"Технический прогресс всё больше и больше разрушает вашу

The proud pose of a schizophrenic patient with delusional ideas of greatness

You know, I've seen so many fanfictions about the Living Atlantis, and I was very disappointed that we weren't given a series where Atlantis would be human. Like the Tardis with the 11th Doctor in "The Doctor's Wife". I think I desperately miss it.

Знаете, я видел столько фанфиков про Живую Атлантиду, и был сильно разочарован, что нам не дали серию, где Атлантида была бы человеком. Как Тардис с 11 Доктором в "Жена Доктора". Я думаю, мне отчаянно не хватает этого.

I've been struggling with a migraine and light sensitivity the last few days. I've watched some SGA but am struggling to even remember which episodes I watched. I think I watched Echoes, Tao of Rodney, and McKay and Mrs. Miller. Season 3 really does have some of the best episodes.

This morning, I decided it was time to start rewatching some of the good but hard episodes, which really are my favorites. I started with The Last Man and Search and Rescue.

The Last Man is one of those episodes where you really see how the city lights up for Sheppard. I don't remember which of y'all first put that in the tags, but I love it so. His home is always waiting for him, ready to light up. You see this as each corridor flickers on as he's walking through, like they remember him.

Rodney tells Sheppard they have to get him back in two months or everything is lost. Rodney explains about Teyla and then has to tell Sheppard it's not his fault. Like, holy cow dude, it's not your fault Teyla died. You go sucked 48,000 years into the future. (I totally relate to this. I'm very prone to taking on burdens that aren't mine. Not to share them, but feeling responsible for things in not responsible for.)

Guys! Sam's ship is the Phoenix. A Phoenix rises from the ashes. Is this a tiny ray of hope? A tiny bit of foreshadowing wrapped up in one word? Right in the middle of all the horror of what happened to his family, we have a ship named the Phoenix. And you know what the next episode is? Search and Rescue!

Having seen several seasons of SG-1, Sam's death hits hard.

Also, it's heavily implied that Woolsey himself is a better man because of Sheppard, which I find endearing.

Sheppard is concerned that if he gets sent back, he'll mess up Rodney's timeline, where he survives and gets the girl. Could this man be more selfless?

Um, Lorne has his Atlantis painting on the wall. The one from Sunday. Why did that make me cry?

This is the ultimate We Don't Leave Our People Behind episode. Even though they don't actually say that, they show it. Do y'all remember early on in season 1 in one of the earliest episodes Rodney wants to do something and Sheppard tells him that if it doesn't work it will take then like 200 years by puddle jumper to rescue him? Rodney asks if they'd come for him anyway, and Sheppard, deadpan, says sure. Well, Sheppard is trapped 48,000 years in the future, and Rodney spends 25+ years getting him back. It's not a sarcastic sure. It's an absolute solid yes because we don't leave our people behind, and each of our people is important. Without everyone together, we can't win this thing.

Search and Rescue is a trip.

Highlights include:

"As a rule, I like to keep the daring rescues down to one a day." - Caldwell

Ronon, the total mother hen, to Sheppard: Give it to me. You don't have to do everything.

Rodney delivering Teyla's son is never not special.

Sheppard leads the way in trusting Kanaan because Teyla trusts him.

Sheppard with the baby is epically beautiful. And I love Caldwell: Major Marks, please make that ship go away.

If you don't want a huge amount of psychic damage, make sure you watch these two episodes together. They're really great!

I don't really have anything to say this is stupid

Zeus and Hercules

Plato's stepchildren

bones and spock both strike me as people who are likely to skip breakfast in the morning. they both know better, of course, but some habits are hard to kick. maybe it’s morning nausea, maybe they’re trying to squeeze just a bit more work into their day - who knows

they both notice, however, that jim seems to be a bit twitchier on the days where spock skips breakfast to go to the labs for a bit before reporting to the bridge. or mornings where bones shows up just to have some coffee and nothing else. it’s not super noticeable, they probably only notice because they pay a Lot of attention to him, but he’s just a bit jumpier, a bit more distracted

maybe they discuss it with each other, maybe they both notice it independently. maybe it’s something they noticed about him even before the 5 year mission, but just really fell into place after they semi-established their breakfast routine. he’s usually fine after lunch anyways, and he doesn’t generally get like that if they just skip lunch or dinner. spock tested this, of course. logically.

