Thanks a million for that useful link, Corylea!
That will come in handy in the future when I need quotes to back up my theories...which will then be promptly be beaten to pulps by the folks here!! 
'All Our Yesterdays' theory
- Thread starter LMFAOschwarz
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Thanks a million for that useful link, Corylea!
That will come in handy in the future when I need quotes to back up my theories...which will then be promptly be beaten to pulps by the folks here!! 
You're welcome!
That will come in handy in the future when I need quotes to back up my theories...which will then be promptly be beaten to pulps by the folks here!!
Ah, but armed with the magic of exact quotations, you'll be able to beat them back.
Ah, but armed with the magic of exact quotations, you'll be able to beat them back.
That, or dig my hole even deeper!
We can't assume that, since we're never given any information about the Sarpeidons' spaceflight capability. Technical advancement in one area doesn't necessarily mean the same level of achievement in other areas. It's like asking, "If we can send men to the moon, why can't we cure cancer?"
Also, the discovery of time travel could have been a very seductive technology which sidetracked any desire for space travel. And it did seem pretty pervasive, what with the evacuation plan, and Zor Kahn's antics. And the atavachron did seem to be spoken of quite reverently.
Who knows, maybe they'd even have been inclined to use it to escape disasters and diseases in the past!
Who knows, maybe they'd even have been inclined to use it to escape disasters and diseases in the past!
I thought I'd mention that that's the exact premise of one of Isaac Asimov's books.
The End of Eternity
I don't remember this being established in the episode. Could you let me know when that's shown?
Anyway, even if they could evacuate to other planets, they'd produce a paradox in their own history if they don't evacuate the population to their own history. Closed time loops are like that.
Was it ever state in the episode that they HAD to evacuate to their own past, because that's what history said happened? Otherwise...there's no real need for them to do so.
Mr Atoz didn't seem very surprised at seeing Kirk, Spock and McCoy when they arrived the way a guy who had never met aliens before would act. Implying he knew about aliens. So if they knew...why not just ask someone for help to evacuate?
Mr Atoz didn't seem very surprised at seeing Kirk, Spock and McCoy when they arrived the way a guy who had never met aliens before would act. Implying he knew about aliens. So if they knew...why not just ask someone for help to evacuate?
SPOCK: Reports deny that they had any space flight capability.
Right on the front cover.
Oops.
A while back I read that book after someone mentioned it. I was also prompted by the write-up in Wikipedia. The technical premise struck me as one of the biggest pieces of handwavium I'd ever seen.
You may be inferring that, but I don't think it's implied at all. Atoz doesn't seem to recognize Kirk, McCoy or even Spock as anything but natives to the planet.
What if someone alters their history such that the Atavachron is never developed? Then what?
Here we go again... Time travel does not mean time "happens again." And paradoxes are impossible, by definition. See the "City on the Edge of Forever" thread. The Sarpeidons probably learned that long ago and knew that one is always a part of whatever history one is in, "past", "present" or "future" which are subjective terms.
There is no single, definitive set of rules for time travel. It's a completely fictional premise that can work however a particular writer wants it to work for the purpose of their story.
Amen.
If you read the arguments in the "City" thread, you wouldn't be making this statement. In short, I know it is fictional, which means writers must fall back on logic. If they toss that out the window, then they can't craft a logical series of events in their story, turning it on and off at will to suit their needs and using the audience as a punching bag. "Just because" would invalidate most, if not all, of the posts on this forum.
Exactly. Sarpeidon seems to have put its energies and ingenuity into exploring time, not space. And maybe there are no other M-class planets within light-years of Sarpeidon? Piling into rocket ships does you no good if there's nowhere to go . . ..
(In my book, if you'll indulge me, I speculate that Sarpeidon never developed space travel because there are no other planets in their solar system, so they never had any incentive to develop a space program. They would've had to skip the baby steps and go straight to warp capacity if they wanted to get anywhere.)
As to why they didn't ask their neighbors for help, who's to say they had any space-faring neighbors in the vicinity or were even aware that other civilizations existed?
Remember, the Enterprise is way out on the final frontier. It's not like Sarpedion was sitting right next door to the Federation or something. Or regularly engaging in trade and diplomacy with the Andorians or Romulans or whomever. Sarpeidon was off by itself in the middle of nowhere, busy exploring its own past.
(Imagine that we suddenly discovered that our sun was about to go bang. It's not like we can fire off an SOS to some friendly aliens, asking for help.)
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