Is Data's head still under San Francisco?

[DonIago]

^No. But there has to be an original timeline where Data's head wasn't there.

 

[BillJ]

^No. But there has to be an original timeline where Data's head wasn't there.

Probably. But I'm pretty sure Trek as we know it doesn't exist in that timeline.

 

[DonIago]

^I was just about to add, "Unfortunately, we never get to see that timeline."

Kirk can theoretically keep giving his glasses to himself, but they have to have originated somewhere (or somewhen, if you prefer) else.

Timeline A - Someone makes the glasses, Kirk gets them in TWoK.
Timeline B - Kirk sells the glasses...and ultimately gets the same set in TWoK.
Timeline C....Infinity - Kirk keeps receiving and selling his own glasses. After a "time" they're not really his own glasses anymore since the lens has been repaired, the components would age, etc...eventually they might bounce to an entirely different timeline where Kirk can't sell the glasses, doesn't get the same amount of money, etc...

NuKirk can get the "same" set of glasses in Timeline A', but he can't get his own glasses in any of the other timelines unless he travels back in time and sells them first. He certainly can't get PrimeKirk's glasses unless he engages in a different form of timeline hopping.

 

[Set Harth]

You can maintain that Data's head is already in the past by the time of NuTrek all you'd like, but I disagree.

You can disagree all you like, but Data's head is already in the past by the time of NuTrek. Nero and Spock Prime come from the post-TNG timeline in 2387.

I maintain that Nero travels into a timeline where the head can't be there yet because Data hasn't traveled into the past yet.

Data has traveled into the past, in 2368. In the timeline depicted on screen in Time's Arrow, Data's head is there between 1893 and 2368. This remains unchanged by the events of Time's Arrow, meaning that as the TNG timeline moves on into its future, it is still true: Data's head is still there in the past of the Prime timeline. When Nero goes back in time from 2387 to 2233 and creates the branching Abramsverse timeline in the process, he leaves a timeline in which the head was there between 1893 and 2368, including 2233, so when Nero arrives in Abramsverse 2233, the head is there. This has nothing to do with whatever does or does not happen with the hypothetical character "NuData".

 

[UFO]

Ok. I admire your tenacity and we can agree to disagree.

It's not about tenacity. It's about following the rules as defined by the creators of the story. If we follow the rules as defined by Orci and Kurtzman, then the head of the Data we all know and love is sitting under San Francisco in the Abramsverse.

You can disagree all you like, but Data's head is already in the past by the time of NuTrek.

The way I see it, if "traditional" time travel is allowed in NuTrek then its the usual can of worms with nobs on and therefore Data's head will be in San Francisco because it was in the Prime Universe (it was there when the universes split). It doesn't matter whether anything in the future of the Abramsverse puts it there or not (in a non-branching scenario you would end up with two heads if they did). Whatever causal links you may require follow through from the parent universe. Anyway that's my story and I'm sticking to it (until it becomes intellectually untenable)!

However, if "traditional" time travel is now ruled out and indeed, despite contradictions, assumed never to have happened, then Data's head is not there, as it was never in the Prime Universe (just one of the earlier branches from it).

I have come to the view that the decision to use branching multiverse theory (BMT), whether it is real or not, is the best thing in the movie!* Very straightforward (if explained properly!) and with no or few complications from a time travel perspective. What more could you ask for?

*No, I don't mean to damn with faint praise.

 

[DonIago]

Well, that's the rub for me. Without quantum signature checks (or even any reference to them aside from Parallels, AFAICR) I don't think we can make any assumptions as to whether Our Heroes are or are not jumping realities.

 

[BillJ]

However, if "traditional" time travel is now ruled out and indeed, despite contradictions, assumed never to have happened, then Data's head is not there, as it was never in the Prime Universe (just one of the earlier branches from it).

If the character that we see in Star Trek 2009 is indeed TOS Mr. Spock then we have no reason to excise "traditional" time travel from the Abramsverse. How can the character be TOS Spock without travels to 1930, 1968, 1969, 1986 and Sarpeidons ice age?

So I think it would be impossible to excise "traditional" time travel based on that thread.

 

[UFO]

However, if "traditional" time travel is now ruled out and indeed, despite contradictions, assumed never to have happened, then Data's head is not there, as it was never in the Prime Universe (just one of the earlier branches from it).

