Vulcans and Romulans

[Timo]

Well, most Trek is. The characters of Sarek and Amanda, for example, are a retcon of the early episodes where Spock's parents were supposed to be dead and the human in his bloodline was supposed to be a distant ancestor (see "Corbomite Maneuver"). It's a smooth retcon, since it's easy to ignore Spock's early use of the past tense and to plead estrangement rather than death as the reason for his detached attitude. Similarly, Sisko's dad's death is implied in an early DS9 episode, then retconned as something Joe Sisko dodged (but has been fighting ever since). In both cases, I feel the change of course was to the benefit of drama.

The ridge issue simply took longer to "resolve"...

I know we see a Vulcan in passing in Encounter at Farpoint and we also see one as a competitor of Wesley's in Coming of Age.

Dang! Thank you for the correction.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[C.E. Evans]

The basic assumption that the Romulans left in an unprecedented exodus is perhaps worth challenging. We could just as well assume that Vulcan had a small interstellar empire at that point, and that Romulans didn't so much "leave" as "fail to keep in touch". They might already have been living off-Vulcan to a large part, and their small group of star systems seceded from the larger Vulcan whole, perhaps leaving two midget empires of roughly equal size. Romulus itself might have been settled only after the secession, of course - but some parts of the Romulan Star Empire might be old Vulcan colonies that lie basically next door to the original home system (and thus explain the apparent proximity of the RNZ to Vulcan in, say, "Unification" or STXI).

Additionally, VOY's "Death Wish" established that Vulcans and Romulans fought a 100-year war sometime before the 22nd-Century (the actual when was never specified, but it had to be somewhere prior to 2072 or so as given in the episode).

 

[Timo]

But only if we trust the Q not to do time travel or history rewriting. Which probably isn't a good bet to place.

If we take the Q for their word, we can then start debating whether the war happened before or after the Romulans left planet Vulcan. For all we know, they were always a population group, a nation or a political party on Vulcan, and such an influential one that a past war with other Vulcan factions would be remembered as a "Romulans vs. the rest".

Timo Saloniemi

 

[C.E. Evans]

But only if we trust the Q not to do time travel or history rewriting. Which probably isn't a good bet to place.

Actually, we can since it wasn't something the Q really gave a dingo's kidney about.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Funny thing about the ridges is that they form a triangle shape more or less where the triangle shaped emblem is on those helmets used in TOS.

 

[BillJ]

Funny thing about the ridges is that they form a triangle shape more or less where the triangle shaped emblem is on those helmets used in TOS.

Perhaps the ridges come from serving too long at the lower levels of the Romulan military.

 

[Paradon]

Beverly Crusher mentioned on one of the episode, where Geordie was trapped on a planet with a couple Romulans, that Vulcans and Romulans are virtually identical according to her medical scanners, but she was having trouble saving the Romulan in the sickbay because all the Vulcans she scanned doesn't have a matching blood type, or is it rhybosome. She found a match in one crew member, though.... Worf! Maybe that small fraction of the genetics is actually the results of Romulans and Klingons interbreeding. They were allies for a long time and even trade technologies.

 

[Timo]

The very fact that Crusher even looked for the ribosomes in Worf proves that it's not something that only Romulans and Klingons share. Crusher also looked into humans - in fact, she seems to have looked into humans before she looked into Vulcans, judging by the way she phrases her "early results" for Picard.

Ribosome transfusion is way beyond today's medicine; we may transfuse blood components, but not cell components yet! Perhaps ribosomes prove to be robust and interchangeable between the Trek humanoid species even if said species have had nothing in common after their original seeding by those "The Chase" humanoids. And perhaps they prove to feature a set of "bio-rejection factors" of their very own, akin to blood types, but unrelated to species.

That is, today one may find B negative for a white patient in a black donor, but fail to find it in a thousand white donors. Or vice versa. Doesn't really tell us anything about the relationship between black and white people.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Paradon]

The differences between all the people in the world is only in appearances. We are the same species, but aliens from different worlds couldn't possibly have anything in common. Humans have much more in common with dogs than Vulcans. Do you know human's feelings and emotions are almost the same as dog's, but it's harder to read dogs because because they can't talk. They can only express them through body gestures.

I think Crusher was scanning the humans in the first place is because maybe humans in that century may have Vulcan and Romulan in the family tree. In one of the episode one crew member was exposed and they found out that his grandfather was actually a Romulan, not a Vulcan.

 

[Timo]

On the other hand, we don't need full compatibility in all situations. We can equally well consume a dog, a human or a cow and derive key nutrients from any of these sources. And a Salt Vampire won't have to make an exception with Spock just because he isn't a human. After all, the Salt Vampire's usual prey probably wasn't anything like human or Vulcan anyway.

