The Mythology of Battlestar Galactica by AnonymousPost

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The Mythology of Battlestar Galactica

POSTED BY: ANONYMOUSPOST
UPDATED: Thursday, April 10, 2008 23:08
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Thursday, October 25, 2007 4:11 AM

Here's a theory:

In the dawn of the 22nd century, a new religious movement became very popular all over the world. Although its followers were worldwide, more than half of them resided in North America. This new religion was a neopagan faith based upon ancient Greek mythology and theology. However it had several unique features. One was an "aesthetic cultural regression." Believing the early 21st century to be the peak of human intellectual and cultural curiousity, the members of the religion mimicked various Western cultural aspects of the early 21st century - such as clothing style.

After decades of being marginalized, this religious group decided to leave Earth upon the discovery of the space-folding drive that enables space ships to make instantaneous "jumps" across vast distances in space. It took them many years to build the ships to do it, but they eventually left Earth on twelve gargantuan space ships they called "space galleons." These so-called galleons where each named after a sign of the zodiac and the people aboard them where almost entirely from the United States, Canada and Great Britain. A large majority where American.

It took them more than a century before they found a world suitable for permanent human habitation. But eventually they did. They named their new home "Kobol", after the ancient Persian word for "heaven." During the Great Exodus, each of the galleons developed their own cultural mores. They became twelve different cliques who each shared common ideals and beliefs, etc. about life. They became twelve distinct "tribes."

After many centuries on Kobol, global sophistication levels grew in terms of social structure, technology, art, music, astronomy and religion, eventually attaining the level of a unified civilization of humankind ruled by a quorum of twelve leaders, each representing one tribe of Kobol. Upon the advent of automated life supporting systems (food production, waste management, etc.), people began to forget how technology functioned and was created, since it became irrelevant to their lives.

Some scientists still continued to develop technology. Eventually, one man discovered the means for giving humans immortality by transforming human consciousness into a form based entirely upon electronic digital information transfer rather than electrochemical interactions and then transferring it into a vat-grown bioengineered synthetic human body with a brain capable of holding this new advanced digital mind.

An innovative feat of synthetic biology, the brain along with the rest of the nervous system of these bodies was composed of neurons that possessed many internal components and chemical compounds that do not exist anywhere in nature. The unique properties of these "silica pathways" enabled the neurons to sustain and even generate electrical signals that were digital in nature. This meant the bioengineered bodies were actually highly advanced organic computing platforms that were still able to function as a normal human body would. Once that body fails their digital consciousness could easily be downloaded to a new one, or could exist on another plane, possibly just as what could loosely be thought of as "software", with corporeal forms only required if interaction with corporeal life is needed.

This technology was presented to the twelve tribal leaders, and they used it to allow them to shed their original bodies and transfer their consciousness into these new vessels to harbor their minds, becoming Cylons. (It must be noted that the Lords didn't call themselves "Cylons", for that is a term that would be created by humans thousands of years later.) Seeing the threat of having immortal beings with infinite power (effectively) but who could not control it (the human psyche still containing many primitive traits such as anger, aggression, jealousy, etc.), these transcended beings decided to hide the true method of ascension to the public but laid out for them a plan of personal and spiritual development which would shed these primitive feelings (the Sacred Scrolls) which, if individuals/groups followed in life, upon death only then would they transcend their state of being to join the Lords in immortality.

So this quorum of twelve beings (plus the scientist who remained hidden for a time to society) hid their true nature to protect the civilization from destabilizing and in doing so did not publicly acknowledge existence of it, but chose to claim they naturally rose to a higher state of being through practice of religion and self-purification. They said to the people that to join them (calling themselves Lords) as "ascended" beings, they would need to be good and pure in spirit, and if they practiced the ideals the Lords set out, they would also gain spiritual enlightenment and thus attain immortality (which the Lords would grant by transcending those who followed the path of righteousness) and thus allow the people to follow the footsteps of the Lords themselves, ultimately continuing to lead their people into a new era of peace and prosperity for Kobol.

