Translator is almost within our grasp, but as The Next Generation makes only too clear: Shaka when the walls fell.

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Imagine the boundary between science fiction and science fact disappears, just for a few minutes. In that time, you can reach through and pick out a piece of tech from the Trek -iverse to keep. What do you choose?

Maybe a tricorder to diagnose and treat illnesses; a phaser for super realistic cosplaying (please, set it to stun first); if you move quickly, you could prise a replicator off the wall for your very own endless supply of earl grey tea.

But me, I’d reach for a communicator badge. Because not only is tapping a handy way to communicate after years of staring down at a screen, but the universal translator built inside is extremely impressive.

It’s a plot device that’s pivotal to Trek and a lot of other space-faring stories.

Because if you’re wearing a comms badge with Trek ’s universal translator (or UT for short) built-in, you can hear any language (okay, most languages) translated into your native tongue in real-time. As you can imagine, this is incredibly handy when you’re regularly encountering species from all over the galaxy.

A Quick History of the Universal Translator

The universal translator was built into comms badges from the 24th century Star Trek: The Next Generation era onwards – in one episode, Riker (Jonathan Frakes) and Troi (Marina Sirtis) even have translators implanted under their skin (‘Who Watches the Watchers’ – S3, Ep4). Before that, it was integrated into starship computers but could only be used on away missions in the form of handheld gadgets or tiny wearable devices.

How does the universal translator work exactly? Well, we’ve heard several brief explanations throughout the history of Trek – and a fair few inconsistencies. One of the earliest is in Star Trek: The Original Series when the translator looks like a metal tube. Captain Kirk (William Shatner) explains that it scans brain wave frequencies to identify universal concepts, then translates instantly (‘Who Mourns for Adonais?’ – S2, Ep2).

However, what you end up hearing isn’t a translated version of the voice of the alien standing in front of you. You hear the words that the UT can replace… somehow.

As with a lot of tech and science in Trek, we need to suspend our disbelief to get our heads around universal translators. What about the way an alien’s mouth moves? How come the UT can translate languages humans have never encountered before? Luckily, the universal translator often blends into the background of Star Trek , so these questions don’t ruin the stories for most of us.

Other species have universal translators that work similarly, like the Ferengi, who originally had handheld devices but then developed in-ear translators. It makes sense that most other species have their own translation tech or that Starfleet’s UTs can sometimes work both ways.

Why The Universal Translator Is So Important

Universal translators are a vital storytelling tool. It wouldn’t make a compelling show if characters relied on a glitchy app, had to rifle through a paper dictionary, or played awkward charades and pointed at things every time they bumped into a new species.

When the UT is embedded into the communicator badge and becomes part of the uniform, it puts the issue of language into the background. Because we don’t think about it much or just assume it works seamlessly, it becomes exciting when Star Trek ’s translating tech doesn’t work. Then it becomes central to the story.

This happens a few times throughout Star Trek’ s history. In Star Trek: Discovery’s ‘ An Obol for Charon’ (S2, Ep4), a mysterious sphere causes interference that screws up the universal translator within the ship’s computer, translating speech into all kinds of languages at random. The crew thinks it might be a computer virus, but it turns out the sphere is trying to communicate with the ship, hoping to pass on all of the information it has accumulated over its lifespan of hundreds of thousands of years before it dies.

As soon as you remove the ability to translate anything and everything on the fly, it becomes clear how integral a universal translator is to the plot of Trek – whether it’s in a computer, a comm badge, or under the skin.

That’s why it’s no surprise how often universal translators show up in other science-fiction stories. The ‘microsoft’ in William Gibson’s novel Neuromancer (and further explored in several of his other novels) is a small chip you can plug into a socket behind your ear. It directly interfaces with your brain and gives you knowledge, skills, and computational ability to translate one language into another.

There are also organic examples like the translator microbes in Farscape . Bacteria injected into your brain allow you to understand any spoken language. And the ‘babel fish’ in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is “small, yellow and leech-like, and probably the oddest thing in the Universe”. Pop one in your ear, and it feeds on brain waves, translating any language you hear into your native tongue by excreting it out into your ear, eugh.

Will We Ever Have a Universal Translator?

We’re not all wearing translating comms badges in the real world, and we haven’t discovered a babel fish (yet). But translation tech is still impressive and continues to advance.

There are many apps that you can speak into or type text into, which then translate the words for you in seconds. Granted, they cannot translate conversations in real-time, but that’s still a lot of translation power in your pocket.

One of the best apps is Google Translate . Google’s neural translation tech supports 108 languages and is one of the most powerful, accurate, and accessible translation tools today. As well as translating written and spoken language, you can point your device at the text to translate it – an excellent way to quickly decipher a sign or a menu – and draw text characters.

There are also several translation devices that you can wear in your ear. The Google Pixel Buds are a pair of true wireless earbuds that allow you to play music and take calls. But they also work with the Google Translate app, allowing you to hear spoken language translated into your ear in your native tongue.

