The Borg

[M.A.C.O.]

Predestination. Basically an event in the past happens to trigger an event in the future despite the fact that it hadn't happened yet.

In the episode they called it a Pogo Paradox.

DUCANE: The Pogo Paradox.
SEVEN: A causality loop in which interference to prevent an event actually triggers the same event.
DUCANE: Excellent. Can you give me an example?
SEVEN: The Borg once travelled back in time to stop Zefram Cochrane from breaking the warp barrier. They succeeded, but that in turn led the Starship Enterprise to intervene. They assisted Cochrane with the flight the Borg was trying to prevent. Causal loop complete.
DUCANE: So, in a way, the Federation owes its existence to the Borg.
SEVEN: You're welcome.

As Seven recalls those events the timeline was never altered really so that Borg incursion had always happened.

The problem I have with this exchange is because it doesn't properly reflect what we see in FC.

2373 Earth before Borg time travel

2373 Earth after Borg time travel. Complete with an atmosphere containing high concentrations of methane, carbon monoxide, fluorine and a population of nine billion Borg.

2373 Earth after the ENT-E crew repairs the damage and removes the Borg timeline we the audience and the crew of the ENT-E saw at the beginning of the movie from existing.

Seven can't have knowledge that the Borg would both succeed and fail at assimilating Earth. Therefore I propose that it cannot be a predestination paradox. The timeline where the Borg succeeded was erased when the Ent-E stopped the Borg in the past. Seven wasn't present during the events of FC and at the time (1999 Relativity's airdate) ENT the series hadn't even been conceived. As someone else said, "Regeneration" fixes this gaffe with the Borg sending a signal to the DQ.

Without that episode though you could watch "FC" and then "Relativity" and end up scratching your head thinking: "hey wait, Picard and Worf destroyed the dish before the Borg could send a signal in FC. How does Seven have any info about the mission to assimilate Earth if there was never a message sent?".



I don't think the events of FC fit the role of a predestination/pogo paradox for different reasons. To me if you watch the series of events in FC. There is only one timeline that is constantly being changed and rewritten.

Unaltered which is supplanted by the Borg's incursion
Borg timeline: supplanted by the Ent-E
Final timeline at the end of the movie would be similar to Unaltered timeline with variations.

With Seven and the Temporal Starfleet guy fail to mention is that had the Borg never tried to assimilate Earth in 2063; Zefram Cochrane would've carried out his scheduled flight on time and first contact with the Vulcans would've still happened. The Borg's interference was not a necessary contribution in order to make first contact and by extension the Federation happen.



Compare time travel mechanics of FC with say Terminator. Where Skynet sends a T-100 in to the past to murder Sarah Connor before she gives birth to John Connor. Then there is John Connor. Who sent his own father Kyle Reese to 1984. His mission was to protect/fall in love/have intercourse with his mother to ensure that he (John) would be born. That is a predestination/pogo paradox. Kyle Reese did not exist in 1984. He hadn't even been born yet. However by the machines attempting to change the war in their favor, and John having secret knowledge from the tapes his mother left him. Secured the circular series of events that drive the Terminator franchise. Altered effects can be seen in the subsequent Terminator movies.


Another good representation of a predestination/pogo paradox would be ending scenes of Final Fantasy VIII. Where the protagonist Squall, a leader of the SeeD (military group formed to combat Sorcerers) travels back in time to when he was a child and meets his orphanage's matron Edea. He gives Edea the idea for SeeD and tells her his mission to combat evil sorceress'. Edea who is an elemental sorceress at the time would become a future antagonist ten years later. Edea would be possessed by a sorceress (Ultemecia) from hundreds of years into her own future. Ultemecia who was the final boss of FF8. Ultemecia (who uses space/time magic) travels to the exact same moment that Squall and Edea are having their conversation and transfers her magic power to Edea before she dies. This sets up a circular loop for the game.

Before the Squall and Ultemecia traveled to the past. Edea was just a matron for war orphans. Interacting with Squall and gaining knowledge about her future act of founding SeeD, inspired her to do just that. While interacting with the future sorceress Ultemecia and by absorbing her power, insured that Edea would one day be used by the same sorceress in the future as revenge against SeeD.




P.S.

