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"the Prime Directive is not just a set of rules. It is a philosophy, and a very correct one."
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this post was submitted on 14 Feb 2024
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Risa
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Come on'n get your jamaharon on! There are no real rules—just don't break the weather control network.
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I've been thinking about the prime directive recently and it just doesn't make sense in the grand scheme of things. You don't involve yourself because "well what if this extinction level event was meant to happen?" Could just as easily be phrased as them being there with the capacity to fix the problem was also meant to happen.
Especially if they can magic the problem away without even exposing knowledge of their existence to the pre-warp civilization. Would people who don't know about starships really notice if a tachyon field was routed through the deflector dish to [science fiction jargon], causing the tectonic activity to stabilize?
It's one thing to not interfere with internal politics, but another entirely to not save a planet from a random space anomaly while you happen to be passing through the system.
If we're having a serious conversation about the PD, it's important to note that it's a blanket "don't interfere" rule that applies to all civilizations, warp-capable or otherwise.
Most of the time, it makes sense, but these edge cases are wild.
Where did you get that idea??? It only applies to pre warp civilizations. Not getting involved in the internal politics of warp civilizations isn't Prime Directive- that's just regular diplomacy.
It's applied to other civilizations pretty regularly.
The most cut-and-dried one off the top of my head is Sisko citing the PD when declining to help Tosk in "Captive Pursuit".
The Prime Directive and the rules governing first contact overlap, but they are distinct.