Jedi Mind Trick Vs Vulcan Mind Meld

[Otacon30]

Hello Everyone,

First time post, long time account. sorry i haven't posted anything, but i must admit i have taken this time to read over most of the old forums post and i love it. This site is amazing and its good to see a pro star wars vs star trek site that allows actually 'thinking.'

anyway, lets get to the matters at hand, Jedi mind trick vs Vulcan mind meld, also other abilities on both side, such examples as Kylo Ren's unique ability to pull the very info and thoughts from the mind of his enemies. Can a Jedi probe the mind of a Vulcan? can a Vulcan force mind meld to a Jedi or Sith? which is stronger in your opinion?

also from a episode in DS9 (sorry cant remember which, it was early season 1 or 2), Dukat, S.G. was a Cardassian military officer who had protected his mind from probing, in the episode a Vulcan is incapable of mind melding with him. So does the Jedi have the capability of drawing the information out? Do Jedi/Sith use a different telepathy (if it can be considered that) then Vulcans?

thank you all, and look forward to the discussion.

[Borgholio]

I would say it depends on the strength of the user. For instance, in ST-6, Spock was able to "mind-rape" Valeris and steal information out of her head despite (presumably) her resisting. That's pretty much what Kylo did to Rey, before she learned to resist. Vader was able to read surface thoughts and feelings from Luke on DS-2, and the Jedi High Council was able to easily read the mind of young Anakin.

So take a powerful Force user such as Vader, Yoda, or Windu, and pit them against a Vulcan...it really would depend on how much discipline the Vulcan has. Someone like Spock who has over a century of training would probably be very difficult to read.

[U.P. Cinnabar]

The info can always be Force choked out of Dukat, or Force lightninged, if nothing else works.

Also, the Jedi can do their mind fuckery at range. Vulcans, aside from Spock feeling 430 Vulcans being eaten by the space amoeba in "The Immunity Syndrome," are touch telepaths.

[Borgholio]

Also, the Jedi can do their mind fuckery at range. Vulcans, aside from Spock feeling 430 Vulcans being eaten by the space amoeba in "The Immunity Syndrome," are touch telepaths.

That doesn't mean Vulcan's can't resist Jedi mind tricks, it just means they can't return the favor without being able to touch. Resisting mind-reading is often shown as being an exercise in mental discipline...something which most Vulcans are extremely good at.

[Lord Revan]

that said in the Clone Wars series it was shown that at least powerful Jedi can brute force their way in if they really really wanted something out of person's mind though it took 3 of really strong jedi (Mace Windu, Anakin Skywalker and Obi-wan Kenobi) to do it and it was really painful to person getting mind read.

That said a Jedi mind trick is really, really weak both in terms of a Jedi's telepathic abilities and as telepathic "attack" as it's essentially a suggestion on the lines of "you really want do what I'm saying" so Vulcans would most likely be easily able to resist the suggestion thanks to their mental discipline.

[Simon_Jester]

anyway, lets get to the matters at hand, Jedi mind trick vs Vulcan mind meld, also other abilities on both side, such examples as Kylo Ren's unique ability to pull the very info and thoughts from the mind of his enemies.

That may not be so unique after all. We've seen Jedi and Sith say things like "your thoughts betray you," and while they may not literally be reading details of the thoughts and memories of another person, that doesn't mean they cannot do so. Or at least, that a Force user with sufficient ruthlessness couldn't do so, as forcibly reading another person's mind might be traumatic and damaging. A Jedi should not do such things.

Can a Jedi probe the mind of a Vulcan? can a Vulcan force mind meld to a Jedi or Sith?

Have we ever seen a Vulcan forcibly read the mind of another Vulcan of comparable mental discipline? Spock is a highly experienced and remarkable Vulcan, and would probably enjoy the upper hand over someone like Valeris in telepathic combat. It may well turn into a question of power level. A Jedi padawan might be unable to influence the mind of a paragon like Spock, while a Jedi master might be able to influence the mind of an ordinary, 'street level' Vulcan.

which is stronger in your opinion?

