[M]Unlike the Americans, we prefer not to get our news from the Post[/M]
There were also budgetary constraints which is why there is a Torchwood hiatus.
Typhon Pact..Do tell?
- Thread starter BryanSorensen
- Start date
There were also budgetary constraints which is why there is a Torchwood hiatus.
I'm not so sure about that. What I've heard is that normally there are two production crews spread over Doctor Who, Torchwood and the Sarah Jane Adventures. Now with Doctor who on a reduced schedule, they can't have both those crews doing all the normal Who work, so they have a slightly larger production crew working on all three things this year which is why Torchwood is just five episodes over one week somewhen in June.
Oh, I've been around. Good to be seen, though.
Agreed. One of the underlying premises of the PD seems to be that if you give advanced technology to a pre-warp culture they are just as likely to blow themselves up with the new toys as they are to start boldly going. But, isn't the Federation capable of deciding what technology to transfer to a newly discovered culture? To again use Earth as an example, if the Federation had found us in our 15th century, making a gift of warp drive or transporter technology would have been pointless. However, providing some insight into the nature of germs and disease and the tendency of rats to spread both around the globe might have been handy.
By establishing warp capability as the PD's litmus test, the Federation is saying it believes cultural maturity usually goes hand in hand with technological maturity. If we accept that -- tech capability as a yardstick of cultural maturity -- then surely the Federation could consider different levels of technology transfers based on a culture's existing status.
That's the usual argument, and I don't disagree.
But, I think a strong argument might be made in another direction.
First, cultures mature, species don't. We're homo sapiens until a new species comes along and we go away. We're all just as mature or immature as our ancestors who walked out of Africa.
Second, cultural maturity is spurred by exposure to and use of new technology. I.e., how societies deal with the implications of new technology -- what they do with the power it provides -- determines if, and how, they mature. Cultures either learn to control and benefit from new tools, or they put the tools to destructive purposes.
Third, in the absence of new technology, a society's development in other areas -- civil, ethical, artistic -- is likely to remain stagnant. Why? Because technology challenges a culture to change and adapt to the demands and rewards it offers. Systems at rest do not change unless something gives them a good swift kick.
The whole thing about cultures needing to "mature" is based on a false belief about there being some kind of natural time frame in which that happens. There are people today whose parents were hunter-gatherers but who themselves use laptops and cell phones with no trouble. A culture is made up of individuals. An individual raised from childhood in a modern technological context will be able to cope with it the same way regardless of whether that individual's parents were born in a high-tech society or a primitive hut.
On a larger scale, only a few cultures have actually developed their own technology at a steady pace -- arguably none have, because technological innovation is usually the result of the blending of ideas and inventions from multiple cultures. But progress usually follows punctuated equilibrium -- a culture will be at a steady or slowly advancing level for hundreds or thousands of years and then have a burst of accelerated progress, whether from its own innovation or by obtaining knowledge from outside (and the former usually includes the latter).
So there wouldn't be anything that unusual about a society obtaining advanced technology from an alien source. It's happened many times before. True, when it's something like nuclear power or antimatter or the like, there's a lot of potential for abuse and destruction, so caution should be exercised. But I don't think "maturity" has anything to do with it. Heck, sometimes the more technologically advanced societies are the less mature ones in ethical terms. There's no simplistic forward progress in terms of ethical advancement or responsibility.
On a larger scale, only a few cultures have actually developed their own technology at a steady pace -- arguably none have, because technological innovation is usually the result of the blending of ideas and inventions from multiple cultures. But progress usually follows punctuated equilibrium -- a culture will be at a steady or slowly advancing level for hundreds or thousands of years and then have a burst of accelerated progress, whether from its own innovation or by obtaining knowledge from outside (and the former usually includes the latter).
So there wouldn't be anything that unusual about a society obtaining advanced technology from an alien source. It's happened many times before. True, when it's something like nuclear power or antimatter or the like, there's a lot of potential for abuse and destruction, so caution should be exercised. But I don't think "maturity" has anything to do with it. Heck, sometimes the more technologically advanced societies are the less mature ones in ethical terms. There's no simplistic forward progress in terms of ethical advancement or responsibility.
Exactly. And that can vary within a human lifetime.
For instance, no reasonable person could argue that Germany under the Nazis was a more mature society than, say, Somalia during that same time frame. Yet, just a few generations before that, no one could reasonably deny that Germany was one of the most educated, cultured countries in the world and a center of European learning. (Not that Germany didn't have a history of genocidal behavior, of course.)
And yet, by the same token, only a few generations later, Germany is one of the world's most liberal, anti-nationalist countries, with a strong tradition of human rights and of encouraging humane non-interventionism, so much so that it's literally the most popular country in the world right now.
So different cultures/species mature at different rates. Should there be a litmus test for the PD to use in determining contact/intervention?
One of the canonical criterion for joining the Federation (post-warp drive of course) is a unified world, another is religious freedom and lack of class systems. I believe that the Federation adopted that because Earth didn't unite and drop all that until after it had discovered warp drive. Perhaps if Earth had united beforehand, then it would ask the same of all cultures/species before contact/intervention was made.
