Did T'Pol NEED the Trellium D?

[Aquarius]

Again, it's not difficult to surmise what's going on there. When Trip asks if they can still keep doing the neuropressure, he's trying to judge how complete of a shut-down it is. Was her "exploration" remark a categoric "I never want to see your half-naked body in my quarters again"? Or is there hope that he has another shot at this later? If she lets him in for that, he can keep trying. Not all men are completely dissuaded after rejection--think of how many women get asked out several times by the same man before they finally say yes? The guy would never get the date if he didn't keep trying. Confident men keep trying if given the opportunity. Trip was a confident man looking for his opportunity--that still doesn't make being told it was nothing more than an "exploration" suck any less.

[Alelou]

Trip, to my mind, looks extremely hurt when she first says "exploration" -- watch his eyes. But by the end of the conversation he's 1) saved his own face to his satisfaction" and 2) begun to suspect she's full of ca-ca, which is why I think he brings up continuing the neuropressure and the whole scene ends on a light comic note. We don't really see him start to get frustrated until E2, when it's clear she's really shutting him out.

[WarpGirl]

I definitely didn't see what you both seem to have seen and I gues what 99.9 percent of people think they saw. I'm not saying it was meaningless and Trip didn't care. Of course he did, but he did know T'Pol well enough to know that because she is Vulcan and because of who she is as a person she wasn't being insulting or unintentionally cruel. Look at the situation they were in, I don't think he'd blame her for backing out even without the cultural stuff, emotional differences, and the Trell-D. They were stressed out on a suicide mission. That's a conbustable situation, you do a lot of things that you might think are a bad idea the next day. He could hardly blame her for that. He didn't know the whole story, (we didn't either) but just from what he did know, was enough reason to look at things rationally and not take it too personally (Not that night, the morning after part). Like I said before, he's already had his "tumbles" with other women. Maybe they didn't mean as much as this woman but he didn't know he was in love with her in Harbinger. It was after Hatchery things started to crumble and the main reason wasn't because they had sex.

PS The definition of Exploration and Experiment straight from Websters... Exploration an exploring or being explored. Experiment A test or trial of something; specifically any action or process undertaken to discover something not yet known, any action or process designed to find out whether something is effective, workable, or valid.

These two words are most certainly not interchangable.

[Asso]

Eh ...eh...
Trip's an engineer, not a linguist.

[Aquarius]

That's a great point, Alelou. And by E2, she's no longer on the Trellium. It actually makes sense to a point--in AA, unless you're already married, they discourage you from being in romantic relationships until you reach a certain point in your recovery (a year, I think? I'll have to ask my friend...), figuring that you need to sort yourself out before you inflict your baggage on another human being. So I'm not saying that T'Pol was necessarily twelve-stepping herself; but from a certain point of view, avoiding romantic entanglements while recovering is "logical." Unfortunately, Trip has no way of knowing what's going on with her, and if she'd opened up and told him, he might've found some much-needed patience.

[pdsldl]

But it makes a big difference if what you do involves someone you care about. WG you're expecting Trip to have all this magic knowledge of T'Pol when you allow for her not to understand because she's of a different species. He's a guy and in my experience most of them need neon signs not subtleties. She's spent just as much time with him as he has with her and she most likely had more info available in the computer about humans than he would have had about the secretive Vulcans. By your reasoning T'Pol should have known Trip well enough to know how he felt etc...

[Aquarius]

PS The definition of Exploration and Experiment straight from Websters... Exploration an exploring or being explored. Experiment A test or trial of something; specifically any action or process undertaken to discover something not yet known, any action or process designed to find out whether something is effective, workable, or valid.

These two words are most certainly not interchangable.

So much for the flexibility and fluidity of language.

