[VOY] Lynch's Spoiler Review: "Learning Curve"
Timothy W. Lynch
"Learning Curve." If you haven't learned yet what that means, you
might want to consider caution.
In brief: Now that's more like it. The plot's still a bit on the goofy
side, but at least it's holding together -- and the character work here
was quite promising.
======
Brief summary: As Voyager's bio-neural circuitry mysteriously
begins to fail, Tuvok begins training some difficult Maquis crew in
Starfleet procedures.
======
"Learning Curve" is an example of what can happen when the writing
focuses on the more unique elements of the series' premise. On the
one hand, we had an equipment failure -- a routine enough concept,
but made more pressing by the fact that these things can't be replaced,
by replication or by trotting off to a starbase for repairs. As Janeway
herself noted, once they run out of equipment, that's it. On the other
hand, we had more of an examination of the fact that these are still two
distinct crews at times, with different personalities and different
methods. That side is something that "Deep Space Nine" could
perhaps have done if there were a more prominent Bajoran presence
on the station than simply Kira, but as is it's really more suited for
"Voyager". And while neither side was perfect, both were fairly well
done -- more than enough to be a nice antidote to the weeks of
mundane shows we've seen from VOY lately.
The main reason the Tuvok/training plot worked as well as it did is
because it was two-sided. This could very well have been a "let's
teach the Maquis something" show -- and while that's not impossible
to do well, it tends to glorify one side over the other. Here, though
the four Maquis in question were hardly held up as shining examples
of officer material, Tuvok wasn't much more sterling. Dalby's quote
to him that "this whole concept is insulting" was absolutely spot-on,
and the episode would have been a great deal weaker if it hadn't gone
on to essentially acknowledge and build on that fact in Tuvok's
conversation with Neelix, one of the show's high points.
Granted, I may be a bit biased towards that particular plot because of
my own situation. It doesn't take very much practical experience to
know that the same teaching technique will *not* work for every
single student, and that approaches need to be modified on a more-or-
less continuous basis. I'm surprised Tuvok had as much success as
he did in the sixteen years he taught at the Academy with a single
approach. [I'm also surprised that one of Neelix's points in his "pep
talk" wasn't to note that all of Tuvok's former students _wanted to be
there_, which his four current "cadets" most definitely did not.]
I wouldn't say that the rest of the Tuvok story went perfectly -- it
didn't. For instance, some of the scenes were going a bit too broadly,
such as Dalby's expository bit in the holodeck, and I think the ending
proved a little too pat. (Besides, lines like "if you can learn to bend
the rules, we can learn to follow them" always rub me wrong --
they're way too hokey for me.) However, all four of the "trainees"
were fairly well delineated (Dalby most of all, of course), and whether
the outcome was "expected" or not, the story certainly proved
interesting enough to be worth following.
One point that *did* need to be made, however, was that Tuvok might
have been a bad choice as the crew's tutor. Not just because of his
inflexible manner, as was pointed out -- but because as far as the
average Maquis crewmember is going to know, Tuvok betrayed them.
Yes, he was acting on orders, but I still doubt that's going to go over
well with the likes of Mr. Dalby.
[As an aside, Chakotay's brief demonstration to Dalby that he didn't
want an entire return to the "Maquis way" of doing things was also
very worthwhile. Some forms of discipline you don't want.]
I particularly liked the holodeck simulation of Voyager's bridge.
Fortunately, Tuvok was bright enough not to give them an actual
Kobayashi Maru no-win scenario, but it was entirely too close to be
fair to people with no real starship experience to speak of. And Tuvok
appeared to lose sight of something, too -- even if they made some
incorrect choices, they *did* appear to function as a team then, for the
first time. Tuvok would have been in far better shape had he actually
commended them for that instead of sticking solely to their flaws.
The other half of the episode, namely the "ship gets sick" plot, was
well executed, if somewhat goofy in concept. (I will refrain from
calling it "cheesy" out of deference to the sensibilities of sentients
everywhere. :-) ) As soon as I heard in the premiere about the ship's
"bio-neural circuitry", I knew the concept of a virus attacking the ship
couldn't be too far behind. My hope was simply that it would be done
well.
