Would the following society be allowed to join the Federation?

[at Quark's]

Suppose a Federation ship somewhere stumbles over a (stable) portal that transports ships back and forth to another stellar neighbourhood, which is not recognised (at first). Upon arriving there, a peaceful race is found, approximately being on a Federation level of development. Their and Federation values seem to largely coincide so cordial relations are begun. They satisfy all conditions for Federation membership and after a short time they opt for it, so the admission process is begun.

However, some time into this process, it is discovered that the portal doesn't transport ships primarily through space, but through time, let's say to 1.5 billion years in the past (this isn't noticed at first since 1.5 billion years is enough to alter the stellar neighbourhood beyond recognition (*) ) -- in our time, the race proves to be long, long extinct. Would this be an obstacle for the Federation to admit said society given that all kinds of ties already have been established, or would the Federation still recoil because of "mucking with the timeline"?


(* Probably they would still immediately recognise the fact by comparing positions of other galaxies, such as M31 and other members of the Local Group, but let's disregard that in order for this scenario to work.)

 

[valkyrie013]

I'd vote no.. and I would find a way to colapse the portal post haste.. 1.5 billion years is awhile, but sharing information about the future could wreak the timeline is some way.. I mean Earth is still there.. abit a ball of primordial ooze.. they could just find it and destroy it.. Then that would ruin your saturday plans!
Nope.. to much bad things could happen. Once we found out there in the past, Done.

 

[Riker'sMailbox]

agree with @valkyrie013

And love this question @at Quark's

 

[USS Triumphant]

They would want to make certain that it really IS transporting into the past - and not hopping ships into one of the almost infinite number of other "universe bubbles" outside of our own* that developed almost exactly like our own but 1.5 billion years out of sync. Because if it was the latter, there would be no real reason not to interact with them.

*As detailed in Brian Greene's "The Elegant Universe" - and other less populist places, I'm sure.

 

[UnknownSample]

Interesting idea. Is it a stable wormhole? Can you go back and forth both ways, as if it's the same time period? Look, if you believe in these people enough to let them into the Federation, you trust them not to unhappen Earth... Presumably they're very far from Earth without the wormhole, which won't transport in real time. What better way to make sure they pose no danger than to make them us? A Federation planet isn't going to make trouble....

 

[Grendelsbayne]

The problem isn't whether or not they're going to make trouble. The problem is whether ongoing interaction with your own past may cause changes in the timeline, potentially disastrous ones. And considering the Federation has a LOT more than just Earth to worry about, I'd have to agree it's too dangerous, 1.5 billion years or not.

Especially in the trek universe, which seems to be bursting with spacefaring species at all times. Changing the destiny of this past 'Federation' would have knock-on effects on their neighbours and the younger species who come into space shortly after them, and those changes would have knock-on effects on others, etc, quite possibly in an unbroken chain 1.5 billion years long.

 

[The Old Mixer]

What if the Federation finds evidence that this ancient race's contact with the Federation is already part of their own past? Then it becomes a predestination paradox. Maybe they have to allow it to preserve the timeline.

 

[Mojochi]

I'm inclined to say it's too dangerous, but at the same time, it's already done. Alternatively, if this civilization is advanced enough (& so is ours), it may be possible to "Safeguard" the entire quadrant that the Federation originates from. The choice comes down to pulling out, to limit pollution, even though it has already occurred, or stay & attempt to control it, now that it has. When you look at it like that, don't people always prefer to have control over dangerous things, rather than just leave it to chance?

 

[Grendelsbayne]

There's no such thing as 'control' in such a vastly complicated and delicate process, though.

 

[johnnybear]

What if these aliens were allowed to transport a few thousand of their people into the future and a planet was found for them to live on though? I mean a billion years ago is a helluva long time back even in space terms!
JB

 

[Butters]

What happened 1.5 billion years ago half way across the universe isn’t going to make a jot of difference to the present.

Any attempt to change the present would be like trying to stir soup with a ten meter cane. And besides, what happened 1.5 billion years ago already happened 1.5 billion years ago. Days don’t happen twice.