[Asso]

But it makes a big difference if what you do involves someone you care about. WG you're expecting Trip to have all this magic knowledge of T'Pol when you allow for her not to understand because she's of a different species. He's a guy and in my experience most of them need neon signs not subtleties. She's spent just as much time with him as he has with her and she most likely had more info available in the computer about humans than he would have had about the secretive Vulcans. By your reasoning T'Pol should have known Trip well enough to know how he felt etc...

Good point.

[Aquarius]

But it makes a big difference if what you do involves someone you care about. WG you're expecting Trip to have all this magic knowledge of T'Pol when you allow for her not to understand because she's of a different species. He's a guy and in my experience most of them need neon signs not subtleties. She's spent just as much time with him as he has with her and she most likely had more info available in the computer about humans than he would have had about the secretive Vulcans. By your reasoning T'Pol should have known Trip well enough to know how he felt etc...

Exactly! The biggest complaint most men have about women--we won't come right out and just say what we want or what we mean.

Yes, there are exceptions. But the masses don't usually relate to the exceptions.

[honeybee]

And remember, T'Pol is from a culture where you aren't supposed to have feelings let alone express them. She had no way of knowing what Trip needs. I'm of a mind that the bond was already in its nascent form, so being around Trip was probably very difficult for her - as he triggered feelings in her that she didn't know how to handle and she was sensing feelings from him that she didn't know how to handle.

He probably was sensing she had feelings for him (without knowing why) but her actions didn't make any sense in context of that. And I agree, Trip is hurt but not terribly hurt in Harbinger - it's during E2 that she really shuts him out. That makes her intimate information reveal all the more significant later on.

[WarpGirl]

Let's give the man credit for being educated, and familiar with the scentific terms he hears all day. Exploration is not a term a scientist uses when conducting an experiment with a lab rat. Most of the time test subject is the term they would use, and T'Pol is the head scientist on Enterprise. Heck the word exploration itself was a compliment. Vulcans "don't engage in exploration" how many times did we hear that in season 1? Exploration is something humans value, she was trying to use a word important to him, with the least complicated implications.

From what was presented on the show he had more intuition on T'Pol in the past than he displayed in Harbinger. That was part of their arguement to begin with, he said he didn't need to be an expert to read her or something like that. And normally he didn't, he used intuition and it worked most of the time.

Trip didn't say anything except "you talk first" what is she supposed to pick up from that? T'Pol was never presented with any intuition about Trip's inner workings, nor did she try to use any. She always waited for him to be the one to take the lead up to that point then reacted to it. Even when she kissed him the first time before she dropped the robe it was because he said he was jealous of Sim. And then he kissed her back. She had something to go on. He didn't take the lead the morning after.

As for the flexibility and fluidity of language, its not sacrsocant. Some words cannot be interchanged in certain contexts and retain the same meaning. In this case Exploration and Experiment seem completely different. What was T'Pol trying to discover or prove? That they were attracted to each other, that they were jealous, they admittted that before she dropped her robe. Exploring those feelings is another thing entirely.

The biggest problem with "most people" is that they expect everyone else to experience things and make their choices and judgements in the same way "most people" do. The main problem with that attitude is that all people are unique individuals that are not going to experience life and make choices and judgements the way "most people" do. They are going to experience things and make choices and judgements the way they do.

I will agree with the second half of what Honeybee said.

TnT are not "most people" they are a human in love with a Vulcan and a Vulcan in love with a human.

[pdsldl]

Removed as it apparently posted twice.

[WarpGirl]

At least I'm going against the grain. I mean imagine if we all agreed all the time. What would be the point.

[pdsldl]

And Enterprise was exploring space to meet new civilizations, learn about them, and move on to the next new wonder not set up camp forever in one place. That's what explorers do. And if Vulcans don't explore what were they doing out in space?

I think we're in need of that dead horse again because this discussion isn't going anywhere but in circles.

[WarpGirl]

Not necessarily so in the case of explorers. Many of them found a new place liked it so much they stayed the rest of their lives. A few of them were actually wanted and let the explorer know it.