The writers are so great with coming up the various storylines from any series without breaking from cannon. Seems like a tough job in general, however, I wonder why certain aliens' planets are so plain other than the Terran solar system, the Klingon homeworld, etc. For example the Antedians come from Antede 3 and others like them. Couldn't they have at least come up with actual names for different planets from each of the different systems the way they have ours. Is it because we already have had names for our planets before any scripts were even written? Am I making any sense, does anybody else see what I mean? Thoughts?
General Species' Planet Names Inquiry
- Thread starter PaulMarshall
- Start date
I see it as a Universal Translator thingie, we simply see the species' names translated into our language. I recall reading somewhere once that the proper name of Vulcans (or of Spock, don't remember) was utterly unpronounceable for humans.
I used to think it was silly for aliens to have species names that were just a variation of their planet names or vice-versa (Vulcans from Vulcan, Romulans from Romulus, Betazoids from Betazed, etc.), but then I learned that "human" is etymologically related to humus (earth), as in the sense of earthly beings as opposed to divine ones. So essentially "human" actually does mean "Earthling."
Also, Star Trek tends to treat planets as a parallel for countries/nations. So of course the people of Cardassia are Cardassians or the people of Tellar are Tellarites, just like the people of Australia are Australians and the people of China are Chinese.
Which annoys me. Treating species and nationality as identical is racial essentialism, a very unrealistic and oversimplified view of the way things work. What about immigrants? Wouldn't a human born on Tellar be a Tellarite by nationality?
I suppose that would depend on the laws of the planets. Not all planets may have birthright citizenship. Perhaps there is another name for off-world species born on the planet. For example when the Spanish colonized the Philippines Spaniards born in the Philippines were called "Filipinos" It wasn't until centuries went by that the name "Filipino" came to refer to the native people of the islands. So many humans born on Tellar are caller "Terrarites." Would a Tellarite born on earth be called an Earthling? Perhaps even the concept of citizenship is completely different. Those are interesting questions and I'd be willing to bet the answer varies on a planet by planet basis.
Edit: I seem to have missed the point being made a little. Not my first time, not my last.
I can see why a person would identify as their species rather than where they were born. It's a lot easier to ID your species than to go into a whole thing about where you're actually from. Plus, what about someone like Doctor Crusher who was born on Earth's moon. Would she be a Lunatic?
I can see why a person would identify as their species rather than where they were born. It's a lot easier to ID your species than to go into a whole thing about where you're actually from. Plus, what about someone like Doctor Crusher who was born on Earth's moon. Would she be a Lunatic?
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Yes, but that's the point -- if that distinction matters, then it's stupid to use the same name for both. Species and nationality are two different things, so they should be two different words.
Unless he's in Starfleet, then he's "Half-Vulcan Science Officer Spock." 
Plenty of incidental characters in Trek have been identified as being of X while their makeup instead nails them as species Y. It would seem fair to assume, then, that the identification is by nationality, which in the general case is the same as the species, and these "apparent errors" are those exceptions to the general rule.
A variant of that is the case of the Trill. Joined Trill consist of two distinct species, but which one of them is called Trill? On one hand, we have never heard of a symbiont-less host getting called Trill to our best knowledge; all the uncertain cases can be assumed to involve symbionts. On the other hand, symbiont-host pairs where the host is not of the spotted species are nevertheless called Trill (TNG "The Host"), and the symbiont therein is called Trill separately (the same episode). It would seem logical enough to assume that only the symbiont is of the Trill species - but any resident of planet Trill (the official name of the Trill homeworld) can be considered Trill in addition.
Should the terminology be bifurcated? Apparently not - there are scant few Vulcans outside Vulcan, say, and the same may be true of every species. Vulcan here being (not circularly, but certainly somewhat ellipsoidically) defined as the full Vulcan realm, of course, much like the human realm covers the interstellar human expansion and extends to thousands of colonies.
Here on Earth, nationality, place of origin and cultural identity are one happily jumbled mess, too. There's little functional need to separate a Finn from a Finn from a Finn. If a need arises in the case of a specific individual, exceptions can be made, such as with those "misidentified" DS9 extras whose "true origin" characters like Garak apparently know well enough to defy audience expectations.
Timo Saloniemi
A variant of that is the case of the Trill. Joined Trill consist of two distinct species, but which one of them is called Trill? On one hand, we have never heard of a symbiont-less host getting called Trill to our best knowledge; all the uncertain cases can be assumed to involve symbionts. On the other hand, symbiont-host pairs where the host is not of the spotted species are nevertheless called Trill (TNG "The Host"), and the symbiont therein is called Trill separately (the same episode). It would seem logical enough to assume that only the symbiont is of the Trill species - but any resident of planet Trill (the official name of the Trill homeworld) can be considered Trill in addition.
Should the terminology be bifurcated? Apparently not - there are scant few Vulcans outside Vulcan, say, and the same may be true of every species. Vulcan here being (not circularly, but certainly somewhat ellipsoidically) defined as the full Vulcan realm, of course, much like the human realm covers the interstellar human expansion and extends to thousands of colonies.
Here on Earth, nationality, place of origin and cultural identity are one happily jumbled mess, too. There's little functional need to separate a Finn from a Finn from a Finn. If a need arises in the case of a specific individual, exceptions can be made, such as with those "misidentified" DS9 extras whose "true origin" characters like Garak apparently know well enough to defy audience expectations.
Timo Saloniemi
what about people born on space stations?
What about someone part Betazoid and part Vulcan born on DS9 for example?
In my fan fiction my main character is part Yridian and part human and was born on Yridian planet but her parents moved to a space station when she was three. Her sister was born on the space station.
Other than incompatibility of cells, doesn't it seem that 400+ years from now there would be more mixed species people?
They don't seem to have very much of that in Trek.
