'Kelvin' Timeline was almost the 'Hobus' Timeline

[WebLurker]

Yeah, we are pretty much running into a significant logic problem if there is the demand for Spock to go back and undo the destruction of Vulcan due to the number of lives lost. It pretty much sets up a problem of, "Why not go back and save all the lives?" or "We only go back and save lives when it is so many." Either one presents issues because it makes the characters having to play almost a god role of deciding who lives and who dies.

It's kind of like what happened with Superman with "Man of Steel." Superman has the power (we've seen it) to go back and time but only uses the power when impacts him personally. So, despite the significant levels of destruction in "Man of Steel" none of it impacted Superman personally so no time travel. Same with VOY in "Endgame" where Janeway decides to impact many hundreds of thousands if not millions of lives just because she had a personal loss. Apparently going back and preventing Voyager from going back in the first place and saving her first officer, or even going back and stopping the Borg didn't occur to her. Only certain lives matter.

It's quite a dangerous argument to make.

Yeah, can agree with all that. Not something the franchise has invoked that much in the TV shows and movies, although the Sciences rule book for the Star Trek Advenutures RPG did devote a bit of the time travel section to the murky questions, like someone being ordered to let their daughter be wiped from existence because she wasn't "supposed" to exist. The old LUG RPG also had a similar campaign story idea where a time travel accident flings an early victim of a plague into the future, forcing the players to have to decide if they can condemn this person to the horrible life they would've lead for the greater good (curing the plague) or to try and find a way to ensure the cure is found without forcing patient zero to her original destiny. Something that could be quite interesting to see play out on TV in the franchise; the ethics of time travel and how far can you go with crossing the line.

However, I was thinking in a more practical standpoint; how would Spock even be able to stop the accident even if he had a time ship, set up a warp core implosion, or rigged up a sling shot? I don't see how he can make it back to the prime universe while being stuck in the Kelvin timeline to prevent himself and Nero from being sucked into the red matter black hole, and I don't see how he'd be able to stop Nero from destroying the Kelvin by going back to Kelvin timeline 2233. Also pretty sure Starfleet would stop him from meddling if they got wind of it.

So, yeah, I agree that Spock should've fixed the timeline if he could, but I don't see how he had the means to do that.

 

[Discofan]

Yeah, can agree with all that. Not something the franchise has invoked that much in the TV shows and movies, although the Sciences rule book for the Star Trek Advenutures RPG did devote a bit of the time travel section to the murky questions, like someone being ordered to let their daughter be wiped from existence because she wasn't "supposed" to exist. The old LUG RPG also had a similar campaign story idea where a time travel accident flings an early victim of a plague into the future, forcing the players to have to decide if they can condemn this person to the horrible life they would've lead for the greater good (curing the plague) or to try and find a way to ensure the cure is found without forcing patient zero to her original destiny. Something that could be quite interesting to see play out on TV in the franchise; the ethics of time travel and how far can you go with crossing the line.

However, I was thinking in a more practical standpoint; how would Spock even be able to stop the accident even if he had a time ship, set up a warp core implosion, or rigged up a sling shot? I don't see how he can make it back to the prime universe while being stuck in the Kelvin timeline to prevent himself and Nero from being sucked into the red matter black hole, and I don't see how he'd be able to stop Nero from destroying the Kelvin by going back to Kelvin timeline 2233. Also pretty sure Starfleet would stop him from meddling if they got wind of it.

So, yeah, I agree that Spock should've fixed the timeline if he could, but I don't see how he had the means to do that.

Neither Spock nor Nero destroyed the timeline they were originally from (otherwise they'd both disappear from existence, being without cause), they created a new one where Vulcan was destroyed. So any supplemental effort would not change the timeline(s) already created, it would just create new ones where Vulcan may or may not be destroyed.

 

[WebLurker]

Neither Spock nor Nero destroyed the timeline they were originally from (otherwise they'd both disappear from existence, being without cause), they created a new one where Vulcan was destroyed. So any supplemental effort would not change the timeline(s) already created, it would just create new ones where Vulcan may or may not be destroyed.

Unfortunately, in the Star Trek universe, things can exist without a cause when time travel is involved; "Yesterday's Enterprise"/"Redemption, Parts I and II" (TNG), "Past Tense" (DS9), "Visionary" (DS9), First Contact/"Regeneration" (ENT)/"Q Who" (TNG), "Timeless" (VOY), and "Endgame" (VOY) being such examples. So, yeah, Spock and Nero could exist in an alternate past even if their home timeline was wiped out. Heck, when it doesn't happen, it's the exception, not the rule in Star Trek.

