Pulaski's treatment of Data.

[Kevin Wolff]

Makes me wonder how that would have worked in-universe.... a Starfleet regulation that stipulates all personnel should step over from the 'form fitting uniform model' to the 'loose uniform model' once they reach the age of 40, except when their yearly audit reveals they are achieving high marks on the 'representative aptitude index', and their annual fitness test ?

Lol, more like extra uniform choices for those who need them.

 

[at Quark's]

What was the episode where Pulaski asked if Data could pilot the ship, even though he was already at the helm?

Two scenes I can think of, though neither exactly fits your description. (Perhaps there's a third scene I've forgotten? )

The first is from Unnatural Selection:

<The children, still in styrolite, are being loaded aboard the shuttlecraft. Pulaski is supervising as Data enters.>
DATA Doctor? You sent for me?
PULASKI I did, Commander. I assume you're qualified to pilot this shuttlecraft.
DATA Certainly. I was trained at --
PULASKI I'm sure you were. Please get aboard, we don't have much time.
<Data looks at her quizzically. He starts to board>

The other scene is from Where Silence has Lease. They are in that mysterious cloud (later it turns out they have been captured by Nagilum), and Data (at the helm) is ordered to increase magnification of the viewscreen by 10, 100, 1000 and finally 10.000 times. No change on the screen whatsoever and Pulaski cries out : "It does know how to do these things, doesn't it?"

 

[charliefox]

Two scenes I can think of, though neither exactly fits your description. (Perhaps there's a third scene I've forgotten? )

The first is from Unnatural Selection:


The other scene is from Where Silence has Lease. They are in that mysterious cloud (later it turns out they have been captured by Nagilum), and Data (at the helm) is ordered to increase magnification of the viewscreen by 10, 100, 1000 and finally 10.000 times. No change on the screen whatsoever and Pulaski cries out : "It does know how to do these things, doesn't it?"

In my defense I haven't watched the series for years. I tend to rely on my memory and sometimes it fails me at least partially. In fact the last item of the franchise that I watched was Beyond and before that it was STID and I am not sure about the one that preceded it but I wouldn't be surprised if it was ST09.

 

[Tenacity]

What was the episode where Pulaski asked if Data could pilot the ship, even though he was already at the helm?

While Data has controled the ship by voice control, I don't think Data has ever sat at the helm.

 

[soornge]

@TheAdmiralty nailed it: The dynamic with Spock and McCoy worked because 1) there was never any genuine ill feelings there, it was just friendly insults back and forth, and 2) it was equal participation from both.

Data, on the other hand, was so innocenti g that he just sat there and took everything that Pulaski slung at him. It couldn't even occur to him to fight back. She may not have intended to take advantage of his nature, but that's what ended up happening.



"Doctor, I believe this empty turbolift shaft requires attention."

i get that they were going for the same thing . but the reason spock and mcoy work is because they are debating issues. and mccoy character is so smart i love the way he always boils down spocks arguments : i laugh everytime i think of thier conversation in star trek iv : wait are you telling me i have to die for us to discuss death lol

 

[soornge]

While Data has controled the ship by voice control, I don't think Data has ever sat at the helm.

no in several episodes he ran the helm includingno e where he made like a million corrctions in a flash of light

 

[Nerys Myk]

While Data has controled the ship by voice control, I don't think Data has ever sat at the helm.

I thought any station could be reconfigured for any job. Though they rarely took advantage of it.

 

[soornge]

any station in theory especially on the TNG enterprise could be /can be but you still need all the bridge positions : the reason why fire control is where it is on tng voyager and enterprise is because it falls into the ops station : in TOS its at chekov station who is not helm : i do not know why TNG had to helm stations. except maybe for an asthetic appeal. i suppose you always would want a back up helmsmen but still seems like you just have an extra guy hanging out . but even reconfiguring the stations you still would need scanner/sensor , ops, fire control, helm, command , and cartography especially when you consider you do not really have a window on the screen you have a video rendering, but generally have to remember sometimes you have to break the fourth wall and things are done because its a telePLAY : some issues raised sre not based in function as a starship but function as theater : in actuality they could have operated the whole ship from a column in the middle of a room : like doctor who or the borg

 

[Papermoon]

What I really liked about the Pulaski interaction was that she represented a view of data contrary to the audience. I wonder if having someone diss data makes you implicitly want to stand up for him.

