Starfleet philosophy?

[VulcanGuy]

hey guys i made a thread a few days ago on the philosophy of the other species in the Trekverse, but only got a few replies. surely, much more has been written on the starfleet philosophy of the relationship between the individual and collective.

"The economics of the future is somewhat different. You see, money doesn't exist in the 24th century... The acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force in our lives. We work to better ourselves and the rest of Humanity." is the quote that always stands out for me and the emphasis on co-operation rather than competition as Ensign Wildman says on Voyager using the example of the organs and cells of the body working together. if there is an emphasis on co-operation then what about hobbies or events that are inherently competitive?

someone should write a wiki on here if there isn't already one.

thanks guys

 

[VulcanGuy]

So I was pondering this a few minutes ago and based on Picard's quote it is based at least partially on Nietzsche.

Nietzsche's work is based on the idea that the goal of men is not pleasure or the collection of money, but of self-enhancement.

From Wiki:

"I teach you the overman. Man is something that shall be overcome. What have you done to overcome him? [...] All beings so far have created something beyond themselves; and do you want to be the ebb of this great flood, and even go back to the beasts rather than overcome man? What is ape to man? A laughing stock or painful embarrassment. And man shall be that to overman: a laughingstock or painful embarrassment. You have made your way from worm to man, and much in you is still worm. Once you were apes, and even now, too, man is more ape than any ape...The overman is the meaning of the earth. Let your will say: the overman shall be the meaning of the earth...Man is a rope, tied between beast and overman--a rope over an abyss...what is great in man is that he is a bridge and not an end..."
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[VulcanGuy]

bump

 

[Nardpuncher]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Das_kapital

 

[LLAP]

http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Essays/Trek-Marxism.html

Bunch of commies!

 

[VulcanGuy]

http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Essays/Trek-Marxism.html

Bunch of commies!

thanks for that, i'll check it out later!

 

[VulcanGuy]

doesn't anyone have a link to a list of commandments a starfleet officer looks at when away from the ship or a general guideline on how they treat others and live their life?

thanks

 

[Nardpuncher]

doesn't anyone have a link to a list of commandments a starfleet officer looks at when away from the ship or a general guideline on how they treat others and live their life?

thanks

I don't believe there is one. from your posts about philosophy and so forth...I have a hunch you may possibly like Ayn Rand. Check her out on wiki or something.

 

[VulcanGuy]

I used to be a follower of her philosophy, but after some thinking the espoused complete, utter and pure selfishness is almost like a baby way to live. As we grow older we have responsibilities to our family, our community, our state, country and then our race/people. The only considerations for a baby is being completely selfish in order to survive.

I do agree with some aspect like living life using reason.

Thanks for the advice anyway.

 

[VulcanGuy]

bump

 

[Misfit Toy]

^Please don't bump your own threads. Threads live and die on their own merit. Thanks!

 

[Sci]

As we grow older we have responsibilities to our family, our community, our state, country

I'm with you here.

and then our race/people.

What the hell does that mean?

Perhaps you mean that we all have a common responsibility to humanity itself?

 

[Misfit Toy]

As we grow older we have responsibilities to our family, our community, our state, country

I'm with you here.

and then our race/people.

What the hell does that mean?

Perhaps you mean that we all have a common responsibility to humanity itself?

As opposed to a responsibility to the Andorians, I hope...

 

[Sci]

As we grow older we have responsibilities to our family, our community, our state, country

I'm with you here.

and then our race/people.

What the hell does that mean?

Perhaps you mean that we all have a common responsibility to humanity itself?

As opposed to a responsibility to the Andorians, I hope...

To be fair, I would tend to argue that after the Founding of the Federation, all Federates have certain responsibilities to one-another irrelevant of species, in the same way that all Ohioans have certain responsibilities to Minnesotans, etc....

 

[Myasishchev]

^On the contrary, racism (at least speciesism) is alive and well in the Federation, even in the 24th century. Look no further than Take Me Out to the Holosuite to see the world's most bigoted Vulcan. And we know it's not just this one guy, it's so systemic that he's the skipper of a segregated starship.

In TOS, it was as bad, but at least it went both ways: "green-blooded son of a bitch" indeed. My theory is it's McCoy's fault the Vulcans reverted to one-species starships by the time of the Immunity Syndrome.

