Was it wrong for Data to disable Lore?

[Anji]

We lock up people all the time because they threaten the common good.

Lore was doing the same thing. Data had to de-activate him. Now whether Data felt any remorse doing that to his brother is another story.

 

[RAMA]

We lock up people all the time because they threaten the common good.

Lore was doing the same thing. Data had to de-activate him. Now whether Data felt any remorse doing that to his brother is another story.

I think my thoughts on this were best summed up here:

http://www.trekbbs.com/showpost.php?p=5270344&postcount=18

 

[RAMA]

The only thing about trying to rehabilitate Lore with "psychiatric/technological" is that he's too smart for the psychiatrists/therapists and could fool them; second, he and Data are nearly identical except for some bits of programming which have been implied to be Data's inability to use contractions, lack of emotions and non human like behavior. Their identical programming could included the self correcting mechanism Geordi mentioned in Contagion. That bit of programming could undo any type of technological "cures" used on him. Shutting him off seems the most human and safest way to deal with Lore.

Perhaps, in the future, another cyberneticist could have the chance to study the deactivated Lore, maybe even B-4, and find a way to purge the homicidal/genocidal tendencies from him and reprogram the self correcting mechanism to the newly designed programming, thereby rehabilitating him.

The difference between Data and Lore is that Lore was given full capacity human emotions and this includes the negative ones, which he managed to acquire/develop when he lived with them. Add to this the resentment when he was re-activated. Data was allowed to learn, minus full emotions...this apparently had the desired affect that would lead him to develop as a balanced individual. Now the key here that many people are missing is that depsite being a machine, Data and Lore have sentient rights, and have a right to due process. The one thing that may mitigate his final and swift retribution from a UFP court--remember there is no death penalty in the UFP--is the fact that he is in the end a machine, one which may be re-programmed if deemed necessary...something less likely with human beings...or at least less desirable.

RAMA

Wouldn't reprogramming him, be no different from psychiatric therapy and medication? As mentioned before, for now he's simply being restrained. From a certain point of view.

Where's the due process? It's odd STNG had an episode that people love where Data was declared a sentient machine but Lore doesn't have the same rights...even the worst mass murders in history usually have had that right.

RAMA

 

[Trekker4747]

Where's the due process? It's odd STNG had an episode that people love where Data was declared a sentient machine but Lore doesn't have the same rights...even the worst mass murders in history usually have had that right.

RAMA

Tell that to Osama bin Laden. Which, essentially, this is what Lore was here; a man on a remote world stirring up trouble with the intent of bringing down civilization.

 

[Timo]

...Not much different from the Klingon Chancellor or the UFP President in that respect, I guess. It's just that the Borg take a more egalitarian view on exactly which civilizations should be brought down.

Genocide in all likelihood is a fairly common crime in a world where a single starship can terminate a genus easily enough. What Lore was up to wasn't exceptionally grandiose, just your standard in-cahoots-with-deadly-enemy breach of UFP loyalties. Except that Lore probably never was a UFP citizen: his birthplace, the Omicron Theta colony, did not appear to be a UFP one, but rather a refuge for eccentric geniuses and other hermits, and his father, Noonian Soong, appeared to have left the UFP behind.

As regards due process, mere arrest wouldn't require much of that. Dismantling might count for little more than the application of handcuffs on another type of suspect. And Starfleet's style of frontier law enforcement won't generally allow for suspects to be brought to a timely trial anyway. Either Picard is a qualified judge, or then UFP law has to allow for, say, six months of holding before formal arrest.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[JarodRussell]

Data also deactivated his retarded brother, because, well, he was retarded. He could have kept him active inside a force field or something, or locked up in a room, but he didn't. I think Data has some severe problem management issues.

 

[RAMA]

Where's the due process? It's odd STNG had an episode that people love where Data was declared a sentient machine but Lore doesn't have the same rights...even the worst mass murders in history usually have had that right.

RAMA

Tell that to Osama bin Laden. Which, essentially, this is what Lore was here; a man on a remote world stirring up trouble with the intent of bringing down civilization.

Even in the intelligence community, such actions as assassination are rare...and it could be argued the a nation acting unilaterally, and in a sovereign nation without permission is also a highly illegal act. Just because we are a superpower and CAN do it, doesn't make it "right". Also, I believe Saddam Hussein--another mass murdering leader--had due process, so did many Nazis. If we are to assume the 24th century had charted the human brain(or positronic) and also have an obvious, greater interest in psychological well-being (posited by Gene R) and manifested in the separation of the MD with the counselor, then we might expect a more evolved treatment of such issues in the 24th century.

RAMA

 

[RAMA]

Data also deactivated his retarded brother, because, well, he was retarded. He could have kept him active inside a force field or something, or locked up in a room, but he didn't. I think Data has some severe problem management issues.

Yes, and to follow this logic other people have suggested..."retarded" people should be "de-activated".

RAMA

 

[Trekker4747]

Data also deactivated his retarded brother, because, well, he was retarded. He could have kept him active inside a force field or something, or locked up in a room, but he didn't. I think Data has some severe problem management issues.

Yes, and to follow this logic other people have suggested..."retarded" people should be "de-activated".

RAMA

Hmmmm. Data also deactivated his own daughter for simply asking too many questions. He's a bit of a madman isn't he?

 

[RAMA]

Data also deactivated his retarded brother, because, well, he was retarded. He could have kept him active inside a force field or something, or locked up in a room, but he didn't. I think Data has some severe problem management issues.

Yes, and to follow this logic other people have suggested..."retarded" people should be "de-activated".

RAMA

Hmmmm. Data also deactivated his own daughter for simply asking too many questions. He's a bit of a madman isn't he?

I believe there was also a "cascade failure" in her brain, where at least two experts (including himself) were incapable of reviving her. I suppose he thought he should wait till he could figure out how to have a greater chance at success.

In reality, I'd expect Starfleet would have figured out how to re-create Soong's work, and androids could have joined it by then if they wanted to.

 

[JarodRussell]

It's funny, as Data himself fought hard against getting deactivated and dismantled in "The Measure of a Man".

 

[Trekker4747]

Yes, and to follow this logic other people have suggested..."retarded" people should be "de-activated".

RAMA

Hmmmm. Data also deactivated his own daughter for simply asking too many questions. He's a bit of a madman isn't he?

I believe there was also a "cascade failure" in her brain, where at least two experts (including himself) were incapable of reviving her. I suppose he thought he should wait till he could figure out how to have a greater chance at success.

In reality, I'd expect Starfleet would have figured out how to re-create Soong's work, and androids could have joined it by then if they wanted to.

I speak of the time when Lal was asking Data a lot of little kid-like ''why" questions and he simply turns her off due to the annoyance (?!) prompting him to enroll her in school.

 

[RAMA]

Hmmmm. Data also deactivated his own daughter for simply asking too many questions. He's a bit of a madman isn't he?

I believe there was also a "cascade failure" in her brain, where at least two experts (including himself) were incapable of reviving her. I suppose he thought he should wait till he could figure out how to have a greater chance at success.

In reality, I'd expect Starfleet would have figured out how to re-create Soong's work, and androids could have joined it by then if they wanted to.

I speak of the time when Lal was asking Data a lot of little kid-like ''why" questions and he simply turns her off due to the annoyance (?!) prompting him to enroll her in school.

I guess they couldn't resist writing in a comic scene...one parents all over the world would probably like to duplicate!

 

[Therin of Andor]

In reality, I'd expect Starfleet would have figured out how to re-create Soong's work, and androids could have joined it by then if they wanted to.

See the novel "Immortal Coil" by Jeff Lang.