Dolphins are people too. Cetecean ops as canon!

[RAMA]

Ok..so just when you think you know everything about STNG, you are thrown for a loop. I was well aware of Andy Probert's work for the Online game where he designed an "aquatic lab"...but I didn't realize there was a "cetacean ops". Apparently it was mentioned in the STNG technical manual(perused it but didn't see it in the contents)...and also in 2 episodes of STNG.

Designing the Cetacean Ops

“Cetacean Ops” is a facility onboard the Enterprise-D that, though referred to only twice—in the episodes, “The Perfect Mate” and “Yesterday’s Enterprise”—speaks to the imagination of fans every since Rick Sternbach and Mikael Okuda described and depicted it in their Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual as containing dolphins!
It is stated in the Manual that guidance and navigation research is conducted by a cetacean crew of twelve Bottlenose Dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) and Pacific Bottlenose Dolphins (Tursiops truncatus gilli) who are apparently supervised by two Takaya’s Whales (Orcinus orca takayai). The “Takaya’s Whale” is not an actual species; the name is a homage to the fictional character, “Noriko Takaya” of the Japanese animated series, Aim For The Top! Gunbuster in which “espers and electronic-brained [bottlenose] dolphins” navigate a spaceship.
According to Sternbach, Cetacean Ops was never shown, “since the expense would have been prohibitive, but we did convince the writers to have Geordi ask a visiting official if they ever saw the dolphins.” The entire facility was his idea from the start. “I’m convinced,” he writes in the Manual, “that, even if they’re not intelligent enough to pilot a starship, they can still teach us a few things about other life forms.”

Then of course for ST:Online:

Star Trek: Online

From October through December 2005, Andrew Probert, senior illustrator on Star Trek: The Next Generation, worked with the game designer and art director of Perpetual Entertainment’s Star Trek Online to design previously unseen interiors of a Galaxy class starship. The Star Trek Online project was later taken over by another company, yet Probert’s designs remain and give us a glimpse of what could have been.
Probert was asked to design the “Medical and Sciences” section of Deck 7, which featured besides several laboratories, Stellar Cartography, and an extended Medical Complex, the illustrious Cetacean Ops.

Neat huh?

http://www.ottens.co.uk/forgottentrek/tng_2.php

 

[GeorgeKirk]

Really, Cetacean Ops was Sternbach's idea? I always thought it was Probert's.

It's a shame we couldn't see the interiors of the Enterprise-D rendered with modern technology; it'd be great to see all the large open areas that the ship was supposed to have.

 

[Alrik]

It would be nice if someone with the tech and tallent could do something with these ideas. I would love to seem them brought to life.

 

[Hober Mallow]

I'm trying to bury my memories of Darwin from seaQuest. This thread isn't helping.

Frank Welker's voice: "Caaaaaap... teeeeeeen... Peeeeee...caaaaaaaard." Whistle.

 

[Myasishchev]

I like to think of it as a neutrino detector that just happens to have dolphins in it.

Also, if dolphins are human-level intelligent, isn't referring to their cage as "Cetacean Ops" vaguely degrading? Like calling the bridge "Primate Ops"?

 

[RAMA]

I'm trying to bury my memories of Darwin from seaQuest. This thread isn't helping.

Frank Welker's voice: "Caaaaaap... teeeeeeen... Peeeeee...caaaaaaaard." Whistle.

No, no, no it doesn't have to be THAT way..think Uplift Saga!!!!

I like to think of it as a neutrino detector that just happens to have dolphins in it.

Also, if dolphins are human-level intelligent, isn't referring to their cage as "Cetacean Ops" vaguely degrading? Like calling the bridge "Primate Ops"?

Well its not a cage...let's call it a habitat...and "cetacean ops" is an operations area like any other, I don't think Data minds when his console is called "ops".

RAMA

 

[CaptainStoner]

I suppose the dolphins and whales get ocean leave, water conditions permitting.

Really makes me wonder where Perpetual was going with their STO before the snafu.

 

[T'Girl]

"cetacean ops" is an operations area like any other,

If there were (during TOS) Human mostly and Vulcan mostly starships, by the 24th century were there Cetacean mostly starships in the fleet. The corridors were three quarters water with a gaseous atmosphere near the ceiling. They would be assigned to investigate the oceans and waterways of interesting worlds. After all the majority of the surface of a class M world is water. They would beam into the waters of these world, interact with the aquatic lifeform they found there (who would of course speak using the same squeaks and clicks). Sometime the cetaceans would fire the ships phasers at enemy ships, who's Captain and crew were also cetaceans. And in a homage to Jim Kirk, occasionally the cetacean Captain would get himself a little tail.

