Spoilers Star Trek: Prodigy 1x09 - "A Moral Star, Part 1"

We’ll know for certain next week, but ‪‪that’s what ‪‪I was thinking as well, Janeway’s helping them sell their plan, and hasn’t been rewritten.

 

Over 150 alien species are part of the Federation in the late 24th century... we've only seen a relative handful of them in canon though... most of which were never officially named... we know of the founding members species... and a few others that appeared on-screen by name which were seen repeatedly... but some of those weren't even Federation members.

So, yeah, the Brikar might not be part of the Federation... although they certainly COULD be.

One of the things I'd like to see MORE of are non-Humanoid Federation member species.
That would be very nice and would definitely move away from the 'humanoid centric' idea that some fans (and characters) suggested.
The previous lack of non-humanoid aliens as UFP members can be explained by lack of budget and SFX ability to portray them.

Disco in the 32nd century may have shown a Horta onboard though... but I'd love to see the animated series such as Lower Decks and Prodigy to devote more exploration to non-humanoid UFP member species too.

 

We've been wrong before though... what with Janeway smirking and giving Dal a suggestion they are SF cadets.

I honestly thought Janeway was playing a bit coy and was trying to give kids the chance to come clean on their own terms when trust was developed - that would have been more in line (and slightly more interesting) because we know SF ships have internal sensors which record everything, and we know Janeway has access to those to understand what's been happening on board or outside it... and she can listen in on conversations as this latest episode suggested without physically appearing in the room (but she already displayed these abilities since she was activated by the kids in the first place).

I was a bit disappointed with the direction we got... but its also possible that her lack of 'awarenes' could be tied to the Va'uk'Nat code remnant in the ship which also erased her memory, or her being a low priority system in itself (which seems like a higher probability - since there might not be a reason to give a low priority training advior system greater environmental awareness - so she's a bit 'more' than your run of the mill hologram because she can perform some maintenance on the ship, but curiously ignorant like your average hologram - which seems a bit of a contradiction when contrasted with the fact she has access to internal and external sensors if only to monitor what's happening).

But I'm also curious if Janeway's low priority system access (and general existence) is also down to the Va'uk'Nat code. It's possible that holo-Janeway was more than just an advisor before encountering Drednok and the Diviner... I mean, it may be more credible what with the Doctor acomplished... so it would 'track' somewhat that Lewis Zimmerman could have programmed her in a similar way he did the EMH mark 1... but then that malicious code degraded her overall status (after all, if you want to be able to control the ship without Janeway getting in the way, and if you can't delete her entirely, then it would make sense to severely reduce her system's access).

Plus, 'that's one heck of an upgrade' probably wouldn't be mentioned/shown if it didn't have any merit down the line - but admittedly, it could have been 'just for show' and nothing else.

 

I think membership in the Federation are worlds, not species. The 150 number from Star Trek: First Contact is in response to a question from Lily about how many planets are in the Federation. Take that and Picard's response for what you will, of course.

The only other evidence I can think of with regards to species vs. worlds/polities is in the 32nd century on Discovery, there are obvious human citizens of the Federation, but Earth itself is not a member.

 

Except for the premise that First Contact movie established the idea that UFP is spread over 8000 Ly's.
There cannot possibly only be 150 planets in the whole Federation because that's just NONSENSE.
There are 971 stars within 50 Lightyears. The space within 1000 Lightyears is 8000 bigger than that... so you could expect between 7 to 8 MILLION Stars in just 1000 Ly's radius.
Given the UFP is spread over 8000 Ly's, we're looking at least at 56 MILLION stars. So, in that amount of space (8000 Ly's), there are over 150 warp capable species (and some pre-industrial ones) that comprise the Federation in the 24th century.
151 warp capable species represent 0.00027% in that amount of space (not counting pre-warp ones).

Even TNG established there are MANY uninhabited M-class planets within Federation space.

Worlds in this case (that comprise the UFP) refer largely to alien SPECIES original evolutionary planets - colonies not included ... I'd say that mass migrations between member planets hadn't happened until the later half of the 23rd century.

Separate individuals can be Federation citizens whether or not their member planets are part of UFP.
Earth not being part of UFP in the 32nd century has little merit here because it was a founding member and humans spread to the stars just before that (with most Humans living largely on Earth, in the solar system, others going on freighters, Starfleet etc.).
So while Earth as a planet is not part of UFP in the 32nd century (and therefore individuals who live on Earth aren't Federation citizens), in the grand scheme of things, there are humans outside of Earth who ARE Federation citizens... so provisions would be left for individuals of species planets who left the UFP so that those individuals would retain their Federation citizenship if they wanted to remain in the Federation.