Fortunately, I think it mostly was. Both the infection itself, being one
that only attacked the ship and not the crew, and the "cure", a fever,
seemed grounded in at least marginally plausible logic (which may not
sound like much, but is better than the sort of premises we saw in
"Faces" or "Cathexis", to be sure). And as I said earlier, there was an
actual sense of crisis involved here -- not so much in the "imminent
jeopardy" angle itself, though, but in the fact that a critical system
could fail with _no way_ to replace or repair it, given their location.
Although that point was only really made at the start of the show, that
was enough to keep me thinking about it as I watched, which was a
help.
The one big negative in the show was the closing act. For one thing,
the temperature issues in the "heat up the virus" attempt seemed odd,
partly because it was unclear just where that temperature was. 360
Kelvin is in the 185-190 Fahrenheit range -- that's a bit on the cool
side for the warp engines, but way too hot for humans to survive for
the few minutes they're shown as managing. (I also thought that,
given the heat they're likely to reach, it might have been a prudent
order to strip down to essentials, or at the very least get rid of the top
layer of the uniform shirts. These folks seemed like they were trying
to kill themselves at times.) More important, though, was the
characterization issue I mentioned earlier, where it seems that Dalby et
al. warms to Tuvok a little too strongly right after this. It's
understandable in the heat of the moment, so I'm not knocking it
down yet, but if we see these characters again and everything is
wonderful between them and Tuvok, I'll object. (Another point is that
communications, despite being ostensibly out all over the ship, didn't
seem to cause any problems on the bridge -- they could talk to
Engineering and sickbay as much as they wanted...)
On the whole, though, "Learning Curve" was a definite improvement
over the last month -- still a little on the lightweight side, maybe, but
attempting a necessary point and mostly managing it, which works for
me.
So, some shorter points:
-- Something interesting during Dalby's little self-history: is this the
first time we've actually heard about a character being raped in Trek?
TNG's "Violations" used the term, but only as an analogy. This is
taking it a bit further...
-- The doctor's choice of just now to improve his bedside manner was
definitely a scream. "Don't worry, my little friend" was almost as
amusing a line as "get that cheese to sickbay", which has my vote. :-)
-- We also saw more of Janeway's holo-novel, which I'm starting to
look a bit more forward to. Several people have pointed out to me that
it seems to be an adaptation of _The Turn of the Screw_, which I'm
forced to admit I haven't read; but it's also reminding me of an old
movie called "The Innocents", which I saw this past fall, and which
also has ghosts (at least implied ones, as here) and two exceedingly
chilling children. In any case, it's interesting to see Janeway in an
entirely different light, and I hope we get to see this continue on for a
while. (I also hope we get to see her *finish* at least one sequence
instead of getting interrupted every time! :-) )
That should do it. So, in closing:
Writing: A somewhat silly "jeopardy" plot, but mostly sound writing
and with a lot of good characterization of Tuvok.
Directing: No complaints to speak of. The "climb and run" Tuvok
put his students through came off particularly well.
Acting: Few complaints, though Derek McGrath (Chell) got a little
annoying. Tim Russ seemed particularly good given the
situation.
OVERALL: Let's call this one a 7.5. There's still some room to
improve, but this is definitely an upturn. Onwards!
NEXT WEEK: A rerun of "Eye of the Needle".
Tim Lynch (Harvard-Westlake School, Science Dept.)
tly...@alumni.caltech.edu
"Get that cheese to sickbay."
-- B'Elanna Torres
--
Copyright 1995, Timothy W. Lynch. All rights reserved, but feel free to ask...
This article is explicitly prohibited from being used in any off-net
compilation without due attribution and *express written consent of the
author*. Walnut Creek and other CD-ROM distributors, take note.
Albert Tanone
Timothy W. Lynch <tly...@alumni.caltech.edu> wrote:
>-- Something interesting during Dalby's little self-history: is this the
>first time we've actually heard about a character being raped in Trek?
>TNG's "Violations" used the term, but only as an analogy. This is
>taking it a bit further...
No. It that Galitepp DS9 episode (I think) Kira mentioned about mothers
being raped in front of their child while the father dies a slow death
(or something like that).
Albert Pascal Tan(1) | RANMA NIBUNNOICHI
albert...@inferno.iquest.com | KIMAGURE ORANGE ROAD
ata...@nyx10.cs.du.edu | MAISON IKKOKU-SLAYERS
cool anime address coming here soon | BLUE SEED-TENCHI MUYO!