Other devices are solely dedicated to translation. The brand Timekettle has made a number of these, including the WT2. These are a pair of true wireless earbuds. You wear one, and the person you want to talk to wears another. Your words are translated in their ear as you speak, and vice versa. The WT2 can translate more than 20 languages, has a high accuracy rate, and only takes between 1 and 3 seconds to translate most words.

To understand the tech that powers modern-day translation and where it might be headed, I spoke to Laurence Moroney , lead artificial intelligence advocate at Google and father of our very own Stargate A.I . “It’s getting better all the time,” he tells me. “AI [artificial intelligence] and ML [machine learning] have been a source of major breakthroughs.”

He says that before AI and ML, translation was carried out word-to-word – the tech equivalent of flipping through a dictionary to decipher a sentence. This can be useful but often leads to misunderstandings. Language isn’t simply about our words, there’s more at play, like context, culture, and different syntax.

Moroney says that one of the biggest problems is slang. “If I were to share ‘that man is wearing a green hat’ in Cantonese, the meaning and the gist of the phrase would be there, but the meaning would be very different,” he says. “That’s because in Cantonese’ wearing a green hat’ is slang for ‘his wife is cheating on him’.”

The problems with translation are explored brilliantly in the infamous ‘Darmok’ episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation (S5, Ep3). This is about the Tamarians, a race that uses metaphor to communicate, which makes no sense to the crew of Enterprise-D. Sure, the computer effectively translates each word they say accurately. But without the knowledge of the Tamarian’s style of communication and their history and myths (which their metaphors draw heavily), it proves challenging to understand the meaning.

Moroney tells me that this is why natural language processing (NLP) is essential. A branch of AI that helps computers better understand how humans write and speak.

“NLP techniques in AI map words and phrases into a higher dimensional vector space, and over time meanings and sentiment can be established from these vectors,” he says. “Then, words in the same vector space in another language can be mapped to the ones in our language. And thus translation of semantics can happen. It’s really exciting.”

If that’s what’s being developed right now, what can we expect from the future? “More accurate translations for sure,” Moroney says. “And when they get faster, close to real-time, and predictive, then it gets interesting.”

The big question is: will we ever get a Star Trek -like experience? “Yes and no,” Moroney tells me. He says the big problem with Star Trek ’s fictional tech is that the translation happens before sentences finish.

“In some languages, you don’t know what the sentence is about – in particular, the action verb – because it’s at or close to the end of the sentence,” he explains. “So to expect an accurate translation while the person is speaking may never be possible. A short delay – when they finish a sentence – may be possible.”

However, he says “this stuff is really close” in other ways.” To illustrate this, Moroney shares a video from Google to show where we’re at today with dubbing translation – making the experience much more like what we see in Trek .

“I don’t speak a word of Spanish, but they did a machine translation of my words into Spanish. Then had a human translator ensure the quality of the translation,” he explains. “Then used an artificial voice that was trained using Wavenet on *my* voice. Finally, we used lip-sync technology to map my lips to the new voice so that it could look like the video is of me speaking Spanish!”

Is a Universal Translator the Key to Trek’s Utopia?

There are many reasons why the future imagined in Trek seems like a lovely place to be (well, for the most part). It’s hinted that one primary reason everyone on the planet got their act together is due to universal translation.

This is a stark contrast to Douglas Adams’ ‘babel fish’. In The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy , he writes that, by removing barriers to communication, the fish has “caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation.”

So which is it? Could better translation in the future help us or hinder us? Where the world is right now, it seems we have far too many problems that we wouldn’t simply overcome with better communication. But it can be reassuring to look at Star Trek for a hopeful framework about how we could change things for the better with both the help of new tech and a deeper appreciation of each other.

Thinking back to ‘Darmok’, it was only thanks to Picard’s devotion to understanding and learning from the Tamarian Captain Dathon that led to a breakthrough in language and meaning. “In my experience, communication is a matter of patience, imagination,” he says at the beginning of the episode – and, boy, was his patience tested.

We’ve already learned that translation isn’t simply about replacing one word for another. It only leads to effective communication when you learn more about who you’re talking to and their experience of the world. What’s more, learning that the Tamarians speak in metaphor only unlocked part of the puzzle. Picard also needed to take the time to understand the context and the nature of the myths and stories.

Interestingly, this episode isn’t only about better-understanding others, but better understanding ourselves. I like that, at the very end, Picard is reading a book about Greek myth. “For the next time we encounter the Tamarians,” he tells Riker. “More familiarity with our own mythology might help us relate to theirs.”

I believe this is what the positive and largely peaceful future imagined in Trek is rooted in. An understanding, acceptance, and embracing of differences that starts on Earth and is then extended out to everyone else in the galaxy. Or, as the Tamarians would say, Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra. But without this understanding, well, then Shaka when the walls fell.

This article was first published on April 13th, 2022 on the original Companion website.

