Species 8472: What were their motives?

[The Overlord]

8472 was going to destroy the Borg.

No pretence.

Remember World War Two?

I mentioned it earlier.

It was in all the papers.

What's a paper?

Anyway.

The US had two atom bombs.

Just two.

Boom.

Not so bad.

Boom.

Starting to get annoying.

The point is that Truman, threatened to continue bombing city after city unless Japan surrendered unconditionally.

Which they did, fearful of a third strike.

Even though the US only had two bombs.



It's how you play the game of kings.

You win or you die.

I don't think your analogy works, because the Borg and Species 8472 are very different from human nation states.

My point is, if Species 8472's goal was simply to destroy the Borg, why were they sending out thoughts saying they wanted to kill all liefe forms in the universe. That won't scare the Borg and may ensure that others join the war against Species 8472, which is what happened. So why are they projecting malevolent thoughts if they don't believe in them. These thoughts do nothing to scare the Borg and many other telepath would believe them to be true and thus rally other forces against Species 8472. Species 8472 presenting themselves as pure evil was very counterproductive and had no real benefit, so why did they do it?

Why are you all assuming that the malevolent thoughts were their actual plan rather than just a collective xenophobic hostility directed at anyone different than them, much like you hear babbling out of drunk racists. Their default position.

Except Kes described their thoughts and feelings as a cold malevolent hatred, not some flash of white hot anger you might get from some drunks at a bar. They seemed more like cold predatory psychopaths, then foolish ignorant people. When they were ripping Borg bodies apart and stacking them together, that seemed like a serial killer would do, not a solider. Besides if not all of them had those feelings, why didn't Kes pick up on that. Again all of this makes Janeway look pretty foolish, if Janeway joined with the Borg because she thought Species 8472.

Besides are there different types of extreme xenophobes. The Nazis were xenophobes and they expressed this by invading other countries and wanting to kill "weaker" races. There was no room for diplomacy with the Nazis and the Nazis aggressiveness ensured war was inevitable. However North Kora is also xenophobic, but they express it differently. They favor isolation keeping foreign elements and culture out of their country, to ensure that outside influences do not taint the "purity" of their people. So what kind xenophobes were Species 8472, aggressive war like ones who wanted to kill everything else in the universe or simple isolationists who want nothing to do with anyone else and only wanted to destroy the Borg because they made incursions into their realm.

 

[R. Star]

Species 8472 had every right to regard Voyager as hostile and as a threat.

During their first encounter Voyager attempts to both tractor beam the bioship and beam it away. Both hostile acts. Then they board it as if they had every right to. The pilot had every right to regard them as hostile and attack. Possibly consider them in cooperation with the Borg even too.

During their second encounter the Borg are actively protecting them. It's only by this point that Kes has established any kind of telepathic communication with them. Before this Kes just had a premonition of dead Borg and "Voyager's destruction" and she didn't foresee Harry getting hurt until they had already boarded the 8472 ship. So they had already proven themselves hostile by that point and the vision of Voyager's destruction, well that didn't come true so how reliable was it?

During the 3rd encounter, Voyager actively invades their realm and uses biomolecular torpedoes to destroy a bunch of their ships.

So yeah, Voyager was really the hostile power here. The most provocative thing 8472 did was defend themselves and have the gall to counter attack aggressive forces crying out "the weak shall perish!" which could just be a battle cry for all we know. Given they were perfectly willing to stand down despite all of this in In the Flesh, proves them to be reasonable.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Kes engaged telepathic contact.

8472 replied.

What has that to do with the Borg?

I'm not even sure if the Borg ever even tried to negotiate or surrender, but I doubt they tried either, because they still knew for a fact that resistance was futile.

 

[Anwar]

It's half them being wimps who change their minds quickly, half changed premise.

The 8472 aliens were originally just supposed to be Modern Trek's take on the "Evil Alien Beings from another dimension!" cliche that had been around since HP Lovecraft, they were basically Trek Cthulu.

However, the writers realized that this isn't viable for anything more than a one-short species and that there was no way to wipe out the 8472 to the point they wouldn't have to mention them again so they changed their minds and made them more like semi-reasonable versions of the Founders in "In the Flesh" to end the story because they didn't want to do some big "Borg/8472 War" storyline.

 

[Guy Gardener]

It would have been far more interesting if Chuckles made out with an 8472 who actually looked like an 8472.

 

[TiberiusMaximus]

"Interesting" is one way of putting it...

Why are we assuming there isn't more than one faction of 8472? Some of them want to kill everything, some of them don't care, some of them want to stay home and write Janeway/Chakotay fanfic. Or something. Whatever it is they do in their spare time.

 

[The Overlord]

Kes engaged telepathic contact.

8472 replied.

What has that to do with the Borg?

I'm not even sure if the Borg ever even tried to negotiate or surrender, but I doubt they tried either, because they still knew for a fact that resistance was futile.

Why didn't 8472 reply by saying "The Borg invaded our space, so we are at war with them. We have no quarrel with you, but stay out of our way". If they had done that, Voyager would not have gotten involved, they wouldn't have developed the weapon that put such fear into their hearts and Species 8472 would have destroyed the Borg. So Species 8472 replying the way they did really did screw themselves over. If Species 8472 didn't believe in that rhetoric, why did they bother thinking it, they knew other telepaths might pick up on these thoughts and see them as the bigger threat.

Sending a message of "all inferior races must die!" instead of something reasonable made them more enemies and made it less likely people would leave them alone.

"Interesting" is one way of putting it...

Why are we assuming there isn't more than one faction of 8472? Some of them want to kill everything, some of them don't care, some of them want to stay home and write Janeway/Chakotay fanfic. Or something. Whatever it is they do in their spare time.