--------------------------------------------+-----------------------
Ranma: Who would want that ugly girl's underwear?
Akane: Who's ugly?
Ted McCoy
>side, but at least it's holding together -- and the character work here
>was quite promising.
Blech. Big, big disagreement here.
>The main reason the Tuvok/training plot worked as well as it did is
>because it was two-sided. This could very well have been a "let's
>teach the Maquis something" show -- and while that's not impossible
>to do well, it tends to glorify one side over the other. Here, though
>the four Maquis in question were hardly held up as shining examples
>of officer material, Tuvok wasn't much more sterling. Dalby's quote
>to him that "this whole concept is insulting" was absolutely spot-on,
>and the episode would have been a great deal weaker if it hadn't gone
>on to essentially acknowledge and build on that fact in Tuvok's
>conversation with Neelix, one of the show's high points.
Actually, that was one of my problems with this episode: there never
was any real suggestion that the Maquis side of the ship had anything of
value to teach to the Starfleet side. It was all about the Maquis side
being undertrained, undisciplined, less competent, etc, etc.
(Incidentally, I agree that the issue of Tuvok's interaction with the trainees
was generally two-sided, and that Neelix's conversation was one of the show's
high points. But I didn't see that carried over at all into some of the
broader issues the show was dealing with. Maybe next time?)
>I wouldn't say that the rest of the Tuvok story went perfectly -- it
>didn't. For instance, some of the scenes were going a bit too broadly,
>such as Dalby's expository bit in the holodeck, and I think the ending
>proved a little too pat. (Besides, lines like "if you can learn to bend
>the rules, we can learn to follow them" always rub me wrong --
>they're way too hokey for me.) However, all four of the "trainees"
>were fairly well delineated (Dalby most of all, of course), and whether
>the outcome was "expected" or not, the story certainly proved
>interesting enough to be worth following.
Most of the training scenes made me feel like I was watching one of those
ABC After School Specials. Or maybe a season one SeaQuest subplot. None of
the characters really seemed to be acting like adults.
In fairness, the seeds were planted for some interesting characters here, and
I hope we see those trainees again. But this episode didn't find much of
anything to do with them.
>One point that *did* need to be made, however, was that Tuvok might
>have been a bad choice as the crew's tutor. Not just because of his
>inflexible manner, as was pointed out -- but because as far as the
>average Maquis crewmember is going to know, Tuvok betrayed them.
>Yes, he was acting on orders, but I still doubt that's going to go over
>well with the likes of Mr. Dalby.
That point was bothering me too.
>[As an aside, Chakotay's brief demonstration to Dalby that he didn't
>want an entire return to the "Maquis way" of doing things was also
>very worthwhile. Some forms of discipline you don't want.]
Agreed.
>I particularly liked the holodeck simulation of Voyager's bridge.
>Fortunately, Tuvok was bright enough not to give them an actual
>Kobayashi Maru no-win scenario, but it was entirely too close to be
>fair to people with no real starship experience to speak of. And Tuvok
>appeared to lose sight of something, too -- even if they made some
>incorrect choices, they *did* appear to function as a team then, for the
>first time. Tuvok would have been in far better shape had he actually
>commended them for that instead of sticking solely to their flaws.
One thing I didn't like about this scene: it seemed to be suggesting that
one of the problems with the Maquis is that they don't know when to retreat
and avoid an unwinnable battle. Which really doesn't make sense, if you
think about it. If the Maquis charged into every battle they came across,
they wouldn't have lasted very long against the Cardassians. Their very
surival would've depended on picking their battles carefully.
>The other half of the episode, namely the "ship gets sick" plot, was
>well executed, if somewhat goofy in concept. (I will refrain from
>calling it "cheesy" out of deference to the sensibilities of sentients
>everywhere. :-) ) As soon as I heard in the premiere about the ship's
>"bio-neural circuitry", I knew the concept of a virus attacking the ship
>couldn't be too far behind. My hope was simply that it would be done
>well.
Think of all the possible storylines this opens up. Why, you can take any
of Trek's weird-virus-does-something-strange-to-the-crew episodes and with
a minor modification you have a new ship-comes-down-with-weird-illness
episode for Voyager. Pretty soon we'll have an episode where the ship
catches a virus that makes it begin to age quickly. Or an episode where a
virus makes the ship lose its inhibitions and act out its deepest fantasies.