The Vulcans seem to get more information out of a mind meld than the Jedi typically do out of a mind trick. They learn more details, they can analyze the contents of another person's brain. They can even transfer elements of another person's personality to themselves, and vice versa, for a time (Sarek, Spock's father, does this with Picard in a third season TNG episode, to help himself calm down before an important diplomatic meeting).

On the other hand, a Jedi can influence minds from across the room, can create illusions or hallucinations of sound or possibly sight, and (especially useful) can influence minds without the target knowing they've done so. When a Vulcan mind melds with you, you damn well know you've been melded with, have at least the opportunity to resist, and know what's happened afterwards. Jedi mind tricks work even if the target doesn't know what is going on and just wanders off looking for their droids somewhere else.

So it depends. Which is more powerful, a Vulcan mind meld or a Jedi mind trick? That's like asking, which is more powerful, a steak knife or a Swiss army knife? The steak knife is better at cutting things, but the Swiss army knife is more portable, more versatile, and more flexible.

also from a episode in DS9 (sorry cant remember which, it was early season 1 or 2), Dukat, S.G. was a Cardassian military officer who had protected his mind from probing, in the episode a Vulcan is incapable of mind melding with him. So does the Jedi have the capability of drawing the information out? Do Jedi/Sith use a different telepathy (if it can be considered that) then Vulcans?

Since we don't really know much about the mechanics of telepathy, since Star Trek is (mercifully) silent on how it works while Star Wars is (less mercifully) silent except for saying 'blah blah midichlorians...'

There's really no way to know if the two techniques work on different mechanisms. Or if they work in the same way. Jedi clearly have the advantage in doing things at a distance, but that doesn't mean they're not just using similar mechanisms (just 'wirelessly').

One of the common assumptions we make in versus comparisons is interoperability. Things that work in one setting should usually work in another. Systems that are more or less similar in each setting should work more or less the same as one another. It's not fair saying "well, physics is different in Battlestar Galactica than in Star Trek, so phasers and warp drives don't work in one setting, while jump drive doesn't work in the other." Not only is it unfair, it's generally not fun, because it reduces the ability of things to interact with each other. And interaction is the whole point of a versus.

If we assume interoperability, it is likely that the Jedi and the Vulcans are doing more or less the same things. We would tentatively assume that they're doing similar enough things that they can interact on the same level, play on the same field, so to speak. And it follows that defenses that work against one will work against the other. So Gul Dukat's mental discipline would at least help him to resist Jedi mind reading and Jedi mind tricks, under the right conditions.

[Lord Revan]

anyway, lets get to the matters at hand, Jedi mind trick vs Vulcan mind meld, also other abilities on both side, such examples as Kylo Ren's unique ability to pull the very info and thoughts from the mind of his enemies.

That may not be so unique after all. We've seen Jedi and Sith say things like "your thoughts betray you," and while they may not literally be reading details of the thoughts and memories of another person, that doesn't mean they cannot do so. Or at least, that a Force user with sufficient ruthlessness couldn't do so, as forcibly reading another person's mind might be traumatic and damaging. A Jedi should not do such things.

Actually Kylon Ren's mindreading abilities aren't unique as I said there was Clone Wars episode where Anakin, Obi-Wan and Mace Windu did more or less the same thing, though his strength in that area might be atypical.

That said however Jedi seem to be able to use their abilities more easily (at least fully trained Jedi) where they can use the mind trick (that has nothing to do with mind reading) more or less casually, while I can remember one possible example of a Vulcan using their telepathic abilities casually and intentionally the mind link between T'pol and Tucker or Spock sensing the deaths on the Vulcan crew don't count here really as those weren't intentional uses.

Oh and in case someone wants to nitpick my wording the key words here are CASUAL and INTENTIONAL I made them bloody obvious so everyone can see you're lying when you claim you didn't see them!

PS. that last part wasn't directed at Simon, the person who it was directed towards knows I mean him, but I won't name him out what little respect I have for him.

[Simon_Jester]

Uh, that little byplay aside...

Even there, the 'unintentional' use of Vulcan telepathic ability is quite limited. The "sense the deaths" incident certainly doesn't involve communication of anything substantial other than, well, the death of a lot of Vulcans.