(Frankly, the most likely things worked is that the prime universe was indeed overwritten into the Kelvin timeline, and that what we now know as the prime universe, where Picard is set and all that, is a "backup" quantum reality created due to at least one of the possible outcomes of the Horbus incident being Nero and Spock not being flung into the past when they were sucked into the black hole. A difference with no difference, if you will.)

 

[Discofan]

Unfortunately, in the Star Trek universe, things can exist without a cause when time travel is involved; "Yesterday's Enterprise"/"Redemption, Parts I and II" (TNG), "Past Tense" (DS9), "Visionary" (DS9), First Contact/"Regeneration" (ENT)/"Q Who" (TNG), "Timeless" (VOY), and "Endgame" (VOY) being such examples. So, yeah, Spock and Nero could exist in an alternate past even if their home timeline was wiped out. Heck, when it doesn't happen, it's the exception, not the rule in Star Trek.
...

In that case, how do you explain that old(er) Molly disappears as soon as her younger self gets through the time portal?

 

[WebLurker]

In that case, how do you explain that old(er) Molly disappears as soon as her younger self gets through the time portal?

Exception due to the specific circumstances of that time travel event.

Look, we all know the franchise has used different models over time. We can make inferences based on stuff, like the fact that "time travel overwrites the original timeline and time travelers are protected from erasing their own histories" is the mostly commonly used model and maybe accept the hand wave that the rules can change based on the circumstances, but it is a fact in the Star Trek universe that things can exist without a cause in these incidents. We've seen it happen onscreen. The only question is how we rationalize that working with the instances where it does not.

 

[Smellmet]

Star trek has been going that long, through different eras of science that there's bound to be some inconsistencies to time travel stories, which are problematic at the best of times. I don't take issue with how it was done in 09 at all.

 

[Discofan]

The problem IMO is with inconsistencies inside a series. That a series contradicts another is perfectly understandable but when Ent, for example, in one season says that there is a delay before changes done in the past reach the present and later in that same season there is no such delay, I kinda feel like I've been cheated. Like:" It doesn't matter what we say to them, their attention span is that of a goldfish!"...

 

[MakeshiftPython]

ENT was definitely inconsistent in that regard, but it was a very odd season where the writers were attempting to have their cake and eat it too in regards to serving both episodic and serialized storytelling. An like “Twilight” that is relatively standalone but using the Xindi arc as a backdrop rather than an alien of the week.

 

[XCV330]

Star Trek seems to imply different aations can cause new time lines to develop, branching off from major events, but some events only effect the time line you are in, whereas other events can create branching looping tangential universes that can seemingly wink out of existence once their causation is removed. Then there are preexisting universes that maybe always existed and run parallel.

 

[Discofan]

Star Trek seems to imply different aations can cause new time lines to develop, branching off from major events, but some events only effect the time line you are in, whereas other events can create branching looping tangential universes that can seemingly wink out of existence once their causation is removed. Then there are preexisting universes that maybe always existed and run parallel.

Too many cooks...

 

[fireproof78]

Star Trek seems to imply different aations can cause new time lines to develop, branching off from major events, but some events only effect the time line you are in, whereas other events can create branching looping tangential universes that can seemingly wink out of existence once their causation is removed. Then there are preexisting universes that maybe always existed and run parallel.

Like the Mirror Universe. Or Lazarus' universe.

Also, this thread was discussing that hopping parallel universes doesn't happen with time travel and yet ENT actually shows that it does. I know someone mentioned it up thread but it bears repeating. The Interphase that consumed the Defiant took it to the Mirror Universe's past. So, both universe jumping and time travel.

Star Trek 2009: more consistent with Trek lore than previously thought.

 

[Phoenix219]

So time travel may be a component in dimensional hopping - initiating a rewrite of the dimension they are entering at the moment they start interfering with that universe's proper timeline. It means nothing for solo time travel within a single universe.

 

[MakeshiftPython]

You’re still griping about that?

 

[Phoenix219]

You’re still griping about that?

Just been a busy weekend.... haven't had time to catch up with everything and respond to everything from earlier.

 

[Phoenix219]

However, I was thinking in a more practical standpoint; how would Spock even be able to stop the accident even if he had a time ship, set up a warp core implosion, or rigged up a sling shot? I don't see how he can make it back to the prime universe while being stuck in the Kelvin timeline to prevent himself and Nero from being sucked into the red matter black hole, and I don't see how he'd be able to stop Nero from destroying the Kelvin by going back to Kelvin timeline 2233. Also pretty sure Starfleet would stop him from meddling if they got wind of it.

So, yeah, I agree that Spock should've fixed the timeline if he could, but I don't see how he had the means to do that.

So that should have been his new life's mission at the end of '09 - could have led to some interesting interactions between the characters, like Pine Kirk wondering what happens to them, if it would be like none of this even happened, and Quinto interjecting that their lives are no less important than these possible counterparts, leading to Nimoy quoting "The Needs of the Many... " to his younger self, regarding the deaths of billions of Vulcans.