If the character that we see in Star Trek 2009 is indeed TOS Mr. Spock then we have no reason to excise "traditional" time travel from the Abramsverse. How can the character be TOS Spock without travels to 1930, 1968, 1969, 1986 and Sarpeidons ice age?

So I think it would be impossible to excise "traditional" time travel based on that thread.

Hmmm, I haven't thought this all the way through but maybe there aren't any contradictions. If so, then it might be possible to excise "traditional" time travel, but you may not like it! As others have suggested a while back, when anyone goes on a time travel mission they simply never come back when viewed from the universe they left. Since ST episodes followed the characters we were concerned with and never told us that, it's not a "problem".

So what we think of as the "Prime Universe" is just the last in a long series of branches. But the universe is splitting all the time anyway so why does the "original" have greater claim to our allegiance?

 

[Ryan Thomas Riddle]

Does it really matter whether Data's head is still under San Francisco?

 

[Pauln6]

A - The Primeverse until the events of Time's Arrow. Data's head isn't in the past.

That doesn't work. If Data's head isn't in the past until the events of Time's Arrow, then how is it discovered to have been under San Francisco for nearly 500 years at the beginning of the events of Time's Arrow?

TNG Data's head is already in the past of the Prime timeline when Nero goes back in time to 2233 and creates the branching Abramsverse. The head is there in Prime 2233 and is thus also there in the Abramsverse.

Ok, a quick look on the net has turned up no support for Data Prime's head.

That doesn't make much sense. For example, I know of a thread on the Internet where there is "support for Data Prime's head".

To summarise, Data's head is probably under San Francisco but it will be NuData not TOS Data.

Data wasn't in TOS. The head under San Francisco which I refer to is that of TNG Data. Whatever happens with "NuData" is beside the point.

Good call on the head existing in the episode before Data goes back. I'd forgotten that.

I apologise if I was a bit fuzzy in my use of language. I meant that I wasn't able to find any mention of scienitific support for Data Prime's head (i.e. the theory that would enable it to appear in the altered timeline), albeit in a very brief search. Still, since Data's head was under San Francisco all throughout TOS, he could still be referred to as TOS Data . Scientists seem to view paradoxes like Data's head either as a reason why time travel cannot possibly happen or as evidence that it is an incorrect theory of time travel.

From your own example (writer intent?) the approach becomes muddied again. Data's head existed under San Francisco before he travelled back because he was always going to travel back. Nero has travelled back to a point in time before Data travelled back and changed the future so that Data will no longer go back therefore Data in the past is affected in the same way as Data in the future. IF you accept that the timeline in the future is overwritten by way of branching then alterations that affect the past will branch at the same time (same with Sisko replacing historical figure except that the picture should always have been Sisko... stoopid writers). The only way Data's head can exist in the past is if NuData in the future goes back. It won't be TOS or TNG Data unless somebody from this timeline travels to the prime timeline and steals the head to put it there AFTER the branching has occurred and all that would do would create another two new branches. His mere presence (or absence in the Prime timeline) would be another branching event.

We have also seen that, while the time travellers causing the branching event retain their memories, other people, including Data, are affected by time travel events, unlike Guinan, who retains a dim awareness of what has happened. If Data Prime's head is there, his memories will automatically change as the branching event occurs to reflect his future and this could include vanishing completely like Picard Time Squared I suppose.

In short, the existence of Data's head in Time's Arrow before he goes back shows us that such a thing is only possible if the event occurs in the timeline that exists at the time he is 'meant' to go back.

Spock Prime's memories are preserved because he went through the wormhole at the same time as Nero and/or because of the effects of proximity to red matter. There is a vague argument that Nero's memories should have 'changed' the instant that Spock went through, saving Romulas in the past but let's not complicate matters...

 

[F. King Daniel]

Data's head can't be in the past until he has travelled into the past

Wrong! (and this is my favourite bit): Because time is not linear, we only perceive it that way. All of time really happens all at once, as DS9's wormhole aliens make clear. Thus, in an infinitely branching multiverse happening all at once, there are no paradoxes.

^No. But there has to be an original timeline where Data's head wasn't there.

Yep. But we viewers never see it. There must be a true virgin timeline, before even the builders of the Guardian of Forever (2 billion years ago, or something like that?) or the Q (who existed a lot longer) started fupping with history.