Sometimes I wish ENT was officially made AU like JJTrek. Then they could've made it as futuristic as possible and not have to worry about why tech and story don't line up completely symmetrical with TOS and the TNG era. Rick Berman said in interviews after ENT was cancelled that was one of his ideas. To make a show that looked like it was 150 years more advanced that what we have now. Worrying about the prequel looking for advanced that tech and computers scene in TOS-TNG-DS9-VOY. ARGH THOSE HIDEOUS BLOCK COMPUTERS!!

 

[M.A.C.O.]

Say what one likes about Regeneration, it's a one-off... as in, it didn't do any lasting damage to the series, unlike, say, "Broken Bow", which introduced Reed, Mayweather, and Sato to the cast.

Myself, I think it's tons of fun.

I'm gonna throw another spanner in to the works here regarding Fist Contact the episode. Specifically Picard's line to the Chancellor speaking about first contact.

"Centuries ago disaterous contact with the Klingon empire led to decades of war and it was decided then we would do surviellence before making contact".

Yet when you watch ENT "Broken Bow" where first contact between Earth and the Klingons is made, there is nothing that suggest "decades of war" would ensue. You watch the rest of ENT and still there is nothing resembling a preamble to warfare. Sure Duras had an axe to grind against Archer, but that was it. With how the NX crew and Section 31 helped the empire during the Augment virus 2 parter. It seemed the relationship with the Klingons was no different that what we are used to seeing in the TOS-TNG era. A grudgingly mutal respect.

Why is the history of first contact with the Klingons (that Picard recites), different from what we actually see as first contact with the klingons (ENT Broken Bow?

!!!CONTINUITY!!! It's not just for the coherent anymore

 

[F. King Daniel]

Seven can't have knowledge that the Borg would both succeed and fail at assimilating Earth. Therefore I propose that it cannot be a predestination paradox. The timeline where the Borg succeeded was erased when the Ent-E stopped the Borg in the past. Seven wasn't present during the events of FC and at the time (1999 Relativity's airdate) ENT the series hadn't even been conceived. As someone else said, "Regeneration" fixes this gaffe with the Borg sending a signal to the DQ.

Without that episode though you could watch "FC" and then "Relativity" and end up scratching your head thinking: "hey wait, Picard and Worf destroyed the dish before the Borg could send a signal in FC. How does Seven have any info about the mission to assimilate Earth if there was never a message sent?".

Seven only knew about the failed attempt to stop Zefram Cochrane's warp fight in "Year of Hell" ("The name of the ship was 'The Phoenix' [...] the Borg were present during those events"), and she learned the whole Pogo Paradox story in "Relativity" from studying the 29th century computer files of the USS Relativity prior to going back in time to stop Mad Braxton. In the 29th century, they scan time as easily as the 24th century Starfleet scan space - they would know exactly what happened.

I don't think the events of FC fit the role of a predestination/pogo paradox for different reasons. To me if you watch the series of events in FC. There is only one timeline that is constantly being changed and rewritten.

Unaltered which is supplanted by the Borg's incursion
Borg timeline: supplanted by the Ent-E
Final timeline at the end of the movie would be similar to Unaltered timeline with variations.

With Seven and the Temporal Starfleet guy fail to mention is that had the Borg never tried to assimilate Earth in 2063; Zefram Cochrane would've carried out his scheduled flight on time and first contact with the Vulcans would've still happened. The Borg's interference was not a necessary contribution in order to make first contact and by extension the Federation happen.

Not necessarily. Has the Borg not attacked, Cochrane's flight may have occurred earlier (remember, the TNG crew were working to the date they knew from the time loop, not that of an unspoiled timeline), the Vulcan survey ship misses them and things evolve very very differently.

P.S.

Sometimes I wish ENT was officially made AU like JJTrek. Then they could've made it as futuristic as possible and not have to worry about why tech and story don't line up completely symmetrical with TOS and the TNG era. Rick Berman said in interviews after ENT was cancelled that was one of his ideas. To make a show that looked like it was 150 years more advanced that what we have now. Worrying about the prequel looking for advanced that tech and computers scene in TOS-TNG-DS9-VOY. ARGH THOSE HIDEOUS BLOCK COMPUTERS!!

I think people worry too much about how things look. It's no different to recasting a character IMO. Enterprise was pretty much it's own thing, visually - they snuck in some neat visual homages to other Treks but they clearly looked ahead of their present over TOS' 1960's-style past.

 

[R. Star]

To be fair a hundred years of regular skirmishes be it Duras and Archer to Kirk and Kang could be liberally interpreted as years of conflict or war. Certainly there was a cold war atmosphere, Chang even said they were cold warriors.