What about someone part Betazoid and part Vulcan born on DS9 for example?
In my fan fiction my main character is part Yridian and part human and was born on Yridian planet but her parents moved to a space station when she was three. Her sister was born on the space station.
Other than incompatibility of cells, doesn't it seem that 400+ years from now there would be more mixed species people?
They don't seem to have very much of that in Trek.
Would she be a Lunatic?
is that even a question?
Again that would probably depend a great deal on the rules of the operating authority of the station.
Considering that incompatibility of cells would be the VAST majority of cases, I can't imagine there would be much more mixed species than there are now. I think we could presume that the cases of mixed species we see in Trek are extreme rarities. That is unless the humanoids "species" of Trek really aren't different species, but are just variations of homosapiens that were transplanted from earth in the distant past and genetically modified to adapt them to their planets. Then cross breeding would be much easier and would require less genetic manipulation.
Wouldn't that be similar to people born on military bases located outside their home country? EG, those born on American bases in Germany are considered American as opposed to German.
Good points. Studies show that Homo sapians interbred with Neanderthals. Results show that Neanderthal DNA is 99.7 percent identical to modern human DNA, versus, for example, 98.8 percent for modern humans and chimps. Since most "humanoid" races look more like Homo sapiens and not chimp for example, then our DNA must be a close match which allows interbreeding without special genetic manipulation as you say. Humans can breed normally with Vulcans, Romulans, Klingons, Betazoids, etc., but not Andorian, Tellarite, short gold guys, etc. because physical similarity equates to DNA similarity.
On the other hand, the Tellarites seen in "Whom Gods Destroy" and "The Lights of Zetar" had more humanlike eyes and hands than the ones in "Journey to Babel," because they didn't get the full makeup applied. So maybe they were Tellarite-human hybrids.
Maybe the reason he is incorrigibly criminally insane...and speaking of the Elba Two insane asylum and our playful inmate Marta, I forgot about Orion green slave women. Breed or not, trying would be fun.
Breeding compatibility would have been one of the major goals of the project that created all current humanoid life in the Trek galaxy, surely. The folks from "The Chase" wanted that galaxy teeming with spitting images of themselves and having fun together, or at least this is the message they sent to us all.
If they can nudge evolution so that everybody (including the fish!) is a sapient biped, surely they can make sure there's compatibility, either naturally or with minimal meddling said bipeds can achieve early on in their technological history.
Is there natural compatibility in evidence? Gul Dukat had "accidental" offspring, but his mistresses would have been well motivated to make such accidents happen, by whatever medical means this called for. Everybody else would have enjoyed mutual access to the supposedly required technologies.
Timo Saloniemi
If they can nudge evolution so that everybody (including the fish!) is a sapient biped, surely they can make sure there's compatibility, either naturally or with minimal meddling said bipeds can achieve early on in their technological history.
Is there natural compatibility in evidence? Gul Dukat had "accidental" offspring, but his mistresses would have been well motivated to make such accidents happen, by whatever medical means this called for. Everybody else would have enjoyed mutual access to the supposedly required technologies.
Timo Saloniemi
As I commented above, that wouldn't actually be far off.
Good thoughts. Though, do we even know that the Vulcanian, Romulan, Betazoid, and Klingon cross-breeds were conceived normally? I personally prefer the theory that half-breeds we see required some sort of scientific aid. So that they are pretty much a rare sight. Though this would sort of fly in the face of my other seeding theory.
About Orion Animal Women, I prefer the depiction of them in the original script of "The Cage":Maybe the reason he is incorrigibly criminally insane...and speaking of the Elba Two insane asylum and our playful inmate Marta, I forgot about Orion green slave women. Breed or not, trying would be fun.
SPACE OFFICER (to Pike)
Do any of you have a green one? They're dangerous, I hear. Razor claws, and they attract a man like a sensation of irresistible hunger. . .
Pike is perceptible startled by the familiar term: "Irresistible hunger". And why had Space Officer emphasized the words, and why is he giving Pike that searching look? The Earth Trader is also giving Pike a knowing look. He indicates Pike to the Space Officer.
EARTH TRADER
Now and then comes a man who tames one. (to Space Officer) He'd stumbled into this dark corridor, and then he saw flickering light ahead. (to Pike) Almost like secret dreams a bored ship captain might have, wasn't it? There she was, holding a torch, glistening green. . .
This depiction is much more compelling than that of a sexy dancing girl, or the godawful Enterprise pheromones-power play crap. Here they're more like sirens. They're wild animals that lure men to their deaths. Only occasionally can they be tamed...for...you know.
Personally, I don't consider Marta an Orion Animal Woman. Yes, they have similar external features, but a lot of different aliens in the Star Trek universe look the same. There are probably many other green skinned aliens.
So while it might be fun trying to breed with an Orion Animal Woman, you'd probably just end up getting cut to ribbons with those razor claws.
My theory, which you are free to disregard, is that the seeding experiment by the aliens in "The Chase" actually failed. Their efforts to direct evolution failed, becasue evolution doesn't work like that. Only one of the species on a planet actually evolved to resemble the "The Chase" species and that was homosapiens and their ancestors. Then as I mentioned up thread some as yet unknown alien force transplanted these species from earth throughout the galaxy. These transplants were genetically modified to adapt them to local conditions and make them compatible with local life. So basically all human looking species were descended from humans. The Tkon, Sargon's people, Cardassians, Klingons, AD INFINITVM; were all genetically modified humans taken from earth at various points in history.
So the seeding plan of the aliens in "The Chase" didn't work as they planned, it did work in a round about way.
True I'd forgotten about that one. But wasn't there some effort in the show to make the Bajorans and Cardassians having been evolved from a common ancestor. I can't remember, so maybe I'm just making that up.
