Caretaker - The lack of water?

[Frank Force]

Help me out with something. I can understand why there is no water on the surface of Ocampa - the Caretaker's original experiments saw to that - so the Kazon on the surface are thirsty but stick around for the mining rights. As far as the different Kazon sects go, Neelix says that 'some have ore, some have water, and they all fight each other for it' or something similar. He also says that 'no one around here wastes water in this manner' referring to baths and the like, but why would water be so scarce in this entire region of the Delta Quadrant? Even on Ocampa itself there is still ample water below the surface. Why does the drought seem to be so widespread between different solar systems?

 

[Sandoval]

I suppose the original Nacene experiments could have not just been isolated to the Ocampa homeworld, but rather conducted on every habitable world for a few dozen light-years in every direction creating a vast region where water is so scarce.

Although why these 'peaceful explorers' would continue ravaging these habitable worlds once they realised how harmful their experiments were is hard to explain, so I'm assuming that what happened to the Ocampa planet was a one off.

I does look a bit like the writers mixed up the concept of the planet being without surface water and rain as the result of the fallout from the Nacene technology with water being scarce in that region of space.

Maybe the Nacene secretly like to obliterate the way of life of prewarp species in order to install themselves as godlike entities that live in the sky.

I know that's what I'd do.

 

[Shawnster]

That's only one of the many issues people had with Voyager (and many other scifi shows). On the surface (LOL) and first thought the idea sounds plausible. When reviewed again and again, however, the flaws start to stand out.

In short, there is no reason. There is no explanation how water could be removed from the entire planet, let alone the solar system.

Another oversight that people have mentioned concerns the Ocampa and their only haveing 1 child. If each couple only has one child, then the population decreases by 50% each generation. In no time the race would be extinct.

 

[Sandoval]

In short, there is no reason. There is no explanation how water could be removed from the entire planet, let alone the solar system.

A really big straw.

Another oversight that people have mentioned concerns the Ocampa and their only having 1 child. If each couple only has one child, then the population decreases by 50% each generation. In no time the race would be extinct.

Not necessarily.

Maybe 99% of babies born on Ocampa are female and the 1% of men that are born have a really fun time during their nine short-years.

 

[Timo]

He also says that 'no one around here wastes water in this manner' referring to baths and the like, but why would water be so scarce in this entire region of the Delta Quadrant?

We don't have to think it's the "entire region". This, after all, is what Neelix has to say about the matter later on, in greater specificity:

"Kazon sects control this part of the quadrant. Some have food, some have ore, some have water. They all trade and they all kill each other for it."

So first Neelix establishes who these people in front of the landing party are: the Kazon sects are the only players of note around, thus the ones fighting for the Ocampa riches. Then he further establishes that these local forces of said sects trade and kill in order to be able to stay on the planet and wait for their opening. Which then provides Neelix and the landing party with their opening.

After all, Neelix is not describing the galactic politics of Delta to Janeway in that scene. He's divulging partial truths about the immediate situation on the surface of the desert planet, in order to mislead Janeway into helping him in his personal quest.

So, no water shortage anywhere outside the Ocampa surface encampments (and not even on all of them). But a serious water shortage on this specific encampment, thus a way to manipulate these particular Kazon and liberate Kes.

On this issue, I'm not even convinced that the writers intended the sillier version where the whole quadrant suffers from thirst - the wording is just ambiguous, but the intent all along may have been to describe the situation suggested above. In contrast, the "Elogium" thing is just plain silly by obvious writer intent... But we could explain that one away, too. We just have to note that nowhere in the episode is it actually said that the Ocampa only give birth once!

What is said is that if an Ocampa female doesn't give birth when the elogium first hits, she has missed her chance for good. But if the first time goes all right, then a second, a third and for all we know a fiftieth try should be quite possible. All Kes and Neelix worry about is the first time, after all; we hear nothing about what happens beyond that.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Sandoval]

I'd go with the essay explanation above.

Anyone who's dedicated enough to type their name at the end of every single post instead of just setting it as a signature must be onto something.

Sando Sandiemi

 

[You_Will_Fail]

It didn't make sense. The Kazon are able to fly at high warp, there's no reason they would even need to be on Ocampa.

 

[Sandoval]

It didn't make sense. The Kazon are able to fly at high warp, there's no reason they would even need to be on Ocampa.

Of course there is. To sit around and wait for any more blonde pixies to crawl out of the ground and lead you down to the Ocampan city.

Or to oversee a mining operation. Or cos they want nice suntans.

Loads of reasons.

 

[You_Will_Fail]

They can travel at high warp, they would be able to find any number of uninhabited planets to exploit or even primitive civilizations they could enslave.

 

[Sandoval]

Some people just like where they live. Access to local amenities, good schools, room to expand, nice views, pleasant neighbours etc...

The Ocampa planet likely had all these things.

