Jammer's Review

Yes jammer but who drowns the line and how and where? Can we say that we have the right to destroy the crystalline entity but the entity itself has not the right to survive? becouse if we kill it for reasons of serfpreservation then it will not survive. So we will destroy other lifeforms in order to survive? and the shellfish has not the same right to survive? do we have somehow more right to survival than the selfish? If yes why?becouse we consider ourselves intelligent? you see these are difficult questions and i think that picard is right to pose the question. In the end the actions of Dr. Marr are exactly the kind of action that justify picard's question, they are the actions of a revengfull hunan who doesn't care at all about the entity's right to exist.And for all that the episode i think deserves 3 stars.

Silicon Avatar is a 3.5 star episode. Kila Marr's struggle with dealing with her guilt over leaving her son behind with friends to pursue her career leading to his death by the crystaline entity was well done and compelling, the scene where Data replays his logs in his voice was moving, and the final scene where we see an already broken mother get one more emotional punch to her gut when Data tells her her son would not approve was devastating. Plus the attack in the teaser and early first act added a nice bit of exciting action.

I don't quite understand your issue with the episode honestly. Picard's point was that does a human as a lifeform deserve to exist anymore than crystalline entity--they are both living creatures.

The problem I had with Picard's "moral dilemma" was the idea that the concept of self-defense is somehow morally suspect. If shellfish could fight back against whales, wouldn't they? SHOULDN'T they? Why should any lifeform with the ability to fight back against its own imminent destruction decline to do so, or feel as though it should? Honestly, by season five, I was pretty well and tired of Picard's neverending "moral dilemmas" over issues that are self-evident on their face (such as the right to self defense, or the idea that being alive but "contaminated" is better than being dead and "pure" [See The Masterpiece Society]). TNG had mostly left such preaching behind by this point, making the occasional lapses that much more frustrating.

Picard isn't saying let's let the creature destroy us but he at least wants to make the attempt to communicate with it rather than just immediately deciding to destroy it.

I agree with you startrekwatcher. Otherwise we turn the right to survive into an amoral evolutionary struggle justifying everything in the name of survival.

We already knew that the cystalline entity's intent was evil from previous episodes; that it would kill before; that it had killed thousands. Picard's naive attempts to communicate with it almost begged the question: is EVERY menacing destructive life form on this show always "misunderstood"? Are there EVER any circumstances that would justify the killing of a life for to prevent the slaughter of millions of people?

Few here would argue, I am sure, that a species technologically and physiologically superior to us is under a moral "obligation" to try to listen to our communication before annihiliating us if we are perceived as a threat.

Here, we were faced with a deadly killing machine. Dr. Marr killed it. And the show, through Data, in the final scene, wags its finger at her, saying "Shame on you".

Shame on the show. The ending made me sick. Dr. Marr did the right thing, and people who can't even understand (if not embrace) that point of view can be as narrow minded as the "evil" humans they so easily trash.

Picard just tried to explore the possibility of a compromise through communication nothing more or less. But Marr didn't let him do it she only wanted revenfe and for that shame on her.

What the hell kind of compromise would be possible? "Oh, don't randomly kill thousands of us at a time - we'll offer you some sacrifices to keep you alive from time to time. Hey, look at all that Romulan space..."

Seriously, the thing's existence depends on an act that humans cannot tolerate. No workable compromise is possible.

How would you know no workable compromise was possible? That was precisely what Picard was hoping to find out until Marr decided to take matters into her own hands.

Reading posts *before* responding to them is advisable, Angel. The answer is in my 2nd-to-last sentence.

With all due respect your answer is typical of people who shoot first and ask questions later.

They didn't "shoot first and ask questions later." They were, to continue the metaphor, essentially letting the crystalline entity go on an unabated shooting rampage while wringing their hands about whether they had the "right" to stop it from massacring more people. It absolutely blows my mind that people don't think sentient beings have the right to self-defense. Yeah, this episode ranks as one of the worse examples of naive Star Trek why-can't-we-all-just-get-along "morality".