 

[at Quark's]

Interesting idea. Is it a stable wormhole? Can you go back and forth both ways, as if it's the same time period?

Yes, I was thinking DS9-wormhole style. Only this one transports to the past instead of the Gamma Quadrant.

They would want to make certain that it really IS transporting into the past - and not hopping ships into one of the almost infinite number of other "universe bubbles" outside of our own* that developed almost exactly like our own but 1.5 billion years out of sync. Because if it was the latter, there would be no real reason not to interact with them.

I suppose that could be done easily, by just determining the "quantum signature" or "quantum flux" as they did in Parallels.

I'd vote no.. and I would find a way to colapse the portal post haste.. 1.5 billion years is awhile, but sharing information about the future could wreak the timeline is some way.. I mean Earth is still there.. abit a ball of primordial ooze.. they could just find it and destroy it.. Then that would ruin your saturday plans!
Nope.. to much bad things could happen. Once we found out there in the past, Done.

But why would they? I already specified them to be peaceful and have ideals very similar to the Federation, and I specified them to be "long, long extinct in our time".

1.5 billion years is a hell of a long time, a huge chasm. Suppose that this species existed for 50 million years, which would make them an extremely long-lived intelligent organic species - only the Voth are in that ballpark as far as I know. And yet, they would still have been long dead before any life form that could be seen with the bare eye ever appeared on earth. There would probably be about a thousand- if not more- 'generations' of intelligent life between them and us they'd need to be worried about sooner if they wanted to pursue that course of action. So effectively, we inhabit a different galaxy in that respect and we aren't competitors.

Perturbations to the time line probably either propagate in random directions (if severe enough) or nullify (if not severe enough). Either way, 1.5 billion years is such a long time that probably nothing meaningful can be said about it.

Go back 1500 years and make the Vissian society of that era collapse -- there's a good likelihood that in Archer's time, they won't have developed as far as they did in his timeline.
Go back 1.5 million years and thoroughly disrupt the lives of ancestors species to Homo Sapiens (without exterminating them) - and the effects would be far less easy to predict. Humanity might suffer catastrophically, or not at all, on such a long term and roughly be in the same position as we are now.
Go back 1.5 billion years and there's probably not much you can say about it -- even if you exterminate all life on earth, it might form again (and evolve) in that amount of time. Only blowing up the entire planet would do the job for sure.

 

[Grendelsbayne]

Perturbations to the time line probably either propagate in random directions (if severe enough) or nullify (if not severe enough). Either way, 1.5 billion years is such a long time that probably nothing meaningful can be said about it.

Go back 1500 years and make the Vissian society of that era collapse -- there's a good likelihood that in Archer's time, they won't have developed as far as they did in his timeline.
Go back 1.5 million years and thoroughly disrupt the lives of ancestors species to Homo Sapiens (without exterminating them) - and the effects would be far less easy to predict. Humanity might suffer catastrophically, or not at all, on such a long term and roughly be in the same position as we are now.
Go back 1.5 billion years and there's probably not much you can say about it -- even if you exterminate all life on earth, it might form again (and evolve) in that amount of time.

This is exactly the point, though. The results are completely unpredictable with obvious catastrophic potential. Could you possibly luck out and be ok? Yeah. But that's not the kind of thing you take chances with.

Not to mention: 'roughly the same position' inherently implies changes. The continued existance of the Federation is not much solice for the individuals whose lives might be rewritten or entirely erased.

 

[The Old Mixer]

Days don’t happen twice.

They've been known to on Star Trek.

 

[USS Triumphant]

I suppose that could be done easily, by just determining the "quantum signature" or "quantum flux" as they did in Parallels.

That's the thing, though - the "universe bubbles" thing hasn't been touched by Trek yet at all, but it really seems to me that they would have the *same* quantum signature, because they aren't parallel universes in the quantum sense. They're more like entire universe-sized instances of Hodgkin's law of parallel planetary development, sitting outside of our universe.

