StarDestroyer.Net BBS

OK, look's like everybody's been busy, so I'll have the honors:



This episode was when Manny Cotto was given more control to turn Enterprise around for the better and I agree that "Observer Effect" is a well judged inversion of the infamous "Dear Doctor" and Phlox doesn't like being on the receiving end of callous indifference by so-called "higher" beings.

Come to think of it, the Organians intervention actually made things WORSE.
Why?
Well simple: If they had done nothing, three people would have died and the Enterprise/humanity would have learned something about disease control. It's not like an entire race or a large amount of people were at stake, and those that were were only endangered due to their own stupidity/carelessness.
But what happened now? "Oh, we contracted that deadly, deadly disease and we're gonna die! What's that? Oh, it's all fine now. No need to learn a lesson."

Really, that just shows how STUPID the Prime Directive is applied.
In principle, non-intervention is a fine policy. Giving a civilization powerful technology whose (destructive) potential they do not understand is certainly not a good move - ethics should evolve alongside technology, otherwise you might have problems. Conquering other planets with your vastly superior technology is very immoral as well, for obvious reasons.
And allowing a species to learn it's own lessons is fine as well.
But that's what the Organians prevented here! They REMOVED an opportunity to learn a lesson. Now that's fine if a large amount of lives is at stake - if the Enterprise had brought that disease back home or to another world. But that was not the case here.

Now we can argue that the benefit outweights those costs here - we're still talking about human lives after all. But that would not fit the Prime Directive at all! You can't call yourself non-interventionist when you intervene for every small thing that happens!


Really, i am surprised that Chuck missed that angle. It immediately sprang to my mind when i saw that the Organians not only intervened, but removed the crews memory. At least they could have altered it in order to show them that they needed (almost-)divine intervention and that they really messed up.

Something's wrong with the internets or my internet browser - embedded videos and pictures do not show up here and everywhere else, they seemed to have been replaced with blank squares, with a tiny green-blue-red box in the corner. Is it just me?

It's you.