Also, why do so many parents feel compelled to abandon their children on TNG? I love how Dr. Marr just left her son alone "with some friends" on the colony so she could run around and be a scientist. She couldn't take him with her? I had a hard time feeling sorry for her loss since her kid was obviously pretty low on her totem pole of priorities to begin with...

Picard admits to Marr that there is the possibility that they may have to destroy the entity. But he didn't want to resort to that until he had exhausted all other options, which Marr kept him from doing when she destroyed the entity.

Marr's son was a teenager, so maybe he was at the age when he wanted to be on his own (for a while, anyway).

Every kid wants things that they shouldn't have. I wanted a pet lion and an airplane when I was a kid. Fortunately, my parents saw the wisdom in not getting me whatever I wanted. Abandoning your kid for no good reason is not good parenting, and it's something that shows up time and again on TNG. It drives me insane.

I would have found Marr's "revenge" a little more credible if she hadn't up and left her kid because she decided he was a hindrance to her career.

I see what you're saying but giving a kid a wild animal for a pet and allowing a teenager to spend time away from home with friends are two different things.
Although this was never specified, the friends he was with may have been school/childhood acquaintances whom his mom trusted.

It seems some people just don't like TNG's morality and Picard's attempt to communicate (just an attempt to communicate, Picard didn;t abandon the right to self preservation, that's a misunderstanding at best or a perversion of the truth at worst ) becouse it is "naive" ( how many times i heard this accusation?) while shooting someone without even trying to communicate it's o.k. for them . So let us be naive and if you don't like TNG's "naive" morality don't watch it.

"With all due respect your answer is typical of people who shoot first and ask questions later."

Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. Does that mean that it's wrong? If so, then you should be able to give the reason *why* instead of resorting to polemics.

You don't shoot someone and you don't kill someone before you even try to find another solution. It's as simple as that.Becouse if you do it means that you are not even intersted to avoid the shooting. And that says a lot but i will avoid the apropriate term for such a behaviour becouse i'm not interested in "polemics".

So far, they had tried allowing it to live. That path resulted in many deaths.

You trivialize the lives that were lost, and those that are still in danger of being lost. I realize it's hard to empathize with other sentient beings (humans) when they're on TV. It's easy to see them as expendable, since they're fictional. But within the context of the story, their safety is important.

How many lives do you think would be a reasonable price to pay in order to learn more about the CE?

How exactly had they 'tried allowing it to live'?
Our heroes hadn't seen the CE since "Datalore" so it's not like Picard could've just decided one day to seek it out and talk to it.
And for the last time, PICARD ACKNOWLEDGED THAT IT MAY BE NECESSARY TO DESTORY THE CE!!!
His meeting with it would have determined whether its destruction was imperative until Marr decided to skip a few steps.

They "tried allowing it to live" by virtue of having, for various reasons, been allowing it to live.

And I agree that there was nothing to lose by attempting to communicate with it; they could always outrun it and kill it afterward. I just don't see what they could have gained by it, either.

Picard: "If we can determine what its needs are, we may find other sources to supply it."

Such as other life-forms. Non-humans. How altruistic.

The problem I had with this episode was the whole idea that it was so hard to communicate with the Crystalline Entity, when in Datalore, Lore just flipped on the communicator and spoke to the thing verbally. Even as recently as Brothers, Data tells Soong that Lore conspired with the entity - he clearly knew that communication, even co-operation, was possible. So how come all of a sudden they're reduced to tickling the thing to get a reaction?

"Such as other life-forms. Non-humans. How altruistic."

Picard didn't say other life forms, he said other SOURCES

Just a guess, but I think Lore talking to the CE was just a way of giving it an arrow toward the flying candy store that's the Enterprise.

This moral issue had been done and would be done far better in the Trek canon. This one feels like an excuse for unnecessary continuity with season 1--the CE was a really hokey idea to begin with, I didn't need to see it again just to learn absolutely nothing new about it.

Marr's interaction with Data serves the purpose of letting us see the emotional emptiness of Data himself and how emotional distance leads to altruistic behaviour, a staple of Federation values. For that, I appreciated the story, but Marr herself is overplayed and rather uninteresting.