I find they did a better job with the Doctor on VOY around this aspect.

 

[Kahless the Unforgettable]

The only way Pulaski makes any sense from a marketing point of view is if they were trying to attract the ignorant, redneck, racist viewers to the show. I'm pretty sure that wasn't the case, though, and she was just a horrific attempt to recreate McCoy by writers who didn't understand the original character at all.

 

[Mutai Sho-Rin]

The only way Pulaski makes any sense from a marketing point of view is if they were trying to attract the ignorant, redneck, racist viewers to the show. I'm pretty sure that wasn't the case, though, and she was just a horrific attempt to recreate McCoy by writers who didn't understand the original character at all.

I think this is an extremely distorted presumption of the staff design of the character and its execution. I liked Pulaski just fine and the evolution of her appreciation and acceptance of Data was a highlight of the season. It demonstrated that people COULD overcome biases and create new understandings.

 

[exocomp]

I think this is an extremely distorted presumption of the staff design of the character and its execution. I liked Pulaski just fine and the evolution of her appreciation and acceptance of Data was a highlight of the season. It demonstrated that people COULD overcome biases and create new understandings.

Indeed, I also liked the way she bonded with Worf and joined him in the Klingon tea ceremony, even though it was dangerous to humans to do so. I think she understood him better than Beverly ever did.

 

[soornge]

I think this is an extremely distorted presumption of the staff design of the character and its execution. I liked Pulaski just fine and the evolution of her appreciation and acceptance of Data was a highlight of the season. It demonstrated that people COULD overcome biases and create new understandings.

oh i like pulaski i particularly liked thst she was flawed i enjoyed her not to subtle anti android behavior and how condescending she was to troi and picard and riker ... and jordi....and well everyone lol

 

[UnknownSample]

Agreed. They needed to fix her look too. Trek has this weird obsession of putting form-fitting or exposed neck costuming on men and women of a certain age. Especially in S1 and S2. It's undignified. There are always exceptions, but in general they should really limit that to the young and fit.

? They went out of their way to exempt Pulaski from the tight jumpsuit, giving her something that still matched the other uniforms, but allowed for her middle age. It was a good way of giving her needed dignity. It wasn't loose and baggy, but anyone in Star Fleet would have to meet a certain standard of fitness I'd think. Loose enough for fit woman in her 40s.

 

[cgervasi]

I would have thought that while training in medicine with Starfleet and all the scientific knowledge of the Federation, there would have been a semester or two on non-conventional forms of life, such as silicon-based and non-corporeal.

Self-aware computers were a new technology. Soong was ridiculed for even attempting it. Pulaski was old-school, like a late middle-aged person today who is only vaguely aware of what a smartphone or computer tablet is.

 

[Triskelion]

^ I don't know, I think she was just better educated about life to imbue it in a replication. I think her position that Data is not alive is not so much due to unawareness of his nature, but a keen awareness of it - as well as people's penchant for accepting that replica at face value - the way Kes did with the EMH, when his own creator considered it a tool.

Data may actually be self-aware - but is he alive? Is he? Everything he is, in the Federation view, is an individual. That is because the Federation errs on the side of ethics. But a medical doctor is in no way obligated to accept a collecftion of circuits as alive. In this way, I found her frank skepticism refreshing and justified. This even despite my affection for Data. In fact, it might have been interesting to see her skepticism continue through her run, constantly challenging Data's nature, and treating him as something other than a human being, which is what he actually was.