And frankly, I get the feeling that the writers on Enterprise found themselves breaking a lot of characterization involving Vulcans and mind melds because they were using it as a metaphor for sex and sexual liberation. I speculate that it may be that they were more inclined to do this, now that their Vulcan character was being played by an attractive woman.

Hence you get things like long range telepathic contact between T'Pol and Tucker associated with them falling in love. I'm not sure how seriously to take that in the overall context of what Vulcans do or can do, because I'm not sure what to make of it in terms of how it fits in with the earlier portrayals of Vulcans (at chronologically later dates in the Star Trek universe)

[Lord Revan]

I seem to remember that Tuvok had some issues with a holographic recreation of his wife not being "good enough" for dealing with Pon Farr suggesting there was more then just physical interaction that was needed. That not solid evidence by any sane standards but it's possible this was indication of telepathic link betwen Vulcan mates before T'Pol.

Being a heterosexual man though I can't say anything about attractive Tim Russ is seen.

[Simon_Jester]

My sense is that with Voyager and Tuvok, they took sort of an opposite tack, and wrote him as a more stereotypical uptight Vulcan who used mind melds more or less the same way Spock did, only perhaps more aggressively.

[I could be wrong here; I've watched a lot of TOS and TNG, but a lot less of the '90s-vintage shows and Enterprise]

More generally, that's very much... close range telepathic interaction, shall way say. Whereas with T'Pol and Tucker, the distances involved were, I gather, well outside of what is the norm for mind melding.

[Lord Revan]

There's the matter that Picard was able to stay mind melded with Sarek without physical contact (the TNG episode "Sarek") as did Sarek's aide so "long" distance mental link is not unprecidented, why didn't hear about the link between mates before ENT is probably because it's one of those thing Vulcans don't discuss with outsiders like Pon Farr.

Though it seems the link can be only established while in physical contact (since the orion episode happened after T'Pol and Tucker had practiced "interspecies interaction").

[Borgholio]

Actually Sarek took some of Picard's stability and Picard took some of Sarek's madness, which then took awhile to fade. I don't think there was an active link between the two.

[Lord Revan]

Actually Sarek took some of Picard's stability and Picard took some of Sarek's madness, which then took awhile to fade. I don't think there was an active link between the two.

The episode is (presumbly intentionally) rather vague about the details, but my point is that idea Vulcan telepathic abilities work beyond the range of physical contact is not something without precident what ENT made.

That said we don't really know the details of the link between T'Pol and Tucker either so it could be an active link or simply a lingering side effect of a mental link during you know what. Really only thing we know about it is that it allow Tucker to resist the orion female's phermone based seduction abilities that worked only on males of certain species to begin with Phlox was partly immune as it disrupted the sleeping patterns for his species rather allowing him to seduced more easily and females got headaches rather then be easier to be seduced.

[Otacon30]

Wow Everyone, great job.

im glad the ball is rolling and i have some more discussion questions that popped up while i read these post. First off who (in your mind or opinion) would be considered "Weak Minded" races or individual from the Star Trek universe. What i'm getting at is Jedi Master Obi-wan Ken obi stated " the Force can influence the weak minded" now weak minded doesn't exactly mean the stupid, its my opinion that weak minded are weak willed, or weak fortitude of the mind. Can an individual who is greedy or power hungry be effected, take for example my 2 test subjects (feel free to talk about anyone.) Quark and Winn Adami both from DS9. Does emotional state play affect? for example Garak (DS9) is Claustrophobic, if pushed into his fears would a man who is so easily strong willed, break to Jedi/Sith mind tricks?

[Borgholio]

Well Quark is actually rather cunning and fairly smart. He's not a fool. I suspect he would not be as easy to mind trick as that guy selling death sticks to Obi Wan in Episode 2. Adami is a bit of a tool so she would be easy to trick. Garak is hyper-paranoid due to his Obsidian Order training, so that might be used against him. On the other hand, it might have him question random thoughts that pop into his head that are out of character for him. Hard to say.

There's also the issue of species. It's been demonstrated that at least a few species in SW are unable to be mind tricked at all (Hutts and Toydarians, for instance). So it's possible that some species in Trek are simply immune to the process alltogether.