Or an episode where the ship becomes hostile and paranoid. Wow, the
possibilities are endless.
>Fortunately, I think it mostly was. Both the infection itself, being one
>that only attacked the ship and not the crew, and the "cure", a fever,
>seemed grounded in at least marginally plausible logic (which may not
>sound like much, but is better than the sort of premises we saw in
>"Faces" or "Cathexis", to be sure). And as I said earlier, there was an
>actual sense of crisis involved here -- not so much in the "imminent
>jeopardy" angle itself, though, but in the fact that a critical system
>could fail with _no way_ to replace or repair it, given their location.
>Although that point was only really made at the start of the show, that
>was enough to keep me thinking about it as I watched, which was a
>help.
I liked the point about the difficulties in repairing critical systems.
But everything else was just too silly.
>On the whole, though, "Learning Curve" was a definite improvement
>over the last month -- still a little on the lightweight side, maybe, but
>attempting a necessary point and mostly managing it, which works for
>me.
Far too much on the lightweight side. Maybe it's just me, but I think
treating significant issues (like conflicts with the Maquis on the ship) in
a simplistic and lightweight manner, the way this episode did, is worse than
ignoring those issues altogether. If they're going to deal with these issues,
they need to do it right and get out of this Trek Lite mode.
>-- We also saw more of Janeway's holo-novel, which I'm starting to
>look a bit more forward to. Several people have pointed out to me that
>it seems to be an adaptation of _The Turn of the Screw_, which I'm
>forced to admit I haven't read; but it's also reminding me of an old
>movie called "The Innocents", which I saw this past fall, and which
>also has ghosts (at least implied ones, as here) and two exceedingly
>chilling children. In any case, it's interesting to see Janeway in an
>entirely different light, and I hope we get to see this continue on for a
>while. (I also hope we get to see her *finish* at least one sequence
>instead of getting interrupted every time! :-) )
I'm glad I wasn't the only one reminded of "The Innocents" -- great movie!
I liked this portion of Janeway's holo-novel a lot more than the first one.
>Writing: A somewhat silly "jeopardy" plot, but mostly sound writing
> and with a lot of good characterization of Tuvok.
"somewhat silly"?
Even ignoring the jeopardy plot, the episode really didn't do justice to
the issues it pretended to deal with. Which is becoming something of a trend
on this show.
>Directing: No complaints to speak of. The "climb and run" Tuvok
> put his students through came off particularly well.
Agreed.
>Acting: Few complaints, though Derek McGrath (Chell) got a little
> annoying. Tim Russ seemed particularly good given the
> situation.
Agreed again.
>OVERALL: Let's call this one a 7.5. There's still some room to
>improve, but this is definitely an upturn. Onwards!
Blech. I've turned to rating episodes with letter grades, and I'd give
this one a C-.
Ted
David Mears
> WARNING: This article contains spoiler information for VOY's
> "Learning Curve." If you haven't learned yet what that means, you
> might want to consider caution.
> Granted, I may be a bit biased towards that particular plot because of
> my own situation. It doesn't take very much practical experience to
> know that the same teaching technique will *not* work for every
> single student, and that approaches need to be modified on a more-or-
> less continuous basis. I'm surprised Tuvok had as much success as
> he did in the sixteen years he taught at the Academy with a single
> approach.
While I haven't had any personal experience, I have had a few friends
who served in the military. I don't think it would have been so much
of a problem for Tuvok at all. The military tends to stress sameness
in everything, including recruits. They're not interested in finding
ways to teach everyone a little differently. If the chosen approach
doesn't work well for any given recruit, they either adapt or get out.
The advantage of this is that you end up with a final product which
is more like a uniformly acting machine than a bunch of different
people acting on their own.
David B. Mears
Hewlett-Packard
Cupertino CA
me...@cup.hp.com
David Mears
> Timothy W. Lynch <tly...@alumni.caltech.edu> wrote:
> >In brief: Now that's more like it. The plot's still a bit on the goofy
> >side, but at least it's holding together -- and the character work here
> >was quite promising.
> >I particularly liked the holodeck simulation of Voyager's bridge.