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How Universal Translators Work In Star Trek

O ne of the most consistent features of Star Trek is that we constantly see characters speaking English to one another, regardless of where they were originally born. Even exotic aliens speak in perfect English when they are onboard a ship or a space station in this Paramount franchise, and there's a reason for that: the universal translator.

Humans and aliens are able to understand each other in Star Trek, because of the fictional invention of the Universal Translator.

Of course, Star Trek hasn't always been perfectly consistent with this technology, so we're here to explain, once and for all, exactly how the universal translator works.

Thanks to Star Trek: Enterprise , we know that the earliest versions of the universal translator work a bit like some of our modern translation technology. We see communications specialist and linguist Hoshi Sato wielding a handheld device that can decipher the languages used by others.

After the device receives enough language input, it can build a translation matrix (which is the real cornerstone of this technology) and display a text-based translation of what each party is saying.

The shows are generally written from Starfleet's POV, so we are hearing everything in perfect English while the hypothetical Klingon would hear Riker's words translated into his own language.

Since Star Trek: Enterprise took place about a century before The Original Series , its portrayal of the universal translator was very basic compared to what we see in other shows and movies .

For example, in Discovery , we see the use of handheld communicators that Captain Kirk would later rely on, and these devices had a much more advanced translation matrix that was capable of anticipating alien languages without them having to speak directly into the device. 

More importantly, the devices could now verbally translate what was being said on the fly, so if two humanoid characters were speaking different languages, their words would be instantly translated while they spoke (the translator consistently has trouble translating non-humanoid languages, incidentally). At this point, its translation abilities are very nearly magical, so you just have to roll with it.

Star Trek: The Next Generation brought the franchise into the 24th century, and the universal translator was now conveniently built directly into the comm badges that all Starfleet crew members must wear. This is why everyone appears to speak English: if a Klingon or another alien beams over to the Enterprise, the universal translator will translate their native language into English for the benefit of characters like Commander Riker.

Star Trek Translator Inconsistencies

While this explains the basics of how Star Trek uses the universal translator, there are still some funny inconsistencies across various shows and movies. For example, one memorable scene in Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country involves Uhura trying to bluff her way past a long-range Klingon patrol, and this involves her and several of the crew frantically flipping through paper books to help with translation.

Nichelle Nichols herself objected to this scene because it demeaned Uhura's skills as a communications expert and seemingly overlooked the existence of the translator, so we're willing to chalk this scene up as an anomaly.

Another aspect of the technology that Star Trek fans often debate over is that even though everything is being translated to English for the benefit of the characters, we still see characters like Captain Picard saying Klingon words and phrases that don't get automatically translated from their original language.

While never confirmed by the show, my pet theory is that the translator is familiar enough with certain cultural words or phrases to understand when someone who doesn't natively speak the language wants to say something with all the context and flavor of the original language.

For example, many people who don't speak fluent French prefer to say that certain things have a certain "je ne sais quois" rather than using the much more boring English translation of "I don't know what." In Star Trek, it's reasonable to assume that the universal translator knows that when someone like Picard says "Qapla" to Worf, he wants his alien security chief to hear it in the original Klingon rather than hearing the English translation of "success."

As for why Picard is a French man speaking perfectly-accented English throughout the entire series, not even the universal translator can explain what the hell happened there.

The post How Universal Translators Work In Star Trek appeared first on GIANT FREAKIN ROBOT .

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Strange New Worlds Sheds Light on Star Trek's Weirdest Invention

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The following contains spoilers for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 2, Episode 6, "Lost in Translation," now streaming on Paramount+.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 2, Episode 6, "Lost in Translation" embraces a common Star Trek theme: the struggle to communicate. It provides a showcase for Celia Rose Gooding's Ensign Uhura, as she contends with what at first appears to be horrifying hallucinations but may be an alien species trying to make contact. And it continues Strange New Worlds ' big winning streak in Season 2, exemplifying the franchise at its best.

In the process, it drops an interesting tidbit about Star Trek 's weirdest gadget: the universal translator, which provides a convenient explanation for why every species in the galaxy speaks perfect English. Series creator Gene Roddenberry included it in his original proposal for the series, but the specifics of how it works are deceptively wild. "Lost in Translation" drops an intriguing detail on why they work the way they do, as well as revealing why its outlandishness doesn't matter.

RELATED: Strange New Worlds Showcases Key Differences Between Two Prominent Captains

The Universal Translator Is Purely a Narrative Tool

In his draft proposal for the first Star Trek , Roddenberry described the universal translator as a "two-way scrambler" that automatically translated alien languages into English and vice versa. It was worked into The Original Series ' iconic communicator -- which later series included in their com badges -- though the specifics were rarely discussed onscreen. In author Allan Asherman's The Star Trek Interview Book screenwriter Jerry Sohl reveals that the concept was more or less scrapped, and the producers "assumed that everybody did speak English." Season 2, Episode 9, "Metamorphosis," goes into greater detail when Spock modifies a shuttle's universal translator to speak to an energy-based alien creature.

