Spoilers TNG: A Singular Destiny by Keith R.A. DeCandido review thread

No, it's not. In a given language, there are rules for how to spell a foreign name or what to call it. In German, the proper name for "Germany" is "Deutschland;" in English, it's "Germany." In Spanish, the proper name for the United States of America is "los Estados Unidos de América," and the proper name for "England" is "Inglaterra." Etc.

In English, the proper term for the country once ruled by Saddam Hussein is "Iraq," not "Irak." "Irak" may be proper in German, but it is not proper in English.

 

Beside the fact that I'm no fan of changing names of countries and cities in different languages, I think it's totally understandable if someone uses the way of spelling for a country/city s/he is using his/her whole life (granted, I'm just assuming ProtoAvatar is from a country with German as the official language), even if s/he is posting on a board in another language and I don't really understand why you choose to point out this "mistake" while you have no history of being so pedantic about more blatant typos or grammatical mistakes (I'm sure if you go through my past posts or only this one you would have more than enough chances to be a Grammar Nazi. )



BTW: I checked Wikipedia and the Iraqi name for Iraq/Irak is:

العراق or Al-ʾIrāq

ETA:Since on reread my posts sounded a tad hostile I just want to make clear that they weren't intended that way. It's more a matter of me being a bit surprised by your sudden impulse to correct other people on minor things.

 

Some more quotes:

So, no difference between the trekverse and the universe. Real world facts and star trek examples - the same thing, right?

Of course, later on you changed your opinion:

So, at present, if you were to talk about the real world, you would use a real world example - good to know.
And this is also the point I made - than when talkinng about the real world, a real historical fact has more relavance than an dismissible star trek example.

As for the fundamental physical laws of the universe:

When one talks about the nature of the universe, these fundamentals are ALWAYS relevant.
You think this argument is specious? Be my guest - but don't expect to be taken seriously.

Regardless of the motivation, of the value given to the fact, of misinformation or propaganda, the fact remains: a person put a bomb in a restaurant and killed X people - it's objective.

"History is the process by which a culture decides for itself the meaning of its past."
The culture may decide the meaning, put the past doesn't change - it's objective, non-changeable.
The culture may decide to "forget" or "change" some elements of the past, but history remains, waiting to be discovered behind all the lies.

What you are "trying" to prove:

I never said otherwise - feel free to check.
You were the one bickering that I see things in back and white and so forth - I ignored these declarations because they're unsupported nonsense and I was trying to be civil.
You're sour when you loose an argument, Sci. Did you know that?

About your next post - make it shorter, more concise. You said you are studying political science, right? It shows - interminable posts with little of substance.

 

Defcon,

Thanks for pointing out Sci's unjustified intransigence.
And yes, in my native language, the country's name is Irak.

 

It's a function of Proto's pretensions of having a better understanding of history and politics than his rhetorical opponents, including myself. If you're going to claim intellectual superiority, you should at least have the decency of using proper spelling and grammar in whatever language you're debating in.

No. I argued that there is no inherent or fundamental difference. That doesn't mean that there can't be a difference, but that the difference is not inherent. As I noted above, how moral or amoral the Trekverse functions can be a matter of which story is being told. As a fictional construct, the "moral structure" of the Trekverse is a flexible, mutable thing, whereas, if one can be said to exist for the real world, it is likely fixed.

As I've noted time and again, you have a habit of taking a statement of someone else's and then pushing it to make it say something that it doesn't actually say. It's getting damn irritating. Stop putting words in my mouth.

If that is the point you made, then I would suggest that you used poor language to make it. I will readily concede that a real, historical example has more relevance to the real world than an example from any fictional construct -- but your language seemed to be saying that a fictional example has no relevance whatsoever to the real world and that they could all be dismissed. I firmly reject that conclusion -- fiction, like any form of expression or argumentation, can be a powerful and deeply meaningful way of describing and expressing the world, as books like Night or Nineteen Eighty-Four, or as films like The Last King of Scotland or The Queen, prove.