> >Fortunately, Tuvok was bright enough not to give them an actual
> >Kobayashi Maru no-win scenario, but it was entirely too close to be
> >fair to people with no real starship experience to speak of. And Tuvok
> >appeared to lose sight of something, too -- even if they made some
> >incorrect choices, they *did* appear to function as a team then, for the
> >first time. Tuvok would have been in far better shape had he actually
> >commended them for that instead of sticking solely to their flaws.
> One thing I didn't like about this scene: it seemed to be suggesting that
> one of the problems with the Maquis is that they don't know when to retreat
> and avoid an unwinnable battle. Which really doesn't make sense, if you
> think about it. If the Maquis charged into every battle they came across,
> they wouldn't have lasted very long against the Cardassians. Their very
> surival would've depended on picking their battles carefully.
Yes, but remember these four weren't the best of the Maquis. They were
specifically chosen as the first for the training since they were the
most likely ones to cause problems. I don't think you'd find Chakotay
having any difficulty in choosing a strategic retreat when the time came.
Chakotay was the one in charge on the Maquis ship. I expect you'd find
all the right stuff in the leaders of the Maquis, but not all the crew
or followers would necessarily have what it takes to function well in
Star Fleet. That wouldn't be such a big deal on a Maquis ship where
things would be run more loosely, but on a UFP starship, EVERYONE has to
be the best.
Kevin Chu
> WARNING: This article contains spoiler information for VOY's
> "Learning Curve." If you haven't learned yet what that means, you
> might want to consider caution.
> Granted, I may be a bit biased towards that particular plot because of
> my own situation. It doesn't take very much practical experience to
> know that the same teaching technique will *not* work for every
> single student, and that approaches need to be modified on a more-or-
> less continuous basis. I'm surprised Tuvok had as much success as
> he did in the sixteen years he taught at the Academy with a single
> approach.
Well, if you consider that cadets have busted their butts getting
INTO the acadamy, and that there are hundreds of other people itching
to take your place, then Tuvok's methods could work everytime. The
problem with the Maquis students was that they didn't want to be
there. That would never be the case at Star Fleet.
---
--Kevin Chu k...@Corp.Sun.COM
LAL
> The one big negative in the show was the closing act. For one thing,
> the temperature issues in the "heat up the virus" attempt seemed odd,
> partly because it was unclear just where that temperature was. 360
> Kelvin is in the 185-190 Fahrenheit range -- that's a bit on the cool
> side for the warp engines, but way too hot for humans to survive for
> the few minutes they're shown as managing.
Not so. The military has done some very interesting heat exposure studies
esentually putting humans in large ovens to investigate response to heat.
Subjects have survived much (several hundreds of degrees F) higher heat
for longer. All they had to do was lower the life support atmosphere
humidity and 190F should be easy for the humans.
--
Standard disclaimers apply. Nobody here ever agrees with me on anything.
John Lawler
> -- We also saw more of Janeway's holo-novel, which I'm starting to
> look a bit more forward to. Several people have pointed out to me that
> it seems to be an adaptation of _The Turn of the Screw_, which I'm
> forced to admit I haven't read; but it's also reminding me of an old
> movie called "The Innocents", which I saw this past fall, and which
> also has ghosts (at least implied ones, as here) and two exceedingly
> chilling children...
"The Innocents" *IS* the film version of "A Turn of the Screw"
-John
--
John Lawler
jla...@batnet.com
"No matter how cynical I get, it's never enough to keep up."
Kwang Soo Suh
: might want to consider caution.
: -- Something interesting during Dalby's little self-history: is this the
: first time we've actually heard about a character being raped in Trek?
: TNG's "Violations" used the term, but only as an analogy. This is
: taking it a bit further...
The earliest rape in Trek is Tasha Yar's group rape on
her.
ebx...@corp00.d51.lilly.com
> Timothy W. Lynch (tly...@alumni.caltech.edu) wrote:
>
>> "Learning Curve." If you haven't learned yet what that means, you
>> might want to consider caution.
>
>
>> know that the same teaching technique will *not* work for every
>> single student,
>
> in everything, including recruits. They're not interested in finding
> ways to teach everyone a little differently. If the chosen approach
> doesn't work well for any given recruit, they either adapt or get out.
> The advantage of this is that you end up with a final product which
> is more like a uniformly acting machine than a bunch of different
> people acting on their own.
This is an over-simplification that keeps cropping up in regards to "Learning
Curve." I've tried to explain why it's too simple, but don't seem to be
making any headway. Perhaps a little personal experience will help.