Fair rating. Maybe 2 stars.

@ Rachael...there was one set of parents that took their child with them...her name was Annika.

We know how that turned out...I bet she wished she;d been left with friends.

ALong the line sof Elliott's comments about the hokeyness of the CE...he's right. As presented here, the Crystalline Entity is a a singular being, which begs the question of its origins. Does it have a mother, does it have children? Was this THE same entity that we've seen before? Neither the characters nor the episode itself bothers to ask.

Was a lot harder to kill this thing in Star Trek Online.

What I find strange here is how was everyone so 100% sure that the modified photon torpedos would destroy it (or a resonance for that matter)? I would have seen the communication attempt necessary first hand since firing the creature would almost certainly deny any attempts to find other possible resolutions. By this logic the "let's shoot first" tactic could have been the undoing of all nearby life. I also don't see how any communication attempts could "rob" them of their chance to *try* to kill it. If it was then absolutely sure that they could destroy it, I don't see how the "last words of the accused" would have any danger in them.

Where do these accusations of "letting it live" come from? By trying to speak to it, they were slowing it down if anything.

Also, the doctor was obviously a typical annoying woman. As in "The Drumhead." Probably a ESFJ person, who so easily becomes the victim of hysterization and emotions. Always trying to justify their actions with "reason." And oh yes, that kinda of people do exist.

DanR got it right. In "Datalore" they had already established communication with the CE and in so doing revealed to the CE that humans were intelligent, sentient beings. In spite of that the CE decided that humans were merely food and had no right to exist other than to provide it sustenance. James T. Kirk would have blown that monster away as soon as it got within sensor range [see Obsession]. And, no, Renny would NOT have disapproved of mom's actions.

Boring episode, really didn't interest me, although ending was relatively interesting - but liking the number of outdoor locations and Picard's uniform this series!

I thought maybe they'd communicate with the being, and find out that it hadn't destroyed the people, but instead transported them somewhere, so that Riker could be reunited.. I was wrong.

Dr. Marr was not right. To commit murder is against all laws according to different countries & worlds. Picard wanted to try to communicate with the creature & try to figure out if a comprimise can be reached. Since that was not so, I suspect, Dr. Marr was going to be severely reprimanded.

@Tom What is an 'ESFJ' person?

@Mike: "Dr. Marr was not right. To commit murder is against all laws according to different countries & worlds."

What worlds exactly are you referring to? Murder as you define it, could be part of a natural mating cycle on some other planet. What a ridiculous statement. Typical human arrogance. As if our morality, our laws and our anything are what the universe must revolve on. Before the cosmos, humanity is as insignificant as whatever you can conjure up to satisfy the definition of "really insignificant." Morality is not instinctive in humanity - it is taught through childhood. All of our senses of morality are different from each other. One could even say alien to each other. So, how alien would our sense of morality be to an actual alien?

Anyway, this whole episode is ridiculous. As others have pointed out, Lore established communications with the Entity, the Entity knowingly ravaged a human colony - it knew what we were (as in, sentient beings possessed of advanced technologies) and still considered us a food source. Sorry. Arm photon cannons, you're gone.

So it has the right to live and we should let it… Yeah right! If the entity is intelligent, self aware, and sentient or whatever, it is not going to stop simply because we tell it to. Didn’t Star Fleet tried that with the Borg and other villains? Had it been left to continue it would had destroy the two planets it was heading for and eventually EARTH. I would call that a mass murderer. If it was intelligent that would make it evil, period. Now remember that the crew realized they could actually “communicate” with it. How can an intelligent being not realize the colonist were also intelligent.

