How the Romulans did it

[Brutal Strudel]

It always puzzled me: Vulcans turned to logical non-emotionailty because, we've been told, the other option was passionate self-destruction. However, the Romulans didn't follow that path and they--right up until the Hobus supernova (and that wasn't self-inflicted)--seem to be doing just fine. What gives?

I postulate that the Romulans formed a totalitarian culture of duty in order to do, for them, what Surak's embrace of logic did for the Vulcans: by so thoroughly subordinating self to the state, they found another way to keep their most destructive, animalistic passions in check.

Just a thought.

 

[BillJ]

Works for me.

 

[varek]

I think there was a considerable difference of opinion at the time the original Romulans left. Over time, though, the practicalities of life and politics made them settle down and behave more logically--not like Vulcans, but much more reliant upon logic than before.

 

[Brutal Strudel]

I'd imagine that the Vulcan/Romulan species evolved to be more "logical" than other humanoid species--this is a species for whom repressed memories can be fatal (Voy, "Flasback"). They probably had that trait hundreds of thousands of years before Surak "fetishized" it. At their most savage, Vulcans were probably great scientists and engineers--all the more reason their passions made them a danger to themselves

 

[JesterFace]

Maybe Vulcans are just blindly following some teachings and claim they are so savage it's unreal...

Maybe the "superangry" thing is just a way to get people in control by someone who was too much into Surak's teachings. Vulcans could have been angry... like Romulans are and were freightened into believing it was getting worse, when it really was normal behaviour to them, Romulans could be just like Vulcans would be without Surak's teachings, deceitful and controllably angry.

 

[Brutal Strudel]

Perhaps. But, if we take what Vulcans (and Roddenberry) say at face value, it requires explanation.

It also explains Nero's unhinged behavior in Trek '09: with the Romulan state destroyed, Nero and his crew lacked that check on their most violent and hateful impulses. Nero may be the closest thing we've seen (aside from Spock choking Kirk and breaking Khan's arm AND bashing Khan's face with a chunk of metal) to a Vulcan in his "natural" state.

 

[Robert Comsol]

It always puzzled me: Vulcans turned to logical non-emotionailty because, we've been told, the other option was passionate self-destruction. However, the Romulans didn't follow that path and they--right up until the Hobus supernova (and that wasn't self-inflicted)--seem to be doing just fine.

With all the ponding I receive here at the BBS, one more "heretic" thought won't make that much of a difference.

Your question is appropriate, but IMHO the wondering is due to retroactive continuity (and I refer to the Einstein Quote below) and illustrates that the error is within the retroactive continuity and not the original materials.

We get the information about Vulcan's past from Surak (or Spock's knowledge about him) in "The Savage Curtain". Apparently that has been recorded well enough so that Surak/Spock is able to communicate this information.

But there is no record of dissatisfied Vulcans deciding to abandon their home and colonize a new world - in the far reaches of our galaxy (according to the time it takes a message from the Neutral Zone to reach SFHQ).

In "Balance of Terror" Spock has no idea where the Romulans come from, all he can offer is some colonization speculation.

In ancient Rome (…) defeated political opponents were often not executed but exiled to the far reaches of the Roman Empire. I believe the Romulans to be the offspring of such exiles, originally deported to the far reaches of space and Romulus (think Botany Bay, Australia and “Space Seed”), left with the basic means to survive and to build a new world of their own, but deliberately deprived of warp drive technology to prevent their return home (They only have impulse power according to Scotty in “Balance of Terror”).

Apparently, this took place mostly during the pre-Surak era where this crucial information was lost in war, thus Spock never had this information.

Such conditions (and being deprived of power and armies that could do battle and thin out the Vulcan population) would probably give birth to a different mentality and self-awareness, which could explain the apparent discrepany you noticed. YMMV.

Bob

 

[Mudd]

There's no error at all; the handling of the Vulcans is actually pretty sophisticated: you cannot trust what they say about themselves. Like every community their self-image and understanding is colored by culture and their self-serving understanding of the past. Over time, we've seen that they can be as petty, narrow minded and bigoted as any group of folks.

An example that comes easily to mind is my own culture's mythology about the American West. We've spent well over a century now telling ourselves lies about how the descendants of Europeans "explored" and "setlled" this continent...and most Americans are probably still pretty comfortable believing a lot of that foolishness. Point is, since our culture is the result of the behavior of the folks who prevailed we define ourselves as a community at least partly by the fabrications that suited them - and us.

Vulcans no more tell themselves or others the whole truth about Romulans or how their own way of life came to be than we do.

Credit Theodore Sturgeon with the insight. He looked at a community that had been represented by a single example, a self-admitted misfit, who rather stridently represented his people as rational, dispassionate and tolerant. Sturgeon was one of the best writers to ever work on Trek, and easily the most observant of human nature - and he discarded Roddenberry's rather half-baked original notions of who Spock was, instead envisioning a culture built on shame, hypocrisy and denial, even one whose leaders were as capable of chauvinism and even bigotry as any human beings. He was, of course, drawing on his own impressions and thoughts about his own culture and what he was seeing every day out in the world.

