If the Borg assimilated a wizard, would they be able to use magic?

I'm so glad this got asked.

If you remove the trappings and the geo-potlicial metaphores from star trek, you end up with 'the industrial military complex' vs. 'the indigo children'. I don't believe it to be an unreasonable interpretation of star trek as 'Federalists' visit various cities across the United States to deal with problems found there. 1960's america, this really rough analysis likely extends into TNG, but not Voyager or Enterprise. DS9 lucked out because Ron Moore was there and figured out the conclusion of what happens when a hyper rationalist society discovers the gods... and considering Admiral Ross' gradually backing off Sisko over to the role of the Prophets in his life and that of Bajor on account of them literally fitting the definition of a god unburdened by the restrictions of space and time.

This is precisely why neue trek falls flat with much of the fanbase, because much of TOS and TNG's deeper philosophical and situations with energy clouds or entities that haunt Troi's dreams or kidnaps Riker in his sleep, talking rocks, or time travel, quantum realities all figure into what would be considered within the boundries of normal magical practice. Magic is built into Star Trek's narrative DNA and disguised behind the veneer of scientific inquiry and rationalist paradigms. It supposedly espouses rationality as virtue, while both taking place and completely accepting paranormal phenomina as for granted: I.E. any telepathic species throughout the series; or that whole E.S.P. rating thing each officer under went (apparently) in, Where No Man has Gone Before.

In fact, that the writers of that era of Trek took psychic phenomena as a given, they had assumed that in the future we'd be able to chart an individuals' potential for paranormal virility. Which is neat that they probably thought that at the time. Granted this is in the same era as Dennis Leary and Uri Geller, but I think that further supports my supposition that Trek is ultimately a landscape trying to map out magic as a post-industrial society would understand it; or chart Jungian psychological territory as opposed to a stricter Sagan-esque worldview.

So what I'm about to say is fairly... earnest in nature; I realize this is r/shittydaystrom as in, historically if we take into account what is normally considered magic on every culture on earth, magic can be distilled into four basic powers:

  1. Precognition
  2. Telepathy
  3. Contact with the Dead/Trans Dimensional Intelligences
  4. Probability Enhancement

So, the question is, would the borg get the powers of a wizard. The answer is yes, and they did, with every Vulcan or Betazoid they assimilated. Had they assimilated a fully developed Ocampan they would have technically absorbed a fucking Maiar at their disposal. The thing is the Borg didn't use the magical potentials of their hosts, that we saw.

So, in conclusion, Yes they did, and No they wouldn't utilize it for lack of imagination.

/r/ShittyDaystrom Thread