It's described as "instantaneously comparing the frequency of brainwave patterns," which is a wordy way of saying mind-reading. If it can translate thought patterns into speech and words, it's effectively telepathy. The show ratchets that concept back -- ensuring that the translator doesn't lend further god-like powers to Starfleet -- but it's still a big lift. Thankfully, Star Trek eventually realized the universal translator made a great fulcrum for problems to throw at the heroes. Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country plays it for comedy when Chekov, Scotty and Uhura need to speak Klingon without the help of the gadget. (It also caused a minor continuity error, since Uhura is later portrayed as effortlessly fluent in Klingon.) Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 5, Episode 2, "Darmok," became a classic by revealing the technology's limits, as the Enterprise-D encounters a species who communicate entirely in metaphor.

RELATED: Strange New Worlds Give Kirk and Uhura Their Best Story Together

Strange New Worlds Specifies How the Translator Works

Only recently has Star Trek become more specific about the details. The most telling example comes from Star Trek: Discovery Season 4 , Episode 10, "The Galactic Barrier." Facing a species wielding cosmic levels of power, David Cronenberg's Dr. Kovich brings a plethora of universal translators from across the franchise's timeline. As he explains, the technology "seeks out" shared concepts between speakers and uses them to interpret what it hears. It's a nifty piece of exposition, but it also returns to the telepathy concept.

"Lost in Translation" goes a few steps further in a brief bit of exposition that Uhura delivers. Her dilemma is similar to the Discovery's in "The Galactic Barrier," trying to convey information to an utterly unknown species. In this case, their efforts to reach out are having an adverse effect on the human mind, resulting in violent images. She solves the problem by applying the universal translator's principles. "There are similarities in the ways different species process thoughts, ideas," she speculates. "That's how the universal translator works." In this case, the aliens are attempting to use her brain the same way, which is the source of the problem.

It's a typically wild bit of Trek-speak, but it emphasizes how much the franchise has been able to mine out of a piece of narrative expediency. In its own way, the universal translator is as seemingly magical as the transporters or warp engines. But it gives an opening for some very creative plot complications, which Star Trek only gradually took advantage of. "Lost in Translation" turns the technology's premise inside out and delivers another satisfying episode in the bargain.

New episodes of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds stream every Thursday on Paramount+.

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Universal Translator: Dost Thou Speaketh It?

By james becker | jan 19, 2019.

The Universal Translator in Star Trek is perhaps the most used invention in the entire series, well maybe except for artificial gravity.  Almost every instance of communication between different species utilizes this device, and you’d think it works flawlessly, but what happens when it doesn’t?

Star Trek is replete with fascinating and, let’s face it, convenient technology.  Transporters, for instance, were conceived as a cheaper way to move crew from ship to planet since depicting shuttle trips would prove to be too expensive.   The Orville  does not face these same limitations in our modern times and chooses the shuttle method, interestingly enough.

Other technology is beginning to see analogs in our current times.  Communicators and PADDs are now made real with our smart phones, and even warp drive  has seem some real world possibility, if only theoretically.

Of all the wondrous things that Star Trek has shown us, one of the most overlooked inventions is the Universal Translator.  This device works by processing brain waves in a way to automatically translate language, and one would hope, all the nuances implied within that language.

Practically, the constant and subtle way that this device works results in everyone speaking English or whatever language the viewer speaks.  For audiences and writers this does make life easier, but at the end of the day the Universal Translator is a plot device.  It’s existence is usually only mentioned when it’s pertinent, which is often when it isn’t working.  And like many plot points, its resolution is either underwhelming, or some kind of  deus ex machina to save the day.

Of the many times the device is mentioned, there are some instances that transcend others and show us just how finicky it is and how interesting stories can become when communication that is otherwise taken for granted is jeopardized in some way.

Star Trek VI The undiscovered Country – the crew Lost in Translation Copyright Paramount

Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country

As an ensemble film, and the last to feature The Original Series cast in its entirety, the crew are all given their proper time to shine, and one of my favorite parts is when Uhura and Chekov are tasked with sneaking the Enterprise past a Klingon without using the translator.

Not only is their broken Klingon both hilarious and surprisingly effective at convincing the Klingon on the other end of the line, it shows a flaw of the crew having been so reliant on the Universal Translator.

I think more moments like this would be a reminder that some old-fashioned study time with pronouns and verb conjugations goes a long way, as I learned in high school when I thought I could use Google translate to do my French homework for me.

To the credit of J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek films, Kelvin Uhura is modernized with an education in non-human languages.  This is definitely a great update from the phone line operator/front desk secretary Gene Roddenberry had originally envisioned the communications officer to be.

Star Trek The Original Series – Devil in the Dark Spock and Kirk

The Devil in the Dark

When Kirk and crew assist a mining colony who has unwittingly stirred up a nest of the local wildlife, they wind up discovering more than they expected when confronting the rock eating and prolific tunneler species, the Horta.