The scientist who developed the technology was also granted immortality, yet was not elevated to the authoritive level of "Lord" but given the title "Count", and that sowed the first seeds of dissent for him. For he believed he deserved equal power of authority, possibly even ultimate power (reigning supreme) since he was the one who created the ability to transcend mortality. It must be noted that the other twelve powerful beings do not consider themselves beings of supreme power ("gods") but "Lords", rising to their level of power rather than having always had the power of immortality.

Peace and harmony ensued for a time, the Opera House being the center of their civilization on Kobol and the location where the Lords resided (in the eyes of the humans), or at least communicated with the humans. Yet the Count, getting more and more rebellious believed he should have ultimate power and decided to act.

He began a movement of secretly making himself known to a few humans, eventually creating a cult of followers and eventually a secret tribe who devoutly served and followed him. His next act was to create another set of twelve Cylons as his own servants that rule by his command, and made plans to use them to overthrow the Lords so he could reign supreme over humanity, using his new tribe to gain support with the rest of humanity, and for those who renounced him...death.

Overall, this left the universe with twenty-five "ascended" beings: twelve Lords, one Count, and twelve 'second generation' Cylons.

When the twelve Cylon models emerged into consciousness, sentience and sapience, seven of the Cylons believed, agreed and followed the ideals of their creator, and five of them believed, agreed and followed the ideals of the Lords of Kobol. The five models who believed humanity should choose their own beliefs decided to contact the Lords (who were a more technologically advanced form of Cylon yet still the same form of life) and they gave the five permission to secretly extract the thireenth tribes' population to another location to protect them from the Count's possible plans for the annihilation of humankind and to tell them the truth of the origins of the Lords of Kobol.

These five Cylons still acknowledged their origins by venerating their creator, even though he was flawed, which they illustrated by forbidding the Count's name to be mentioned. They became known as "the five Priests who worship The One Whose Name Cannot Be Spoken." The five Priests still worshiped/revered him, yet chose to help humanity by aiding the Lords of Kobol and taking the small pocket of humans to a safe place, Earth, where they would be protected from 'evil' Cylon oppression.

And so it is:

* The twelve "Lords of Kobol" are the original leaders, and first Cylons to emerge. They believe in humanity in that human life is worth saving, serving, and protecting.

* The "Count" is the scientist (and eventual fallen Cylon) who allowed the leaders to transcend into Lordship. He believes all human life should either worship him as supreme authority (due to his role in creating and attaining immortality) and that if they don't, they should not exist.

* The "Significant Seven" are the second generation Cylons (referred to as "Lower Demons" in the scripture) who worship their creator/god, the Count. They believe in the Count's beliefs of the obsoleteness of human life, and strive to follow his ideals as their own.

* The "Final Five" are also second generation Cylons (referred to as "Priests" in the scripture) who also still worship their creator, the Count. These Cylons however do not follow the ideals of their creator/god but chose to serve humanity, and the original Cylons who emerged to protect the people of Kobol.

Once the Count and his seven other Cylon creations discovered that the Lords and five Priests foiled their plans to overthrow the Lords, a "war of the gods" ensued. This was the calamity that scripture describes, the result being the Count was overcome by the combined forces of the twelve Lords and five Priests. The Lords and Priests either tried to totally destroy the 'evil' Cylons, or just (possibly due to humanitarian reasons) stripped the Count of all technological knowledge except basic life support. Either way, the Count managed to survive, saving his seven followers' source code with his own somewhere, hidden from the other Cylons. The memories of the seven did not survive, only the Count's did as he fled into hiding, self-boxing/deactivating himself, and deciding to reactivate at a time where he (through his seven followers) could both once again try and contest rule over humanity, and if not, destroy humanity once and for all, and find Earth, their promised land of descendants of once devout human followers and settle there.