I've been in the US Army as a combat engineer officer for seven years now
(not to mention several years as a cadet). I have completed a number of
different training courses that have prepared me to do my job effectively.
Engineer skills (building things, blowing them up, and not getting blown
up ;-)), leadership skills (trust me, I know where I'm going!), logistics
(you want it when???), and others have all given me the capability to
perform my duties.
All of which would be worthless without the basics of being a soldier.
Everyone in the Army, regardless of their specialty, must have the
same basic skills.
What are the basics that we're taught? Teamwork. Discipline. Leadership.
"Followership" (a woderfully mangled word). Initiative.
You state that the military isn't interested in tailoring training to the
individual -- this is simply not so. All trainees come in with some of
these skills, and lacking others. DI's work with trainees to ensure that
when they graduate they have mastered all the basic soldier skills. Like any
teacher, they identify individual strengths and weaknesses and work to
improve their students.
The rigidity of basic training, and the enforced uniformity, are tools that
teach Americans - some of the most individualistic people in the world - how
to act together effectively under the stressful, chaotic situations that
soldiers find themselves in. Not to be mindless automatons, but to be
members of a cohesive team.
In combat situations there is rarely time for a quick little conference
ala Picard. Decisions must be made and carried out -- sometimes in a
matter of seconds. Every second spent under fire costs lives. I vividly
recall a training situation where a squad leader froze when his troops
came under sniper fire. He and his squad were the leading element of
a platoon, and the squad leader kept waiting for the platoon leader
to tell him what to do. Meanwhile, the sniper was merrily plunking away.
Finally a drill instructor leaned over the squad leader and yelled:
"Make a decision! Even if its the wrong one!"
The point being that there is seldom time for a leader to determine the
perfect solution. There certainly isn't time for all his subordinates
to put their 2 cents in. Individuals throughout the chain of command
must be ready to take initiative and make decisions. Once the decision
is made, the soldiers must act together, or they are most certainly doomed.
These things, I suspect, will not change by the 25th century. In fact,
given the advances in technology and weaponry, I think that combat in
these situation will be extremely fast and deadly. Given that Voyager
is thousands of light years from home, encountering new situations every
time they turn around, they do *not* need half the crew doing things
the Maquis way.
Doug
=============================================================================
"Anything you do can get you shot -- including nothing."
- Murphy's Laws of Combat
Janis Maria C. C. Cortese
>
>The rigidity of basic training, and the enforced uniformity, are tools that
>teach Americans - some of the most individualistic people in the world - how
>to act together effectively under the stressful, chaotic situations that
>soldiers find themselves in. Not to be mindless automatons, but to be
>members of a cohesive team.
This is interesting - off-topic, I know. I remember hearing a quote in
a book by Starhawk called _Truth Or Dare_ that is similar to this that
is the ONLY time I've ever nodded my head in understanding of what I'd
consider to be a completely unlivable lifestyle -- the military one.
The quote ran very much along the lines of yours -- that the military
lifestyle seemes preposterously overorganized in peacetime, but peace is
not their normal working environment. The strict hierarchy, the
stylized ways of interacting, etc. all bring a sense of order to what is
essentially a completely chaotic working environment. The typical
corporation doesn't need such rigid codes of behavior, but then the
secretarial pool is unlikely to find itself reduced to panic by mortar
fire. What is simple cohesive behavior in wartime is most definitely
equivalent to the rigid behavior of automata in peacetime -- but the
armed forces doesn't specialize in peace.
Of course, I still wouldn't want to be a member of the military -- I'd
go out of my mind and probably get kicked out anyhow, and I have MAJOR
MAJOR MAJOR MAJOR (Catch-22 flashback!) problems with their treatment of
women and glb's. But at least the stylized, rigid lifestyle makes
sense.
>These things, I suspect, will not change by the 25th century. In fact,
>given the advances in technology and weaponry, I think that combat in
>these situation will be extremely fast and deadly. Given that Voyager
>is thousands of light years from home, encountering new situations every
>time they turn around, they do *not* need half the crew doing things
>the Maquis way.
Hell, even within a peacetime corporation, you don't just make changes
yourself without at least notifying people of what you're doing. Can
you imagine how long a sysadmin would keep his job if he just decided to
take down the server without informing ANYONE, or reboot the entire
system without sending out at least a broadcast warning? That's not
just military -- it's plain courtesy. At least TELL the people in the
apartment complex that you're going to be turning off the hot water for
a few hours before you do it . . .
