Prime Directive? Yay-nay

[shanejayell]

The Prime Directive is a good guideline, but applying it should be taken on a case by case basis.

 

[Anwar]

I actually agreed with Picard's position in "Homeward". It would've taken hundreds of Starships working around the clock to evacuate that planet, and then they'd have to find another world and resettle them while leaving a sizable team of experts to help the people adjust to their new world and deal with the amount of extreme damage this would've all done to them in the first place.

And after they did this, it would set a precedent. The pro-interventionalists on Earth would keep using it as an example of what they should be doing ALL the time.

Where are the ships, personnel and resources for this kind of Galactic Babying supposed to come from? Starfleet would have to pull assigned personell from other duties to do so, like defense.

You just have to look at the bigger picture and most of these "monstrous" actions actually make sense, even if you don't like them.

I think you vastly overestimate how often extinction events occur, even distributed amongst, say, ten thousand worlds with intelligent life, on the timescale of humanoid existence. Even then, many of the ones that do occur involve object collision, which are really easy to deal with when you have a tractor beam and are able to catch the offending objects hundreds of years before they strike.

On the other hand, an economic argument is far more palatable than a moral one in this case.

Sometimes nasty things like said meteor collisions and other disasters are ultimately good for a civilization to grow and change. Adversity and all that are necessary things for any civilization to go through if they want to become stronger and better. If you baby them through everything they may never realize their own potential as a culture because they never had to really go through anything bad to begin with.

 

[The Badger]

I didn't vote because there are two very different Prime Directives.
In Kirk's era, the PD existed to protect a civilizations natural social development. As Anwar points out, struggling against adversity is an important factor in the development of civilizations. So Starfleet shouldn't go rushing in to help any pre-warp civilisation that has a volcano, or hurricane, or tsunami.
On the other hand, in TOS the UFP will step in to prevent extinction level events. After all, no civilization that has ever been totally wiped out has ever gone on to bigger and better things. Clearly, at this time, a natural disaster was not automatically considered part of the normal social development of a species.

By Picard's time, however, things had very much changed. If a species faced total annihalition from a natural disaster, then the UFP would simply leave them to their fate. In fact, I recall a speech of Picard's, I can't remember from which episode, where he says that the PD is essentially there to protect them from having to make difficult decisions. From a protective rule to a selfish one.

A few years ago there was a rumour going round that a number of Nu-Trek writers disliked Rodenberries insistence on the PD, and so deliberately set out to portray it in the worst possible light. I've no idea if that is true or not, but if it is it certainly explains a lot.

 

[iguana_tonante]

I agree in principle. Do not mess with other planets, especially if they are technologically less advance. Even with the best intentions, it usually ends in cultural contamination, and the fall of the less advanced civilization. You start helping and you'll end up ruling. "Younger" civilization will face struggles and unrest, but they also have great potential: who knows what would come from that potential? It's like agricultural standardization vs. diversity: standardization might be more efficient, but it's also more dangerous: a plague and you'll end up with nothing. With diversity, you have more potential for surviving dramatic events. Let's say that the Federation society would fall in anarchy and strife: maybe that backward little planet, let alone in its development and spared of the hassle, would the lightbearer of a new interstellar civilization.

Letting civilizations dying by natural disasters is a tragedy and should not be allowed on moral ground. However, I agree that saving them pose an enormous burden on Starfleet, that would soon devour all its funding and personnels. Just to make a comparison, the First World have the financial resource to feed all the people in Third World's nations. Why it isn't done? Greed and selfishness? Sure. But also because it would be a huge on national economies and personal finances of the single citizen. Not ever in Federation's "evolved sensibilities" it would be possible for a government to act like that.

That said, if there is possibility of avoid their fate and a rational cost in terms of endeavour and feasibility, it should be done.

 

[Aquehonga]

The Prime Directive is just self-righteous smug gobbledygook.

The PD has hideous, destructive consequences if adhered to.

The Temporal Prime Directive. Now that makes sense kid.

 

[trilbymonkey]

Caveat: I love TOS and Kirk.

"You're . . . stagnant. . . . You were meant to struggle . . . and CLAW yourwaythroughlife, not be . . . happy. You'll suffer . . . and . . . cry . . . but . . . we'll send a team of Federation advisors later. Bye."

Wow, it's like he's in the room!

 

[JustKate]

I notice that everybody who claims to dislike the Prime Directive doesn't really offer a viable alternative. It's easy to say, as Aquehonga does, that "The Prime Directive is just self-righteous smug gobbledygook," but...does that mean there should be no rule at all?