I never said they weren't. But you are inaccurately representing the fundamentals in the Trekverse. The roll of the dice is not always counterfeit, the result does not always favor the altruist, the main character, the moral of the story, or the whims of the author. Millions of altruistic Bajorans were killed in the Occupation. Billions of Cardassians were murdered by the Dominion. Seven million Humans were murdered by the Xindi (of whom only the Reptilians and the Insectoids were held responsible, whilst the rest of the Xindi Council went unscathed). We've seen main characters die plenty of times (perhaps most infamously in the TrekLit world in Wildfire), and the authors have made it clear on numerous occasions that they tend to find the creation of those stories to be deeply upsetting, not "a whim."

That is why your argument is specious: It presents the premise that everything always works out for the best in the end, and it ignores numerous pieces of evidence in the Trekverse that everything does not always work out in the end. It falsely represents the fundamentals of the Trekverse.

But that's not what history is about. History is about the meaning of that event, about the motives behind it and the forces that it unleashes and the ways it changes society. And all of that is deeply subjective.

You are confusing the past with history. They are not the same concepts. The past doesn't change, but history -- which is our understanding of the past -- changes constantly.

Yes, that's right. I'm the one who's sour.

You are the one who began using very disrespectful, condescending language against other posters who expressed and logically supported their disagreements with you (such as in this post). You are the one who chose to make personal insults and slights, and who has consistently resorted to insults since. Don't be surprised when someone calls you on it.

Once again, resorting to insults rather than logically supporting your conclusions. (Though, of course, given your tendency to engage in unfair over-generalizations, that's not surprising.)

 

Well, I just finished ASD and have to say that I really enjoyed it. But it is IMO rather a "filler" book that explains more or rather sets the scene than it actually contains a plot. But that's not a bad thing as it introduces new and interesting key players (I "like" those Kinshaya - well, it was about time that some kind of theocratical state appears in ST instead of just your random fundamentalist) and lets our protagonists take a deep breath before the next political, rather than humanitarian, crisis appears.

I enjoyed Sonek Pran very much so far, and I hope he'll make another appearance some time soon. The only point of criticism I have is that he comes across as a little two-dimensional. I'd have wished for a more emotional outburst when he learned of Rupi's death, at least some kind of inkling as to a more darker side to his personality.

I'm still not too comfortable with the Aventine and her crew - I thought that silent treatment of Altoss' towards Sonek was quite a bit childish and ridiculous because ultimately, it wasn't Sonek's decision to go to Maxia Zeta... and he could have argued till hell freezes over when that equally childish lieutenant whose name I conveniently forgot now, had just adhered to her orders.

And given the small amount of ships available - why was Titan sent out on her exploration mission already? I mean, can't Riker help with relief operations first, and then set out again?

ASD's quite a good follow-up to the Destiny-trilogy, setting out pieces of the story until they all come together at the end to form an intriguing mosaic. The only thing I'm a bit concerned about is that ST might get a bit too political for my taste right now. I don't see any opportunity for a light-hearted story of exploration or first contact, at least not in the A-Q. And I certainly don't need another BSG-like monster-arc in ST... But I'll reserve judgment on that for now.

 

Including everything, sure, that's a bad idea. Including things which have been explicitly integrated into the novels isn't at all.

Pity, that. They're good.

I count the Rihannsu novels inasmuch as they can be counted upon because the detail that they include about the Romulans has been adopted--as much as possible, of course--into the novels. If Krad goes so far as to include Artraleirh, the Romulan colony world that supported the first two Free Rihannsu victories against the RSE, in A Singular Destiny, on top of all of the other details which have been incorporated into other relaunch novels in different series, then it's justified to conclude that the Rihannsu series are, if not novelverse canon, then novels which are freely mined for canon.

Post-coup Romulus must have been chaotic. That said, the Remans explicitly threatened to attack Romulan cities if they didn't get what they wanted; Remus would presumably have been depopulated, but I don't think that they cared.