Regards,
Janis the net.proud.hussy
Janis Cortese || President and Founder: SEFEB, and The ||
cor...@netcom.com || Society of People Who Would Love to ||
Net Loudmouthed Bitchy || Shove a Stick Up Rush Limbaugh's Ass; ||
Renaissance Woman and || Core Member of The Star Fleet Ladies' ||
General All-Around Hussy || Auxiliary and Embroidery/Baking Society ||
===============Web URL: http://www.io.com/user/cortese/ =============||
I used to be a bitch and just thought it was my problem. ||
Now, I've learned to make it everyone else's problem, too. ||
=====================================================================||
Jim Brownfield
> In article <3q8rlu$5...@gap.cco.caltech.edu>,
> Timothy W. Lynch <tly...@alumni.caltech.edu> wrote:
>
> >On the whole, though, "Learning Curve" was a definite improvement
> >over the last month -- still a little on the lightweight side, maybe, but
> >attempting a necessary point and mostly managing it, which works for
> >me.
>
> Far too much on the lightweight side. Maybe it's just me, but I
> think treating significant issues (like conflicts with the Maquis
> on the ship) in a simplistic and lightweight manner, the way this
> episode did, is worse than ignoring those issues altogether. If
> they're going to deal with these issues, they need to do it right
> and get out of this Trek Lite mode.
I agree with Ted, and I also think that the writers failed to deal with the
obvious implied slavery of the Maquis. The Maquis officers may have agreed to
do certain tasks, but they obviously didn't agree to becoming Starfleet
pseudo-officers, and I found the fact that this wasn't addressed repulsive (I
don't buy off on any concept of "our lives depend on making you a slave, so
you're going to be a slave").
--
Jim Brownfield (Jim_Bro...@Radical.Com) NeXTmail/MIME accepted
Radical System Solutions, Inc.
System/Network/Database Design, Development, Consulting
rad i cal \'rad-i-kel\ n -- a basic principle: FOUNDATION
Kim Headlee
ebx...@corp00.d51.lilly.com wrote:
> In article <3qfsu5$d...@hpindda.cup.hp.com>, me...@cup.hp.com (David Mears) writes:
> > Timothy W. Lynch (tly...@alumni.caltech.edu) wrote:
> >
> >> WARNING: This article contains spoiler information for VOY's
> >> "Learning Curve." If you haven't learned yet what that means, you
> >> might want to consider caution.
> >
> >
> >> It doesn't take very much practical experience to
> >> know that the same teaching technique will *not* work for every
> >> single student,
> >
> > The military tends to stress sameness
> > in everything, including recruits. They're not interested in finding
> > ways to teach everyone a little differently. If the chosen approach
> > doesn't work well for any given recruit, they either adapt or get out.
> > The advantage of this is that you end up with a final product which
> > is more like a uniformly acting machine than a bunch of different
> > people acting on their own.
>
> This is an over-simplification that keeps cropping up in regards to "Learning
> Curve." I've tried to explain why it's too simple, but don't seem to be
> making any headway. Perhaps a little personal experience will help.
[Doug's personal experience exposition snipped]
Thanks for sharing this -- lots of good insight here.
However, I do feel inclined to point out what I learned in a Myers-Briggs
personality test debriefing ("seminar," for you non-military types ;-) way
back in 1986. At the time, my husband was teaching math at the USAF
Academy. We had both attended that institution as cadets, though I had
long since left the AF by then. The Myers-Briggs was being administered to
all cadets, and faculty and their spouses were given the option to take the
test too. So my husband & I both took the test. His personality combo
evaluated to Introvert-Sensing-
Thinking-Judging (ISTJ). Mine came out
Extrovert-iNtuitive-Thinking-Perceiving (ENTP). And according to the
debriefer, the overwhelming majority of all military folks are of the ISTJ
persuasion.
So it's not just the fact that military institutions stress "sameness" --
it would seem that also tends to work out that way *au naturel*.
Peace and Long Life,
Kim D. Headlee (hea...@mustang.nrl.navy.mil)
"If you love, love without reservation.
If you fight, fight without fear."
-- John Sheridan, Captain, Babylon 5
(from "The Coming of Shadows")