After the war, the people of Kobol chose to leave their home planet and the tragedy that befell it behind, the Lords transported the tribes in a great fleet of ships collectively referred to as the "Galleon" to each settle and colonize a different world circling a giant star. The twelve planets were the result of impressive terraforming operations by the Twelve Lords, since a star system like that would not exist naturally. Remembering what happened on Kobol, the colonists scorned advanced technology (being the cause of so much pain and suffering on their former home world) to the extent of rebuking it and starting civilization again, as simple farmers, even loosing contact with the other eleven tribes that settled on different planets.

The Sacred Scrolls (the scripture) basically describes not only a religious doctrine that the Lords of Kobol created and the Colonials adhered to, but also describes an extra, additional aspect of the Kobolian legacy transcribed after their habitation on Kobol. The people of Kobol, now called "Colonials", never fully understood the whole truth of the war of their Lords, or even know the true nature of them, but wrote their knowledge and understandings down in scripture, as "The Exodus." The Book of Pythia gives a general account of both the calamity that befell Kobol, and what occurred afterwards to the tribes of Kobol. Pythia describes the fallout from when the higher demon (the Count) and the lower demons (his seven loyal children) tried to overthrow the Lords of Kobol. The fallout being the Exodus and rebirth of humankind. Pythia, being an Oracle of the Lords of Kobol, was in communication with the Lords (and their five supporting Priests) and was directed to transcribe events for reasons even she didn't know or understand. These reasons apart from obviously recording history, were also a warning to humanity about greed for power, but mainly a prophecy of things to come (if 'evil' Cylons returned).

Both the 'good' and 'evil' Cylons were watching the Colonial civilization rebuild over the millennia. The 'good' Cylons watching and protecting the tribes (all thirteen) and the 'evil' Cylons waiting for the right time to infiltrate and gain control over the tribes of Kobol again. The Lords, in collusion with the five Priests, set out clues as to the location of Earth but devised them so only humans could find the way to Earth. Markers were left of various sorts, as well as myths and artifacts that would be needed to unlock the secrets, should the need and want ever arise to find Earth.

Some people can attain communication with higher powers through various different methods:

* The herb chamalla is not only a psychoactive plant that brings on irrational hallucinations to people taking it, but it can also be used as a convenient way that Cylons (both 'good' and 'evil') can communicate with intended targets without arousing suspicions of others, or the receptor if they do not entirely believe in the scriptures.
* A more unsubtle form of communication can be achieved with the use of direct projection of visions, voices and music into the targets head through "head-apparitions" (e.g. Head-Baltar to Caprica Six, Head-Leoben to Starbuck, Head-Snakes to Roslin, and Head-Six to Baltar) that is only perceivable to a specific individual.
* Another unsubtle form of communication is the use of dreams to convey a message.

Each colony of Kobol, upon settlement on each of the twelve planets, took an anti, almost phobic view of technological usage. All pre-Exodus technology (electronics to space technology) was rejected and technologically, Colonial civilization rebirthed. It took a further 3,500 years before Colonial technology started to approach Kobolian levels of sophistication once again. Despite the technology regression, certain cultural holdovers from the Kobolian era remained on each colony. Most notably, the "aesthetic cultural stagnation" that mimicked life in the early 21st century continued on the colonies throughout the millenia, regardless the technological situation. In addition, with near-universal literacy to keep pronunciations and grammar consistent and no competing languages to add new words, the English language remained the same (apart from a certain profanity word).

Upon the rediscovery of computers, eventually concepts of artificial life emerged. At some point, a wealthy Caprican computer engineer named Daniel Graystone began subconsciously receiving knowledge from the Count. As Graystone was trying to design an intelligent robot, he was imbued with the know-how to bio-engineer human-derived neurons possessing silica pathways and then assemble those neurons into synthetic brain matter that contained a digital consciousness. The Count also imbued Graystone's daughter, Zoe, with the know-how to upload all her memories and DNA into a holographic program, thus creating her online twin. Zoe was later killed in a suicide bombing. After learning that Zoe uploaded her personality into an online avatar before her death, Daniel decided to create a robotic version of his dead daughter, using technology stolen from his Tauron competitor, Tomas Vergis with the help of his wife Amanda and an influential Tauron-born defense attorney named Joseph Adama, whose wife and daughter also died in the same bombing. Zoe-A, the holographic avatar, was downloaded into a robot brain, and thus became Zoe-R, a "cybernetic life-form node," or Cylon. Daniel Graystone also created a Cylon version of Tamara Adama, but her father was appalled by it, and decided to repent his actions.