The ones that we see, sure. Romulan society before the split was established as chaotic and factionalized; other factions and other individuals, not seen in the movie, were also in play.

But Picard thought that a thalaron weapon made out of the deflector would be a viable defense against an entire Borg fleet. Even if the fleet was stationary, four thousand Borg ships would still have occupied a huge area of sky as seen from Enterprise's position. The thalaron weapon sounds like it was a wide-effect weapon, sterilizing things within dozens of degree of its point of generation.

 

As I understood it, Titan and the rest of the Luna-class ships still active - probably a few hundred other ships as well to varying degrees - are all being sent back out for at least three sets of reasons:

1. Morale/PR - reminding the public of the UFP that there's still Reasons to Go On. Exploration feeds that.
2. Strategic - getting a sense of the as-yet-unexplored spaces near the UFP and its neighbours. Playing the long game, as it were.
3. Tactical - being out there was how Titan found the Caeliar, which led to Solving the Borg Problem Permanently Without Being Genocidal.

They can't afford to not do this.

 

Well, but those reasons are a bit counteracted by the restrictions on material for repairs and the building of new ships - and I'm not talking about no exploratory missions for all time, but to at least postpone them until the immediate crisis is over (i.e. the refugee problem etc.).

 

Ultimately, both reasons for or against exploration right away are equally logical. Personally, I think it's irresponsible not to continue exploring -- amongst other things, you never know what else might be out there and might be able to help you or hurt you.

 

Claudia, if you want a good old fashioned Trek exploration story, you really should check out Over A Torrent Sea. I'm about 110 pages into it, and so far it seems to be exactly what you were describing.

 

Oh, - I'm just waiting for amazon to finally send it to me...

 

Thanks to everyone who's managed to squeeze in actual reviews of ASD in the midst of the arguing. (Not that I'm complaining about the arguing, it's actually fun to watch....) Glad people are digging the book.

That's covered in Over a Torrent Sea.

 

Finished ASD today and I have to say that I really enjoyed every moment of it. I've read others' comment on what they didn't like but I found that Pran was quite three dimensional as a character. Yes, the loss of his family and the family issues might have been a little cliched, but that kind of thing happens in real life all the time. I've had similar events happen in my own family, just not in such a violent manner.

I loved seeing the Palais staff again, those that we did, and the "big picture" events were very interesting. I would personally have said Pran was more Cussler than Clancy but I loved the book all the same.

Here's hoping for more from Bacco, Pran and Dax.

One question though. Why is it called the Typhon Pact? Surely the Tholians, Gorn, Breen, Kinshaya, RSE and Tzenkethi have their own name for the Typhon Expanse. Why name their alliance/government after the Federation name?

 

Maybe it's just the way the Universal Translator translated it.

 

^That was my thought as well.

 

^That's my thought too...or they'd have to call it by a different name depending on who they were speaking with. Like Bacco using theTholian name for that area when speaking to Tezrene for example.

 

Maybe "Typhon" is just the honest-to-goodness local name for that region of space and the Federation and the rest of the galaxy adopted it?

(What, is that any more unlikely than aliens that call themselves Vulcans and Romulans and Remans?)

 

We don't call 40 Eridani A (or Epsilon Eridani, can't remember which), Vulcan, and Diane Duane has the Romulans and Remans actually calling themselves Rihannsu and Havrannsu respectively. Although I accept that for on-screen Trek such allegories were used for ease or lack of imagination within timescale for production, but I would like to see more alien races called by their name for themselves than our name for them.

I'd also like to know where the names for some races came from, like Bajoran or Cardassian.

 

Well, we know from "Horn and Ivory" that Bajor's name has its origins in the Bajora, an ancient nation-state that engaged in military conflicts with neighboring nations in Bajor's distant past as part of a campaign to spread their faith in gods they called "the Prophets" -- the faith that later came to dominate that world's culture.