But if you meant it in a different way... before the UFP was founded (and some time after that), most species just occupied their native planets and colonies (very little or no inter-species mixing or species living on each other origin planets and colonies).
Since UFP, various migrations would occur and 4 different species would intermix with each other and become citizens of Earth, Andor, Vulcan, Tellar, etc. (aka, Burnham was a citizen of Vulcan/Ni'Var) and so forth... but she was part of SF/UFP as well.

So, in this context, sure, worlds is wouldn't necessarily represent exact number of species , but you still have about over 150 different alien species living on each member planet (depending on the atmosphere) and inter-mixing, living and working together by the 24th century... by the 31st (prior to the Burn), you'd be looking at a pool of 350 species.

Planets by the 32nd century would have plethora of different species on a single member planet sure... but I largely count in the 24th century 'worlds' as individual species by their name ... more or less... but even in this century, each member planet would have any variety of other alien species working and living there and being citizens of Earth, Andor, Tellar and Vulcan for example and on a larger scale, citizens of UFP... but you're still probably looking at a pool of 150 different Warp capable species across those member planets.

Some individuals from outside UFP could have requested asylum and become Federation citizens, so the number of species could actually be GREATER than 150 in the 24th or greater than 350 in the 31st century... but again, when looking in the context of inter-species mixing... most species before joining the UFP and maybe sometime initially after joining would have stuck to their own (with some smaller migrations initially and later on moving onto more migrations).

But heck, even representatives of that planet in the 32nd century with the Butterfly people ended up being of the same species (not mixture of other species - which is what you'd expect by the 32nd century - a mixture of species on each previous member planet - and even planets who were never members of UFP to begin with).
Even Trill seemed to have only been populated by Trill only. Earth on the other hand had a more diverse amount of aliens living there.

 

Well, I did say take that as you will. Lily asked about planets. I took Picard trying to reclaim control of Enterprise at the time as an indicator he wasn't really going to bother giving a nuanced answer. It'd be like being asked, "How many provinces in America?" There's a lot to break down in explaining the assumptions about the question, clarifying does America mean the United States, etc. If I had no time or inclination to go into it, I'd just say 50. I am not adhering to the word 'planet' as defining Picard's answer.

I took 150+ as not physical planetary objects in the entirety of the UFP, but 150+ full member worlds, including whatever world's colonies as part of its membership. World doesn't need to mean planet. And aligning the numbers of species and members omits the idea that there are planets whose dominant species might be the same as another planet's dominant species. I don't know the canonical status of Mars as a full member in the UFP, but if it is, you are considering Martians a different species. In general though, yes I would assume most memberships correlate with a homeworld of a single sapient species.

And about 8K LY. How much distance would you say the United States is spread out over? Alaska is a short distance from Russia. Hawaii's way out in the Pacific. Or the departments of France? They've got overseas departments in the West Indies and South America, and in the Indian Ocean near southern Africa. If you extend that to other overseas territories, that includes islands near Canada, and various islands in the south Pacific. The sun was once said to never set on the British Empire. Even then, the vast majority of the planet was NOT part of the British Empire.

In the 24th century, I assume the Federation is centered at the Alpha/Beta split with the number of full members decreasing as you move away from its center (presumably in space relatively local to Earth). You just need to have one outlying world 4000 light years from the center to say the Federation spans 8000 light years.

 

It is highly unlikely that colonies are counted as 'member worlds'. Those would mostly be adjacent/attached territories of a main member world/species that joined.
So for example, When Vulcan joined the Federation, every part of space they colonized became part of the Federation... but as we know, Vulcan is counted as 1 planet... colonies such as the one on say P'Jem aren't counted as a separate member world.

Same with Romulans. When they joined UFP, previous Romulan space and planets they occupied would become part of UFP (but again, Romulans here are referenced as a species as joining the Federation - and considering Romulus was destroyed by a Supernova...eventually they relocated - and it was implied it took centuries for Romulans to reunify with Vulcans).

In case of any minor species the Romulans may have enslaved (such as the Remans), those would have probably been released prior to Romulans joining up and allowed to flourish on their own (unless they also expressed a desire to join UFP as independent species).

