Size of the Federation vs Galactic Empire's Size

[Mike DiCenso]

I'm not sure I like this whole each species has their own colonies idea. So Humans, Vulcans, Andorians, Betazoids all have their own colonies and are "spreading out". It seems to me they would be at each others throats long before Klingons or Romulans entered the picture. Besides when a Federation starship discovers or charts new suitable colony whose colony is it? The only way this can work is if they are all Federation colonies.
Furthermore, and I believe we also had a discussion on this, 1000 worlds in 2260 is not a minimum number for 2370 because there is no natural law that says number of colonies must always grow. It is entirely possible that a large number of colonies simply didn't pan out. After all most of the colonies we've seen are one village affair, it seems likely many of these were simply abandoned and people returned to Earth or emigrated to larger colonies which were more successful. I know that "has an orbital defense" would be the first on the list of things I'd check when moving to a new colony especially after crystalline entity attacks and similar incidents.
In any case when Picard, Sisko or Janeway state that Federation has 150 worlds there is no more justification for multiplying that number using various guesswork-derived factors than there is to multiply 100,000 world Republic or million world Empire.

Only Earth has colonies? What about that nifty little terraformed colony the Andorians and Vulcans fought over called Weytahn (Paan Mokar, if you're Vulcan)? Or howabout Vulcanis Lunar Colony where Tuvok was born? Show me, Kane, if you can from this list, that all of them are Earth and Human-only colonies. Also, from the list, you can see which ones are failures and they only make up a small fraction of the whole. The largest loss of colonies would seem to be when the Federation ceded some to the Cardassian Union to for the Demiliterized Zone, but the Federation also got some colonies from the Cardassians as part of the deal in the territory swap, and after the Dominion War, it is very likely that the Federation got all of them back. And many of the colonies did get resettled.

Also a bit of a reminder what Picard says in ST:FC:

LILY: How many planets are in this Federation?
PICARD: Over one hundred and fifty ...spread across eight thousand light years.

There are more than 150 member worlds. Kirk clearly makes the thousand planets statement. It's hard to believe that there's much guess work in figuring out that there are probably well over a thousand planets in the Federation, likely many times that by the 2370's and 2380's. What you're trying to convince us of is that 99 percent of the Federation's colonies have been failures, when that is clearly not so.
-Mike

[Kane Starkiller]

Only Earth has colonies? What about that nifty little terraformed colony the Andorians and Vulcans fought over called Weytahn (Paan Mokar, if you're Vulcan)? Or howabout Vulcanis Lunar Colony where Tuvok was born? Show me, Kane, if you can from this list, that all of them are Earth and Human-only colonies. Also, from the list, you can see which ones are failures and they only make up a small fraction of the whole. The largest loss of colonies would seem to be when the Federation ceded some to the Cardassian Union to for the Demiliterized Zone, but the Federation also got some colonies from the Cardassians as part of the deal in the territory swap, and after the Dominion War, it is very likely that the Federation got all of them back. And many of the colonies did get resettled.

You misunderstood me. Of course many of the species had their own colonies however the issue is whether each species maintains its own separate colonies after it joins the Federation or are all planets under the jurisdiction of the federal government. As I said if Vulcans and Andorians still have their own separate colonies and Humans, Vulcans and Andorians are "spreading out" then Federation member worlds are going to get into conflict over who gets which colony long before Klingons or Romulans enter the picture.

Also a bit of a reminder what Picard says in ST:FC:
LILY: How many planets are in this Federation?
PICARD: Over one hundred and fifty ...spread across eight thousand light years.

There are more than 150 member worlds. Kirk clearly makes the thousand planets statement. It's hard to believe that there's much guess work in figuring out that there are probably well over a thousand planets in the Federation, likely many times that by the 2370's and 2380's. What you're trying to convince us of is that 99 percent of the Federation's colonies have been failures, when that is clearly not so.

Both Kirk and Picard mention the number of planets or worlds. At no point does Picard say, imply or even hint that he is talking about homeworld planets when he mentiones the "over 150" number.
Likewise at no point does Kirk say, imply or even hint that he is talking about "human colonies" only if something like that even exists inside the Federation.
Therefore we have two numbers: 150 and 1000. We can be conservative and say Federation has 150 worlds while the others were small scale colonies that were abandoned. Or we can be generous and say that Picard limited himself on major planets and the total number is 1000 or so.
But what you do is invent out of thin air that Picard meant "homeworld planets" when he said 150 and Kirk meant "human colonies" when he said 1000 so that theoretically you could multiply 150 with 1000 to arrive at 150,000.
150-1,000 vs 100,000-1,000,000 is the number of planets sources give us for Federation and Republic/Empire. Anything else is invention.

[Praeothmin]

I am a new user here, but yet I am fully interested in these debates. As such I am posting here.

And you couldn't have picked a worse place

Why?
Because here, he'll need to back up his claims instead of insulting the opposition down?
Because "SDN says so" is not an acceptable argument?

