MovieChat Forums > Star Trek: Voyager (1995) Discussion > episode living witness

episode living witness

posted 3 years ago by tyrannosaurus_sex (553)
4 replies | jump to latest

So 700+ years in the future another version of the Dr, is traveling 2 the alpha quad in a shuttle craft from that planet; I thought this was some alt reality that wasn't suppose 2 happen.

[–] Costumer (1833) 3 years ago

I'm not sure what you are asking here?

In this episode a copy of the Doctor is activated 700 years after Voyager has left this planet. The history of Voyager's visit has warped over time. Eventually the Doctor copy becomes the Minister of Health (or some similar title) of the planet for a number of years before deciding to follow Voyager home.

Now, this does have an issue since at least once or twice it is mentioned that the Doctor's program cannot be copied. That doesn't seem very logical since I cannot conceive of a reason why a program cannot be copied.

Either way, there is no alternate reality or time travel going on here.

Author:
The Road from Antioch
In the Markets of Tyre
Flight to Lystra
The Theater at Ephesus (coming soon)

[–] Zinger (2439) 3 years ago

You might want to watch the episode again.

[–] RoboReCop (3379) 3 years ago

Though never repeated again, the Doctor was a product of a "backup drive". Great episode, nonetheless.

[–] [deleted] 3 years ago

I create backups all the time, but they consist of archived folders containing files. Doesn't mean that the programs can run from the archives.

The same must be true for the Doctor and other holograms, where they're stored in a compressed form but one that can't run like normal uncompressed code. Note that if the Doctor needed to be run from an archive, it would have to be uncompressed first. That's my take on it.