I think what people really mean is that a strict interpretation of the Prime Directive can be harmful, and they're right - then again, ignoring it can be harmful as well. But as we've seen over and over again, the PD isn't interpreted all that strictly, at least not consistently. What the exceptions are, I don't know and I don't think we're told explicity, but clearly there are some.

I'd rather a society have a standard, even if it can't always meet that standard, then just bounce through the galaxy doing whatever the heck it wanted.

 

[Aquehonga]

The PD? Have the PD or not to have the PD? That is the question. One of ST's Great Debates.

Beats those Borg vs Dominion, ship class vs ship class, SW vs ST, Khan vs Mr. Roarke, Kirk vs TJ Hooker, & Spock vs Agent Paris GD's & et al etc.

That's for sure.

Picard was content to leave a low-tech humanoid civilization to die Due to SF's horse hockey PD.

Thank God Worf's human brother Paulie was there to save the day

SF & the UFP need to get their feces together concerning what the PD is exactly & what it entails.

Otherwise, 86 it!

The only PD that really makes sense & is necessary is the Temporal PD.

The PD

Does make for a good dramatic ingredient. Give it that

 

[Jonas Grumby]

As several posters have already mentioned, the Prime Directive of TOS was a much different animal from the Prime Directive of later Trek. The TOS version was a compassionate directive aimed at preventing the inadvertent harming of others. It was never used to justify standing idly by while others suffered or died. And it certainly never advocated allowing an entire civilization to die in order to preserve their "natural development." I mean, really, I thought the argument that "we had to destroy the village in order to save it" was discredited decades ago.

In contrast, the Prime Directive depicted in TNG and later Treks is an immoral and cowardly document. It uses the rather staggering conceit that, in all the universe, we are somehow set apart from the "natural order" and therefore have no obligation - moral or otherwise - to help when others are endangered.

The argument has been made, in reference to the TNG episode "Homeward," that Picard did the right thing by standing idly by while the last of a doomed civilization perished on the planet below him, because he could only have saved a few of those people and those few would be so traumatized by the loss of their civilization that it would be better to just let them die naturally. The problem with that argument is the astounding arrogance of it. Maybe the survivors would be hopelessly devastated by the trauma or maybe not. Either way, it is not Picard's place to decide whether another's life is worth preserving or not.

 

[LutherSloan]

Here's how I view it.

Overall it's a good idea, mostly the part about not interfering with pre-warp societies. I disagree (and clearly most of Starfleet's greatest captains feel the same way) with the PD's notion that noninterference includes letting sentient beings be destroyed by, say, a comet.

I can't specifically remember one instance where the Federation let a pre-warp society die from a natural disaster because of the Prime Directive, on any show. Maybe I'm forgetting something, but I can't think of one.

 

[Anwar]

As several posters have already mentioned, the Prime Directive of TOS was a much different animal from the Prime Directive of later Trek. The TOS version was a compassionate directive aimed at preventing the inadvertent harming of others. It was never used to justify standing idly by while others suffered or died. And it certainly never advocated allowing an entire civilization to die in order to preserve their "natural development." I mean, really, I thought the argument that "we had to destroy the village in order to save it" was discredited decades ago.

In contrast, the Prime Directive depicted in TNG and later Treks is an immoral and cowardly document. It uses the rather staggering conceit that, in all the universe, we are somehow set apart from the "natural order" and therefore have no obligation - moral or otherwise - to help when others are endangered.

The argument has been made, in reference to the TNG episode "Homeward," that Picard did the right thing by standing idly by while the last of a doomed civilization perished on the planet below him, because he could only have saved a few of those people and those few would be so traumatized by the loss of their civilization that it would be better to let just them die naturally. The problem with that argument is the astounding arrogance of it. Maybe the survivors would be hopelessly devastated by the trauma or maybe not. Either way, it is not Picard's place to decide whether another's life is worth preserving or not.

And what about those economic, realist problems I brought up?

 

[Jonas Grumby]

^ Are you referring to it not being possible to do everything? If so, I answer that quite simply: Not being able to do everything is never a moral excuse for doing nothing. Especially where life is concerned.

 

[Anwar]

But the fact still stands that there was no way to evacuate that planet fully without hundreds of Starships working round the clock. As well as how the pro-interventionalists would also cite it as the precedent of how the Feds should have a task force out there actively searching out every endangered world and doing the same, despite what that'd do to the economy.

 

[Jonas Grumby]

^ It's very simple. You don't decide to save no one just because you can't save everyone. And you don't let people die just because you're afraid of setting a "bad precedent."

In fact, that "bad precedent" argument is an excellent example of camel's-nose-under-the-tent thinking being carried to an absurd extreme.