Then why didn't Kes pick up on this? Why did Kes only sense genocidal ones and did not sense one of the reasonable ones? This really comes off as a bad ret con, the way they were portrayed in Scorpion seems completely different then they were portrayed in "In the Flesh".

It's half them being wimps who change their minds quickly, half changed premise.

The 8472 aliens were originally just supposed to be Modern Trek's take on the "Evil Alien Beings from another dimension!" cliche that had been around since HP Lovecraft, they were basically Trek Cthulu.

However, the writers realized that this isn't viable for anything more than a one-short species and that there was no way to wipe out the 8472 to the point they wouldn't have to mention them again so they changed their minds and made them more like semi-reasonable versions of the Founders in "In the Flesh" to end the story because they didn't want to do some big "Borg/8472 War" storyline.

Well in Dr. Who they have gotten a lot of stories out of the Daleks, who hate all species besides themselves and want to kill them all.

Frankly I think I prefer "Space Cthulu" version of these characters, its a bit naive to assume that all space aliens are easy to understand. In Scorpion they came off as creatures that were beyond our understanding, so beyond humans it be like an ant trying to make peace with a person. In "In The Flesh" they came off as a generic Star Trek alien race, all the other worldly qualities were gone, they went from something beyond our understanding into poor misunderstood creatures who just need a hug. Its such a U turn, it happens too quickly to make sense. That is why it comes off as a bad ret con, rather any sort of natural development. It took way longer for the Klingons and the Federation to make peace and the Klingons came off as more reasonable then Species 8472 did in Scorpion.

All of this makes Janeway look stupid for allying with the Borg in scorpion. If Species 8472 were not genocidal psychopaths, then Janeway's alliance with the Borg was the biggest strategic mistake any Star Fleet captain has ever made. Species 8472 could have destroyed the Borg, removing any future threat they pose to the Federation and the DQ. Instead the Borg are free to assimilate other races now that the greatest threat to their existence has been dealt with and species 8472 decided that the Federation is the bigger threat and planned to destroy them. Janeway is lucky that she stumbled across their base in the DQ, otherwise they would have gone to the AQ and destroyed the Federation and it would have been her fault. See this ret con makes all of her decisions in Scorpion look stupid, it makes her look bad in the process.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Because they're idiots.

Your argument is that what they did, didn't make sense, so what we saw can't have been the full story.

My argument is that what they did didn't make sense because they're idiots.

 

[TiberiusMaximus]

Both arguments have merits.

Guy's is funnier. So he wins.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

But that means he wins everything.

 

[stj]

Polo is the game of kings.

 

[Guy Gardener]

I woke up this morning and face palmed.

"Game of frakking Thrones".

How the hell could I mess up that quote?

It's the name of the damn tv show.

 

[Anwar]

Well in Dr. Who they have gotten a lot of stories out of the Daleks, who hate all species besides themselves and want to kill them all.

The Daleks are inferior to the Doctor's tech and intelligence, and we've seen Daleks trashed by aluminum baseball bats. VOY's problem was that they were chronically UNDERPOWERED compared to everyone else.

Make the series about them forming a Delta Federation, then there's the power and influence to do big cool stories. Not so much with a series about a small scout ship a kick in the shins will blow up.

 

[Guy Gardener]

That was a gravametric baton they made from reconfiguring a aluminium bat with a stellar manipulator, a device usually used to create a controlled collapse of a star into a blackhole, to function as a stable power source like the eye of harmony.

The Hand of Omega.

Daleks are a lot more powerful these days.

Forcefields and flight.

They used to be scary, but now they're competent.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Could the Borg assimilate them? Would the exterminate mandate overrule the assimilate imperative or vice versa. Assimilate would have to take over or the assimilated dalek would begin exterminating the borg around it.

 

[Guy Gardener]

The Cybermen are owning the Borg in the TNG/Doctor Who comicbook crossover, and the Cybermen are a significantly less powerful force to contend with than the Daleks, but that's possibly because the Cybermen need to convert and the Daleks need to exterminate which are completely different invasion models.

Dalek's are one and all supergeniuses, but their personalities are predicated from the cradle to hate... Which probably means that with the right cheatcodes you can make then think and feel anything you want, which was proved convincingly earlier this year.

"Sigh"

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

Maybe it's the hate that makes Species 8472 impossible to assimilate and not the biology.

 

[Guy Gardener]

Daleks, when at a loss for resources, have made Daleks out of Earthicans, and so did/do the Cybermen.

8472 on other hand were just faking it till they made it, so it must have been their deceit rather than their faux loathing that had the Borg think of them as such a bitter pill.

 

[TEACAKE'S PLEATHER DOME]

We never saw an example of the an assimilated non-humanoid species did we? 7 made a big deal about the Borg's failure to assimilate Species 8472 as if it spoke of their formidableness. Perhaps this was the propaganda the Borg told themselves to avoid the lack of perfection shame over only succeeding with one basic model.

 

[Guy Gardener]

A refresher...

EMH: I tried giving him a sedative, but it was rejected immediately. In fact, every treatment I've tried has been neutralised within seconds. These are alien cells. Each one contains more than a hundred times the DNA of a human cell. It's the most densely coded life form I've ever seen. Even I would need years to decipher it.
JANEWAY: They have an extraordinary immune response. Anything that penetrates the cell membrane, chemical, biological, technological, it's all instantly destroyed. That's why the Borg can't assimilate them.
EMH: Resistance in this case is far from futile. Nevertheless, I believe Borg technology holds the key to saving Mister Kim.

A new thing I find weird is that if the unnaturally dense state of 8472 is because they evolved in fluidic space, then why does the environment on their ships seem to be basically a oxygen/nitrogen mix much like our own?