 

[Sci]

^On the contrary, racism (at least speciesism) is alive and well in the Federation, even in the 24th century. Look no further than Take Me Out to the Holosuite to see the world's most bigoted Vulcan. And we know it's not just this one guy, it's so systemic that he's the skipper of a segregated starship.

Conceded with regards to the captain of the T'Kumbra -- although I would point out that his crew seemed perfectly amenable to respectfully socializing with the DS9 crew after the game, suggesting that most of the T'Kumbra's crew didn't share their captain's primitive and illogical bigotries.

For better or for worse, though, Starfleet does seem to practice species segregation for the most part. How many aliens served aboard Kirk's Enterprise besides Spock? Still, I'm not sure if I'm comfortable concluding that that's evidence that Starfleet practices institutionalized racism/speciesism, though -- it's just as possible that species segregation was originally instituted in the Federation Starfleet because of the hostilities felt between Vulcans, Andorians, and Tellarites, and that it simply became institutional inertia afterwords.

Still, one of the reasons I like the Star Trek: Titan book series is that it represents a deliberate attempt to both acknowledge and overcome the institutional species segregation of Starfleet, boasting a diverse cast from many different alien cultures, including Efrosians, Vulcans, Trill, Bajorans, Elaysians, Betazoids, Pahkwa-thanh, Kobliad, Tiburon, Pacificans, Skorr, Bolians, Betelgusians, Andorians, Caitians, Orions, Kasheeta, Ferengi, Choblik, Horta, Cardassians, Pak'shree, and on and on and on.

All the same, I don't think there's any evidence that the Federation, as a whole, is racist/speciesist, though. The evidence we've seen seems to indicate that every planetary state that joins the Federation joins as equals and as partners in the Federation's democratic governance.

 

[Myasishchev]

Generally speaking, I concur. In fact, although I'm one of the few(?) who thought Take Me Out to the Holosuite was an entertaining hour, it was really unnecessary and a misstep to have the heel be Vulcan's answer to Strom Thurmond.

It wasn't as necessarily reprehensible on TOS, because of the notion that the Federation was still a century young and still coming together as a functioning society--the early mention of the Enterprise being a United Earth Ship is completely consistent with the Vulcan "Intrepid" (what's with the name?) being, until recently, a "United Vulcan Ship." The truly clueless nature with which Enterprise's humans bumble about in Amok Time is added evidence that there is nothing like Federation "society," but more only a tight military and loose economic alliance of independent planets, with no more and probably much, much less in common than the individual U.S. states a hundred years after the creation of that country, or the individual nations of the EU in 2060.

However, by the 2360s, we have a real Fed society, at least a mostly integrated military/scientific/diplomatic service, certainly an integrated and powerful (if distressingly geocentric) federal governing body, and constant contact between individuals of different worlds at almost all levels, from the administrative bureaucracy to artistic colloboration to (mind-bogglingly commonplace) interpsecies mating. Shame they had to go and stomp all over that.

A possible explanation is that the pressures of the Dominion War led to huge volunteerism on Vulcan, and Solok, inveterate racist, took advantage of this to get a transfer to the command of a ship built in Vulcan orbit and staffed entirely by semi-trained Vulcan semi-conscripts, with whom he intended to show all the round-ears of the galaxy just how superior his species was.

As for Titan, I agree that the huge diversity is cool, and it's probably the most attractive aspect of that series.

 

[Sci]

It wasn't as necessarily reprehensible on TOS, because of the notion that the Federation was still a century young and still coming together as a functioning society--the early mention of the Enterprise being a United Earth Ship is completely consistent with the Vulcan "Intrepid" (what's with the name?) being, until recently, a "United Vulcan Ship." The truly clueless nature with which Enterprise's humans bumble about in Amok Time is added evidence that there is nothing like Federation "society," but more only a tight military and loose economic alliance of independent planets, with no more and probably much, much less in common than the individual U.S. states a hundred years after the creation of that country, or the individual nations of the EU in 2060.

Yeah. I think one of the interesting things about TOS is that -- even though I'm inclined to disregard references to UESPA and the Enterprise being a United Earth ship and just pretend that they're saying "Federation" and "Federation Starfleet" -- the show seems to imply that the UFP was still in the process of integrating its society. I'm not sure I'd say that Federation Member Worlds were truly independent polities and that the UFP was a genuine alliance, but it's fair to say that it wasn't exactly a unified society yet, even if it was legally a state.