 

[at Quark's]

This is exactly the point, though. The results are completely unpredictable with obvious catastrophic potential. Could you possibly luck out and be ok? Yeah. But that's not the kind of thing you take chances with.

Not to mention: 'roughly the same position' inherently implies changes. The continued existance of the Federation is not much solice for the individuals whose lives might be rewritten or entirely erased.

Well then, then the question would become whether this was 'supposed' to happen. I.e. did it happen "already" 1.5 billion years in our prime timeline's past before the portal was discovered or not? If not, then you would probably be right (though I still think the amount of control humans can exert over such things is an illusion). If however, it is already in our past, it could be very dangerous to not continue as we would have done, for exactly the same reasons. 1.5 billion years might simply be too long a time to find out either way.

It reminds me a bit of the situation in Cause and Effect. Picard and Crew already know they are involved in a disaster, just not what they did or didn't do that lead to it. Was their lack of knowledge leading to the disaster the first time around? Or would using their foreknowledge to try to avoid it in effect lead to the repeat of it? In the end, Picard concludes "we can't afford to start second-guessing ourselves" and he & crew decide to carry on as if they weren't caught in a time loop, but still be very diligent at the first sign of trouble.

 

[Grendelsbayne]

Well then, then the question would become whether this was 'supposed' to happen. I.e. did it happen "already" 1.5 billion years in our prime timeline's past before the portal was discovered or not? If not, then you would probably be right (though I still think the amount of control humans can exert over such things is an illusion). If however, it is already in our past, it could be very dangerous to not continue as we would have done, for exactly the same reasons. 1.5 billion years might simply be too long a time to find out either way.

It reminds me a bit of the situation in Cause and Effect. Picard and Crew already know they are involved in a disaster, just not what they did or didn't do that lead to it. Was their lack of knowledge leading to the disaster the first time around? Or would using their foreknowledge to try to avoid it in effect lead to the repeat of it? In the end, Picard concludes "we can't afford to start second-guessing ourselves" and he & crew decide to carry on as if they weren't caught in a time loop, but still be very diligent at the first sign of trouble.

It would be difficult to uncover that sort of information from so far in the past (though anything is possible if the writer chooses to do it). Absent any relevant information that it is a predestination paradox, the only sane thing would be to follow the standard time travel safety procedures and not interfere in the past.

 

[valkyrie013]

Well for cause and effect I would have asked.. What were we doing i the first go around? On this course at this speed? Okay.. adjust heading by 1 degree.. Done!
One DTI would flip a lid on the time travel.. 2.. 1.5 billion years ago.. were there any life in the galaxy? would they be almost alone?? I mean.. Someone has to be first to evolve to sentience..
Best answer would be. Everyone throu the portal, settle a new planet in our time, and still colapse the portal. To many questions..

 

[Artoo Atari]

Personally, I would agree with most and say shut it down. The Federation has enemies that could exploit it. If the UFP from the 23-24th century didn't close it up, I'd bet the temporal busybodies from the 31st century UFP would.

But to play Devil's Advocate for a moment, I would mention that the span of distance as well as time would most likely make interference negligible. Also, what about the Guardian of Forever? The Federation has a portal sitting right there that can cause more trouble of a more local and recent scope, yet there it is, allowed to remain.

 

[uniderth]

This is exactly the point, though. The results are completely unpredictable with obvious catastrophic potential. Could you possibly luck out and be ok? Yeah. But that's not the kind of thing you take chances with.

I disagree. The results are exactly predictable. Since we would be living in this hypothetical present, that present would exist as the sum total of all actions taken in the past, including those taken by meddling time travelers.

How do we know the Romulans wont sneak through and destroy earth 1.5 billion years ago? Because of the fact that earth was never destroyed 1.5 Billion years ago.

If any nefarious party had ever been successful in their plot to destroy earth in the past then earth wouldn't exist. Because, it does in fact exist, we can know with a surety that no one will ever be successful in their plans to destroy earth in the past.

I know that's not how time travel is generally portrayed on Star Trek, but I think the way they do portray it is pretty dumb.