Made of silicone and fibrous asbestos (keep the phone number for that mesothelioma class action lawsuit handy), this strange beast turns out to have been only defending its young.  When Spock uses his Vulcan mind meld to connect with it, he feels intense emotions that are easily understood no matter one’s language, anatomy, or scope of communication.

It’s hard not to identify with organisms who can feel emotions just as we can.  Not all communication is verbal, nor does it need to be.  It’s the reason I can’t stay mad at my dog when he gives me those sad, droopy eyes.

Little Green Men

Quark and family crash and accidentally wind up in 1940’s Earth at the alleged time of the UFO crash in Roswell, New Mexico.  This is the kind of premise only Star Trek could pull off, and I love it.  Initially during their detainment, the Ferengi and Humans are unable to communicate, and we have a chance to hear it from both sides instead of just the humans for once.

The humor of this interaction aside, I find myself wanting more things like this to happen in Star Trek .  Seeing how an alien species such as the Ferengi reacts to humans and our language flips the perspective in an entertaining way.

On another note, once the Ferengi manage to get their translators working again, it’s not long before one of the humans compares Quark to his brother who sells used cars. It’s kind of refreshing to know that once the barriers of language are shattered that we can potentially find such commonalities with other species.

Star Trek The Next Generation Patrick Stewart in Darmok

Not only is this the episode where it takes the whole idea of the Universal Translator and turns it on its head, it’s one of the best episodes of Star Trek .  Overcoming differences and working together, forging connections with a new species, empathy and open-mindedness,  this episode embodies many of the timeless qualities of the Federation.

The Tamarians of this episode speak a language which can be deciphered linguistically, but it’s context is nonexistent because they speak in such a metaphorical way that the specific terms they use have no translation.

Watching Picard discover how to reach back into his own knowledge of humanity to speak in metaphor in order to communicate excited a part of me that always wanted to become an archaeologist.  Cultures live not just through the words of their language, but through the meaning attached to those words, and art, and architecture.

It’s hard to believe that this kind of communication isn’t more common in Star Trek .  Even on Earth idioms don’t translate between languages because of differing context, so certainly this is to be expected with completely different species.

Dost Thou Speak It?

Looking at the big picture, there is so much more to any culture than just their language.  But when a series introduces us to so many different races over so many years, we can only expect to learn so much about them, or the writers only have so much time to develop them before moving onto another story.

Maybe in the future, Star Trek could take the more focused and less episodic format it has currently adopted to show us fewer species at a time, and give them more detail.  With fewer episodes spent on “aliens of the week” we might get a better chance to learn about the ones we do meet.

Next. Star Trek style universal translator closer to reality?. dark

The Universal Translator might make it easier for aliens to communicate with the Federation, and essentially us the viewers.  However, I find myself wanting it to work the other way around, and perhaps I’d like to see how much more I could identify with the aliens.

Will We Ever See a Real-Life ‘Star Trek’ Universal Translator?

Machine translation is much harder than it looks.

There’s a lot of enviable technology in the world of “Star Trek.” Starships zip around faster than the speed of light, diseases are cured with just a few spritzes of hypospray and food replicators can materialize tasty meals out of energy in just a few seconds.

But one of the most practical tools the Starfleet organization has on its journeys to alien civilizations is the universal translator — a device that automatically translates speech into each person’s primary language. Essentially, an English speaker will hear everyone talking to them in English, no matter what language they are actually speaking.

What Is Machine Translation?

But is it possible to build a universal translator in the real world? Natural language processing has made astonishing progress over the last few years, with projects like GPT-3 able to generate sentences and paragraphs that can fool even experts in the field. In a world where that’s possible, why does Netflix still face a translator shortage for translating the subtitles on their TV shows?

Maite Taboada, professor of linguistics at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, Canada, said the sticking point has to do with context. It’s in the subtleties of meaning where machines are falling behind in their ability to do translations. And no matter how much data we throw at the problem, we may never get to the point where it’s accurate enough.

Machine Translation Is Natural Language Processing’s Ultimate Problem

“ Machine translation is the ultimate application,” Taboada said. “It’s like the Holy Grail.”

Taboada is referring to machine translation’s special status in the field of natural language processing , an area of computer science research that aims to have computers “understand” languages similar to how humans do. Machine translation builds on all the other knowledge under natural language processing’s domain, like grammar, language understanding and language generation. All these underlying topics need to be mastered in order to build a good machine translation tool. 

“So when we say, ‘What are the hurdles of machine translation?’ — well, it’s all the hurdles of natural language processing,” Taboada said.

The good news is that researchers have been studying natural language processing for over 50 years now. Many areas within this field are already well understood. For example, automation of tasks like spell-checking works almost perfectly: Spell-check programs only very rarely require human intervention and it’s now, practically speaking, something humans can depend on machines for, Taboada said.