[Youngla0450]

I am going to give you the following facts:

*The Galactic Empire's twelve million member worlds are major worlds, not minor settlements or such.

*The Empire's 50 million colonies and protectorates consist of colonies, minor settlements, and other smaller galactic governments who either pay tribute or provide military support to the Empire.

*The Federation's 150 member worlds are the worlds with populations in the billions. These include Earth, Mars, Andoria, Tellar, Vulcan, Betazoid, etc.

*The Federation's 1,000+ colonies and protectorates are colonies, minor settlements, and planetary or regional governments who are given military or financial support by the Federation.

[Jedi Master Spock]

In the Inside the worlds of Episode I (and also the publication for Episode II) an image of Star Wars galaxy is given along with the explici diameter figure:

The main problem is that neither that nor the other maps are any different in terms of canonical authority. Both are "continuity" materials.

Regarding Sullust-Endor distance on the maps it is possible that there is more than one system named Sullust or Endor in the galaxy. After all the distance between Detroit and London is 160km if we are talking about London, Ontario rather than capital of UK. Combine the world map with 160km figure and you arrive at very interesting conclusion about the size of Earth.

Two problems. First, the "real" Sullust and Endor are both points of historical interest. Not labelling them while labelling another Sullust and Endor would be like putting London, Ontario on the map and neglecting to put London, England on the map.

The second problem is that the second map provided, which mostly agrees with the Vector Prime map, uniquely identifies Sullust and Endor by labelling the Sanctuary pipeline.

You misunderstood me. Of course many of the species had their own colonies however the issue is whether each species maintains its own separate colonies after it joins the Federation or are all planets under the jurisdiction of the federal government. As I said if Vulcans and Andorians still have their own separate colonies and Humans, Vulcans and Andorians are "spreading out" then Federation member worlds are going to get into conflict over who gets which colony long before Klingons or Romulans enter the picture.

Both Kirk and Picard mention the number of planets or worlds. At no point does Picard say, imply or even hint that he is talking about homeworld planets when he mentiones the "over 150" number.

Actually, it is implicitly members. Homeworlds or not is an issue of some debate. We haven't seen a member that isn't a homeworld, but quasicanonical materials have indicated they exist.

How many republics were in the Soviet Union? 15. How many states are in the USA? 50. How many members are in the UN?

The UFP is made up of its members. It's a federation, in truth.

Likewise at no point does Kirk say, imply or even hint that he is talking about "human colonies" only if something like that even exists inside the Federation.

Therefore we have two numbers: 150 and 1000. We can be conservative and say Federation has 150 worlds while the
others were small scale colonies that were abandoned. Or we can be generous and say that Picard limited himself on major planets and the total number is 1000 or so.

But what you do is invent out of thin air that Picard meant "homeworld planets" when he said 150 and Kirk meant "human colonies" when he said 1000 so that theoretically you could multiply 150 with 1000 to arrive at 150,000.
150-1,000 vs 100,000-1,000,000 is the number of planets sources give us for Federation and Republic/Empire. Anything else is invention.

Kirk predates Picard by a century. The Federation is expanding, adding members, and exploring new territory looking for possible colony sites at an incredible rate. There's no indication that the Federation is shrinking whatsoever - let alone shedding large numbers of human colonies while adding large numbers of alien members. Both numbers are canonical and well established, so you're stuck with both of them. The Federation supports massive terraforming efforts both in the TOS era and in the TNG era - something that would flatly not be the case if the Federation had changed policy and was abandoning all its small colonies as the 24th century continued.

The only reasonable way to explain the difference in numbers is to say that Kirk the explorer is talking about inhabiting while Picard the diplomat is talking about political membership - saying there are 150+ planets in the Federation is like saying there were 15 republics in the USSR. Now that we've ruled out the possibility that Kirk and Picard are actually talking about the same thing, though, we wind up back at square one: The Federation is growing rapidly. It's added numerous members since Kirk said that, and presumably colonies as well. Therefore, we can only conclude that the Federation, while being a Federation of 150+ planets, inhabits more than a thousand planets.

The next step is the identification of homeworlds with species homeworlds. Every planet that we canonically know is a member, however, is a species homeworld. We have to go out into quasi-canonical material not actually presented on screen to get to members that aren't homeworlds. This does

The final step - the assertion that Kirk is talking about human colonies? Well, that's less defensible. It's quite possible that he's counting all inhabited worlds controlled by the Federation. He also could be speaking hyperbolically. We don't need to conclude that Kirk, a human, speaking to a human who disappeared before the founding of the Federation, back when the Vulcans were carefully holding back human progress, is necessarily speaking of humans - but it's an assumption we have to make if you want to truly generate an upper bound.