 

[darkwing_duck1]

I'm trying to bury my memories of Darwin from seaQuest. This thread isn't helping.

Frank Welker's voice: "Caaaaaap... teeeeeeen... Peeeeee...caaaaaaaard." Whistle.

There was nothing wrong with Darwin...communication between two entities that do not share a common language, let alone common communications formats is going to be primitive at first. I would have liked to have seen Darwin's syntax and vocabulary improve as the seasons progressed.

Think of Darwin and "Bridger's Folly" as the earliest beginnings of human/cetetian cooperation, and it's easy to extrapolate what the 24th century with its superior tech could achieve in that area.

 

[RAMA]

"cetacean ops" is an operations area like any other,

If there were (during TOS) Human mostly and Vulcan mostly starships, by the 24th century were there Cetacean mostly starships in the fleet. The corridors were three quarters water with a gaseous atmosphere near the ceiling. They would be assigned to investigate the oceans and waterways of interesting worlds. After all the majority of the surface of a class M world is water. They would beam into the waters of these world, interact with the aquatic lifeform they found there (who would of course speak using the same squeaks and clicks). Sometime the cetaceans would fire the ships phasers at enemy ships, who's Captain and crew were also cetaceans. And in a homage to Jim Kirk, occasionally the cetacean Captain would get himself a little tail.

Apparently dolphins are really horny!! Perfect captain!

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

Didn't a TNG novel have a cetacean crew member, at least a "visiting" one?

 

[darkwing_duck1]

Didn't a TNG novel have a cetacean crew member, at least a "visiting" one?

I want to say it was either Imzadi or Dark Mirror, but I don't remember for sure...

 

[T'Girl]

Diane Duane's Dark Mirror did, been a long time since I've read Imzadi.

 

[Myasishchev]

Apparently dolphins are really horny!!

Gang rapists, actually; at least many of them.

If we acknowledge dolphin sapience (tantamount to personhood) does this mean we have a duty to enforce our criminal law upon them?

 

[Agenda]

I'm trying to be open minded, but this concept is too "out there", even for Trek.

 

[Ra'min]

"cetacean ops" is an operations area like any other,

If there were (during TOS) Human mostly and Vulcan mostly starships, by the 24th century were there Cetacean mostly starships in the fleet. The corridors were three quarters water with a gaseous atmosphere near the ceiling. They would be assigned to investigate the oceans and waterways of interesting worlds. After all the majority of the surface of a class M world is water. They would beam into the waters of these world, interact with the aquatic lifeform they found there (who would of course speak using the same squeaks and clicks). Sometime the cetaceans would fire the ships phasers at enemy ships, who's Captain and crew were also cetaceans. And in a homage to Jim Kirk, occasionally the cetacean Captain would get himself a little tail.

The Xindi supposefly joined the Federation at some point, so there may be xindi-aquatics crewed ships in starfleet.

 

[RAMA]

I'm trying to be open minded, but this concept is too "out there", even for Trek.

I guess we could call them pre-sapient life forms...in the Uplift novels, Dolphins are only able to understand "our" language, use tools, and speak because they have been genetically and mechanically modified..but once they are, they are considered sapients with rights.

RAMA

 

[RAMA]

Apparently dolphins are really horny!!

Gang rapists, actually; at least many of them.

If we acknowledge dolphin sapience (tantamount to personhood) does this mean we have a duty to enforce our criminal law upon them?

...and they also make war, kill, hunt and more. Humans are of course..masters of these.

RAMA

 

[darkwing_duck1]

I'm trying to be open minded, but this concept is too "out there", even for Trek.

I guess we could call them pre-sapient life forms...in the Uplift novels, Dolphins are only able to understand "our" language, use tools, and speak because they have been genetically and mechanically modified..but once they are, they are considered sapients with rights.

RAMA

In the Trek universe, at least some species of cetatians are fully sentient, as witnessed in ST IV.

The real-life problem in addressing the issue one way or the other is our utter lack of a common referential system, and the lack of compatable communicative organs.

 

[RAMA]

I'm trying to be open minded, but this concept is too "out there", even for Trek.

I guess we could call them pre-sapient life forms...in the Uplift novels, Dolphins are only able to understand "our" language, use tools, and speak because they have been genetically and mechanically modified..but once they are, they are considered sapients with rights.

RAMA

In the Trek universe, at least some species of cetatians are fully sentient, as witnessed in ST IV.

The real-life problem in addressing the issue one way or the other is our utter lack of a common referential system, and the lack of compatable communicative organs.

I could accept they have a very advanced culture, its just not one suited to evolve out of their niche.

We don't really know if humpbacks were that intelligent in STIV, they communicated, but we don't know if it was just instinctual or if the probe was just checking on "pets" or if they have a child level IQ.

RAMA