The Milky Way

[Skywalker]

Out of curiosity, I looked that up. Turns out, 53. Though only 26 are confirmed members as of the 24th century. The rest are believed to be members depite nothing being firmly established one way or the other, those that Mr. Daniels claimed would be members in the 26th century, and members of the Coalition of Planets who likely did become Federation members, though there's nothing canon to say so.

Fun fact.

Do we know that 150 worlds mean 150 separate species, though? In the books, at least, both Mars and Alpha Centauri, both (apparently) with human-majority populations, are depicted as individual members of the Federation, separate from Earth.

We Humans may not be so unique in this respect. Could be any number of races that colonized other worlds - some of which have joined the Federation more or less independantly of each other.

Indeed, that's the point I was trying to make. I just don't know of any non-human examples. If there can be at least three human-populated worlds that are counted as separate members of the Federation, I don't see why there couldn't be, say, several worlds populated by Tellarites that are all separate member states.

 

[scotpens]

And all this is why I get royally pissed whenever I hear a science fiction show advertised as "the intergalactic adventures of..." when it's clearly INTRAgalactic.

Hear, hear.

Writers who casually toss around the word “intergalactic” without knowing what it means are a bug up my ass.

 

[USS Excelsior]

And in the Star Trek movies we see plenty of aliens we haven't seen before or see again. And we haven't seen Denobulans in any other show yet they are most likely members of the Federation, and then there were some aliens in Terra Prime when trying to form some alliance with never before seen aliens there too.

 

[7thsealord]

And in the Star Trek movies we see plenty of aliens we haven't seen before or see again. And we haven't seen Denobulans in any other show yet they are most likely members of the Federation, and then there were some aliens in Terra Prime when trying to form some alliance with never before seen aliens there too.

Consider the diversity of Humans on just this planet. Then add in the effects of several generations of different subgroups living in radically different environments (high-g / low-g just for starters).

Could be that some of those alien races, despite appearances, are actually quite closely related to each other