Now let use Picard’s analogy and simply say it was acting on pure instinct. So how many of you out there believe that if you get an infection you should just let it play its course and allow whatever is killing you to continue since the germs are only feeding themselves, they are not intelligent and are, just like the whales, just doing what comes naturally. They too have the right to be here, especially since many of them are quite beneficial. Or maybe you would allow cockroaches, mosquitoes, rats, mice, bed bugs, lice or another pest invade and stay in your home or body living right besides you or off you and your children. Perhaps if you house is invaded by Termites you would probably just let them eat it to the ground and just go purchase another house somewhere else. After all they are beneficial and acting on instinct. Without them life on this planet would be impossible. Imagine no cockroaches, Flies, bacteria, or even Termites. We would be living in a pile of Garbage. When they invade they too are acting on instinct, nothing personal, just eating.

Oh but wait, these are tiny little creatures and the Crystalline entity was a huge beautiful creature, worthy of scientific studies. Really? In space? In our galaxy these entities would be just as microscopic in comparison as bacteria would be in our bodies. In such comparison men would be the cure, the anti bodies needed to control them from totally destroying the galaxy, much as our own immune system defends our bodies. Uhh, or maybe we should destroy our immune system in order to keep it from destroying the germs that attack us. Does anyone see how ridiculous this whole episode was?

We have animals on earth that are quite capable of killing humans but when they do they kill a human or other animal they feed on it and move on, they don't kill everything in their path, yet we still kill them to protect ourselves or our live stock. I’m sure that if one you were in the jaws of one of these animals you would give anything to have someone kill the animal before it kills you. What would you do if the animal was capable of killing the entire population of your town in a couple of hours and then started moving on to another town? I guess it has the right to live and eat so just let it go on its merry way.

This episode was an insult to ANY intelligent viewer that saw it and agreed with Picard. He’s an idiot. He would draw a line on the Borg, “Here! No Further!” but would allow a planet killer to go on its merry way totally destroying all life and whole civilizations. With the Borg at least the victims continued to live. What about in "Identity Crisis"? Why did he destroy the life form that had taken over LaForge? Lilly was right, he is a coward and in this instance he was afraid of the Crystalline Entity, even a mouse when cornered would come out fighting, and I truly believed this is the kind of behavior he exhibited time after time, cowardice, then defense because he was cornered.

What would any of the other Captains do? This episode destroyed the Picard character.

@Ralph: Dude, calm down.

There are problems with this episode (and I'll get to those). But you're kind of misstating what Picard tried to do.

As you noted, citing "Identity Crisis," Picard will try to eliminate something that is a threat that CAN'T BE REASONED WITH. TNG is clearly the most PC of the Star Trek series, so it might be the case that Picard and co. bend over backwards to do this too often. But this episode (as it is written) is only a slight stretch.

Picard was trying to establish communication with the entity to see if there was a way they could reach a mutual understanding. He also does this in "Time's Arrow" when he asks the beings traveling back in time to San Francisco if there is anything that could replace the neural energy they're stealing from humans. This happens after the aliens have killed a bunch of humans in the 19th century.

The outrage at the entity's destruction stems from the fact that Picard might have moments before found a way to communicate -- so they could explain to the entity what it was doing and try to get it to stop. The comparison with the whale paints the entity as some sort of incoherent force that just doesn't understand what it's doing.

And, if that were applicable, Picard's position is exactly right and consistent with Star Trek.

The problem with this episode is that it forgets much of the entity's first appearance in "Datalore". The entity, in that episode, was pretty clearly sentient and could communicate with Lore (Lore talks to it, at one point). It's hard to believe that it didn't know what it was doing -- which means negotiations would have been harder, if not impossible.

But even then, Picard's approach to try to find a solution through communication is consistent. Archer made peace with the Xindi, even after they killed 7 million humans because of bad information. Picard sent Hugh back to the Borg collective (because he'd become sentient) without the virus (or whatever it was) Data and Geordi had designed to destroy the Borg. Etc. Etc.

This episode suffers from poor continuity -- but viewed on its own, it's is pretty consistent with TNG and Star Trek.

Why does everyone who criticizes this episode forget that Picard acknowledges that they *may* need to destroy the CE? In fact, there's a scene in this episode where he talks to Worf about preparing photon torpedoes when they run into it. Hello?

I think people conveniently forget this to fit their "Picard is a wuss" narrative.