Yeah, we are pretty much running into a significant logic problem if there is the demand for Spock to go back and undo the destruction of Vulcan due to the number of lives lost. It pretty much sets up a problem of, "Why not go back and save all the lives?" or "We only go back and save lives when it is so many." Either one presents issues because it makes the characters having to play almost a god role of deciding who lives and who dies.

Its not just about the number of lives - although numbers in the billions could make the argument that it *always* worth trying to save that many - but its about the fact that none of them were *supposed* to die but for outside temporal influence... or even invaders-from-another-universe interference. No one is saying to try to save every single person ever - but if it is blatantly clear that this was all a mistake, i think the importance of rectifying such an event is much more paramount. Its the exact opposite of what Janeway did, more along the lines of Yesterday's Enterprise - the war was never supposed to happen. .

Again, this argument means that every single disaster that has occurred, form the Dominion War, to the Xindi attack, Wolf 359, or even the Hobus supernova, is to get traveled back in time and avoided.

Only if they were altered from extra-universal interference.

Still mad they never undid the Xindi attack in 2153? 7 million humans killed that weren't supposed to be...

Still haven't gotten that far in Enterprise (doing a complete watch through for the first time) and I didn't know the Xindi was a time travel arc, apparently? Big difference between 7 million and some number of Billion.... thats a fraction of a percent in the big picture.

 

[fireproof78]

Only if they were altered from extra-universal interference.

One could argue that Q's interference could count.

Also, I am tremendously uncomfortable that if the number is high enough then we go save lives. Other than that, screw it. It's unsettling to basically quantify a disaster to argue for time travel intervention. By this same argument, Spock should go forward in time to stop the Hobus event.

 

[Discofan]

Q has the added power of being able to change anything in the timeline without any side consequences. Like he would replace Hitler with a woman and everything else would remain strictly the same. That's Stark Trek for you, sometimes it's little more than a glorified fairytale, if that.

 

[Phoenix219]

One could argue that Q's interference could count.

Also, I am tremendously uncomfortable that if the number is high enough then we go save lives. Other than that, screw it. It's unsettling to basically quantify a disaster to argue for time travel intervention. By this same argument, Spock should go forward in time to stop the Hobus event.

As far as Q goes, I have yet to see any solid proof that his powers do anything more than make glorified impossible to escape holodeck type bubbles where all of his fantasy changes take place.

As for Spock, yeah, he absolutely should - it would be the best way of fixing the problem. It would make for a great "life's work" for him to dedicate to.

Actually, the story in my head (until Nimoy passed) was a super duper Older Spock (Nimoy) using any and all means necessary, including periods of self induced coma and/or cryogenics, plus advanced anti-aging techniques, to stay alive long enough to be there for another attempt at the end of the 24th century to stop the Supernova, with Quinto Spock as Old Spock assisting him, attempting to set things right and save Vulcan. Older Spock's final act before he passes would be hitting the button that saves his home planet and the timeline.

 

[F. King Daniel]

So that should have been his new life's mission at the end of '09 - could have led to some interesting interactions between the characters, like Pine Kirk wondering what happens to them, if it would be like none of this even happened, and Quinto interjecting that their lives are no less important than these possible counterparts, leading to Nimoy quoting "The Needs of the Many... " to his younger self, regarding the deaths of billions of Vulcans.



Its not just about the number of lives - although numbers in the billions could make the argument that it *always* worth trying to save that many - but its about the fact that none of them were *supposed* to die but for outside temporal influence... or even invaders-from-another-universe interference. No one is saying to try to save every single person ever - but if it is blatantly clear that this was all a mistake, i think the importance of rectifying such an event is much more paramount. Its the exact opposite of what Janeway did, more along the lines of Yesterday's Enterprise - the war was never supposed to happen. .



Only if they were altered from extra-universal interference.



Still haven't gotten that far in Enterprise (doing a complete watch through for the first time) and I didn't know the Xindi was a time travel arc, apparently? Big difference between 7 million and some number of Billion.... thats a fraction of a percent in the big picture.

Okay, so what is the number if victims that makes a time travel-related disaster worth fixing? Where do you draw the line?

And if you've seen as far as "Shockwave" you know the difference one man disappearing from a vital moment can have.

 

[Discofan]

Okay, so what is the number if victims that makes a time travel-related disaster worth fixing? Where do you draw the line?

And if you've seen as far as "Shockwave" you know the difference one man disappearing from a vital moment can have.

I just have a hard time believing that that man would be Archer. If anything his disappearance would have made things better. Like he's the reason why the Andorians bombarded the Vulcan monastery... Gazelle, my ass!!