 

[Anwar]

Then you get into the slippery slope of the "Who DO we save then?" since they clearly wouldn't have been able to save everyone on that planet. Besides, Nikolai only saved that one group because he was boinking one of their women.

"Bad precedent" is also one of the only things from keeping the Federation from becoming a Galactic Nanny or Welfare State that will ultimately collapse under the strain of it's own babying operations towards the rest of the Universe.

 

[Jonas Grumby]

^ "Slippery slope," "nose under the tent," it's the same thing. And you're still carrying it to an absurd conclusion.

You seem to believe that there is a "gotcha" point here where a precedent is immediately set in stone and leads inexorably to a bad conclusion, unalterable by any further deliberation or common sense. Believe me, if Captain Picard rescues a few people from that planet, it isn't going to doom the Federation into becoming a "Galactic Welfare State."

As for "Who DO we save then?", it's a tough choice. But life is full of tough choices. What really disgusts me about the TNG version of the Prime Directive is how it tries to use a very twisted "morality" to justify completely avoiding these choices, no matter what the consequences.

 

[Myasishchev]

Sometimes nasty things like said meteor collisions and other disasters are ultimately good for a civilization to grow and change. Adversity and all that are necessary things for any civilization to go through if they want to become stronger and better. If you baby them through everything they may never realize their own potential as a culture because they never had to really go through anything bad to begin with.

It's possible to make a good estimate of whether a natural disaster is going to be merely unpleasant (a forty-meter meteor), civilization-halting (a four-mile asteroid) or extinctionary (a gamma ray burst from a nearby supernova). If the destruction falls into the former category, leave it be; if it is of medium magnitude, attempt to stop the offending factor without the knowledge of the affected populace; if the harm is in the latter category, do whatever necessary the fleet is capable of to save them. Of course, if the harm is of the civilization's own making, leave it be, except perhaps in the cases where extinction will surely result from inaction.

The great thing is even a gamma ray burst gives years of lead time! Put a ship with its shields up four light years from the planet, and due to the conical nature of the photon spread, it may miss the entire system. A meteor may leave decades, and as I said can be nudged out of trajectory with the merest of efforts.

Almost every problem could be solved without affecting the course of a civilization and ages before the civilization to be affected even became aware of the issue. The very few that couldn't would be a pain in the ass, but truly rare.

Starfleet need only pay attention to undertake this rather modest galactic welfare state. Given the nature of their mission, paying attention to developing alien cultures is something Starfleet ought to be doing anyway.

 

[Anwar]

It's called looking at the big picture, I'm not just talking about a planet by planet case I'm talking about how setting such a precedent would irrevocable change how they did things, and how there would be ultimately negative effects due to it.

If Picard had saved those people of his own choice, it'd cause the sh*tstorm debate back on Earth with the pro-interventionalists using him as an example which probably would've led to him being drummed out of the service for helping their case. Then there'd be that economic problem I brought up as a direct result of the pro-interventionalists' stance which obviously would be "go out and baby the galaxy".

Life IS full of tough choices, including the bitter one that you can't go around messing with every little event everywhere and sometimes bad stuff happens. Sad? Yeah, but that's part of life (and death).

 

[Anwar]

Almost every problem could be solved without affecting the course of a civilization and ages before the civilization to be affected even became aware of the issue. The very few that couldn't would come along once a century. Starfleet need only pay attention to undertake this rather modest galactic welfare state.

Like I said, you go around babying everyone then they'll never overcome adversity on their own and become a bunch of pansies who never had to really work for anything because Galactic Big Brother was always there to keep every scratch from happening. And they'd still have to pull a huge number of personnel and ships off of other duties to actively search out every single endangered planet in existence and mess around with them.

 

[Myasishchev]

Like I said, you go around babying everyone then they'll never overcome adversity on their own and become a bunch of pansies who never had to really work for anything because Galactic Big Brother was always there to keep every scratch from happening.

In other words, model Federation citizens. The human race has never had its nightside scoured clean by a gamma ray burst--I don't think such "adversity" would be conducive to development, even theoretically. Yes, that which does not kill us often makes stronger, but more often it merely cripples.

And they'd still have to pull a huge number of personnel and ships off of other duties to actively search out every single endangered planet in existence and mess around with them.

Observation could be automated. Few ships need be involved with the clandestine rescue efforts, no more than the number of inhabited systems that exist within Federation territorial bounds. That sets an upper bound of perhaps a few thousand--a few thousand which will face peril of an actionable nature once a millennium or less. Major rescue efforts would probably be so rare as to be extraordinary.