 

[Pauln6]

Data's head can't be in the past until he has travelled into the past

Wrong! (and this is my favourite bit): Because time is not linear, we only perceive it that way. All of time really happens all at once, as DS9's wormhole aliens make clear. Thus, in an infinitely branching multiverse happening all at once, there are no paradoxes.

Thank you! This is what I've been trying to say.

Daniel's 'junk' from 'overwritten' timelines can exist just fine in such a multiverse. The real question is why does Daniels exist? If time happens everywhen all at once in near infinite combinations, we'd need an infinite number of Daniels all trying to make every universe the same. Can you imagine what his/their salary would cost?

 

[BillJ]

I apologise if I was a bit fuzzy in my use of language. I meant that I wasn't able to find any mention of scienitific support for Data Prime's head (i.e. the theory that would enable it to appear in the altered timeline), albeit in a very brief search. Still, since Data's head was under San Francisco all throughout TOS, he could still be referred to as TOS Data . Scientists seem to view paradoxes like Data's head either as a reason why time travel cannot possibly happen or as evidence that it is an incorrect theory of time travel.

From your own example (writer intent?) the approach becomes muddied again. Data's head existed under San Francisco before he travelled back because he was always going to travel back. Nero has travelled back to a point in time before Data travelled back and changed the future so that Data will no longer go back therefore Data in the past is affected in the same way as Data in the future. IF you accept that the timeline in the future is overwritten by way of branching then alterations that affect the past will branch at the same time (same with Sisko replacing historical figure except that the picture should always have been Sisko... stoopid writers). The only way Data's head can exist in the past is if NuData in the future goes back. It won't be TOS or TNG Data unless somebody from this timeline travels to the prime timeline and steals the head to put it there AFTER the branching has occurred and all that would do would create another two new branches. His mere presence (or absence in the Prime timeline) would be another branching event.

We have also seen that, while the time travellers causing the branching event retain their memories, other people, including Data, are affected by time travel events, unlike Guinan, who retains a dim awareness of what has happened. If Data Prime's head is there, his memories will automatically change as the branching event occurs to reflect his future and this could include vanishing completely like Picard Time Squared I suppose.

In short, the existence of Data's head in Time's Arrow before he goes back shows us that such a thing is only possible if the event occurs in the timeline that exists at the time he is 'meant' to go back.

Spock Prime's memories are preserved because he went through the wormhole at the same time as Nero and/or because of the effects of proximity to red matter. There is a vague argument that Nero's memories should have 'changed' the instant that Spock went through, saving Romulas in the past but let's not complicate matters...

You're really over-thinking this and making it far more difficult than it needs to be. Why would Data forget events that happened to him from a timeline that still exists?

The new timeline is just a continuing sequence of events from 2387. No different than today being Saturday and tomorrow being Sunday. The new timeline cannot exist without the totality of events of the "original" timeline.

 

[Pauln6]

You're really over-thinking this and making it far more difficult than it needs to be. Why would Data forget events that happened to him from a timeline that still exists?

The new timeline is just a continuing sequence of events from 2387. No different than today being Saturday and tomorrow being Sunday. The new timeline cannot exist without the totality of events of the "original" timeline.

Because of this:

Because time is not linear, we only perceive it that way. All of time really happens all at once, as DS9's wormhole aliens make clear. Thus, in an infinitely branching multiverse happening all at once, there are no paradoxes.

NuData can only remember events that have occurred (or will occur) in this timeline. Time travel in Star Trek only appears to preserve the memories of the time travellers creating the branching event or people with temporal shielding. Since Data did not create this branching event, his memories will adjust around it.

 

[BillJ]

You're really over-thinking this and making it far more difficult than it needs to be. Why would Data forget events that happened to him from a timeline that still exists?

The new timeline is just a continuing sequence of events from 2387. No different than today being Saturday and tomorrow being Sunday. The new timeline cannot exist without the totality of events of the "original" timeline.

Because of this:

Because time is not linear, we only perceive it that way. All of time really happens all at once, as DS9's wormhole aliens make clear. Thus, in an infinitely branching multiverse happening all at once, there are no paradoxes.

NuData can only remember events that have occurred (or will occur) in this timeline. Time travel in Star Trek only appears to preserve the memories of the time travellers creating the branching event or people with temporal shielding. Since Data did not create this branching event, his memories will adjust around it.

