Trills, Skills, and Past Lives

[Six of Twelve]

In the 7th season, Ezri Dax was often part of the bridge crew aboard Defiant, despite the fact that her training was as a counselor, a skill irrelevant to be a bridge crew member.

She no doubt was assigned to this post because she retained Jadzia's relevant skills and experiences.

This made me think of joined Trills doing things their current hosts were not trained for personally and just how much they depend on the skills and experiences of past hosts in everyday life. I imagine that some skills might eventually become outdated, obsolete, and even irrelevant after awhile from more distantly previous hosts. And I wonder if the memory of the skills of the earliest hosts eventually fade to the point of inaccessability, or does the symbiont have an infallible memory?

 

[Sophie74656]

Jadzia talked abou this a lot, it was actually something I disliked about her character. In most situations Jadzia would say that one of her past hosts had experience in that and she was basically an expert in it. I didn't like that about her. I don't like when characters are too good. It's one of the things I disliked about Odo too.

 

[Six of Twelve]

You're referring to the Mary Sue syndrome. But apparently the Trill have a good reason for being good at so many things.

I never noticed that Odo was good at everything. Indeed, the show often showed his shortcomings and blind spots, such as being too by the book, too prideful at times, being overly sensitive and touchy about some things, as his susceptibility to the female founder. I never saw him as too perfect.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Troi was able to command the ship after some night courses, so I don't think Ezri was significanty more resourceful or adaptable than the typical SF officer. However, there were plenty of things that she could not do as her previous hosts could: she was not an expertise navigator nor Klingon fighting styles, as was Jadzia. Moreover, there was plenty of doubt, uncertainty and stress when accessing those skills. It was never said that Trills had perfect information from the memories of past hosts, and a lot of evidence that they did not.

 

[Smellincoffee]

The problem with this is plasticity: our brains are constantly rewriting themselves. Old information is written over by new material. Joined Trills may have the capacity for longer memories than we do because of the symbiont, but even they can't retain EVERYTHING perfectly. I could live with Ezri doing Jadzia things, but if she starts rebuilding a shuttle because so-and-so was an engineer in the 22nd century, I'd call BS.

Ditto if she became magically athletic because of Emony. Getting a stomach slug doesn't do a thing to condition and train the body's muscles..

 

[jmiller]

Ditto if she became magically athletic because of Emony. Getting a stomach slug doesn't do a thing to condition and train the body's muscles..

I think you hit the nail on the head. It doesn't always depend on knowing how to do something, you also have to have the physical skills to pull it off. Knowing how to press some buttons on the bridge of the Defiant, easy, since she's been in the muck before. But I don't think she could pick up a batleth and go storm the Albino again.

 

[STR]

Troi was able to command the ship after some night courses, so I don't think Ezri was significanty more resourceful or adaptable than the typical SF officer. However, there were plenty of things that she could not do as her previous hosts could: she was not an expertise navigator nor Klingon fighting styles, as was Jadzia. Moreover, there was plenty of doubt, uncertainty and stress when accessing those skills. It was never said that Trills had perfect information from the memories of past hosts, and a lot of evidence that they did not.

Martial arts are as much "muscle memory" as instruction. Even with perfect recall of the forms of Kling-Fu , you'd probably still stuck at it until you rebuild that conditioning. No different than physical therapy, really. If you lose the ability to walk during an injury,you still remember *how* to walk, but that's not sufficient.

Now project that out to switching out your whole body...

 

[elamigodemiamiga]

we don't know what other skills she had. She was comms position on the bridge, and counsellor is a senior officer. she can be on the bridge.

 

[Six of Twelve]

we don't know what other skills she had. She was comms position on the bridge, and counsellor is a senior officer. she can be on the bridge.

Why? Deanna Troi never worked a station on the bridge as part of her normal duties. She had an office below decks where her primary duties were carried out. The only times she was on the bridge was sitting by the captain when her ability to sense things might be needed to assist Picard to decide on a course of action.

She wasn't needed to work a bridge station, as there were others to fill those posts, which were their primary duties. Same with DS9, there were others more qualified to work those stations, and it seems like the only time they'd put a counselor (or a doctor) to working a bridge station would be in a dire emergency.

 

[elamigodemiamiga]

Why? Deanna Troi never worked a station on the bridge as part of her normal duties. She had an office below decks where her primary duties were carried out. The only times she was on the bridge was sitting by the captain when her ability to sense things might be needed to assist Picard to decide on a course of action.

She wasn't needed to work a bridge station, as there were others to fill those posts, which were their primary duties. Same with DS9, there were others more qualified to work those stations, and it seems like the only time they'd put a counselor (or a doctor) to working a bridge station would be in a dire emergency.

She was part of the senior staff, and was their on Picard's admission since she could sense out opponents or enemies.

But any senior staff member can be on the bridge on the Captain's discretion.