When the Cardassians joined UFP, all their territory would become part of UFP. Again, if they had minor species which were conquered and whatnot, a prerequisite would be made that those species are released to become independent and develop on their own unless they wanted to join up UFP as separate planets a the same time.

Also, we don't have ANY evidence which suggests Mars is a separate planet and not considered part of Earth's solar system.
Same with any remote human colonies... those were never confirmed in canon to my knowledge... they were merely speculations by fans.

 

I specifically said colonies are part of the homeworld's polity. But colonies tend not to want to remain colonies forever, at least in the real world.

How would species-based membership even work? If B'Elanna Torres had a kid with a Klingon, and that kid got together with a Klingon, etc., how many generations down would it be before the child is not human enough to qualify as a UFP member?

You are doing a lot of speculation and passing it off as canon evidence. Romulus never joined the Federation. We don't know that any Romulan-controlled government joined the UFP. We only know that the preexisting UFP member Vulcan integrated Romulan citizens and had a name change to Ni'Var. We also do not have evidence that there aren't other Vulcan-dominated UFP member worlds. There has been no line saying Vulcan only has one voice in the Federation government.

We also don't know that Cardassia/Cardassians joined the Federation. We saw a Cardassian or two around on Discovery, and the president in that era is mixed human/Bajoran/Cardassian. One of those species' homeworld is explicitly not a member, so why would the other two necessarily be?

 

if it works like real world states with ius sanguinis citizenship, you have a right to be citizen as long as you can prove one of your ancestors, no matter how remote, was one.

 

I don't think its that demanding.
The UFP doesn't really ascribe to such draconian measures that one needs to 'prove their ancestry' or something to that effect.
I think its enough that if a person wishes to live (and possibly work) in UFP from a species that's not a member, they are usually accepted with very little purview.
I suppose there may be some background checks to ensure they might not be a spy or whatnot, but generally, I'd say they wouldn't have anything like work permits or ancestry documentation since UFP is an open society which generally welcomes other alien species and has done away with most of that nonsense which impedes on people's freedoms.

There might be some issues if a person or a group of people are coming in from a hostile power, but in that case, usually, they use the asylum route. And once security measures have been undertaken and people checked, and if there's nothing seemingly out of the ordinary, they should be free to live in UFP.

 

Although that does bring up the mystery of how Simon Tarses got into Starfleet while having Romulan ancestry, something a genetic scan even during the period of Romulan isolation from the Federation post-2311 could have revealed. The Romulans were either a distant and unseen Cold War-type enemy or outright antagonist for most of the 2311-2379 period and Tarses' true heritage probably would have flagged him, especially in the days before the Dominion War alliance with the Star Empire and then the destruction of Romulus.

 

He is part human. I don’t see the issue.

Not to mention that worf is a federation citizen while the Klingon aren’t federation members. Ancestry isn’t the only way to have a right to citizenship.

 

I'm just saying that the Romulan ancestry would have red-flagged him with some Federation agencies. Sure, you're probably right that his human blood probably granted him a lot of slack but now that Section 31 and other intelligence assets have been retconned into the Federation and Starfleet of the 24th century one can wonder why he wasn't kept out for some contrived reason.

 

I suppose that if Simon was descended from smooth forehead Romulans, and those might be genetically indistinguishable from Vulcan, it may not flag.

As a Federation citizen, I can't imagine it would have been a bar to entry in Starfleet if he were honest. Paranoiacs like Satie and Section 31 may exist, but having some kind of genetic purity requirement feels against Starfleet's core principles.

 

Agreed.

The problem was never that Tarses had a Romulan grandfather. The problem was that he LIED about it.

That said, there may be mitigating circumstances which could reduce any penalty Tarses faces for lying. If, for example, his Romulan grandfather raped a human woman and one of Tarses' parents was the result of that assault. If that's the case, it would be understandable that Tarses would want to keep that a secret

Edit: So when is Part 2 going to air?

 

February 3rd.

 

I mean, his Romulan ancestry DID red flag him.

 

Took them long enough. In the retconned Starfleet established with DS9 I doubt it'd have taken that long.

But anyways.

 

Agreed. I think the show is doing a terrific job of both showing kids/new folks what Star Trek is all about and reminding some of us older fans why we love it.

I've been wondering about that too. It makes more sense. Unless he was somehow involved in designing the ship.

Agreed!

Is it Thursday yet?