That revision is what's been carried forward, to different degrees in different stories by different writers. It's most obvious in Star Trek Enterprise but we've seen similarly ambiguous portrayals of Vulcans in all the incarnations of the show.

 

[Robert Comsol]

Interesting thoughts, Dennis.

But I was under the impression that the Vulcans were not just mirrors in which to reflect ourselves but a genuinly advanced race, hence the many comments of Spock addressing the violent history of Earth.

And there must be something to the cliché that "Vulcans Never Lie". If there wasn't it would be pretty hollow and I don't see that in TOS or TNG.

Bob

 

[Mudd]

First, every character who ever spoke in Trek was a reflection of human beings. Writers can only write about people, however disguised.

Second, Spock has been established as an unreliable narrator/witness. We've seen how violent his people were, both in his time and historically.

One really can't go wrong by doubting whatever Spock claimed about Vulcan unless it was shown on screen. Everything onscreen is canon, however contradictory, but in the case of an event that's shown, that event is canon whereas if a character claims that an event took place it's only canon that he/she claims it to be so.

 

[Robert Comsol]

First, every character who ever spoke in Trek was a reflection of human beings. Writers can only write about people, however disguised.

I'm not a screenplay writer, yet I'm very aware of that. But the character of Spock is the "outsider", the alien who watches human behaviour and invites us to wonder about some of our human "weaknesses" and to think about ourselves which I dare to say is one of the factors why Star Trek and particular Spock are so popular!

Second, Spock has been established as an unreliable narrator/witness. We've seen how violent his people were, both in his time and historically.

I have to disagree here. Spock is pretty earnest and credible, I don't see why he is unreliable. The Vulcans find display of emotions distasteful and "Amok Time" really illustrates how violent their emotions can be which simultaneously illustrates how good they keep these under control under average circumstances.

One really can't go wrong by doubting whatever Spock claimed about Vulcan unless it was shown on screen. Everything onscreen is canon, however contradictory, but in the case of an event that's shown, that event is canon whereas if a character claims that an event took place it's only canon that he/she claims it to be so.

If you are referring to "The Savage Curtain" I should point out that the image of Surak was exclusively taken from Spock's subconciousness by the Excalbians.

Of course, you can claim that he was being fed Vulcan propaganda, but to me and a few others the portrayal of Surak looked authentic with no need to double guess its accuracy.

Bob

 

[Mudd]

Surak is absolutely not an accurate representation of anything - he's an image taken from the mind of an admirer living thousands of years after his death, built from Spock's expectations and imagination.

Spock's demonstrably not reliable. He even lies about not lying, and offers rationalizations for why he's not lying when he does - the hallmark of an experienced and casual liar.

After "Amok Time" there's no reason to believe anything about the Vulcans unless we see it...and "Amok Time" painted them as slightly less upright and dispassionate than the Ewings of Dallas.

 

[Brutal Strudel]

What we saw in "Amok Time" bolsters my theory, though: Vulcan biology seems so animalistic thar SOMETHING more drastic than anything we have done--or could do--to keep them from erupting into destructiveness.

 

[Marsden]

Don't forget the Vulcans have some kind of mental group contact that the Romulans either lack or have suppressed. Maybe when they work out their frustrations in pon farr it breaks the tension for all of them, not just the immediate participants.

It's plainly stated they can sense other Vulcans, maybe this developed after the passions were "controlled" by the logical precepts, and that's why the Romulans lack it.

And maybe, like so many blanket statements, hyperbole is involved. We're headed for destruction! Maybe it doesn't actually mean destruction as much as not attaining an advanced civilization, so destruction of future advancement, not destruction of the physical race, but the potential culture. The Romulans created their own culture.

There's also the possibility of a third party. A race of Preservers that seeded Vulcanoid life on different planets. Or, possibly the sophonts now known as Romulans were exiled from Vulcan with primitive space ships and taken to their new home of Romulus, some where they could never reach on their own.

It's a question that will never be answered.

However, a few more comments. Romulus is far away from Earth and the Federation. The Romulans must have some kind of FTL ablilty, maybe not Warp as we know it, but if they didn't have FTL, it would take them a year just to fly across the neutral zone. Their power is simple impulse. I think that means their power systems are not more advanced then Federation power systems, not their speed capability. The second sentence, To be used to run from them? starts to discuss speed, but I don't think it's definitive. Also, how could they create high warp speed capable torpedoes without FTL capability? I do think it's clear that the Enterprise had much more power capability than the Romulan ship, so that would agree with my version. I don't pretend it's the right version, they don't even know what is the right version, even if there is a right version, someone else will retcon it to be wrong as it suits them.

 

[Mudd]

What we saw in "Amok Time" bolsters my theory, though: Vulcan biology seems so animalistic thar SOMETHING more drastic than anything we have done--or could do--to keep them from erupting into destructiveness.

Diane Duane's book, Spock's World, is fairly interesting with regard to a lot of this. She suggests that the general experience Vulcans had of life, for many millennia, was of periods of progress punctuated by paroxysms of extraordinary self-destructiveness because of their lack of emotional regulation. They began over, and over again.

