Living Witness

[hux]

Why, after 700 years plus, hasn't the federation reached Kyrian and Vaskan space - when the doctor is activated, they have no knowledge of humans or the federation other than through their knowledge of voyager

At maximum warp, it would apparently take 70 years to reach the alpha quadrant so presumably 700 years is more than enough time for the federation to have made contact (and that doesn't even take into account, technological advances)

so why, after 700 years, are the kyrians and vaskans totally unaware of the federation - is the federation over - did the dominion destroy it - surely the federation would have travelled that far within the space of 700 years

 

[The_Baroness]

Why, after 700 years plus, hasn't the federation reached Kyrian and Vaskan space - when the doctor is activated, they have no knowledge of humans or the federation other than through their knowledge of voyager

At maximum warp, it would apparently take 70 years to reach the alpha quadrant so presumably 700 years is more than enough time for the federation to have made contact (and that doesn't even take into account, technological advances)

so why, after 700 years, are the kyrians and vaskans totally unaware of the federation - is the federation over - did the dominion destroy it - surely the federation would have travelled that far within the space of 700 years

just because they're likely to be able to travel there easily by then, doesn't mean they will. They can't go everywhere.

Or, maybe given the state of conflict that area was in when Voyager went through the Feds have avoided it.

Or maybe, Voyagers databases have shown that theres not much in that area of interest to the feddies.

Even if they don't advance Warp tech, 70 years is a long time to travel in one direction to look at a planet that someones already been to...

 

[Timo]

...And if technological advances make it trivial to travel that far, the future UFP may decide the Kyrians are too primitive in comparison and cannot be contacted due to Prime Directive concerns.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[F. King Daniel]

In 700 years anything could have happened. The Federation might not even exist anymore

I loved this episode. They should have done a Good Voyager vs. Evil Voyager alternate universe crossover episode. It would have been cheesy, yet awesome.

But how come this is the only time the Doctor ever has a back up??

 

[Timo]

Might be they only figured out how to create one some time after "Endgame", in that alternate reality where the ship took the long route home. There's no stardate on "Living Witness", so its 24th century parts might have taken place during the 8th season for all we know.

That'd mean they went back and picked up Neelix again, though. So perhaps something between "Homestead" and the last time they complain they can't back up the EMH would be the right timeslot for this one?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[The_Baroness]

So essentially, you can recreate as many copies of the Doctor as you like so long as it's for 'back up' purposes.

Reckon in the 24th century, people download pirate copies of him?

....they'd have to program him with a pirate hat of course.

 

[Michael]

I have nothing valueable to add but: Best episode of the whole series! I love "Living Witness".

 

[Guy Gardener]

This is how the Prime Directive works.

As the Federation makes certain technological leaps that redefine them as a people and separate them vastly/further from the younger species who have not figured out now simple technologies that it would be incredibly dangerous to share these advances with other space faring cultures because they would most likely do something stupid and get themselves killed or light up a crusade, it's the Federations responsibility to section themselves off from these younger races for their own protection.

I see transwarp and time travel as two bench marks which with the increasing sophistication of the federation will be means enough to seriously think about pairing down their list of friends and acquaintances who are too stupid to handle responsibly what the federation takes for granted.

With a big enough transwarp reactor they'll be able to shield off the entire federation like China did with that wall of theirs when they decided they were too cool for school.

With complete control of time they'll be able to physically remove the federation that it won't even be noticeable to the prying eyes of the filth and rabble still skirting around with "warp".

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

The Kyrians and Vaskans probably don't yet qualify for Federation membership. One of the requirements is that a planet have a single, unified global government.

 

[Anwar]

But usually there aren't two separate species living on one world in Trek. They WERE both from the same planet, right?

 

[KNH]

But how come this is the only time the Doctor ever has a back up??

Could be that after the events of Critical Care (7x05) they figured a genuine, useful backup couldn't hurt and started to implement one.

Was there a stardate or such given for when the doctor was borrowed in Living Witness?

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

But usually there aren't two separate species living on one world in Trek. They WERE both from the same planet, right?

But they had separate governments, didn't they?

 

[Guy Gardener]

What exactly got deleted when the Doctor murdered the Equinox EMH?

Was there a blank slate of absolute nothingness or was just the "personality" destroyed that there was still the factory specifications left in tact that that Hologram could be retasked if only to be slaved to mimic Voyagers Doctor program for in case of emergency.

 

[HoneyBLilly]

I'm sorry. There was more stuff going on in this episode other than seeing Kate look ravishing with those gloves on and being evil. I never noticed . . .

There's probably a back-up because Doc and Seven had one hidden just in case something happened to him.

 

[Anwar]

They built a backup for the Doc, and then lost the one backup they were able to build to the Kyrians and couldn't make another.

Easy as pie.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Kim tried as hard as he could to make a back up and failed.

Things change.

 

[Anwar]

On-Screen, he tried and failed. Off-screen/between episodes he succeeded and then the one copy he made was lost and they couldn't do it again.

 

[Guy Gardener]

What part of "things change" did it make it seem that I didn't already say what you just said?

Message in a bottle was half way through season 4.

Besides after they got the 29th century codecs they were easily able to reduce the doctor down to portable size and every thing he claimed about his program being bound to sickbay in eye of the needle was moot.

 

[Timo]

Was there a stardate or such given for when the doctor was borrowed in "Living Witness"?

None. That part of the episode could fit in anywhere between "The Gift" where we get Seven and lose Kes, and "Homestead" where we lose Neelix, especially considering that it's an inaccurate description of the events.

They built a backup for the Doc, and then lost the one backup they were able to build to the Kyrians and couldn't make another.

The one implausible thing about this is the idea that they'd lose the ability to make further backups. That makes no sense: they were never short on spares in the final seasons, always finding friendly suppliers if they just kept on looking long and hard enough. And the EMH program got more and more adept at jumping from hardware to hardware as time passed, thus probably becoming easier rather than harder to back up. Why would they lose the ability to make backups?

"Critical Care" establishes that our heroes (still) lack the ability in early Season 7, unless we're to interpret the episode so that the thief accidentally destroyed our heroes' EMH backups when stealing the original. (He wouldn't have deliberately destroyed them, as he wanted to hide the theft.)

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Guy Gardener]

I have a darker thought.

What if all the other backups, were also stolen and put to task?

And even if they didn't steal the back ups, they could have made their own back ups by the thousand and the tens of thousand...

Are we positive that Voyager rescued them too?

And what would Janeway do with a spare 10,000 EMH mark1's? Except cull them, since destroying (it's not murder if they're not sentient.) the technology is more moral them letting a savage child race exploit itself with stolen Federation (implying culpability) technology that they were weeks away from using the EMH as a template for Holographic paratroopers who were going to crusade rape and pillage (In olden days (Thinking mostly about the Mongols, but others too) rape was a tool of war not enjoyment. It pacified spirits and polluted the genepools of your victims that their children would be more like you then them. Really dark shit. So yes there is a reason the holograms would rape.) across that world and maybe the next few in the sector.

The Module was probably B'Elanna's first (or so) attempt at a mobile emitter using 24th century contemporary hardware, since (logically) it's a violation of the Prime Directive to steal/acquire technology through timetravel.

They're all very bad people.