05 Mission-based stardates
Description
This article is from the Stardates in Star Trek FAQ, by Andrew Main zefram@dcs.warwick.ac.uk with numerous contributions by others.
05 Mission-based stardates
Another theory is that stardates refer only to the ship's current mission, but
increase at an objectively constant rate. This is an improvement over the
previous theory, because different ships' stardates would differ by constant
values only. This theory has also been used to give some very plausible
relative dates for ST:TOS.
However, it doesn't account for the Earthbound use of stardates, or the
demonstrated universality of stardates in ST:TNG. Furthermore, if each ship
has its own subjective epoch, it seems most odd that all stardates would
increase at the same rate. The only type of stardates that would be of any
use would be those referring to a single standard timebase (i.e., the
Federation Timebase), and having the same origin for everyone.
The constraint of universality makes matters a little complicated, because it
means that the rate of increase of stardates is not totally constant. For
example, the duration of the ST:TNG series is confirmed within itself to have
lasted about seven years, during which time the stardate has increased almost
7000 units. This is irreconcilable with the fact that SD 5943.7 to SD 7411.4
was more than two years (ST:TMP).
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