SF Debris: Playing God

[Nutso]

http://blip.tv/sf-debris-opinionated-re ... ew-6716851

Opinionated DS9 Episode Guide watches the station crew "Play God." I'm guessing this means dealing with the proto-universe and not killing Cardassian voles, although since they spend equal time on both it's hard to tell.

[Teaos]

Proto universe?

The concept of that is so huge, yet I didn't even remember it before this review. Its the same as the Dyson sphere they found. It is such a massive concept, and they treat it as the anomaly of the week.

[McAvoy]

Yeah. The Dyson Sphere is perhaps one of the most impressive things in Sci-Fi and they treat it like its the equivilant of new flower they found on some random planet.

[Teaos]

The implications of that sphere for the Federation are massive, either moving it or fixing the sun (Both long shots but well worth a good go) would be the single most important thing in Federation history.

And the thing is, the inside looked kinda fine, only radiation of some sort if memory serves, their must be species that could live there, or humans even with preventative medication.

[McAvoy]

Moving that sphere would be even a more massive undertaking than fixing the sun. The Federation already has technology that can do that or research along those lines.

Taking apart that sphere would be just as a massive undertaking as making a new one.

[Teaos]

Worst case use it for scrap.

[Coalition]

The fun part is Kira was making the argument about us vs them and arguing that since they need to protect themselves (and have the capability to do so), they should (technobabble) the protouniverse first. One opportunity that was missed is Odo could have thrown that back in her face, that the Cardassians felt the same way towards the Bajorans. (9:45, especially 10:15)

As to Odo not stepping on ants, I see that as Odo preferring Order. He likes a well-run station, and the order in an ant hive reflects his own Changeling conditioning about wanting order wherever they go. He was an umpire at a baseball game, a security officer under the Cardassians and the Federation, and each time he wanted a correctly-run game or station (he memorized the rules for baseball and was able to quote them!).

For the 'life' in the protouniverse, they could have just said that it resembles life, producing small amounts of order in it, as the protouniverse expands. Like plants do absorbing energy from the sun. It is a basic energy critter, feeding off concentrated energy sources, and using those to think and move with. Hopefully the DS9 crew treated them nicely, so they don't become the C'Tan.

[Graham Kennedy]

The implications of that sphere for the Federation are massive, either moving it or fixing the sun (Both long shots but well worth a good go) would be the single most important thing in Federation history.

Then again, moving a Dyson sphere is probably so far beyond the Federation that it's not even worth thinking about. They've struggled to move a stellar core fragment and a moon before now, moving a whole Dyson sphere would be impossible.

Fixing the star would be more reasonable, we've seen them modify a star in Half a Life, though it didn't work, and we've seen them relight a dead one in that DS9 episode. But I'd suggest that if the original builders of the sphere couldn't fix it, then the Federation is very unlikely to be able to.

[Captain Seafort]

They might not need to fix the star - there was liquid water on the interior surface of the Sphere, so the instability can't be too bad.

[Teaos]

I thought it was something like raditation?

[Graham Kennedy]

Data : "Sensors show that the star is extremely unstable. It is experiencing bursts of radiation and matter expulsions."

In other words, unliveable conditions.

Whoever built this thing would have to be thousands of years in advance of the Federation, if not tens of thousands. And the fact that they abandoned it heavily implies that they were unable to move it, unable to fix the star, and unable to live with the effects of the star. To presume that the Federation would succeed where they would fail seems rather unlikely, to put it mildly.

[Teaos]

Well it seems obvious that species is not around anywhere anymore. So maybe they just didn't fix it cause they were moving on.

[Graham Kennedy]

Well it seems obvious that species is not around anywhere anymore.

That doesn't seem at all obvious to me. The large bulk of the galaxy is as yet unexplored by the Federation. There's plenty of room for a hundred very powerful and advanced species out there.

So maybe they just didn't fix it cause they were moving on.

That's certainly a possibility. But even so that doesn't imply that the process of fixing it is within the Federation's reach. It can hardly be called a problem with the scenario that the Federation didn't just fix the star when it's sheer assumption that fixing the star was something they are even remotely capable of.

[Captain Seafort]

Data : "Sensors show that the star is extremely unstable. It is experiencing bursts of radiation and matter expulsions."

In other words, unliveable conditions.

Visuals from the episode show liquid water on the interior surface:



Given that shortly thereafter Data got the formula for the surface area of a sphere wrong, it's possible that he was malfunctioning at the time.

And the fact that they abandoned it heavily implies that they were unable to move it, unable to fix the star, and unable to live with the effects of the star.

The fact that the E-D could find no signs of life is evidence that the sphere is unoccupied. The reasons for that are completely unknown.

[RK_Striker_JK_5]

Yeah, this episode has NO idea what it wants to be about, does it?