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Today, Machine Translation Means Deep Learning

An early technique researchers used for machine translation was phrase-based machine translation, which uses supervised learning to translate known phrases. Supervised learning relies on humans to label training data before it gets fed into the training model, therefore creating bottlenecks around the data algorithms have access to. The technique struggled with “long-distance dependencies,” where the accuracy of translations faltered on longer pieces of content.

For instance, if a sentence mentions a car at the top of a paragraph, and the last sentence in the paragraph refers back to the car as “it,” the algorithm may get confused about what that “it” relates to.

Phrase-based machine translation techniques are not used much anymore, and that’s mostly because, in 2016, Google switched the algorithm powering their Google Translate tool from phrase-based translation to deep learning , a machine learning technique that relies on building large neural networks. Google said the new technique reduced errors by around 60 percent .

“And then the thing exploded, everybody wanted to use deep learning,” Taboada said. “I think there’s no going back.”

One of the main advantages of the deep learning technique is that it can be trained using mostly unsupervised learning — it doesn’t require as much human supervision for labeling data for the training process to work.

Taboada said the lack of supervision is possible because deep learning can infer the meaning of words and expressions from context. The meaning of words are mapped as “vectors” in multi-dimensional space, and when two are often observed together, the algorithm learns that their meanings are related. As a result, deep learning is able to use that vector-style understanding of the meaning of words to help with the translation process.

Bias and Lack of Data for Many Languages Hinder Machine Translation

Even with the deep learning model, many obstacles remain for building a universal translator. One is the issue of bias in training data. Because deep learning uses unsupervised methods, it learns everything by pulling in data from the world and, as a result, inherits the same problems and biases that exist in the world.

Taboada illustrated the problem with the example of nouns that have genders. In some languages, like Spanish, a translation into the language needs to include genders even when the original text doesn’t specify genders. For example, if the word “doctor” is translated from English into Spanish, it has to have a gender, and what that gender is may be decided by the predominant gender associated with doctors in the model’s training data.

“Data just reflects the way the world is, but that’s not necessarily the way we want the world to be, and it may not be appropriate.”

“So you go out in the world, what do you see? Maybe ‘doctor’ is 70 percent of the time translated as ‘el doctor’ in Spanish and ‘nurse’ is 85 percent of the time translated as ‘la enfermera,’ feminine,” Taboada said. “That’s actually not a fault of the data — data just reflects the way the world is, but that’s not necessarily the way we want the world to be, and it may not be appropriate.”

There are other concerns as well. Some languages simply may not have enough data to build good training models. And algorithms may not be able to differentiate between nuances like dialects, effectively flattening translations. 

For streaming services like Netflix, part of the difficulty of translating subtitles for shows and movies is the physical constraints of time and space on the screen — sometimes translations are too long to fit on screen or be read quickly enough. In those cases, humans are needed to make the hard decisions about what to cut so the subtitles are still enjoyable.

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The Biggest Obstacle for Machine Translation Is Context

Another big hurdle for machine translations is the problem of context. While there is plenty of data for deep learning to train on, such as content on Wikipedia, books or academic articles, it can be hard for algorithms to learn from the language differences between those mediums.

“It’s just completely different the way I write an academic article from the way I write a tweet, and that all gets collapsed into one set of data,” Taboada said.

Untangling that still requires work on behalf of humans. Taboada specializes in sentiment analysis, a field within natural language processing that analyzes the emotions behind sentences and phrases.

While machine translation has come a long way, it still struggles with detecting subtle positive and negative emotions. Deep learning algorithms are quite capable of translating texts like user manuals, which don’t usually contain emotional phrases or require a lot of cultural context to understand, Taboada said. And they are also capable of doing a decent job at content moderation, enabling companies to scale up their content moderation and automatically find inappropriate comments.

But algorithms are still not very reliable at these tasks when they require a great deal of nuance. A 2016 study examined the words and phrases used by both racist and anti-racist online communities and found many linguistic similarities. Those similarities make it difficult to accurately detect hate speech because it’s easy to accidentally block anti-racist comments.

“I would never have a call between [President Joe] Biden and [Russian President Vladimir] Putin be translated automatically.”

“Moderating hate speech is really difficult because the words overlap,” Taboada said. “So you need to know more about the context and the way in which they’re used to to understand whether that’s something that needs to be deleted or not.”

When it comes to sensitive issues and situations where nuance is important, like legal contracts or political matters, machine translation is not an appropriate application.

“I would never have a call between [President Joe] Biden and [Russian President Vladimir] Putin be translated automatically,” she said.

Would machine translation ever be accurate and dependable enough for translating sensitive conversations, if deep learning models had unlimited data for their translation models to train on?

“I don’t think so,” Taboada said. “With a complex problem like machine translation, right now, I don’t see how it’ll ever be good enough that I can click a button, walk away and assume that the translation is going to be great and I don’t need to do anything about it.

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OK, how does the Universal Translator work?