Data could have tentacles and a replicator installed in his belly; he could have wheels and detachable phaser arms. He could be reprogrammed to be monotone or turned into a giant chicken. His "character" was just a piece of rewritable software - and he was not, in fact, capable of reproduction, only replication. I will grant that his program adapted and learned; but in the end, it took a human actor to imbue Data with humanity.

So no, I don't view Pulaski's skepticism as prejudice, I view it as plain old judiciousness. Plus brusque rudeness and a dash of meanness ("I mispronounced your name? Don't tell me you're programmed with hurt feelings!"). Hers is precisely the type of judgment Data would ultimately have to overcome on his journey into Lifeform Status.

Ultimately, his thousand-year lifespan may have tested his limits as an individual. For all we know he may have become an interchangable component of the Borg Collective, spread out over a dozen cubes (if they found his technology worth assimilating, which they really didn't. And if the Borg didn't want him, why is that? They value and appreciate intelligence and artifice. Why wouldn't they want to utilize this obvious resource? Was it perhaps because they considered even themselves more alive than he)?

In short, Pulaski wasn't prejudiced; she was postjudiced. She had an intimate familiarity with the characteristics of life. Impressing her was a decent part of Data's character arc. Behavior is not life. It is behavior. In fact I don't think the question of Data's nature was ever fully satisfied. The goofy humor and the skin sensation of the films don't even begin to explore the implications. Measure of a Man was sociological, but did not imbue him with life, just because Picard said with conviction Well there it sits! That sir, may only be an opinion based on personification and emotional attachment. Like a Tamagotchi toy.

Prove it wrong. Data's ultimate "death" is not proof. It is a fitting end, turning him "mortal" (and I still would have preferred a Godfather death for his character over a hero's death). But - for all his experience, he may have been nothing more than an adaptive piece of technology capable of passing a Turing test with - not his own thoughts, but those of his living creator, Noonien Soong.

So yeah, I appreciate Pulaski's skepticism and unwillingness to just sell off her values for actual life just because people have become attached to what may in fact have been a personified technology. I don't think she was prejudiced. I think she was educated, and so, a tough audience. (But not making any friends).

​

 

[Thorsman]

The thing about Pulaski is that she looked like a female Bones McCoy. Strikingly so.

 

[Phoenix219]

oh i like pulaski i particularly liked thst she was flawed i enjoyed her not to subtle anti android behavior and how condescending she was to troi and picard and riker ... and jordi....and well everyone lol

Yup, she was the only one that saw through and would call them on their arrogant, elitist bullshit and "our shit don't stink" attitude and self righteousness.

 

[Thorsman]

They were certainly doing a female Bones with Pulaski, but it didn't work because Data isn't Spock. Personally, I think Diana Muldaur looks like a female DeForest Kelley and that they should have made her his granddaughter, but at the time they had a fatwa against mention of TOS characters.

 

[Phoenix219]

They were certainly doing a female Bones with Pulaski, but it didn't work because Data isn't Spock. Personally, I think Diana Muldaur looks like a female DeForest Kelley and that they should have made her his granddaughter, but at the time they had a fatwa against mention of TOS characters.

Data was too child-like and naive at that point to be able to enter the Spock/McCoy bantering at the proper level, which led to people feeling she was bullying him. If she had stayed on, I think it could have developed over time to a lot of learning and character building for Data, including learning about that subtle humanity that came through so easily with Spock, those jabs and mild humor in response to Pulaski's needling. It could have been a great growing experience for Data.

Growing experiences.... would have been good for *most* of the TNG cast. Still feel lilke Tom Riker was completely wasted, rather then completely underlining Riker's stagnation. Somewhere on the board it was suggested that Shelby return as his superior officer near the end of the series to make that point, but how hilarious would it be to find out that Will's own duplicate had more ambition then he did? "Will, meet your new CO, Thomas Riker." :jawdrops: dum dum dummmmm.....