Prime Directive

In the Star Trek fictional universe, the Prime Directive, Starfleet's General Order #1, is the most prominent guiding principle of the United Federation of Planets. The Prime Directive dictates that there be no interference with the natural development of any primitive society, chiefly meaning that no primitive culture can be given or exposed to any information regarding advanced technology or alien races. It also forbids any effort to improve or change in any way the natural course of such a society, even if that change is well-intentioned and kept totally secret. "Primitive" is defined as any culture which has not yet attained warp drive. Starfleet allows scientific missions to investigate and move amongst pre-warp civilizations as long as no advanced technology is left behind, and there is no interference with events or no revelation of their identity.

Usage of the term in other science fiction

Jack Williamson's novel The Humanoids features invulnerable robots who ruthlessly follow the "Prime Directive", which is to "serve and protect" all humans. It is more closely related to the Three Laws of Robotics. This book was published in 1949, so it predates Star Trek. In The Humanoids and its sequel The Humanoid Touch (1980), the Prime Directive is rather sinister, because the Humanoids take extreme measures to protect humans. This protection even goes against the wishes of the humans being protected. They do succeed in stopping all wars and running a perfect economy. However, potentially dangerous activities such as skydiving or using power tools are strictly forbidden. The Humanoids are so well-designed that all human attempts to thwart them fail. The humans being protected usually disapprove of the Humanoids' restrictions, but any active protesters are drugged into submission.

Related Topics:
Jack Williamson - Robot - Three Laws of Robotics - 1949 - 1980 - Humanoid - Skydiving

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Robocop

In RoboCop, the title character, a deceased police officer brought back to life as a cyborg, was programmed to follow four prime directives:

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• Serve the public trust
• Protect the innocent
• Uphold the law
• Classified (which is not to move against a senior executive of OCP)

In RoboCop II, the additional known (documented) directives include:

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DIRECTIVE 233: RESTRAIN HOSTILE FEELINGS.

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DIRECTIVE 234: PROMOTE POSITIVE ATTITUDES.

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DIRECTIVE 235: SUPPRESS AGGRESSIVE EMOTIONS.

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DIRECTIVE 236: PROMOTE SOCIAL VALUES.

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DIRECTIVE 237: ENCOURAGE ENVIRONMENTAL CONSCIOUSNESS.

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DIRECTIVE 238: AVOID DESTRUCTIVE BEHAVIOR.

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DIRECTIVE 239: BE ACCESSIBLE TO THE PUBLIC.

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DIRECTIVE 240: PARTICIPATE IN GROUP ACTIVITIES.

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DIRECTIVE 241: AVOID INTERPERSONAL CONFLICTS.

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Babylon 5

In the Babylon 5 science fiction universe there wasn't any actual Prime Directive for most of the races featured in the series. Some races didn't have problems with sharing technology — the Centauri for example shared jump gate / hyperspace technology with humans, while others, particularly the Vorlons, deliberately kept some advanced technology out of the hands of younger species (although sharing and instigating some other developments). Later the Interstellar Alliance shared advanced technology, such as artificial gravity, with races that did not yet have that technology.

Related Topics:
Babylon 5 - Centauri - Jump gate - Hyperspace - Vorlons - Interstellar Alliance

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However the concept of keeping advanced technology from the less advanced races was at times used to keep techonology out of the hands of those who were not ready for it.

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• In the episode, "Deathwalker", a renegade scientist named Jha'dur who is obviously modeled on Josef Mengele is captured but bargains her freedom with a breakthrough medication that grants immortality. However, just before her departure to the winning bidder, she sadistically reveals that the manufacturing process involves fatal extractions of essential materials from the same species as the recipient. Helpless to stop this obvious trigger to societal chaos, Babylon 5 looks on as Jha'dur departs, only to have her and medication suddenly destroyed by the Vorlons who would only explain that the young races weren't ready for immortality.
• When Epsilon III was discovered to be harboring a gigantic machine in the two part episode A Voice in the Wilderness, it is discovered that a living being named Varn had integrated himself with the machine to act as a CPU for the machine. Because this being was dying, the Minbari Draal took the place of Varn as the CPU. In space, a battle was taking place over ownership of the machine. The Earth Alliance was fighting to keep criminals that were the same species as Varn from taking the planet. Draal appeared to everyone involved in the dispute. He said that because the planet's technology would give an unfair advantage to any one race, that the planet was off limits to all. When Varn's people approached, he destroyed the ships. A year later however, Draal offered his services to John Sheridan to help him fight the Shadows.
• In the episode "Epiphanies", John Sheridan took Alfred Bester to Za'ha'dum to search for a means to remove Shadow technology from the brain of his lover Carolyn. Lyta Alexander accompanied them, and when she got in range of the planet she used implanted Vorlon commands to cause the planet to explode.
• After the Vorlons had left the galaxy, a number of people attempted to travel to Vorlon to lay claim to the advanced technology there. The planet's automated defense systems destroyed those who approached the planet. In the episode "The Fall of Centauri Prime", Lyta explains that humanity was not presently meant to have Vorlon technology. She went on to say that humanity would be unable to go to Vorlon until they were ready, which would be at least one million years after the events of the series. Humanity did leave Earth for Vorlon in the episode "The Deconstruction of Falling Stars", which they renamed New Earth. Afterwards Earth was destroyed when humans caused the sun to go nova.

Ender's Game Series

In the Ender's Game Series the Starways Congress established the law that no alien culture found is to be provided with superior technology or any information about the human society in order to preserve the natural development of the culture.

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