Was Kirk right to report Finney's mistake? ("Court Martial")
- Thread starter dswynne1
- Start date
Report Finney.
Not the best, though it shouldn't be graded through the eyes of Discovery.
Not the best, though it shouldn't be graded through the eyes of Discovery.
Grading it through modern scifi at all is more than enough.
The USS Enterprise isn't analogous to the standard working office environment. It's a space navy vessel with military ranks and procedures--i.e. it's more like a US Navy ship on deployment.
If a mistake occurs which could threaten the safety of the ship and crew, it is every crewmembers duty and responsibility to report it.
It really shouldn't be though. These were writers whose understanding of science and the future was much different than where we are at now.
But even TNG rendered it embarrasing not as long after. That was 30 years ago now, it stands out in a bad way.
You mean twenty years later? That's a touch more than "not long after".
Well it's all before I was born so it's all relative.
(Close enough...)
I really don't see the issue. Finney explicitly subverted the internal sensors - that was the very heart of his plot, revolving around the creation of utterly convincing false visuals. Making himself disappear from the records would be an even simpler trick than switching the timeslots of two events in the records. Happens all the time to Tom Cruise or George Clooney.
And all indications are that the ion pod was a remote probe. All the fuss was about jettisoning it at a specific moment, at the very center of the storm, at the Captain's specific command, as the result of him evaluating the risks and calculating the mounting danger to the ship against the apparently similarly mounting scientific benefits. Classic tornado hunting stuff there.
Trek makes an overarching if implicit point about starships being capable of things remote probes aren't anyway. Many a phenomenon remains uncharted or undefeated after waves of probes have been sent, but a starship sorts it all out in a jiffy (the Great Barrier, the Space Amoeba, Nagilum's realm, whatnot). We just learn here that Ion Storms belong to that list as well. And Starfleet is fine with risking a ship and losing an officer, until foul play is suspected.
Timo Saloniemi
Spock of the DSC era would have been able to detect the hacking, even Airiams 28th century enhanced sabotage was unnoticed by everyone.
Personally, given then Ben would have been my friend, I would not have reported it if was just an honest mistake. I would have then berated Ben in private to make sure is stays on the ball. However, if there were some bad reason for the mistake (drugs, alcohol, apathy etc.) I would report it.
The real problem here is that any "switch" that can blow up the ship should have backup systems and protocols in place to prevent a person's "mistake" from killing everyone. No person can work long hours for years and not have a memory slip at some point. In a real "Star Trek" future, such poorly designed protocols, procedures and systems will result in every star-ship blowing up. In such a world, I would not make Ben the scapegoat for that.
I'm curious. Airiam's hacking went undetected (save for her suspicious movements eyewitnessed by Nhan), yes. Isn't this good reason to think Finney's would, too?
Why would Spock have "been able" to detect the hacking when we see he did not? Three people were listed as being capable of messing with the records - the Records Officer, the XO and the Captain. Spock's computer skill was specifically referenced. Kirk probably had little skill, but a lot of clearance. If Finney had both (being Records Officer with the associated clearance because he had the skill), there's the chance he could defeat Spock in a one-on-one. But no pressing reason to think that being X% better than Finney would be what's needed to notice the hacking.
It's a pretty regular occurrence in later Trek (including DSC) for the heroes to be confounded by hackings, these either going unnoticed or being misattributed to a fall guy. "Court Martial" is the prominent TOS example, is all - and all the more exotic for having been done before the age of hacking, thus featuring fancy futuristic terminology for the things involved, such as "Records Officer"...
As for the nature of Finney's mistake, I doubt the ship would have been lost because of him. The premise is that it could have been lost, in theoretical circumstances - if everybody made mistakes like Finney, things would go south quickly enough, and this is why he should be punished.
Timo Saloniemi
How so? The sets are just cardboard and plastic in both eras. The technobabble is the same. There's the computer guy in the wizard hat who can talk machine, and the others who can't, and the dialogue between these lets the audienve in on what happens. Fundamentally, every ship has its Finneys and its Kirks, or its Airiams and its Pikes, and then there's the Trek bit where there's this ace-of-all-trades Spock in between, unlike in Forbidden Planet yet. It's all very fifties anyway, when it comes to computers. Just as in every computer movie ever made.
Timo Saloniemi
Timo Saloniemi
IMHO opinion Kirk was right to report Finney.
Anyway, here is the relevant dialog:
And:
I note that, for example, some posters have assumed that lowly Ensign Kirk was a superior officer of Finney at the time of the incident, even though Finney was older and had been Kirk's instructor when Kirk was a midshipman at the Academy and probably outranked Kirk. But Kirk said he relieved Finny on watch, indicating that they had the same duties on different watches and were probably both under the same superior officer.
In "The Menagerie Part 1":
In "Charlie X":
So Finney being careless with his own life and the lives or two to four hundred other people was a big deal.
Anyway, here is the relevant dialog:
And:
I note that, for example, some posters have assumed that lowly Ensign Kirk was a superior officer of Finney at the time of the incident, even though Finney was older and had been Kirk's instructor when Kirk was a midshipman at the Academy and probably outranked Kirk. But Kirk said he relieved Finny on watch, indicating that they had the same duties on different watches and were probably both under the same superior officer.
In "The Menagerie Part 1":
In "Charlie X":
So Finney being careless with his own life and the lives or two to four hundred other people was a big deal.
But that's the thing, right? We've seen Kirk bend the rules for his friends, even to the point of stealing a starship later on, so why was Finney the exception? Heck, Kirk cheated on a combat simulator, while at the Academy, and was applauded for "thinking outside the box". SMH.
I'd have to go with putting it on report. If I remember correctly it's an error that could have led to the destruction of the ship. That's not something you could really poo poo away. I mean, if it was that he just forgot to sign a report, or maybe if it were something that would have led to a minor mishap, then I can see maybe pulling Finney aside and saying "hey, you missed this last night, just a FYI"
But Finney's mistake could have led to a catastrophe. That takes it to the next level IMO.
But Finney's mistake could have led to a catastrophe. That takes it to the next level IMO.
