Picard, 'Yesterday's Enterprise' & polluting the timeline

[Saul]

^ How do you know that Sela didn't exist all along? Just because we never saw her before "The Mind's Eye" doesn't mean she wasn't around.

Then we are getting into schroeder's cat territory if we are looking at it that way.

What we know about Predestination paradox based on TV, it's one timeline, nothing changed and events always played out that way.
'Yesterday's Enerprise' is not that because it introduces an element from an alternate timeline (alternate Tasha) who no longer exists in the original timeline.

There is absolutely no proof that the timeline at the end of YE wasn't exactly the same one as existed at the beginning. The timeline was only changed once; at the end, everything was reset to the way it was before.

Not exactly. In 'Yesterday's Enterprise' it was implied that the Enterprise C was/would be destroyed with all onboard while in Redemption there was a mention of survivors.

And again, we seem to be taking it on faith that Sela is who she says she is. I'm not sure we should be doing that. Assuming she is indeed Romulan...why should we believe a word she says?

She has intimate details of her mother, probably she can DNA test if requested. It's a very strange play by the Romulans to make up such a story that a dead crew member was still alive in another timeline and went back into the past of their timeline to give birth to Sela. Guinan confirms who Sela is too doesn't she?

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

'Yesterday's Enerprise' is not that because it introduces an element from an alternate timeline (alternate Tasha) who no longer exists in the original timeline.

Again: We have no proof that Sela didn't always exist, even before the events of YE were shown.

 

[Saul]

Yes, and we also have no proof that Sela isn't married to Future guy (aka no proof that it's not future Jonathan Archer) and on her days off she likes to throw darts at pictures of Captain Janeway while eating ice-cream. We have no proof that Mickey Mouse isn't a crew member aboard the Enterprise D in this timeline. What's your point? I can only argue about what we saw onscreen, Sela didn't exist in our minds and the minds of the writers until season 4. Myself and Starfleet don't have proof that she always existed in that timeline and who the hell would in a timeline that was altered without their knowledge. Except Guinan!

 

[DonIago]

In other words, you acknowledge that Sela may always have existed in the "original" timeline.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

Not exactly. In 'Yesterday's Enterprise' it was implied that the Enterprise C was/would be destroyed with all onboard while in Redemption there was a mention of survivors.

YE as we saw it, does not rule out the possibility of survivors. It isn't even discussed.

 

[Dukhat]

The problem with the Sela character is that she really doesn't make much sense. Because she exists, we're expected to believe that:

1. Going back 22 years into the past, alternate-Tasha survived long enough to have a child with a high-ranking admiral (never mind why said admiral would even want to do that), and was either interrogated about Picard and the Enterprise-D, or at least told Sela about it, who then presumably told other members of the Romulan military. Either way, the Romulans know the existence of Picard and the Enterprise-D from two decades in the future, and that Tasha will be part of his crew. And yet there's no attempt by the Romulans to take advantage of this (the best idea being that the Romulans could have kidnapped Prime Tasha and replaced her with Sela, since they both look alike!)

2. That a 20-something half-Romulan, half-human girl could rise up so fast in the Romulan military that she's in command of ships and forces above other more seasoned officers just because her daddy was some bigwig?

3. That Sela never once tried to contact Prime Tasha, even if it was just to tell her how much she hated her? Hell, at the least she could have been on the Romulan Warbird that makes first contact with the Enterprise at the end of "The Neutral Zone!"

While it's true that we can't speculate either way about whether Sela existed before YE or not, I find it telling that we didn't hear a peep out of her or that the Romulans never took advantage of their knowledge of the future before YE.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

1. I'm not sure how much useful intelligence that alt-Tasha and the rest of the Enterprise-C survivors would really have had...the fact that there exists an officer named Picard (who is already an adult in 2344 anyway) and that there will one day be an Enterprise-D (which none of the Ent-C crew were aboard long enough to gain any useful information on) doesn't seem that important, in the grand scheme of things. I'm sure that the Ent-C survivors were all interrogated and executed - despite Tasha's father's "deal" to spare them, which I'm sure he never intended to keep - but they probably couldn't tell the Romulans very much.

2. Sela's father surely fast-tracked her through the Romulan military and ensured she got all the best connections, quickly, before anyone else did. Didn't Sela say that her father was very wealthy and powerful? With his name backing her, Sela probably zoomed up the chain of command.

3. I'm definitely not surprised Sela never once tried to contact Tasha-prime. Sela hates her mother so much that Sela doesn't even consider herself even part human, and probably wants to forget Tasha ever existed.

 

[Ithekro]

Alt.Tasha's information about Picard might have resulted in the cloning attempt that resulted in Star Trek Nemesis.

 

[Dukhat]

1. I'm not sure how much useful intelligence that alt-Tasha and the rest of the Enterprise-C survivors would really have had...the fact that there exists an officer named Picard (who is already an adult in 2344 anyway) and that there will one day be an Enterprise-D (which none of the Ent-C crew were aboard long enough to gain any useful information on) doesn't seem that important, in the grand scheme of things. I'm sure that the Ent-C survivors were all interrogated and executed - despite Tasha's father's "deal" to spare them, which I'm sure he never intended to keep - but they probably couldn't tell the Romulans very much.

2. Sela's father surely fast-tracked her through the Romulan military and ensured she got all the best connections, quickly, before anyone else did. Didn't Sela say that her father was very wealthy and powerful? With his name backing her, Sela probably zoomed up the chain of command.

3. I'm definitely not surprised Sela never once tried to contact Tasha-prime. Sela hates her mother so much that Sela doesn't even consider herself even part human, and probably wants to forget Tasha ever existed.

1. Alt-Tasha was the security chief of the most advanced Starfleet warship from 20 years in the future. The knowledge she would have had would be invaluable to the Romulans.

2. It's inconceivable to me that a 20 year old girl would be in the position Sela was in, even if she was fast-tracked. That's like saying that a newly minted ensign straight out of Naval Academy graduation is now in command of a fleet of U.S. Navy warships just because his dad had some pull with the Chief of Naval Operations.

3. I doubt it would really matter whether Sela hated her mother or not. She's just a cog in the overall Romulan military. If her superiors decided she was going to contact Tasha (or better yet, infiltrate the Ent-D by assuming Tasha's identity), then she would have to do it.

Alt.Tasha's information about Picard might have resulted in the cloning attempt that resulted in Star Trek Nemesis.

Yeah. That would have made the whole idiotic cloning idea make more sense. Too bad that was never actually addressed in the film. I guess dune buggy races were more important than logical explanations.

 

[M'rk son of Mogh]

Has anybody played Star Trek: Online?

According to that, Sela's actions make her one of the biggest menaces of the galaxy, and it's all Picard's fault by creating her.

Spoiler

She goes back in time and takes something from the Iconians that basically houses their cultural identity and all that they are, which eventually leads to a huge war between them and us. Even the Conspiracy aliens are the cause of this!

 

[DonIago]

I prefer the novelverse version.