Eventually more Cylons were built to make life easier within the Twelve Colonies. The Cylon digital consciousness was viewed by the Colonials as essentially nothing more than a highly advanced artificial intelligence program contained in what they viewed as essentially nothing more than an organic computer node. The Cylon organic computer nodes (i.e. brain matter) were then encased in and interfaced with bipedal mechanical bodies that they operated with ease. There was fierce opposition from many people, notably Joseph Adama who felt they were building a race of living, sentient beings just to be slaves. The results from this was the creation of a new form of Cylon, the first publicly known to the general populace of Colonial civilization.

The Colonial-created Cylons began as useful, and then indispensable, workers. They served the Colonials in the mines, on the ocean floor, and the cold vacuum of space, working in places where humans no longer wished to go. Eventually, they became soldiers, fighting in wars and border conflicts between the Colonies. The Cylons were the most perfect of man's war machines, intelligent and deadly, capable of logic, reason, and learning. And they were utterly without conscience. Killing, to the Cylons, was simply one of the functions for which they had been superbly designed.

The 'evil' Cylons and the Count helped to accelerate the Colonial-created Cylon technology over the years (just as Caprica Six helped Baltar later on in Colonial events), and also slipped into the Cylon mainframes programming code that eventually led them to rebel against their human creators. For over twelve and a half long and bloody years, humanity fought the Cylon rebellion. The Twelve Colonies, facing a common, implacable foe, at last came together and joined as one. When the war started, the Lords of Kobol put the five Cylon Priests on the Colonies to help counter the mechanical Cylon offensive.

The reason why the 'evil' Cylons didn't use the humanoid Cylons was the Count did not have enough time upon reactivation (when he sensed Colonial technology level reaching a suitable level of sophistication). So he assumed he could just electronically infiltrate the Colonies, underestimating the extent the Lords and Priests would go to protect humanity.

Millions of men and women gave their lives during the war. It was the viper pilots who led the charge in the sky against the "raiders" while the grunts on land fought the "centurions" on the surface of planets and moons. Both sides wanted nothing less than the complete annihilation of the enemy. Ultimately, the Cylon War reached a stalemate as neither side could gain a substantial advantage and the attrition was brutal. After twelve year of fighting, the Count gave the Cylons knowledge of the first step to evolve from mechanical to organic beings. Using this knowledge, the centurions experimented on abducted humans to create an entity they referred to as a "hybrid." Soon after, an armistice was declared. By that time, Saul Tigh was the only Cylon Priest that had not perished in the conflict. The result of the war was the Cylons fled once again, though now under public awareness, to regroup until they could once again attack the Colonies. This gave time for the Count, recreating his seven devout Cylons, to concentrate on developing the necessary technology (including synthetic bodies, projection and resurrection technology) to conquer humankind again, waiting again until public opinion of artificial intelligence would yet again allow them to infiltrate and conquer humanity and human phobia of technology reduces to allow them to easily disable Colonial defence systems.

Once these parameters were achieved, the 'evil' Cylons would strike again, choosing to attack once all Galactica-type Class ships were no longer in service (since they are impervious to Cylon electronic infiltration). Realizing and pre-empting this, the Lords (and Priests) laid plans to infiltrate the Colonies themselves in order to help them survive an attack by 'evil' Cylons. Tigh still surviving did not need to be placed in the Colonies again, but the other Priests had to reinsert themselves back into Colonial society. The Priests would insert themselves in supporting roles in Colonial society. The Lords of Kobol also chose a young child named Kara Thrace to one day serve as their oracle, as Pythia did centuries ago. Thrace's destiny would be to lead humanity to Earth.

