Read The Higher Frontier by Christopher L. Bennett. It explains everything.
What happened to espers?
- Thread starter Laura Cynthia Chambers
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It's on brand for Section 31.
Perhaps, Betazed wasn't a Federation member yet. Section 31 noted that there were aliens out there with ESP ability, that the Federation lacked. Vulcans have some, but it's limited. So... S31 decided the Federation needed that and started to try to make it happen.
Betazed then joins the Federation, and the project is abandoned. The Betazoids can fill that role now.
By the way, were all of the members of the 23rd century New Human movement supposed to be espers or could you join as a baseline human?
It's standard Earth practice to evaluate and measure all Starfleet personnel for their ESP rating. Gary Mitchell had the highest rating on the ship (091), followed by Dr. Dehner (089). ESP in humans is a measurable, scientific fact in the future.
Apparently, Spock was not affected by the barrier which concludes that he has a lower (normal) ESP rating though he has telepathic mind powers which he first reveals in Dagger Of The Mind. Vulcan mind melding must not be ESP?
The information in Gary's file suggests that ESP (or at least his ESP) was passed on to him through the maternal bloodline, and first started about six generations ago with "metaphysical studies" and "spiritual readings" which may suggest that ESP was being genetically advanced/amplified in humans (more eugenics?). Dehner's history of family ESPers goes back only three generations. With a generation being around 20-30 years or an average of about 25 years, six generations is about 150 years if we assume this is earliest experimentation to amplify ESP on Earth. (Of course, ESP could go back even farther, maybe to the dawn of man; gypsy fortune tellers, old wise women, stage mind readers, etc...but I get the feeling that they are talking about something different, more powerful than our current level of ESP.) If WNMHGB is ~200 to ~300 years in the future, then ESP studies and maybe its further advancement in humans started 50 to 150 years in the future from 1965 or Earth year ~2015 to ~2150. Since the ~300 year future is now canon, then ESP in humans may have been developed in the mid-22nd century if we assume Gary Mitchell's family was one of the oldest line of ESPers. Over the generations, it was recognized and measurable by the ESP rating and various quotients.
Miranda Jones was probably another gifted human whose ESP rating was so high that she was born a natural telepath. Blasting her though the Galactic Barrier in Is There In Truth No Beauty? didn't affect her, so, Starfleet may have put in passive features in their ships to prevent the barrier from affecting the crew, or this section of the barrier didn't have the ESP enhancing feature.
There is clearly a deeper understand of such in the Trek future, so being able to measure it is not surprising.
Apparently, Spock was not affected by the barrier which concludes that he has a lower (normal) ESP rating though he has telepathic mind powers which he first reveals in Dagger Of The Mind. Vulcan mind melding must not be ESP?
I don't know if that conclusion must be the only conclusion. Spock wasn't affected by the barrier, therefore has a lower than normal ESP rating seems like we aren't looking at all the data points. Spock isn't human... his brain physiology is going to be different. Concluding that because something didn't happen to him that did happen to humans could just as easily be due to him being Vulcan.
Since the ~300 year future is now canon, then ESP in humans may have been developed in the mid-22nd century if we assume Gary Mitchell's family was one of the oldest line of ESPers. Over the generations, it was recognized and measurable by the ESP rating and various quotients.[/quote]
With the "new" timeline of the Eugenics Wars taking place sometime post-2024... it's not unreasonable that even if the genetic modifications that would bring forth the ESP abilities were Eugenics Wars-era, and assuming that these modifications took several generations to begin to manifest/increase (why? I don't know.)
If Starfleet did eventually discover it was due to genetic modifications... then Starfleet officers would no longer have ESP ability because they would be barred from Starfleet.
I have. I just wonder, in canon, what might have happened.
We see only a handful of Starfleet members in TOS and TAS. Not nearly enough to make any definitive statements on who's in it.
According to Memory Alpha, ESP ratings in the vast majority of humans are normally incredibly low.
Only a few outliers exist, and even then, they had to have contact with the Galactic Barrier to amp that factor up.
Ergo Gary Mitchell & Dr. Elizabeth Dehner are considered unique edge cases where they were naturally high on the ESP ratings for a human. So they were truly "Edge Cases" because they wouldn't have become a threat if they never encountered the effects of the "Strange Energies" inside the Galactic Barrier at that moment in time.
Realistically, it wasn't the Galactic Barrier itself that caused problems, it was the "Strange Energies" that was inside the Galactic Barrier at that moment in time that affected Gary Mitchell & Dr. Elizabeth Dehner.
Remember, in Lower Decks, there was a seperate "Strange Energies" on a Second Contact mission to Apergos that caused Jack Ransom to be affected by it and develop "God Like" powers.
So these "Strange Energies" can be nearly anywhere and can affect all sorts of people, eventually giving them Super Powers equivalent to Marvel/DC Comics level or more.
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Seems to be an extrapolation on MA's part. We know Gary, Dehner, and the ones who died have high ratings.
They all got into Starfleet without worry on Starfleet's part. Dr. Jones would seem to have a higher rating than Gary or Dehner as she was a telepath without ever encountering the barrier.
Of course, the comment I was responding to was about Betazoids in the fleet, not humans,
Scientists discover all humans can read minds
Researchers uncovered that parts of the brain actually act as a 'psi inhibitor' - meaning it suppresses the natural psychic, telepathic, and clairvoyant abilities people have.
Scientists discover all humans can read minds
Researchers uncovered that parts of the brain actually act as a 'psi inhibitor' - meaning it suppresses the natural psychic, telepathic, and clairvoyant abilities people have.www.dailymail.co.uk
How many times have you been told not to bump your own threads? And this one has been dead for over a year.
You’ve earned formal warnings for this twice.
Just…stop.
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