so it’s probably not worth worrying about; just a weird little quirk of their captain’s. but they start trying to be a bit better about making themselves eat at least an apple or something with jim before work every morning. it seems to get better, and the new habit is mostly sticking, so they kinda stop thinking about it

that doesn’t last, of course. ‘conscience of the king’ happens. they learn about jim and kodos and tarsus, and now all of a sudden the prospect of jim being in a weird mood whenever the two of them skip breakfast seems to be a much higher priority.

because if they skip breakfast, jim has no way of knowing for certain if they’ve eaten anything until at least lunch - if not dinner, if they’re too busy to have a proper lunch break together. jim, who probably regularly went without food to make absolutely sure that kevin riley and the others had something to eat, because making sure everyone else is okay is far more important to him.

i don’t think they really talk about it, after. at least not for another few years. but they stop skipping breakfast.

TNG: “Who Watches the Watchers”

The Bronze-Age culture of Mintaka III knows nothing about spaceflight or life on other planets.  One of them, Liko, chances to discover a hidden Federation research facility, which has been damaged by equipment failure.  In the ensuing commotion, Liko is gravely injured and taken aboard the Enterprise for treatment.  Efforts to suppress his short-term memory fail, and Liko soon tells his village that he was brought back to life by a pantheon of gods ruled by “The Picard.”

A curious detail about this episode is the choice to portray the Mintakans as resembling Vulcans.  Star Trek heavily relies on the conceit (“Hodgkin’s Law”) of aliens that just happen to look like humans, but I believe this is the first time that reasoning has been extended to aliens that look like other, unrelated aliens.  I’m not sure the idea really added enough to this episode to be worth the potential confusion for casual viewers.  It’s pleasing to see the Mintakans apply empiricism to their predicament, but they didn’t have to have pointy ears and blunt bangs to do that.

Speaking of pointy ears, Riker and Troi employ the old “use cosmetic surgery to disguise ourselves as aliens” trick.  The idea that resembling an alien is as easy as visiting a 20th century television studio’s makeup department was introduced on the original Star Trek series, but sparingly–Kirk got some Romulan ears one time, but the other cases involved alien spies under very deep cover.  In the 1990s, though, Star Trek came to overuse this concept, with the implications becoming increasingly disturbing.  Characters would casually switch from one alien look to another as if it just meant switching prosthetic latex foreheads and not, y’know, carving off chunks of bone and/or grafting on new ones.

This episode is arguably Star Trek’s most damning indictment of religion, and belief in the supernatural altogether.  Captain Picard is obviously opposed to the Mintakans believing he’s a god, since it’s not true and they shouldn’t have encountered him in the first place.  But beyond that, he clearly would not approve of the Mintakans adopting supernatural belief of any kind, with or without alien meddling.  I can’t say I agree with that position, but fortunately Picard doesn’t let it color his dealings with the Mintakans.  He is very clear that he is not a god, rather than proclaiming that there is no god.

The fuzzy definition of “god” opens up a plot hole here, in that Picard’s “proof” that he is not divine is to demonstrate that he is human.  Jean-Luc has a pulse, he is “flesh and blood,” he was born, and he can be wounded or killed.  He’s also named after two biographers of a certain miraculous fella who fits those same criteria, so try again.  Later he emphasizes that his people have no power to truly stop or reverse death, but that really only disqualifies him as a particular type of god.  I find all of this questionable because even if humanity someday transcended corporeal form and conquered death, humans still wouldn’t be gods for the Mintakans to worship, for the same reason Picard doesn’t fall on his knees when Q shows up. 