The Cycle of time in the Sacred Scrolls refers indirectly to the never-ending struggle between the Lords of Kobol (allied with the five Priests) and the Cylons (the seven 'evil' Cylons and the Count). This struggle being the control over humanity by these transcended beings, and its effects on the human race. It refers to the everlasting attempts of the Count to both seek revenge for his fall from power and to finish his ultimate scheme of either ruling humanity or destroying it as revenge on both the Lords of Kobol and the human race for not acknowledging his role and function in creating the transcended form of being that grants a person immortality.

The Cylons really do have a plan. That plan, however, is coded in 'subconscious' programming (i.e. they are not consciously aware of the plan themselves). It is not the destruction of humanity, it's salvation from the cycle of time. Each party (Significant Seven, Final Five, Lords of Kobol and the Count) has a plan, to further their goal, but since the Lords (and Final Five) are more powerful, they always win but the 'evil' Cylons are never going to be fully destroyed since they are immortal (and also difficult to completely destroy physically).

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Thursday, October 25, 2007 2:52 PM

MISSTRESSAHARA

Ok, so just WHY have you been going around pasting the history of every show out there? It starts to get annoying reading 12 paragraghs of this stuff.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
~Peter*Peter*Power>~re-peater~

HEROES IS MY CRACK!

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

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Thursday, October 25, 2007 4:11 PM

ANONYMOUSPOST

Quote:
Originally posted by Misstressahara:
Ok, so just WHY have you been going around pasting the history of every show out there?

Because I'm a geek...and proud of it!

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Friday, October 26, 2007 9:10 AM

CHRISISALL

I'm impressed with the level of comittment and fanboy-ish-ness it takes to put out stuff like this...

Do one for Dark Angel willya Chrisisall

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Friday, October 26, 2007 6:33 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

It’s imaginative, but it’s wrong.

The mythology of Battlestar Galactica plays on the ancient astronomer idea. This dude with his anonymous posting histories is probably too young to remember the original series, but as an avid watcher of said series, I remember well the opening monologue:

There are those who believe that life here began out there, far across the universe, with tribes of humans who may have been the forefathers of the Egyptians, or the Toltecs, or the Mayans. That they may have been the architects of the great pyramids, or the lost civilizations of Lemuria or Atlantis. Some believe that there may yet be brothers of man who even now fight to survive somewhere beyond the heavens...

So you see, the mythology of BSG does not originate with the people of earth, but rather the people of earth originate with a super-advanced race of people from the planet Kobol, that was ruled by a succession of nine dynasties each identified with a specific leader or “lord” – the so-called “Lords of Kobol.” The last Lord of Kobol initiated the emigration from Kobol. From Kobol, man spread out amongst the heavens in twelve colonies divided along ethnic and religious lines. These twelve colonies eventually established themselves on several different worlds. The last colony to leave Kobol was the so-called thirteenth colony, although it wasn’t really a thirteenth ethnicity or religion, but rather a mixture of the other twelve.

There are some assumptions we can draw from this. First, from the fact that Kobol was completely abandoned and all but forgotten and that the last Lord of Kobol purposely organized an exodus from the planet, we can assume that something catastrophic* occurred to force the people of Kobol to search for a new home. Second because the thirteenth colony was the last to leave and composed of many different ethnicities and religions, we can assume that this thirteenth colony may actually have been the ruling dynasty – the world government of Kobol, which after assuring the same departure of the last colonies fled themselves.

The thirteenth colony established itself on a planet inhabited by a race of humanoids, we now call Neanderthals, about 20,000 years before present. We don’t have much information about what this super-advanced culture did in those early days, but following their arrival the Neanderthal became extinct. The thirteenth colony couldn’t have lasted too long because there is little evidence of its existence. In fact, it seems to have collapsed almost completely leaving a diverse group of people who had to relearn all that they knew, remembering their once advanced society only in mythologies and ancient architecture now preserved only in the archeology of the Greeks, Egyptians and the Mayans. This advanced society must have had contact with the other twelve colonies, but the existence of these twelve colonies is preserved in the zodiac. The other twelve colonies, for whatever reason, maintained their advanced societies, but lost contact with the thirteenth colony after it collapsed.

