Trek Realities

For many folks, it's fun to think about how and why our reality is so much different from that seen in fictional contexts, such as Star Trek. So let me indulge in a bit of sci-fi speculation. The following is a bit of fantasy, for hard-core SF fans only.

You have been warned.

Here goes:

I think that all the time-traveling that was done in the various series have precipitated changes in the "proper" timeline -- that is, the one in which we exist.

Whether a "proper" timeline exists is a whole 'nother story.

In Trek, we can even "go back" (relative to the real production timeline) to the events relating to the antiwar activist, Edith Keeler. Supposing that Edith Keeler existed; it remains possible that the death of Ms. Keeler was not intended. It remains possible that the events predicted to occur were she not killed would still have not occurred, due to future intervention in the "City on the Edge of Forever" ("COTEOF") timeline by a subsequent timetraveler.

Or, alternatively, regardless of Kirk's actions in the COTEOF timeline, the intervention of the TNG crew in "Time's Arrow" -- merely by existing in the past (see: butterfly effect) may have altered this universe in important ways.

I would say that the Eugenics War-related exodus has transpired, if at all, in a way that seems improbable, as sleeper ship technology is still unknown. (I do realize that a novel has addressed the Eugenics War issue in general.)

Ahem.

Part of the process in speculating about these matters involves testing one's sense of history, together with one's creativity.

Historians call it "counterfactual hypothesizing".

To me, it's just plain old fun.