[Lord Revan]

I dunno how it's explained now but in legendaries the "weak minded" was explained as "how willing is the target to obey the suggestion" so the Stormtroopers in ANH weren't dumb per say but just bored and unwilling to inspect each and every arrival to the city so the suggestion "this isn't what you're looking for" worked on them.

[bilateralrope]

Garak is hyper-paranoid due to his Obsidian Order training, so that might be used against him. On the other hand, it might have him question random thoughts that pop into his head that are out of character for him. Hard to say.

That training is likely to include some techniques for resisting telepathy. Making it even harder to predict how he would fare when faced with a different telepathic attack used against him.

[Elheru Aran]

Garak is hyper-paranoid due to his Obsidian Order training, so that might be used against him. On the other hand, it might have him question random thoughts that pop into his head that are out of character for him. Hard to say.

That training is likely to include some techniques for resisting telepathy. Making it even harder to predict how he would fare when faced with a different telepathic attack used against him.

Quite probable, given that there are a number of known telepathic species in the Federation, who it can be easily assumed by the paranoid to be part of their opponents' forces. If nothing else, by capture it would be one way to wring information from prisoners' minds without resorting to torture (more or less).

The mind-meld does seem to differ from the 'mind trick' in that it's a more direct invasion of a mind, rather than a simple suggestion of "you *really* want to do this". The Jedi do have a version of mind-melding available to them, but they're far more wary about using it against a unwilling subject, it seems.

EDIT: Hell, given the existence of known telepathic species, I would consider mental resistance training to be pretty much mandatory above a certain rank and in some positions in pretty much each faction. Klingons, Romulans, and so forth. The basics of it are likely set forth in early training (Starfleet Academy) and once promoted to a certain level they might have an appointment quietly set up with the Division of Telepathic Security or whatever.

[bilateralrope]

EDIT: Hell, given the existence of known telepathic species, I would consider mental resistance training to be pretty much mandatory above a certain rank and in some positions in pretty much each faction. Klingons, Romulans, and so forth. The basics of it are likely set forth in early training (Starfleet Academy) and once promoted to a certain level they might have an appointment quietly set up with the Division of Telepathic Security or whatever.

The Federation has the most telepaths of the AQ powers. That means the Federation would have an easier time testing their anti-telepath techniques than any other faction.

[Elheru Aran]

EDIT: Hell, given the existence of known telepathic species, I would consider mental resistance training to be pretty much mandatory above a certain rank and in some positions in pretty much each faction. Klingons, Romulans, and so forth. The basics of it are likely set forth in early training (Starfleet Academy) and once promoted to a certain level they might have an appointment quietly set up with the Division of Telepathic Security or whatever.

The Federation has the most telepaths of the AQ powers. That means the Federation would have an easier time testing their anti-telepath techniques than any other faction.

Probably. It does make one wonder how the Klingons manage, they aren't noted much for psychic abilities of any sort, and I haven't heard of any psychic aliens within their sphere of influence.

The Romulans *should* have somewhat the same abilities as the Vulcans, however quite likely they don't have any real skill at it given the long generations of division between the two races. It's not impossible though that they might have agents who infiltrated the Vulcans to learn some tricks. It's the sort of thing they would happily do. But then with their paranoia how do they know that their agents wouldn't get turned around on them?

Aren't Vorta telepathic to some degree?

[FaxModem1]

My sense is that with Voyager and Tuvok, they took sort of an opposite tack, and wrote him as a more stereotypical uptight Vulcan who used mind melds more or less the same way Spock did, only perhaps more aggressively.

[I could be wrong here; I've watched a lot of TOS and TNG, but a lot less of the '90s-vintage shows and Enterprise]

More generally, that's very much... close range telepathic interaction, shall way say. Whereas with T'Pol and Tucker, the distances involved were, I gather, well outside of what is the norm for mind melding.

In the Voyager 5th season episode "Gravity ", Tuvok uses a mind meld as an intimate goodbye to Noss, a woman who was rather enamoured with him for several months. Vorik, in the third season episode "Blood Fever",when trying to get into Torres's pants, initiates a mind meld with her. It's broken off by her and makes her unstable. So mind melds do have a sense of physical intimacy in the 24th century.

