Frustration wrote: ↑Thu Dec 01, 2022 9:08 pm
Except the Delta Quadrant is less advanced than the Federation as a whole, and Neelix certainly doesn't have advanced knowledge in anything.
Not as a whole. Maybe the area where Voyager first started at but we did see plenty of species that were more or less on par with Voyager.
And if you buy into the idea that the Borg control a vast part of the Delta Quadrant then you really can't say as a whole anyway. If you just go by the Borg alone.
When it comes to the Delta Quadrant's big powers, only the Kazon are objectively weaker than Voyager AKA the Federation's most advanced ship of the day. And even they were retconned, that big ship in Caretaker was kicking their ass.
I'm also going to apply Data's logic regarding the Ferengi in their first appearance. "More advanced in some ways, less in others."
For example, the Vidians have medical tech that massively outstrips the Federation. Its probably what the Think Tank asked for.
Now... the Gamma Quadrant. That's an overall weak place as far as we can tell, although its a pity we never saw the "civilian" Dominion expanded upon that was alluded to in season 2.
Fianna wrote: ↑Mon Dec 05, 2022 8:48 pm
What about the Beta Quadrant? Logically, there must be one, but is it ever brought up in the shows?
If I understand correctly, the Alpha and Beta Quadrants are basically treated as one and the same. The Klingons, for example, have huge chunks of their empire in the beta quadrant. It's like talking about "Europe" in the 19th century. The Ottomans and the Americans get dumped into the bin of European despite not geographically being in Europe because they fit the mold of the states of Europe.
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Yeah, beta quadrant was probably situated as “far away” as a general guideline for the writers for TOS. Vulcans are “near” it while Klingons actually have outposts there.
Considering it's the only thing on the subject, Mandel's star maps book is probably the closest thing we have to canon for galactic geography. In there the Galaxy is show to be split into the four quadrants with the Terran system forming one of the axes running towards the galactic center. The Federation is split pretty evenly between the Alpha and Beta quadrants, with the Romulans and Klingons entirely in the Beta quadrant.
What's kinda weird about that setup is the MIDAS Array from Pathfinder is shown to be several hundred light years further away from Voyager than Earth itself, clear past the southern side of the Klingon Empire.
Fianna wrote: ↑Mon Dec 05, 2022 8:48 pm
What about the Beta Quadrant? Logically, there must be one, but is it ever brought up in the shows?
Ah, the Beta Quadrant issue. Half of Voyager's journey SHOULD have been through Beta, not Delta. Because otherwise Voyager would have been travelling as the crow flies which would have meant a trip through the centre of the galaxy. The only alternative would be Delta to Gamma, but we know they didn't do that for obvious reasons.
(Heading for the Bajoran wormhole would have been too smart for this crew of dumbos anyway. They would have known exactly where it was after all, and "Caretaker" was set before the Dominion War so that's no excuse.)
Anyway, the writers knew this full well, and thought that we were too dumb to understand the concept of two quadrants. True story.