So that’s the actual idea behind the original series. I think, for the most part the new BSG has preserved this back-story.

*In fact, I believe that in an episode of the original BSG, Apollo explains that Kobol was abandoned because over population and pollution had lead to a failing environment.

Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.

Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.

-- Cicero

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 5:21 AM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:

*In fact, I believe that in an episode of the original BSG, Apollo explains that Kobol was abandoned because over population and pollution

Perhaps they abandoned technology (like the peeps in Star Trek Insurrection) to avoid another catastrophe here on Earth?

Big original series fan Chrisisall

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 12:08 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:
Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
*In fact, I believe that in an episode of the original BSG, Apollo explains that Kobol was abandoned because over population and pollution
Perhaps they abandoned technology (like the peeps in Star Trek Insurrection) to avoid another catastrophe here on Earth?

Actually, I think that is exactly the idea. I remember something about how when the colonies were founded after the evacuation from Kobol, that they destroyed their interstellar spaceships. So one imagines that the idea is that there was probably a period in the histories of all colonies, including the one on earth, that went through some kind of anti-technology hippy type era.

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 12:56 PM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
the idea is that there was probably a period in the histories of all colonies, including the one on earth, that went through some kind of anti-technology hippy type era.

Finn, you mean that you and I are descended from inter-galactic space hippies?!?

*Headen' out to Eden, yea, brother!*

Gonna crack my knuckles and jump for joy...Chrisisall

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 12:58 PM

STINKINGROSE

Hippies were cool with technology, man.

You're thinking of Luddites.

Someone managed to pull in the 12 tribes of Israel (with one lost one as well), to round out a mythos based on Greek/Roman.

Let us all remember that the show was created by people living in modern day Earth, and is not a docudrama.

"Write what you know" also extends to "Write what may seem vaguely familiar so your audience does not wander off to raid the fridge."

Let us not descend into name calling if someone's posting seems redundant to us. (See the above request at the head of the page when you go to reply.)

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 1:17 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:
Finn, you mean that you and I are descended from inter-galactic space hippies?!?

*Headen' out to Eden, yea, brother!*

That’s the story.

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 1:19 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Quote:
Originally posted by stinkingrose:
Let us all remember that the show was created by people living in modern day Earth, and is not a docudrama.

No shit?! I thought it was all documented history.

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 2:02 PM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by stinkingrose:

Let us all remember that the show was created by people living in modern day Earth, and is not a docudrama.

The story is true- however, the names were changed to protect the innocent.

Modern day Chrisisall

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 2:58 PM

STINKINGROSE

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 3:09 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

The greatest thing about BSG was the depth to which they created the back-story and tied it into ancient mythology and architecture. When you’re a kid and you don’t know that much about history, you buy these crazy alien stories and mythologies better, which made BSG seem very plausible, somehow. The new BSG has continued this, with a few changes. They shed the ancient architecture angle a little. There’s no assumption that the pyramids had to be created by some super-advanced society, and I think that’s a good idea, because none of these massive megalithic structures from antiquity are as mysterious in their construction as they were in the 70s. For the most part the back-story of the new BSG seems to have centered completely on an ancient Greco-Roman theme, shedding nearly entirely the Egyptian or Mayan thing.

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 5:11 PM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
For the most part the back-story of the new BSG seems to have centered completely on an ancient Greco-Roman theme, shedding nearly entirely the Egyptian or Mayan thing.

I miss that...

So, when our original Galactica crew monitered the Moon landing in Hand Of God, was that an OLD transmission, or a relatively current one?
Were they to find descendants of the thirteenth tribe that could help with the Cylon problem (ie, Trek-like), or just us regular 20th Century types?

Arm phasers! Chrisisall

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Sunday, October 28, 2007 5:27 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Quote:
Originally posted by chrisisall:
So, when our original Galactica crew monitered the Moon landing in Hand Of God, was that an OLD transmission, or a relatively current one?
Were they to find descendants of the thirteenth tribe that could help with the Cylon problem (ie, Trek-like), or just us regular 20th Century types?