The fact that the Vulcans can also use this as a weapon against enemies or as a translation process is a whole other can of worms society wise.

[Simon_Jester]

I dunno how it's explained now but in legendaries the "weak minded" was explained as "how willing is the target to obey the suggestion" so the Stormtroopers in ANH weren't dumb per say but just bored and unwilling to inspect each and every arrival to the city so the suggestion "this isn't what you're looking for" worked on them.

But then that sort of conflicts what Obi-Wan did in Episode II to the drug dealer, who presumably did want to sell death sticks and wasn't all that inclined to go home and rethink his lifestyle.

Perhaps a better explanation is that "weak minded" refers to how open a person is to suggestions or how likely they are to act on a new impulse introduced to their brain. A person who normally thinks things over very carefully might be harder to mind-trick. Meanwhile, stormtroopers are explicitly brainwashed and subject to all sorts of indoctrination.

In which case telepathically implanting yet another suggestion into their mind, which is already a big ball of suggestions and programming, might be a case of "pushing at an open door." It just swings out of your way and does not resist, because it has already been unlocked.

Likewise, a petty drug dealer (who may themselves be a drug user) has low resistance because they're an impulsive person or a person who routinely acts on their impulses without thinking things through.

Whereas Jabba, even if Hutts are not naturally immune to mind tricks, might still be resistant. Because he is a thinker and a planner, who is capable of planning ahead and preparing contingencies for emergencies. He's a criminal mastermind, which makes it understandable that he would be contemptuous of his lesser-minded associates who are vulnerable to Luke's suggestions.

[Alyrium Denryle]

I've gone over some of this in detail in another thread, but it is worth going over again.

A Jedi Mind Trick is thwarted by stubbornness or a well-ordered mind and it takes three Jedi to mind trick a moderately stubborn bounty hunter. So you are looking at mind tricks being blocked by someone with good impulse control or resistance to suggestion. Blocking the telepathic probes of a Jedi simply requires guarding one's thoughts most of the time so they dont leak.

Vulcan are baseline touch telepaths. Without a whole lot of training they are able to use touch to communicate, and perform a complete consciousness meld. Their mental discipline is also over and above what we see in Star Wars. They are basically the platonic form of having a well-ordered mind that resists suggestion.

So on the attack, I dont think a Jedi will get much telepathic traction in there. No matter how powerful they are. Now, most Vulcans probably wont be able to do much to a Jedi because they would have to get physical contact and that is hard to do through a lightsaber. However, there are exceptions. Particularly well trained Vulcans are capable of scanning and thought projection at range. We see both (particularly projection) from Spock, Tuvok and Sarek. How forceful against a target that knows what is happening they can be at range, I dont know.

[FaxModem1]

which is stronger in your opinion?

The Vulcans seem to get more information out of a mind meld than the Jedi typically do out of a mind trick. They learn more details, they can analyze the contents of another person's brain. They can even transfer elements of another person's personality to themselves, and vice versa, for a time (Sarek, Spock's father, does this with Picard in a third season TNG episode, to help himself calm down before an important diplomatic meeting).

On the other hand, a Jedi can influence minds from across the room, can create illusions or hallucinations of sound or possibly sight, and (especially useful) can influence minds without the target knowing they've done so. When a Vulcan mind melds with you, you damn well know you've been melded with, have at least the opportunity to resist, and know what's happened afterwards. Jedi mind tricks work even if the target doesn't know what is going on and just wanders off looking for their droids somewhere else.

It is worth noting that in the Enterprise episodes"In a Mirror, Darkly", Mirror T'pol melded with Mirror Tucker and gave him hidden instructions to sabotage the warp core as well as erasing the memory of the meld with the memory of them having sex instead, or at least removing the meld part of the memory altogether.

So, if motivated, a Vulcan could command someone with a mind meld and have their Patsy be none the wiser. Though, as you said, it requires physical contact.

[darthy2]

Spock performed a mind meld with Nomad, an artificial intelligence, in "The changeling" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZsJazHAr9EE at 0:28