[Det. Bullock]

Star Trek always had this issue, I detected it some 30 years ago, so it's kind of a weird thing to come at DISCO for.



I mean, according to ST canon, the klingon empire was due to be completely collapsed within 50 years after Praxis blew up if they wouldn't change their imperial ways, but some 80 years later they would totally dominate the Federation militarily if they had chosen so. The Klingons have always been what the writers wanted them to be, either very weak and pathetic at their silly feudal ways, or extremely dangerous and overwhelming.

The thing is that at the start of Disco they basically state there isn't really a real Klingon government like during TOS or TNG so the thing is even more far fetched.

[Luis Dias]

Hmm, I'd suggest that it is mostly the feudal nature of the Klingon Empire that keeps everyone else somewhat safe, and that the real dangers appear when some big lord comes up and unites the entire fiefdoms into a single unit. In this way, it is reminiscent of all the "barbarians" of all kinds that threatened Rome and then Europe throughout the centuries and thus have become a trope in story-telling. It's a mess, but I'd argue it's *always* been a mess.

I could never believe such a barbarian species could even *be* technological enough to have space-ships in the first place, so I always read the Klingons as some insert of barbarian tropes into a sci-fi property, to create some difference and contrast to the federation, as it has been common to all barbarian species' story-telling throughout the centuries...

[MP-Ryan]

I've always wanted to understand how an engineering caste or position fits into the Klingon warrior hierarchy.

Technology requires consideration, thought, careful exploration, etc. How do these qualities fit into the Klingon societies portrayed in any ST series?

[Lorric]

I've always wanted to understand how an engineering caste or position fits into the Klingon warrior hierarchy.

Technology requires consideration, thought, careful exploration, etc. How do these qualities fit into the Klingon societies portrayed in any ST series?

Klingons are not portrayed as unintelligent. Give everyone super powers and no one has super powers. Not every Klingon is going to be cut out to be a warrior. When Riker served on a Klingon ship, he praises the single mindedness of the Klingons. He says more, but I can't remember and can't find a clip. But it's qualities that can be turned to more than warring, these Klingons were at peace, but were switched on and focused on their duties aboard ship. Not being in battle does not bore them, and they have a strong sense of duty to the Empire. Also, same episode, start of this video, This average Klingon warrior is very curious as he's never seen a human before. Klingons clearly have enquiring minds.

This Klingon adjutant looks every bit suitable for his job:

I don't ever recall seeing Klingons look down on scientific pursuits or educated people. Klingons are perfectly capable of putting careful thought and consideration into their actions.

[Buckshee Rounds]

I've always liked the Klingons, but then I always suspend my disbelief when it comes to asking just how exactly they're able to maintain a technologically advanced society.

I like to think they're just competent without comprehension - they can design and develop warp drive and all the other fancy tech without really understanding how it works. It's like how a cat can land on its feet, but it doesn't really understand how it does it.

It's a dumb explanation, but it works for me.

Edit - just to expand on this horrible idea further, maybe they have some kind of super intelligent subconscious that allows them to use complex mathematics and such with no real conscious idea of what they're actually doing.

[Lorric]

Aliens looking in on us might wonder how we've accomplished what we have. The fact is, all the high end stuff is accomplished by geniuses. Maybe Klingons produce such geniuses too. They're born, not made. When a kid blazes through the entire school curriculum and gets top grades on everything in half the time the rest do, it has comparatively little to do with their teachers. We can give them a leg up by teaching them what we already know, then they leave us behind and do things no human mind out of the billions and billions before them has conceived of before. They do what they were born to do. They do things the rest of us couldn't do if we lived to a million years old and devoted all that time to trying.

[Det. Bullock]

It's not so much about the tech (I mean, if Klingon are an older species than humans it's possible they might have reached a fairly similar tech base and while they culturally celebrate dumbness they are not dumb per se) but the logistics required to actually build stuff on that scale, the way they are presented in the Discovery pilot they are simply too fragmented to be able to curb stomp the Federation in space warfare that badly. I might get it if it was like in DS9 in which it was clear they had the advantage in land warfare because that's their thing and they were actually organized under a real government that wasn't there just for show, but here I find simply not believable that the feds couldn't msuter enough resources to crank up a bunch of ships to keep themselves from being overwhelmed.

[The E]

The canon answer is that while the warrior caste dominates klingon culture, it is not the only caste. There have been a few non-Warrior klingons on screen in a few episodes, and they've been portraited as being fed up with the warrior bull****, or as having adopted the warrior mindset for their actual job; There was a scientist in one DS9 ep that mentioned "honorable combat against ignorance" as his calling. In Voyager, B'Elanna is told that, although she isn't a warrior by herself, her accomplishments as an engineer and her ability to keep Voyager battle-ready make any of Voyager's victories hers.