However, by the 2360s, we have a real Fed society, at least a mostly integrated military/scientific/diplomatic service, certainly an integrated and powerful (if distressingly geocentric) federal governing body, and constant contact between individuals of different worlds at almost all levels, from the administrative bureaucracy to artistic colloboration to (mind-bogglingly commonplace) interpsecies mating. Shame they had to go and stomp all over that.

Well, you know, something to consider here is that even if all of the member worlds of the Federation engage in a specific campaign to mix and mingle and fully integrate their societies, the UFP is still going to be considerably more species segregated and its Member Worlds more isolated from each other than the constituent polities of any present-day federal republics, simply by virtue of physical reality. It's simply never going to be possible to mix societies that exist on separate planets that are scattered across space to the extent that, say, the American or German states or Canadian provinces are mixed, solely because of the sheer distances and the sizes of planetary populations involved. Earth may be the exception to the rule because of its status as the Federation capital planet, but I betcha that even if there are a good billion or so Vulcans living on Andor, Andor's population is still by a large percentage majority-biological Andorian.

A possible explanation is that the pressures of the Dominion War led to huge volunteerism on Vulcan, and Solok, inveterate racist, took advantage of this to get a transfer to the command of a ship built in Vulcan orbit and staffed entirely by semi-trained Vulcan semi-conscripts, with whom he intended to show all the round-ears of the galaxy just how superior his species was.

I like that explanation...!

As for Titan, I agree that the huge diversity is cool, and it's probably the most attractive aspect of that series.

Yeppers.

ETA:

Titan captures quite well that facet of Trek that has always been espoused, though not always lived up to -- the idea of infinite diversity in infinite combinations. The rejection of the primitive and evil concept of racial purity and the embracing of the notion that difference is a good thing that makes us better and stronger, that no two peoples are inherently superior or inferior, and that "purity" will only make us weak.

 

[Myasishchev]

I'm inclined to disregard references to UESPA and the Enterprise being a United Earth ship and just pretend that they're saying "Federation" and "Federation Starfleet"

I do the same with United Star Ship. I hear it as a contraction of United Starfleet Ship. I mean, I hope your starship's in one piece, otherwise it won't work very well.

Well, you know, something to consider here is that even if all of the member worlds of the Federation engage in a specific campaign to mix and mingle and fully integrate their societies, the UFP is still going to be considerably more species segregated and its Member Worlds more isolated from each other than the constituent polities of any present-day federal republics, simply by virtue of physical reality. It's simply never going to be possible to mix societies that exist on separate planets that are scattered across space to the extent that, say, the American or German states or Canadian provinces are mixed, solely because of the sheer distances and the sizes of planetary populations involved. Earth may be the exception to the rule because of its status as the Federation capital planet, but I betcha that even if there are a good billion or so Vulcans living on Andor, Andor's population is still by a large percentage majority-biological Andorian.

Hard to say--we see large populations on other planets, and they had to get there somehow. I'm sure that most homeworlds are still dominated by their original species, if for no other reason than Andor and Vulcan, for example, and at least as depicted, look like absolutely hellish places for a human to live. Andor's frozen, Vulcan is almost too heavy to walk on and is too hot to bear. It doesn't seem to be the other way around (Spock and "I've been on planets near the boiling point of water" Shran never seem to complain about how godawfully cold or hot it is on Earthling ships), so a normal Earth-type planet could be colonized by a whole bunch of different peoples--shame that's never really been explored onscreen afaik.

I like that explanation...!

Thanks. It could easily be contradicted by something in the dialogue, but at least it doesn't paint Starfleet as willing to enforce Surak Crow Laws.

The rejection of the primitive and evil concept of racial purity and the embracing of the notion that difference is a good thing that makes us better and stronger, that no two peoples are inherently superior or inferior, and that "purity" will only make us weak.

Agreed. At the very least, one successful virus and the whole "pure" species is gone.

 

[VulcanGuy]

segregated starship.

What's wrong with a segregated ship?

Keeping Vulcan for the Vulcans, Romulus for Romulans etc. If you have a ship of only Klingons it doesn't mean the Klingons don't respect or admire other species', they only want to preserve and cherish their own people. What is so wrong with a people wanting to survive?

The Federation seems like the only entity that has mixed crews.

BTW why is everyone throwing around the word 'racist' so much? Racism is a word invented by Trotsky, a Communist who supported mass murder.

It always seemed like the Humans in the Federation were the ones who kept it strong and secure.