• Thread starter bfollowell
• Start date May 7, 2015

• May 7, 2015

OK, how does everyone envision the UT working? In the shows, and in books that I've read, it seems to me that it just translates language as it comes in and the characters hear the translation. In reverse, they speak in Federation Standard and that spoken language is then translated into whatever alien language is required and then broadcast to them. Things get a little trickier with person-to-person contact but, I've always assumed it was something similar. Alien speaks, character waits for translation. Maybe the translation is sub-aural, maybe the alien actually hears the unit translating. Then the character speaks in Federation Standard, which the alien hears, then the unit translates, which the alien also hears. Now, this is where I get hung up. I'm currently reading Enterprise: The Good That Men Do , and Trip and the other agent are impersonating Romulans. They have implanted translation devices. How, exactly, is this supposed to work?! Are we supposed to believe that the Romulans these two encounter don't think something is strange when these two "Romulans" speak in this strange, alien language and then a disembodied voice speaking Rihannsu comes up from nowhere?! I mean, it's not like the translation device suddenly gives them the ability to speak Rihannsu. This glaring issue really makes it hard for me to suspend belief and buy into this storyline. Is there something I'm missing here about how the UT is supposed to work?  

Christopher

Yup, it's just a story cheat that couldn't possibly work as depicted. Best not to think about it too much.  

OK. If that's the case, I guess I'll just have to roll with it. Christopher, I'm heading quickly towards your Enterprise books. I've heard a lot of bad things about the Enterprise novels up to The Romulan War , especially Kobayashi Maru , but I've really enjoyed them so far. I heard that the novels started getting better after Michael broke away from Andy and that they really took off after you took over the series. I'm anxious to start The Romulan War arc and then on to The Rise of the Federation .  

I've always assumed its virtually instant translation, i guess as well as an ear implant you need a vocal chord one too? I think the latest ENT book mentions an alien noticing the lips don't match the (translated) words being said.  

It's basically magic. Don't try to think about it or it ruins things.  

Rear Admiral

I'm happy to suspend disbelief for the universal translator but I wish they had explored it a little more in the shows. Sometimes it feels like the crews are all English speakers and only when they encounter alien races does the UT come into play. Some clarification here would have been nice (how many of the crew are English speakers) Additionally, I never liked it when people would reference their own language but it doesn't get automatically translated into an English equivalent Eg - You're such a p'tak But overall, the technology makes sense, is necessary and works well as a cheat (if a little under explored)  

Vice Admiral

Fleet admiral.

I never thought the device merely used a loudspeaker to insert an additional, translated voice to whatever the person was saying (and somehow damped out the original voice). That just plain wouldn't work in any context. But the device could well intercept communications between the ear and the brain, and again between the brain and the mouth, and do the translating there. This implant would then be boosted by external devices that add computing power and allow the deciphering of all-new languages (whereas the implant itself only handles known languages). This would explain how our VOY heroes in "Basics" can still speak with, say, Neelix (who knows no English while the heroes know no Talaxian) or with their Kazon captors, while being unable to learn the language of the local cavemen. However, a device that takes in the Romulanese coming through the ears, turns that into English, allows the user to think of a response in English, and then turns that into Romulanese for the lips to speak, still doesn't meet the criteria of the UT: we see in VOY "The 37s" et al. that the device actually translates not just from , but also to multiple languages at the same time! Perhaps the better bet, then, is that only the incoming signal is intercepted and translated, and everybody has a UT of his or her own implanted so that they understand what is being spoken to them in an alien language? Their brain simply ignores the lack of lipsynch, just like the human brain naturally does (or then the UT tickles the brain a bit to facilitate the self-deceit). However, this doesn't work with "The 37s", or with DS9 "Little Green Men", as the receiving parties in both cases are primitive humans who decidedly lack UT implants! "Little Green Men" is easily explained by the device inside the Ferengi affecting their output, perhaps making their lips say things in English - but "The 37s" cannot be explained that way, as Janeway can't really be speaking in three languages at the same time. What are we left with? Well, holodecks show that the UFP has mastered the trick of having forcefields (?) create localized and directed sounds while hanging in empty air. Such tech could allow the UT to create virtual loudspeakers for every person present, sending the proper sound signals in their direction while damping out unwanted signals. That does not sound like something our ENT or even TOS era heroes could be relying on, though! All that said, though, an implant should nicely explain the events of the ENT novel, if we assume it simply makes the human heroes speak Romulanese! That is, the version where the implant alters the way the lips move by messing with the signal while it travels from the brain to the lips (*) is certainly doable with ENT tech and in the plot circumstances involved. Timo Saloniemi (*) Simplifying a bit, of course. The intercept would probably happen somewhere between the language centers of the brain and the motor centers that their cues from the language centers, after which the whole sound-generating apparatus in our bodies would be producing Romulanese rather than English without even noticing anything amiss.  

