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TIME TRAVEL
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Since I would have to mention this plot device in five different episodes, the subject of time travel in the Star Trek universe deserves its own page. It probably should be noted that people either love the possibility of time travel (and the plot intricacies it involves), or they hate it because it requires too much effort to figure out the ramifications of going elsewhere in time. There are basically two schools of thought on time travel plot subjects:
School of Thought #1: A person going back in time and interfering with past events would alter the future and thus change history.
School of Thought #2: A person going back in time and interfering with past events is necessary to preserve the history as he knows it.
Star Trek actually pursued both schools of thought in its five time travel episodes:
In "TOMORROW IS YESTERDAY" and "THE CITY ON THE EDGE OF FOREVER," the past was changed because of interference from the Enterprise crew, and the main story involved correcting the damage done to the past so that the timeline could continue normally.
In "ASSIGNMENT: EARTH," it was revealed that the actions of the Enterprise crew in the past were necessary for history to unfold in a normal fashion.
In "THE NAKED TIME" and "ALL OUR YESTERDAYS," the ramifications of time travel aren't revealed in the course of telling the story.
I personally enjoy thinking about the ramifications of time travel. So did the writers of the later Star Trek series. In fact, in a Deep Space Nine episode, it was revealed that there is a Department of Temporal Investigations within the Federation, whose sole purpose is to question any individual who travels in time and determine if their actions had a detrimental effect on history. Of course, if an individual had changed the past, how would those in the future know . . . ?
E-mail me if you have comments about time travel. Might make for an interesting discussion . . . .