Data is a holdover from the Prime universe... not a new construct experiencing things for the first time. He exists in the Prime line before the branching occurs.

Your saying that if they dig up Data in 2234 of the new timeline that his head would be devoid of information. You have no indication that Data and NuData are/will be in any way similar. Or that a NuData will ever be constructed at all.

There is no reason to believe that an artificial construct from the future lost in the past would be in any way affected by a branching of the timeline.

 

[F. King Daniel]

TNG Data is simply from a different branch of the future than the STXI gang. His memories would be no more altered than Spock Prime, Nero, Daniels, Future Guy, Captain Braxton, Admiral Janeway or anyone else's were.

SGU did a great spin on this in season 2.5. The duplicate Destiny and the lives of it's crew in the past had zero effect on the lives of the versions in the timeline we (the viewers) saw.

 

[Pauln6]

Data is a holdover from the Prime universe... not a new construct experiencing things for the first time. He exists in the Prime line before the branching occurs.

Your saying that if they dig up Data in 2234 of the new timeline that his head would be devoid of information. You have no indication that Data and NuData are/will be in any way similar. Or that a NuData will ever be constructed at all.

There is no reason to believe that an artificial construct from the future lost in the past would be in any way affected by a branching of the timeline.

People view the branching event as 'creating' the new timeline from nothing. It doesn't. We are looking at two parallel timelines that APPEAR identical to the viewers and characters 'until' Nero travels back. Nero doesn't create duplicate people with new histories; he's steering identical people who already existed in a different quantum reality in a new direction i.e. their history is 'branching' in a new direction away from the parallel. He is the cause of the branching off, the branching is 'alternate' to what would have happened if he had not arrived but the reality doesn't spring into existence because of him. The Data in this quantum reality would have known everything that Data Prime knew if Nero had not arrived but Nero's presence has now changed that. The history of the two timelines was never identical because time occurs everywhen all at once. Nero was always going to come here.

SGU dealt with two Destinies from two quantum realities somehow ending up in the same quantum reality. I think a Voyager episode did something similar. We know that didn't happen because Data Prime got his old head back in his quantum reality.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Nothing about time happening all at once precludes branching histories with a common past.

A common past, the timeline branching out for every possible outcome of every event anywhere ever and history happening all at once accounts for and fits every Star Trek time travel story except "Year of Hell"

Was "Time's Arrow" a predestination paradox, or did it just seem that way? In the "City on the Edge of Forever" timeline, Nazis may have found and reanimated Data's head. And it would have been the same Data we saw from "Farpoint" all the way up to "Time's Arrow" in the same way STXI's Old Spock is the guy from "The Cage" through to "Unification"

If the timelines are always seperate and only seem identical until, say, Nero appears in 2233 then the there are paradoxes and artifacts and ghosts of other histories. That's not a problem in a branching multiverse. The shared past is merely littered with artifacts from other futures and we're watching a heavily changed, branch from the get-go.

 

[Pauln6]

In the "City on the Edge of Forever" timeline, Nazis may have found and reanimated Data's head. And it would have been the same Data we saw from "Farpoint" all the way up to "Time's Arrow" in the same way STXI's Old Spock is the guy from "The Cage" through to "Unification"

If the timelines are always seperate and only seem identical until, say, Nero appears in 2233 then the there are paradoxes and artifacts and ghosts of other histories. That's not a problem in a branching multiverse. The shared past is merely littered with artifacts from other futures and we're watching a heavily changed, branch from the get-go.

Lol - I'm not sure if you are agreeing with me or not... It would not be the SAME Data per se, it would be a different quantum reality Data with an identical history up to that point. None of this precludes items or people from other quantum realities turning up in any other reality. However, the same person or item can't be in more than one reality - wasn't that the point of the Worf story in Parallels?

 

[F. King Daniel]

As much the same Data as possible, identical through the TNG future and the past up until "City on the Edge of Forever". At the point McCoy jumps into the past, the timeline branches into "Edith dies, Nazis lose", "Edith lives, Nazis win" and billions of unseen variations. But his memories and experiences of the Enterprise-D would be unchanged.

If the timelines were always seperate, "time travel" is replaced with Sliders-style universe hopping. That's not the case.