So, this whole "no klingon scientists" thing? It's very much an instance of the various viewpoint characters in the shows not actually knowing all that much about klingon life.

[0rph3u5]

The canon answer is that while the warrior caste dominates klingon culture, it is not the only caste. There have been a few non-Warrior klingons on screen in a few episodes, and they've been portraited as being fed up with the warrior bull****, or as having adopted the warrior mindset for their actual job; There was a scientist in one DS9 ep that mentioned "honorable combat against ignorance" as his calling. In Voyager, B'Elanna is told that, although she isn't a warrior by herself, her accomplishments as an engineer and her ability to keep Voyager battle-ready make any of Voyager's victories hers.

So, this whole "no klingon scientists" thing? It's very much an instance of the various viewpoint characters in the shows not actually knowing all that much about klingon life.

You forget the whole "let's explain why TOS Klingons look more like Johne Wanye in The Conqueror than Micheal Dorn as Worf"-arc in the final season of Enterprise has all that canon contrivance in one spot

But of course we can't trust the audience to just accept external limiting factors to media production. /sarcasm

I mean, according to ST canon, the klingon empire was due to be completely collapsed within 50 years after Praxis blew up if they wouldn't change their imperial ways, but some 80 years later they would totally dominate the Federation militarily if they had chosen so.

In the 1800s people looked at rising population in Europe and though humanity would come to an end because of a Malthusian catastrophe - spawning a 150+ year oppession with eugentics that managed to "revitalize" (strict word sense) the ideological backing of so ... many ... problems ... we ... still ... live ... with ... today

In the 1970 people thought we would run out of oil by the 2000s - funny who that projection turned out...

Not to mention all the optimistic projections that didn't come true ...

... since the 1700s people have conjoured up a post-labour mechanized utopia that would achieveable in a few decades, because combustion engines existed ...

... since the 1880s "the wireless" has inspired people to think of a world where/when out ability to communicate across distance with little or no delay would make us all more connected and empathetic people, once it became widely availible ...

Not to the failure of these to come to pass didn't invalidates the intermediate progress they have enabled, e.g. the current reality shock about just how far the undesirable (euthemism) present we are living in is from tolerable one we imagined ourselves to live in might just be the catalyst to explore the causality that lead to our present condition to its fully richness (considering our generation might actually be the first capable of that in many places around the world; of course for that to happen you have to acknowledge that problems have causes that do not relate directly to the currently most visible symptoms)

... oh - I went off topic there, sorry...


As to why I am here:

Now I might be a week behind, but I don't see Disco Season 3 to be substantial different from the previous flawed seasons:

- The failure of authorities, or the percieved failure of authorities, as the cause for conflict - CHECK
- That it is sentiment rather than rationale that make characters aspire their better selves - CHECK

Still more attractive to me than The Expanse or The Mandalorian, neither of which is bad just lacking the same qualities.

[The E]

So Episode 2 was much better -- Mostly because it focussed on the Discovery crew, who as a whole are just a very good ensemble. It also used the tried-and-true space western thing that Star Trek can't help to get back to occasionally; the main plot of the episode being about Saru and Tilly (and Giorgeou) ridding a mining settlement of a nasty bandit. It was fun, it had good character moments, and heaps of idealism, all things good ST episodes have. Guess I'll keep watching then.

Now I might be a week behind, but I don't see Disco Season 3 to be substantial different from the previous flawed seasons:

- The failure of authorities, or the percieved failure of authorities, as the cause for conflict - CHECK
- That it is sentiment rather than rationale that make characters aspire their better selves - CHECK

I sometimes wonder what Star Trek other people have been watching all this time for criticisms like this to emerge. Literally every Star Trek show has had episodes or arcs dealing with a failure of authority due to a failure of said authority to hold up the sentimental ideals of the Federation and Starfleet. In Star Trek, idealism and sentiment will always triumph, sometimes  (as in S3E1) this comes across ham-handed and clunky, sometimes (as in S3E2), it works out better. The conflict between strict rationality and expediency and idealism has been a core part of ST's DNA since the beginning; this is, in fact, part of the reason why I keep watching it.

[Colonol Dekker]

I found lower decks more enjoyable than disco in every single way.   Longer episodes would be a boon.

[Luis Dias]

I agree about Lower Decks being a lot more enjoyable than Disco.

Regarding the Klingons, it is what it is, there's a cognitive dissonance happening in there, whether we like it or not. Frankly I think that the Mass Effect franchise's solution to the Klingon "problem" was so much better solved that I even think they went out to actually specifically solve this Klingon thing, when they used the storyline of how Salarians "uplifted" the Krogans. So much more sense. Oh well.

[Colonol Dekker]

You're allowed to enjoy disco more than I do buddy.  👍