Daystrom Institute
Welcome to Daystrom Institute!
Serious, in-depth discussion about Star Trek from both in-universe and real world perspectives.
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All threads and comments submitted to the Daystrom Institute must contain an explanation of the reasoning put forth.
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This entire community has a “serious tag” on it. Shitposts are encouraged in Risa.
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Episode Guides
The /r/DaystromInstitute wiki held a number of popular Star Trek watch guides. We have rehosted them here:
- Kraetos’ guide to Star Trek (the original series)
- Algernon_Asimov’s guide to Star Trek: The Animated Series
- Algernon_Asimov’s guide to Star Trek: The Next Generation
- Algernon_Asimov’s guide to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
- Darth_Rasputin32898’s guide to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
- OpticalData’s guide to Star Trek: Voyager
- petrus4’s guide to Star Trek: Voyager
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I would say Neelix is a big part. Starfleet officers have already consented to the possibility that they might be ordered to their death for the good of their ship or the Federation. While their transformed versions may not have been exactly the same beings as the originals, there is still some ethical cover in that some version of them in the past had accepted these risks. Neelix, however, was not a Starfleet officer and had made it very clear that he did not consent to having his life sacrificed for the greater good of Voyager.
Just how much this ethical baggage from either side carried over to a new being is unclear; it certainly would have been less unclear if it had been two officers merged together and not a civilian passenger.
Yes, finally, some common sense. Neelix did not consent to die for Starfleet. Tuvok did not consent to die to become Tuvix. Neither consented to staying as Tuvix, because Tuvix was his own person and could not make decisions for them.
Nobody protests Tom and William Riker staying separate despite literally being the same person. Why not extend the same logic to Tuvok and Neelix? If a clone can be it's own person, then why is the well being of two individuals cast aside?