 

[Nerys Myk]

First, every character who ever spoke in Trek was a reflection of human beings. Writers can only write about people, however disguised.

I'm not a screenplay writer, yet I'm very aware of that. But the character of Spock is the "outsider", the alien who watches human behaviour and invites us to wonder about some of our human "weaknesses" and to think about ourselves which I dare to say is one of the factors why Star Trek and particular Spock are so popular!

That's just one of Spock's roles. He also represents the detached, dispassionate side of Human nature. McCoy is often his counterpoint.

 

[Mudd]

The idea that the Trek format required an "outsider" character to comment on humanity was a later accretion - Spock was an individual; he happened to interact with other characters in a certain fashion consistent with his character, and when people started making up new versions of Star Trek for Paramount they abstracted that and elevated it to part of the format.

 

[Robert Comsol]

Spock's demonstrably not reliable. He even lies about not lying, and offers rationalizations for why he's not lying when he does - the hallmark of an experienced and casual liar.

I think you’ve been reading too much of my satire. I think audiences understood that Spock was a character who was often in denial about the true reasons for some of his actions. Despite his Vulcan coolness this kind of ambiguity made him accessible for audiences and most people never considered him “an experienced and casual liar”, well, at least I never did.

Also, how could they create high warp speed capable torpedoes without FTL capability?

A couple of interesting points you raised which IMHO just illustrates why “Balance of Terror” is a TOS episode we discuss frequently in terms of treknological research more than any other TOS episode. It’s a vast playground for interesting ideas, but given my current lack of time I’d like to address this one issue above you mentioned.

As an analogy I’d like to present our real history. First came the atom bomb, before energy creation through means of nuclear fission. Next came the H-homb, but we are still struggling for methods to commercially use nuclear fusion to create energy. Something tells me that it’s going to be similar with antimatter.

Simply put, the Romulans may have created a weapon with FTL capabilities, but that doesn’t necessarily imply they already knew how to achieve FTL drive (according to Scotty’s impulse power statement).

As another analogy I’d like to mention the Messerschmitt 262 jet fighter. When it arrived at the frontlines, the Russian planes simply dispersed and reduced speed so the Me 262 would often overshoot its targets. Possible something similar applied to the Earth-Romulan War where Earth ships had to reduce to impulse power to combat Romulan ships. Add to this, we don’t know if the “primitive atomic weapons” even had any FTL capabilities. Possible the Earth ships had to drop out of warp to fire their weapons, which would have put them on equal footing with their Romulan adversaries (from an entirely TOS point of view, I should add).

Bob

 

[Marsden]

Somewhat off topic, but on Balance of Terror and the new universe, I was hoping, in vain, that with the "other reality" of the new universe Star Trek movies they could have recalled The Romulan Commander's statement about he and Kirk being friends. I know that will never happen, but just thought I'd post it.

 

[Mudd]

Well, now the continuity has changed such that Kirk won't be involved in that kind of stealthy confrontation with such a Romulan vessel. Clearly the Romulans and Federation are reasonably familiar with one another, in the "present day," when Kirk enters the academy.

 

[Timo]

And there must be something to the cliché that "Vulcans Never Lie". If there wasn't it would be pretty hollow and I don't see that in TOS or TNG.

Vulcans would probably make for the best liars in the universe. In order to carry the lie so far that nobody realizes it for what it is, one needs an extremely disciplined mind capable of not just carrying on the fiction but also separating it from the truth, planning ahead on further untruths, and perhaps branching off to yet other falsehoods...

"Vulcans don't lie" is a saying that no doubt could obtain a life of its own as an insincerity in its own right: anybody quoting this would simply be acknowledging the fact that you just plain can't catch a Vulcan on a lie.

Simply put, the Romulans may have created a weapon with FTL capabilities, but that doesn’t necessarily imply they already knew how to achieve FTL drive (according to Scotty’s impulse power statement).

It never ceases to amaze me how we dare trust Scotty to be making an expert statement on a culture after haphazardly assessing a single vessel thereof. It's not even a matter of not trusting Scotty on his word: it's a matter of realizing that he wasn't concerned with evaluating the Romulans as a culture, merely with assessing the threat vessel at hand. Would we declare Germany incapable of making steam turbines on the basis of their power being "simple electricity" in a U-Boot vs. destroyer escort confrontation? An Allied engineer making that latter statement wouldn't be in error in any real sense - he would just be omitting the part where everybody knows Germans are famed for their superior steam turbines, and the part where everybody knows they can't put those on their submarines.

Well, now the continuity has changed such that Kirk won't be involved in that kind of stealthy confrontation with such a Romulan vessel. Clearly the Romulans and Federation are reasonably familiar with one another, in the "present day," when Kirk enters the academy.

Well, Romulan invisibility or plasma weaponry is not established in nuTrek. So the only thing different about the confrontation would be that it would not come as a surprise to Kirk that the skipper of the invisible ship had pointed ears.

Timo Saloniemi