Certainly the whole augment forehead bit probably didn't endear them to humans.

 

[M.A.C.O.]

@ King Daniel. I like you points. You give me a lot to think about. I just think the Terminator example is a better example to a predestination/pogo paradox. In Terminator, Skynet and John Connor create their own futures by interfering with the past. Sarah Connor would've never had John or known to train and leave him information if she hadn't been threatend by a Terminator and if Kyle Reese hadn't dumped a massive amount of spoilers on her. Compare to FC where Cochrane was already planning to conduct his warp flight without any influence from future travelers. The funny thing is, when Cochrane has spoilers of the future dumped on him by the ENT-E crew. Cochrane tries to run away and abandon his destiny. You don't even need the Borg to sabotage history. The heroes will do it for you!

@GoRe Star You also gave me a thought. I don't think Archer haters would object to this. But WHAT IF Archer was the instigator of the "decades of war" with the Klingons? With all the boneheaded things he did in ENT. Would this really surprise anyone?

 

[Tiberius]

Seven can't have knowledge that the Borg would both succeed and fail at assimilating Earth.

Yes she can.

The enterprise took sensor readings of Earth when it was assimilated, just before they followed the Borg back.

The Borg came onto Voyager and assimilated engineering. They obviously got computer access, even if Data locked them out of some areas.

The Borg could have accessed those sensor logs.

The drones in the Sphere survived the fall to Earth relatively intact, as we know from Regeneration. They could have been sent those sensor logs after the Borg on the E accessed them.

The Borg on the planet are revived in Regeneration and at the end of the episode send a message to the Delta Quadrant.

The Borg in the 24th century receive this. Seven becomes aware of what happened, as do all the other drones. Also contained in the transmission is information about how humans were able to defeat the Borg on three occasions (the escape in Q Who, The Best of Both Worlds and the Battle of Sector 001 in FC). Unfortunately, some information is lost (the Borg in FC were trying to send an interplexed signal; in Regeneration they weren't able to do this, which is why the signal took so long to go to the Borg.)

The Queen sends the ship that attacked the outposts in The Neutral Zone. It finds that Humans are unremarkable and heads home. A waste to send Cubes across the galaxy to assimilate a species that is just like the ones in the DQ.

Q Who. The Cube on its way home finds the Enterprise, and the Queen becomes curious at how it escaped so easily. The Cube turns around and we see it again in BoBW.

Then another cube is sent, it gets to the Federation in FC. Launches a sphere, yadda yadda yadda, and the drones on board are given specific instructions by the Borg Queen that when you are revived by those scientists after being pulled out of the snow, make sure you send that information that originally got me interested in the Humans, okay?

Not canon, but it works.

 

[Rennick]

The episode never really fit. It was a monster-of-the-week episode used maybe to attract viewers.

Ultimately, I think it's good for shows to have mysteries, and as far as Star Trek goes, the Borg make for a good mystery. Where did they come from, what was their genesis?

Revealing the answers to those questions only reduces the impact and influence of the Borg.

 

[LMFAOschwarz]

With the Borg, every crew that encounters them one-on-one is always using all sorts of fancy tactics to stop them, rotating shield frequencies, re-modulating phasers, etc. But I've always wondered if a bunch of Borg were coming up the hallway, couldn't one just throw a bunch of marbles on the floor to slow them down?

 

[F. King Daniel]

The episode never really fit. It was a monster-of-the-week episode used maybe to attract viewers.

Ultimately, I think it's good for shows to have mysteries, and as far as Star Trek goes, the Borg make for a good mystery. Where did they come from, what was their genesis?

Revealing the answers to those questions only reduces the impact and influence of the Borg.

Supposedly they planned on doing another Borg episode in season five - Alice Krige was to play a Starfleet medtech who got assimilated by 22nd century Borg and became their queen, thus explaining her obsession with humans in FC and Voyager.

 

[R. Star]

Yeah, I can't see that being anything but silly at the best.

 

[Tiberius]

With the Borg, every crew that encounters them one-on-one is always using all sorts of fancy tactics to stop them, rotating shield frequencies, re-modulating phasers, etc. But I've always wondered if a bunch of Borg were coming up the hallway, couldn't one just throw a bunch of marbles on the floor to slow them down?

I'd love to see that!

 

[LMFAOschwarz]

I'd love to see that!

Yeah, the more I think about it I could envision Tom Paris doing that. I could picture him having a marble collection among all that junk he has.