Perhaps that should be the litmus test. The non-interference until planet x is united with religious freedoms and lack of class/caste systems.
Is that more sensible?
One of the canonical criterion for joining the Federation (post-warp drive of course) is a unified world, another is religious freedom and lack of class systems. I believe that the Federation adopted that because Earth didn't unite and drop all that until after it had discovered warp drive. Perhaps if Earth had united beforehand, then it would ask the same of all cultures/species before contact/intervention was made.
Perhaps that should be the litmus test. The non-interference until planet x is united with religious freedoms and lack of class/caste systems.
Is that more sensible?
I have a strong suspicion that the writers for the Typhoon books will be in no particular order: KRAD (seeing as he starts the ball rolling in ASD), Mack, Bennett, Ward/Dilmore and DRG III though I have no clue how many books this thing will have.
i pick...
KRAD
Mack
Bennett
Wardilmore
PAD
KRAD
Mack
Bennett
Wardilmore
PAD
I say:
Bennett
Swallow
KRAD
Mack
Wardilmore
MWB
DRGIII to finish
Bennett
Swallow
KRAD
Mack
Wardilmore
MWB
DRGIII to finish
I don't think so, because contact with outside cultures can often help bring about such changes within a society. Engagement is more constructive than isolation. Of course the PD forbids imposing change on a culture, because such change can't stick if it doesn't come from within, but the movement driving change within the society can be inspired or promoted by an outside example.
And again, we shouldn't fall into the TNG-era mistake of defining all contact as interference. Interference means getting in someone's way. You're not in someone's way if you're walking alongside them.
Anyway, I don't think there should be a litmus test. Every case is going to be unique. A set of guidelines for evaluating the decision in each individual case is valuable, but a strict, simplistic universal rule is misguided.
I like your selection of MWB. Do you think the TP will stretch so far back into TOS territory?
I don't know, perhaps MWB could do a prequel to the Typhon Pact arc which sets everything up for the others to do.
Agreed.
I'll define "mature society" as "one that doesn't use new technology to blow itself up". I don't want to consider ethics because it is such a variable. I'm not sure we can equate ethics with maturity. I'm not even sure it's a term that can be applied usefully to entire cultures. (Question: Who has the most mature society -- humans, Klingons, or Romulans? They all certainly have different ethics and social patterns, but I don't think we can use those as criteria to make that choice. An independent external arbiter, with no skin in the game, might have an entirely different opinion.
But, back to the PD: The Federation creates a relationship with every new culture that it discovers, even if it does not reveal itself to that culture. The PD, then, would be more useful if it did not simply prohibit contact with pre-warp cultures, but provided guidance on the amount and nature of contact that might be established. That could begin with remaining completely invisible and going from there.
I realize this is thoroughly pointless theorizing, but while we're at it, I might as well join in. I figure that the TP miniseries is going to have individual books focusing on individual crews, because Destiny just did the one-big-story thing, and since the Pact is so multifaceted, it makes sense you'd have different crews tackling different aspects. Keep the politics running through the whole thing, but center each book around a different crew.
I'd do:
Bennett - Titan
DRG3 - TNG (wouldn't this be good?)
KRAD - Klingons
Mack - Aventine
Beyer - Voyager (probably)
and maybe:
PAD - NF
though he hasn't been that much of a team player lately.
That'd be a fun lineup.
I'd do:
Bennett - Titan
DRG3 - TNG (wouldn't this be good?)
KRAD - Klingons
Mack - Aventine
Beyer - Voyager (probably)
and maybe:
PAD - NF
though he hasn't been that much of a team player lately.
That'd be a fun lineup.
Just to clarify, are you guys talking about Margaret Wander Bonanno or Mike W. Barr? And either way, why assume said author can only do TOS? Mike has written a TNG annual for DC Comics, and Margaret wrote the 24th-century tale Catalyst of Sorrows.
Technological adaptability is not what I had in mind; I don't doubt that if a Federation-like culture were to make contact, within a dozen years our children would be making warp-scale calculations. That very technological adaptability is, however, a problem; as I said, I dread the idea of such destructive potential in the hands of those who have demonstrated time and time again their willingness to disregard human life in pursuit of whatever mad cause drives them. Our real problems remain conceptual; that the majority of the species is, to put it bluntly, fucking stupid. Whether it's a refusal to accept centuries-old scientific realities, infantile in-group thinking or good old fashion killing the guy the next river/border over because he/she looks/talks/acts different, I think we're a long way from being ready to accept the idea of aliens. From individual to individual, of course, I persist in the belief that our potential is great, but if I was an alien, I don't see why I would want to contact a species which--collectively--is mired in fear, ignorance and aggression.
Fictitiously yours, Trent Roman
I just started re-reading New Frontier (as I had only read the first few books many years ago). I'm a little confused by the fact that the Danteri are both a part of the Federation and apparently still bent on conquest (possibly enslavement?).... Can anybody clarify this for me?
Similar threads