 

[Timo]

There's generally a slight misconception there whenever Troi's Bridge Officer test thing comes up. What Troi learned to do is not a high-skill job. In today's navies, it is basically menial. The Officer of the Deck is the hapless sap who sits in the center chair when nothing is going on, and is expected to keep the ship running smoothly and steadily and minding the myriad little things - a job with a heavy responsibility but limited powers.

It's not something you learn in a crash course, either: since it involves all those little things, you learn it by apprenticing, by hanging around the bridge (say, in the capacity of the conn guy, the one turning the little wheel) until you get the hang of it.

OODs are typically petty officers. OOD doesn't really involve making any command decisions. If the need for those arises, a proper officer is summoned.

Yet for all the seeming differences between ODD and Troi's new capacity, the similarities are the more significant. Somebody needs to sit in that chair when the "real" officers can't be bothered to. And since the bright future is automated, this somebody does not get into much trouble with the aforementioned little things any longer... But studying those is probably what Troi mostly did in that exam anyway.

Joined Trills may have the capacity for longer memories than we do because of the symbiont, but even they can't retain EVERYTHING perfectly.

That's the thing, though - perhaps the slugs are nothing but memory machines with a bit of gut attached? A human brain can store one lifetimeful of memories, sort of. A slug might store a dozen, which is about as many as we ever hear of. Also, Odan was bigger and uglier than Dax - perhaps the slug grows to feature more memory matter as it ages?

There's little theoretically to stand in the way of multi-lifetime recall, is all.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Six of Twelve]

She was part of the senior staff, and was their on Picard's admission since she could sense out opponents or enemies.

But any senior staff member can be on the bridge on the Captain's discretion.

"sensing stuff" is not a bridge station. Indeed, she would sit in a chair without a computer terminal on those occasions her empathic abilities were needed. And, again, this wasn't her primary function aboard ship, as her office below decks, where she counseled crew members was her primary "station".

And, of course, any senior staff member could be "present" on the bridge, but being present isn't the same thing as working a station there. Why would they need to take the doctor or the counselor away from their primary duties to run these stations that had nothing to do with their specialized training and primary functions, when crew members were available whose training and primary functions were to run those stations?

ETA You never saw Bones working any station aboard Kirk's Enterprise, now, did you? His services as Chief Medical Officer were too important for him to waste time manning the conn, considering they had trained crew to run that station.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

There's generally a slight misconception there whenever Troi's Bridge Officer test thing comes up. What Troi learned to do is not a high-skill job.

Yes, it was. Whatever happens in contemporary navies, what Troi studied and was tested was described in the episode itself, and it was a lot more than how to call to CO or how to avoid the iceberg.

 

[Timo]

How so? We never saw Troi do anything more demanding. Say, no Kobayashi Maru decisions, nothing involving combat, just tedious technical manual after technical manual to read. And then that one bit about having to be prepared to tell an underling to die, which is not what she expected to be part of the test at all.

That Crusher got to do something more when Picard put her in a difficult position in "Descent" was something else altogether, and never blamed on her test as such.

Timo Sloniemi

 

[Bad Thoughts]

no Kobayashi Maru decisions,

No sending crewmen to their death as part of the "engineering qualification?"

 

[Timo]

That's the thing - as Riker says, it's not a no-win situation. Nor is it a test of personality, but just a matter of making Troi follow proper procedure. There's no room for initiative there.

Certainly the definition of "little things" is broader for Starfleet, as Troi studies diplomatic law and first contact procedure. But Trek is broader than real life to begin with. Diplomatic law 101 can be taken to be analogous to signaling 101, first contact procedure akin to the right-of-way rules of the sea. We don't see Troi put in positions of command as the result - but she does get classic ODD practice such as helm duty...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Riker: You considered all your options, you tried every alternative, and then you made the hard choice.

I call that initiative.

 

[Six of Twelve]

Another thought about Troi from my previous post. She was on the bridge sometimes to help with sensing things, not because she was ships counselor, but because of her unique, natural skills as an empath stemming from being a Betazoid. What she did was unique to her and not something any ship's counselor could do.

With Crusher in Destiny, it was an emergency situation with so few people left aboard. Crusher had command experience of a sort, being in charge of her department, commanding all medical personnel. Though she had little to no experience with bridge duties, she knew how to delegate tasks and make the best use of personnel. She sought opinions and feedback from the junior officers who had some experience in bridge duties, but who didn't know how to command. Picard wouldn't have sought, nor needed such feedback, but it was appropriate for her to do so in this instance.

 

[Timo]

In-universe, one might surmise that Crusher's main qualification for command in the episode was "valued personally by Picard". That is, any excuse would do for giving her a task other than beaming down and risking assimilation.

It's just as well that there is no dialogue in the episode to establish why Crusher got the job. We can speculate on things like "useless for the surface job" and "best qualified to command the other useless dunsels that would be left aboard" or "secretly a combat veteran", without fear of much contradiction.

Timo Saloniemi