IMO it makes more sense if the humans in Star Trek are unreliable narrators.
How is it possible that a teenage mechanic can improve engine efficiency by 5% messing around in his spare time? Why didn't the engineers whose full time job it is to build the engines figure that out?
In fact, cosmic radiation in space drives all humans insane. They truly believe they're doing science experiments, but stuff goes wrong because they're just jamming random household items into the engine.
Also since companies are adding AI to everything, sometimes when you think you're just doing a digital zoom you're actually getting AI upscaling.
There was a court case not long ago where the prosecution wasn't allowed to pinch-to-zoom evidence photos on an iPad for the jury, because the zoom algorithm creates new information that wasn't there.