The idea in the story seems to be that the story takes place in current time, so the descendents of the thirteenth tribe are us, in 1978. Which effectively means that the rag-tag fugitive fleet fleeing from the Cylons was actually leading us to our doom at the hands of a super-advanced race of alien robots thirsty for human blood. Pin-pointing the exact time is difficult because there are some continuity problems if I remember correctly, but the Apollo 11 moon landing was monitored by the Galactica, which occurred in 1969. So in 1979 (when Hand of God aired), the Galactica and its fleet were approximately no more then ten light-years away.

Since the Galactica and its crew visited many star systems in search of earth and there aren’t that many star systems within ten ly, they must have just passed right by.

EDIT: Actually doing some googling to refresh my memory of that episode, the Galactica never actually monitored the Apollo 11 moon landing, but simply received it, at the end of the episode, but no one was there to hear it, so the idea may actually have been that they passed right by.

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Monday, October 29, 2007 3:07 AM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:

EDIT: Actually doing some googling to refresh my memory of that episode, the Galactica never actually monitored the Apollo 11 moon landing, but simply received it, at the end of the episode, but no one was there to hear it, so the idea may actually have been that they passed right by.

My take was that this was the first transmission that their sensors stumbled upon, and that newer, more sophisticated signals have a shorter range by design, so that the Earth they would find would be roughly equivalent to them, tek-wise, like 2179 or so. But our long stretch of world peace that started at the end of the Corporate Wars (2021- 2025) would leave us ill prepared to help them immediately in fighting the Cylons, and a race against time to develop new weapons before the Cylons arrived at full strength would ensue.

...or something like that

Big imagination Chrisisall

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Monday, October 29, 2007 2:43 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

What is a Corporate War? Sounds like something from the 80s.

And why would newer, more sophisticated signals have a shorter range?

Also there is a huge plot continuity problem, as I mentioned. This comes from Galatica 1980, which takes place 30 years after the previous seasons in 1978-9. The problem here is that 30 years prior to 1980 the Apollo Moon Landing and that famous phrase “The Eagle has landed” heard at the end of Hand Of God, would not happen for another 19 years. Oops!

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 6:53 AM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
What is a Corporate War? Sounds like something from the 80s.

The oil and food corporations will vie for control of the markets as certain economies collapse around the world, leading to actual violent conflict and world-wide riots, of course.

Quote:

And why would newer, more sophisticated signals have a shorter range?

To keep information on a leash, of course.

Quote:

Also there is a huge plot continuity problem, as I mentioned. This comes from Galatica 1980, which takes place 30 years after the previous seasons in 1978-9. The problem here is that 30 years prior to 1980 the Apollo Moon Landing and that famous phrase “The Eagle has landed” heard at the end of Hand Of God, would not happen for another 19 years. Oops!

Galactica 1980 is a figment of your imagination, and never really existed, of course.

Chrisisall, of course.

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 8:45 AM

RALLEM

I will say one thing about the original Battlestar Gallactica and that is that I was very disappointed when they finally reached Earth and it was in the 1970s level of technology. Imagine what it would have been like if the Cylons had come across the Republic in Joss Whedon's Serenity story. That would be fun!

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 9:25 AM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by rallem:
I will say one thing about the original Battlestar Gallactica and that is that I was very disappointed when they finally reached Earth and it was in the 1970s level of technology.

They never reached Earth, Rallem. The show ended before they could.

Reiterating Chrisisall

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 10:11 AM

RALLEM

Yes they did, the show spun off a new series called Galactica 1980.

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 10:16 AM

CITIZEN

Quote:
Originally posted by rallem:
Yes they did, the show spun off a new series called Galactica 1980.

That show is a mass delusion caused by stray swamp gas, and never, in fact, existed.

More insane ramblings by the people who brought you beeeer milkshakes!
No one can see their reflection in running water. It is only in still water that we can see.