Perhaps Jabin and his entourage had no interest in flying off and 'enslaving primitive civilisations' and instead wanted to improve where they lived by improving their home with running water and sanitation via the Ocampa City below them.

 

[MacLeod]

I try not to remember that Hydrogen and Oxygen are the 1st and 3rd most abundant elements by mass in the universe. Or remember High School Chemistry H2O. I could go on but I wouldn't want to highlight a plot chasm.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Frank and Sandoval already gave you the answer.

PARIS: Why would anyone want to live in a place like this?
NEELIX: The rich cormaline deposits are very much in demand.
CHAKOTAY: The Ocampa use it for barter?
NEELIX: Not the Ocampa, the Kazon-Ogla.
JANEWAY: The Kazon-Ogla? Who are the Kazon-Ogla?
NEELIX: They are. Kazon sects control this part of the quadrant. Some have food, some have ore, some have water. They all trade and they all kill each other for it.
JANEWAY: I thought you said the Ocampa had our people.

Ocampa is a fricking goldmine, no matter how the Jack Pack pooh poohed cormaline in Statistical Probability,

 

[Timo]

Anyone who's dedicated enough to type their name at the end of every single post instead of just setting it as a signature must be onto something.

I'm curious - who around here sets his real name as a signature?

Ocampa is a fricking goldmine

Plus, it's possible the Kazon aren't complete idiots. They might have noticed that the Caretaker array was worth raiding, if only the geezer himself could be distracted somehow. And since the Caretaker/Ocampa connection was pretty obvious, stalking next to the Ocampa dwellings might well prove worth the while.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Guy Gardener]

Something like "You've come to investigate the Arrays irregular behaviour too Captain Janeway?"

The Array was for some reason a days march from Ocampa at cruising speed.

(High warp is faster. Go figure.)

Methinks that the array had to be were it was to take advantage of what ever natural resource it was tapping to run the Ocampan City, but that's hardly provable.

 

[RoJoHen]

JANEWAY: The Kazon-Ogla? Who are the Kazon-Ogla?

This is my favorite line from the entire series because it sounds so ridiculous when Kate Mulgrew says it.

 

[Timo]

The Array was for some reason a days march from Ocampa at cruising speed.

I thought the main reason for the seeming low cruising speed was that they had to dodge the rubble Neelix was living in and on? It's not as if the return trip was a particularly long one!

I think the "array sits on a resource" idea is a good one, with the second place perhaps going to "array was built far enough from the Ocampa planet to keep the natives from spotting the alien meddler, and there was no real point in moving it even after everything went haywire".

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Guy Gardener]

It was transmitting power tot he Ocampa via a visible burst of energy.

(Not what you meant?)

Also the Nacene, we found out form Susperia, seem to want to exist in a nearby dimension with different physiucal laws, maybe the "door" to that thirdspace needs to be located on a weakened area of firstspace to aid in the transition?

Maybe this was a "safe distance" in so that the exploding array after the caretakers death wouldn't cause a new iceage as chunks of banjoman's home colided into the planet?

Then of course making it difficult/impossible for the Kazon to run thier refinery would mean that they might bugger off, which would be a good thing?

Except that the only threat the kazon pose according to the Caretaker is that the kazon will take the ocampas water. So what happens if the ocampa run out of water, rise to the surface, only to find no space faring alien culture, but chilling ice age that will flash freeze them in 4 minutes flat.

"Sigh"

 

[Timo]

It was transmitting power tot he Ocampa via a visible burst of energy. (Not what you meant?)

It sounded as if the Nacene were doing the standard alien abduction and examination routine on the Ocampa before a mistake by the Caretaker ruined the planet; it was only at that point that the Nacene went public and started openly interacting with the Ocampa, and only at that point that they built the underground haven and started supplying it with energy via those very visible bolts.

Until then, their spying and anal probing station would justly have been located at some distance from the planet - distant enough that the star system would be called "neighboring" by our Starfleet heroes.

Those ideas about safety concerns sound good, too, though. But they might only have come to play later on.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Guy Gardener]

Imagine Janeway did something awful. Cocked up so bad that she had to leave some one behind to make up for the crap she inflicted on a species that did not "Have it coming"?

Kathy has three very real real choices about who to leave behind as Voyager continues its way towards Earth...

Herself because she is most responsible.

Tuvok because he is the most capable to handle anything.

Harry Kim because he is expendable, and his loss doesn't risk Voyagers mission any.

It's my belief that Caretaker was a Nacene answer to Harry Kim.

Maybe he wasn't just senile in the pilot.

He could have been the ships janitor or candy striper?

 

[Sandoval]

I think we can all agree that the Caretaker getting left in the Delta Quadrant was the result of a situation akin to a person taking their unwanted pet into the wilderness tying it to a post, then driving off and leaving it there.

This understandably ate away at him for a number of centuries, prompting him to concoct that elaborate 'I stayed for the good of the Ocampa' rubbish to avoid admitting that he was abandoned for getting on his colleagues' nerves.