The best evidence that Picard isn’t a god is that he insists he’s not a god, a point which curiously sails over the heads of the Mintakans.  I guess I can conceive of a situation where a god would deny himself to his own worshippers, but my planet has had millennia to dwell on this sort of thing.  “The supreme being is using reverse psychology to test my faith” is an awfully advanced theological concept for a bunch of villagers who just invented religion this morning.

Багратион, 1812

«All people have the right to life, freedom and happiness»

«Все люди имеют право на жизнь, свободу и счастье»

Eng: I watched an episode of TNG and read the name "Sakharov" on the shuttle. I am from Russia, and I am pleased to see positive references in Western culture. Vicky confirmed my suspicions: According to Star Trek Encyclopedia, 3rd ed., p. 426, the Sakharov was named for "Russian nuclear scientist and peace advocate Andre Sakharov (1921-1989)"

Andrei Sakharov is a Soviet theoretical physicist, academician of the USSR Academy of Sciences, public figure, dissident and human rights activist.

One of the creators of the first Soviet hydrogen bomb. People's Deputy of the USSR, author of the draft constitution The Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia. The winner Nobel Peace Prize in 1975.

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Since the late 1950s, he has actively advocated for the cessation of nuclear weapons testing. A.D. Sakharov expressed his attitude to the question of the justification of possible victims of nuclear tests and, more broadly, human sacrifices in the name of the future in general as follows:

"…Pavlov [the state security general] once told me: — There is a life-and-death struggle going on in the world between the forces of imperialism and communism. The future of humanity, the fate and happiness of tens of billions of people over the centuries depend on the outcome of this struggle. To win this fight, we must be strong. If our work, our trials, add strength to this struggle, and this is extremely true, then no sacrifice of trials, no sacrifice at all, can make a difference here.

Was it insane demagoguery or was Pavlov sincere? It seems to me that there was an element of both demagoguery and sincerity. Something else is more important. I am convinced that such arithmetic is fundamentally wrong. We know too little about the laws of history, the future is unpredictable, and we are not gods. We, each of us, in every case, both "small" and "big", must proceed from specific moral criteria, and not the abstract arithmetic of history. Moral criteria categorically dictate to us — thou shalt not kill!"

Rus: Я смотрела эпизод ТНГ и прочитала название "Сахаров" на шаттле. Я из России, и мне приятно видеть положительные отсылки в западной культуре. Вики подтвердила мои догадки: Согласно энциклопедии «Звездный путь» , 3-е изд., стр. 426, « Сахаров» был назван в честь « российского ученого -атомщика и сторонника мира Андрея Сахарова (1921-1989)»

Андре́й Са́харов — советский физик-теоретик, академик АН СССР, общественный деятель, диссидент и правозащитник.

Один из создателей первой советской водородной бомбы. Народный депутат СССР, автор проекта конституции Союза Советских Республик Европы и Азии. Лауреат Нобелевской премии мира за 1975 год.

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С конца 1950-х годов он активно выступал за прекращение испытаний ядерного оружия. Своё отношение к вопросу об оправданности возможных жертв ядерных испытаний и — шире — вообще человеческих жертв во имя будущего А. Д. Сахаров выразил так:

«…Павлов [генерал госбезопасности] как-то сказал мне: — Сейчас в мире идёт борьба не на жизнь, а на смерть между силами империализма и коммунизма. От исхода этой борьбы зависит будущее человечества, судьба, счастье десятков миллиардов людей на протяжении столетий. Чтобы победить в этой борьбе, мы должны быть сильными. Если наша работа, наши испытания прибавляют силы в этой борьбе, а это в высшей степени так, то никакие жертвы испытаний, никакие жертвы вообще не могут иметь тут значения. Была ли это безумная демагогия или Павлов был искренен? Мне кажется, что был элемент и демагогии, и искренности. Важней другое. Я убеждён, что такая арифметика неправомерна принципиально. Мы слишком мало знаем о законах истории, будущее непредсказуемо, а мы — не боги. Мы, каждый из нас, в каждом деле, и в „малом“, и в „большом“, должны исходить из конкретных нравственных критериев, а не абстрактной арифметики истории. Нравственные же критерии категорически диктуют нам — не убий!»

Naruto Buddha Art