Ribosomes are complex cell organs, but currently we don't know if they would have compatibility problems. They are essentially "cells within cells", and might well survive in alien environments and serve alien "parent cells". It wouldn't be impossible to postulate some sort of a negative indication for insertion of the desired type of ribosome - an indication that would be present in a certain percentage of all species, be they human, Vulcan, Klingon, canine, or invertebrate. By the same token, some other type of ribosome might have a different set of negative indications, and might slip harmlessly into the cell of the nameless Romulan patient or Worf (but be lethal to Centurion Bochra or Picard or Spock).

Of course, modern medicine doesn't tell us what good it would do to transfuse ribosomes to a patient's blood. But it sounds intuitively probable that transfusing cell organs will run into fewer compatibility problems than transfusing whole blood, because there are fewer components involved that might cause problems. In that sense, transfusion of ribosomes would be realistic scifi, a way to address the unrealistic concept of cross-species-compatible blood.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[therealsb63]

My thought on the Romulan ridges...something apparently happened on Romulus between the time of STVI:TUC and "The Neutral Zone." While the "new" Romulans had already been seen on TVG in TNG, Ambassador Nanclus in STVI is shown without ridges...even Caitlin Dar in STV had no ridges.

Perhaps some kind of ecological or biological accident or even disaster hit Romulus during those years the Romulans went missing after Khitomer, forcing them to make a biological/genetic adaptaion, which led to the ridges.

 

[therealsb63]

Beverly Crusher mentioned on one of the episode, where Geordie was trapped on a planet with a couple Romulans, that Vulcans and Romulans are virtually identical according to her medical scanners, but she was having trouble saving the Romulan in the sickbay because all the Vulcans she scanned doesn't have a matching blood type, or is it rhybosome. She found a match in one crew member, though.... Worf! Maybe that small fraction of the genetics is actually the results of Romulans and Klingons interbreeding. They were allies for a long time and even trade technologies.

Or the rules of medicine were simply bent a bit to make for a good plot...

 

[Paradon]

If they are identical, they would at least found some matches. That would be a more logical senerio. Why the heck would a Klingon possess a key rhybosome that produces certain enzymes that keeps him alive.

 

[Timo]

If they are identical, they would at least found some matches.

Depends on how complex the matching scheme is, and how many Vulcans there'd be aboard the E-D. More than one, obviously, but we never learn whether there were two or perhaps two hundred.

Why the heck would a Klingon possess a key rhybosome that produces certain enzymes that keeps him alive.

Well, virtually every species in the Milky Way of the Trek universe is supposed to carry DNA, thanks to a common origin to the species. Ribosomes even in the real world are ancient, and are mostly common between all vertebrate life. If anything in Trek universe is going to be cross-compatible between species, it's ribosomes and the related DNA/RNA mechanism.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Paradon]

Jazia had to use DNA re-sequencing and gene therapy on the womb to conceive a baby on DS9.

 

[Paradon]

I wonder why Romulans never mind meld? It's probably against their believes. The early Vulcans during the 22nd century also prohibited mind meld. They were more stringent back then and probably view mind meld as unethical and immoral...you know like sneaking into people's home and evesdropping. And it was probably very personal and intimate (just like having sex I guess! lol). Vulcans and Romulans are very passionate and deeply emotional races, and when you mind meld you know everything that person feel and what they have done...whether it's his/her experiences with thier spouse or personal opinions about something and someone, that they wouldn't necessary want to share with others.

 

[Deks]

It might be that the Romulans either lack the ability or have decided to forgo that particular mental ability because it's too connected with their Vulcan heritage (if one recalls, the majority of Romulans were not really too keen on the unification process).

 

[Timo]

I wonder why Romulans never mind meld?

Might be they meld all the time like crazy. We watch Romulans so seldom that we'd miss any instances of melding even if we didn't blink, unless Romulans were much more active in that respect than Spock or Tuvok.

Melding is hardly a viable interrogation technique, for example, if it truly means sharing one's thoughts. What Romulan intelligence operative would want to share his or her thoughts, even with somebody who's probably going to die soon? Not that we'd have seen a Romulan interrogation, surprisingly enough. (Unmeldable weirdos like Odo don't count here.)

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Paradon]

lol That's probably true! You know how it is in ST? lol

 

[Paradon]

It's funny the Vulcans and Romulans always state the truths and obvious that are right in front of your noses, but most people seem to over look it. For example, in "Tears of The Prophets" we see the Romulan senator saying it was a bad idea invading the system and Dominion space and I think the reason was that he didn't really know why the Dominions have abandoned the system. The Romulan senator was mocking General Martok saying your weakness was about to get much stronger. They found out later that they installed orbital, weapon platforms all over the system, and the Federation-Klingon-Romula alliance were planning to blast their way through them anyway. It turned out it wasn't as easy as they hope, and if weren't for Garak (who is a Cardassian and understand how their technologies work) who noticed the weakness, the fleet would have been anialated. They make it seem like it wasn't that important.