Timo said: All that said, though, an implant should nicely explain the events of the ENT novel, if we assume it simply makes the human heroes speak Romulanese! That is, the version where the implant alters the way the lips move by messing with the signal while it travels from the brain to the lips (*) is certainly doable with ENT tech and in the plot circumstances involved. Click to expand...

Deranged Nasat

Now, now, let's be rational here. The Universal Translator, in its various forms, is the favoured technology of a race comparable to the Q, or perhaps exceeding them. As such, it is woven into the metaphysical construct of the multiverse, by these peoples' hand, that if one is using, carrying or implanted with such a device, then reality will bend to accommodate one. The translator doesn't just deal with languages itself, it also serves to access the power of this unknown super-race, so, for example not only allowing the Romulans to understand Trip but arranging matters so that they believe he is actually speaking Rihannsu . Or, more to the point, so that in their reality he truly is. One might say that there is the very slightest deviation, wherein Trip and a given Romulan are communicating through some form of anomaly that intersects two otherwise identical timelines, one in which Trip is speaking English only to have it be rendered Rihannsu , and one in which Romulans are listening to (and watching, because of the lip thing) someone speaking Rihannsu unaided; these are laid over each other with only the slightest irregularity. Any mental uncertainty is quashed by the awesome power of the race in question. Thus everyone hears the other person speaking their language, not the other person's own. There are some moments where the power fails, however, and the two timeline sheets don't integrate effectively. Swear words are particularly likely to prove a problem, in that the race in question were rather puritan and so the multiverse still suffers the occasional mild shock to the system upon encountering them. ** Speaking of the Akaali, Idran , I like how the translator breaks down in "Civilization" during the discussion about pet animals. I like to assume that it's not bad timing or a random breakdown, but that Riaan's attempt to mention a native animal is specifically what caused the device to splutter. Archer : I have a similar one. I talk to my dog. Riann : My mother bought me a tousorobco once, but it tuployo pludak... How does tousorobco translate? What's a comparable animal both biologically and in terms of cultural significance, so that the translator can substitute something? It should just have said [translation error], but there was too much obvious from context for it to return that, I'm betting. And while it's trying to find some suitable translation for what it knows is a workable noun with a reasonable translation and can't , it starts missing the rest of her speech and falls behind and it's all too much for its feeble little circuits. Shouldn't have mentioned the dog, Archer.  

hbquikcomjamesl

To paraphrase something a famous stage conjurer once said, when asked how he did a particular trick: It works rather well, don't you think?  

hbquikcomjamesl said: To paraphrase something a famous stage conjurer once said, when asked how he did a particular trick: It works rather well, don't you think? Click to expand...

Deranged Nasat said: Speaking of the Akaali, Idran , I like how the translator breaks down in "Civilization" during the discussion about pet animals. I like to assume that it's not bad timing or a random breakdown, but that Riaan's attempt to mention a native animal is specifically what caused the device to splutter. Archer : I have a similar one. I talk to my dog. Riann : My mother bought me a tousorobco once, but it tuployo pludak... How does tousorobco translate? What's a comparable animal both biologically and in terms of cultural significance, so that the translator can substitute something? It should just have said [translation error], but there was too much obvious from context for it to return that, I'm betting. And while it's trying to find some suitable translation for what it knows is a workable noun with a reasonable translation and can't , it starts missing the rest of her speech and falls behind and it's all too much for its feeble little circuits. Shouldn't have mentioned the dog, Archer. Click to expand...

• May 8, 2015

Kor said: This is easy. The universal translator works the same way the transporters, warp drive, subspace, and replicators work. Kor Click to expand...

It's magic... any sufficiently advanced technology. Like Babelfish.  

It works like a real time dubbing. Out of sync, though.  

The problem is that translation could never work fluidly in real time. Lots of languages have different word orders from one another -- for instance, one would have the noun at the start of the sentence, the other at the end. If you're translating from the latter to the former, you wouldn't know what the subject of the sentence is until the sentence was finished, so you couldn't start translating it until then. Any attempt at an instant, real-time translation would result in a bizarre, Yoda-esque word order, and that wouldn't fool anybody. So the premise that UTs could be used to pass as native speakers of a language just can't be justified. It's always going to be something of a narrative cheat to move the story along. In my original story "The Hub of the Matter," I made the translators implants between the speech center of the brain and the vocal apparatus, so that they'd intercept the words you planned to say and have them come out of your mouth in the listener's language. That would be sort of like how translators are shown to work in Trek, except that if both parties were using that kind of translator, we'd see and hear them speaking each other's languages. And it'd only work with languages that are already known. I have another, as yet unsold original work where I'd originally written the characters as hearing the translations of alien speech fed into their ears, but then I realized, under influence from the age of texting and augmented reality that we live in, that it might work better if they actually saw subtitles projected onto their retinal implants (with computer annotations as needed to explain complex or ambiguous concepts in the alien language). That way, they could actually hear the alien speech clearly and it would be easier for them to learn it over time.  

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