doctor who - How do Time Lords prove to others that they are the same person as their past regenerations?

Not sure if this is addressed in the old series:

Suppose that there is this famous Time Lord that invented chess, and one morning he regenerates and no one witnesses it.

How do Time Lords prove to others that they are the same person?

Since the regeneration thing is managed by those High Council guys, I suppose that they are able to verify it somehow. But what about the rest of the community? How can they tell, trivially, if this new face is truly the inventor of chess, and not somebody impersonating him?

I'd imagine that a TARDIS, which is apparently linked to its owner, can serve as credentials. But I doubt everybody has a TARDIS - besides, that's probably not the most convenient way to show people who you are.

And finally, I'm not sure, but it looks like most Time Lords have some sort of tool (like the Doctor's screwdriver, or the Master's deathstick), which I guess is good for credentials - but heck, the impostor could've just stolen it.

Answer

This has been a matter of some discussion on the Doctor Who Wikia;

In short, Timelords seem to be able to almost immediately recognise each other. On top of that they're capable of telepathy so any lingering doubt could easily be erased by conducting a mind-to-mind contact;

They can still recognise each other regardless of regeneration. This was shown in The Armageddon Factor when Drax was able to recognise the Fourth Doctor and The Twin Dilemma when Azmeal was able to recognise the Sixth Doctor, despite their last encounter being in the Doctor's fourth incarnation.

Given that Time Lords have been shown to have some telepathic ability, it is reasonable to suppose that this is how they recognise each other after regenerations. However, this doesn't explain how the Doctor recognised the Master on television in "The Sound of Drums". It is possible, therefore, that certain other traits are carried from one incarnation to the next e.g. Subtle facial characteristics.

Comments

languages - Do we ever see written English in the Star Wars films?

In Empire Strikes Back , we see a transcription of what R2's beeps and bloops mean, but it's not English (sorry for the low quality, it's from the 2004 DVDs): I'd assume it's what Basic looks like when written, but is there some point in the the Star Wars films we see written English instead? (This sort of spun off from a discussion in How do people understand astromech droids? .) Answer At one point there was English but it has been phased out in subsequent versions of the films. Chris Gould at DVD Active did a comparison of all versions of each of the Star Wars films, and in his comparison of Episode 4 , there are a couple of screenshots showing how the power gauge for the Death Star tractor beam was changed. I imagine there are probably more to be found in his other comparisons but I haven't got around to reading those yet.

Was the "pure soul" of Harry's what had really hurt Voldemort?

In the Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort possesses Harry, and it hurts. Greatly. I think that Dumbledore explained that it was because Voldemort's rotten soul was incapable of assimilating Harry's pure soul, that Voldemort didn't understand the love and friendship etc that Harry has in his heart. But, I think it was a lie. Remember that in Deathly Hallows, while looking for information regarding Horcruxes, it is discovered that it is in fact possible to merge a soul fragment back, but that the process was extremely painful. Now then, if Voldemort tried to possess Harry, and Harry had a fragment of Voldemort's soul, I think that it could have been the true cause of Voldemort's pain: the fact of having his soul so close of another fragment. I think that Dumbledore knew that fact, but had to lie to Harry because it was inappropriate to let him know that he had one of Voldemort's soul fragments at the moment. Is that right? Or was it truly the pure soul of Harry's...

star wars - What "exactly" happens when someone turns to the Dark Side?

When I saw the original Star Wars saga as a kid, the concept of the Dark Side imprinted in me was quite simple. You did a bad thing, so you're a bad person so you go to the Dark Side and keep doing bad things. Now, obviously this doesn't hold true in reality. In my mind it is perfectly reasonable for Luke to kill the Emperor and Vader and then just flee the Death Star and rejoin the Alliance. After all they are at war, those are enemy officers that have captured him and are taunting him by threatening with death of all loved ones and the whole operation was intended to kill the Emperor anyway. The same would hold true for Anakin. He could have killed Mace Windu to save the Chancellor and Padme but that doesn't mean he's going to then go mad and kill all Jedis including children. It doesn't add up from a merely psychological point of view. He had a set of objectives and that made him want to keep the Chancellor alive (quite valid by the way, Mace Windu is quite clums...

star trek - Warning regarding forward saucer section in Nemesis?

In Star Trek: Nemesis , just before the Enterprise rams into the Scimitar, Picard sends a text message from his captain's chair arm pad to Troi — who is manning the helm in lieu of the crewman who was just blown out through what was once the view screen — indicating that she should put full impulse on standby. (Literally, if you watch the scene closely, Troi's console prefaces the order with "TXT MSG" !) My question is: Did Picard also somehow warn crew members in the forward saucer section about what was about to happen? The ramming of the Scimitar was a heat of the moment decision. Considering that he also resorted to calling the auto-destruct sequence shortly after (which ended up being offline), he probably was of the mindset that any losses would be acceptable in order to hault Shinzon's march to Earth. Still, I'm curious. Answer The original script indicates that he called for the crew to " brace for impact ". Whether that call (or the comma...

Blog

Search This Blog