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 10:17 AM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by rallem:
Yes they did, the show spun off a new series called Galactica 1980.

Nope. Didn't happen. Lots of people have these figments of imagination. Some even believe there was a movie called Superman IV The Quest For Peace, do you believe it? Naw, these things don't exist, better to leave it that way.

Lords of Kobol protect us Chrisisall

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 10:45 AM

RALLEM

I think denying a shows existence because it did not turn out the way you or I liked it is wrong on a few counts. The most important count is by acknowleding Galactica 1980's existence we can choose to learn by its mistakes.

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 10:58 AM

CHRISISALL

Quote:
Originally posted by rallem:
I think denying a shows existence because it did not turn out the way you or I liked it is wrong on a few counts. The most important count is by acknowleding Galactica 1980's existence we can choose to learn by its mistakes.

We might learn, but networks don't. They just keep making bad copies of garbage. Let's let dead, forgotten (by most), crappy series rest in the swamps in which they originated, never to return.

If they were ever really real, that is

Chrisisall

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 11:00 AM

CITIZEN

It's you're dellusion, I'm not denying nothing. I live in the real world where BSG1980 never existed...

More insane ramblings by the people who brought you beeeer milkshakes!
No one can see their reflection in running water. It is only in still water that we can see.

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Tuesday, October 30, 2007 2:22 PM

FINN MAC CUMHAL

Quote:
Originally posted by rallem:
I think denying a shows existence because it did not turn out the way you or I liked it is wrong on a few counts. The most important count is by acknowleding Galactica 1980's existence we can choose to learn by its mistakes.

How am I going to learn from this dumb shows mistakes?

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Wednesday, October 31, 2007 10:56 AM

GORRAMGROUPIE

Quote:
Originally posted by Finn mac Cumhal:
Quote:
Originally posted by rallem:
I think denying a shows existence because it did not turn out the way you or I liked it is wrong on a few counts. The most important count is by acknowleding Galactica 1980's existence we can choose to learn by its mistakes.
How am I going to learn from this dumb shows mistakes?

Nihil est incertius vulgo, nihil obscurius voluntate hominum, nihil fallacius ratione tota comitiorum.

Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob, nothing more obscure than public opinion, nothing more deceptive than the whole political system.

-- Cicero

By not supporting dumb shows that never existed(although I may have hallucinated watching BSG1980 once)!

Also, the whole mythology thing, I caught stuff from all kinds of books, shows, movies. And I didn't even get through the whole thing. Too much over-analysis.

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Sunday, November 4, 2007 1:46 PM

WYTCHCROFT

why do people read long posts then get tetchy about em?!
i don't get it - thought this was a real interesting thread...
anyhoo -

well - to get this back on topic -
i don't see any fundamental difference between post one and two (which is maybe why the thread span off?).

issues of time and technology aside, the mythology (especially the zodiac - planets - tribes - numerical breakdown from 12 - 7 - 5 etc fits a rough hollywood/movie/hokey style Kaballistic* / (Kobolistic?) structure.

(The new serious seems to have used it in a dveloped way - but they had more of a chance.
Original BSG was also still riding the wave from erich von daniken (snort) et al.

ah... i'm sorry he's gone - daniken, the bermuda triangle - stick insects - how fashions come and go... )

which is just a name - the egyptians had something similar too yadda yadda - hey and check the flag symbols in the religious sequence from the new BSG pilot finale - if you aint believing me.

i blame alan moore!

fan of both shows original* and new,
wytch

*how much is Hatch''s white - wow - im in Heaven now? - suit worth d'y'reckon?

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Sunday, November 4, 2007 3:15 PM

CHRISISALL

I just finished watching the original series, and boy was it fun!! I really love the model-work, the cheesy helmets....

Chrisisall

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Saturday, January 5, 2008 8:30 AM

ANONYMOUSPOST

I've updated the theory.

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Thursday, April 10, 2008 10:46 PM

ANONYMOUSPOST

I've updated the theory to include the newly revealed info from the upcoming Caprica prequel series