See, we don't know how much larger than 1,000 systems the Federation inhabits. We do expect that most colonies are lightly inhabited worlds, and we do expect that humans are the most widely spread members, but beyond knowing that little bit, the Federation could easily have colonies on a hundred thousand worlds. Given its terraforming technology and the small population of many colonies, it's quite believable.

I am going to give you the following facts:

*The Galactic Empire's twelve million member worlds are major worlds, not minor settlements or such.

*The Empire's 50 million colonies and protectorates consist of colonies, minor settlements, and other smaller galactic governments who either pay tribute or provide military support to the Empire.

*The Federation's 150 member worlds are the worlds with populations in the billions. These include Earth, Mars, Andoria, Tellar, Vulcan, Betazoid, etc.

*The Federation's 1,000+ colonies and protectorates are colonies, minor settlements, and planetary or regional governments who are given military or financial support by the Federation.

The latter two assertions are not too unreasonable, but you're really going to need to back up your claims if you want to convince anybody of anything. Especially since, regarding the first two, our top-line numbers are 100,000 and 1,000,000, not 12,000,000 and 50,000,000.

I'd particularly be interested in seeing what you have indicating that Mars is a Federation member.

[Youngla0450]

What is wrong with you? Episode II: Attack of the Clones depicts the Republic holding "over a hundred thousand members". Tarkin's quote of at least one million member worlds in the Empire is true. Also, the Essential Atlas and Dark Empire, issue 3 depict the galaxy has at least twelve million major inhabited systems, as well some fifty million colonies and minor settlements. These are my sources. If you challenge them, then so sad for you.

Also, Picard stated in Star Trek: First Contact that the Federation "over one hundred and fifty worlds, spread across 8,000 light years". So that backs up my claims concerning the number of Federation member worlds. And according to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Battle Lines", and Star Trek: Voyager episode "Innocence", the Federation had at least 1,000 semi-autonomous colonies.

[Kane Starkiller]

The main problem is that neither that nor the other maps are any different in terms of canonical authority. Both are "continuity" materials.

Since other maps don't explicitly state the diameter of the galaxy there is no contradiction. Certain issues like Endor-Sullust distance can be explained like I showed above.

Two problems. First, the "real" Sullust and Endor are both points of historical interest. Not labelling them while labelling another Sullust and Endor would be like putting London, Ontario on the map and neglecting to put London, England on the map.

The second problem is that the second map provided, which mostly agrees with the Vector Prime map, uniquely identifies Sullust and Endor by labelling the Sanctuary pipeline.

Yes but which Sullust (provided that there are several) is the big one? The Sullust at which Rebel fleet gathered might be only a smaller system only significant for that battle while the other one could be a much larger system.
The same goes for Sanctuary Pipeline which like Sierra Nevada mountains might not be unique. Or both Sullust's could be located on the same "pipeline." The point is that, even ignoring the fact that Endor-Sullust distance is only vaguely described as "hundreds of ly", there is no evidence that those maps contradict the maps from ITW Episode 1 and ITW Episode 2 both of which explicitly show a 100,000-120,000 galaxy complete with a scale.

Actually, it is implicitly members. Homeworlds or not is an issue of some debate. We haven't seen a member that isn't a homeworld, but quasicanonical materials have indicated they exist.

How many republics were in the Soviet Union? 15. How many states are in the USA? 50. How many members are in the UN?

The UFP is made up of its members. It's a federation, in truth.

Well clearly if a planet is in the Federation it can be said it is a member of the Federation. The issue is whether "member" is some kind of official political/administrative status within the Federation not shared by other planets. What do you mean when you say that we haven't seen a member that isn't a homeworld? That a colony wasn't explicitly defined as a member of the Federation or explicitly stated to be in the Federation even after being identified as a Federation colony? Why would such information even be necessary?
The point is you haven't shown any evidence that "homeworld" and "colony" are official administrative divisions of the Federation rather than unofficial differentiation between whether a particular planet is home to an indigenous species.

Kirk predates Picard by a century. The Federation is expanding, adding members, and exploring new territory looking for possible colony sites at an incredible rate. There's no indication that the Federation is shrinking whatsoever - let alone shedding large numbers of human colonies while adding large numbers of alien members. Both numbers are canonical and well established, so you're stuck with both of them. The Federation supports massive terraforming efforts both in the TOS era and in the TNG era - something that would flatly not be the case if the Federation had changed policy and was abandoning all its small colonies as the 24th century continued.

To say that Federation expanded between 2260-3270 because we have, on occasion, seen it admit new members or start up a new colony is like claiming that information about Russian population declining from 148 million in 1991 to 142 million today must be incorrect because we visited Moscow hospital and saw many women giving birth to children.
That both Kirk's and Picard's number are canonical was never a point of contention just like Russian population of 148 million in 1991 and 142 million today. That that decline is seemingly contradicted by many Russian women giving birth/Federation on occasion adding new planets only means we don't see the whole picture.
We can try to be generous and take the 1000 number but if we limit ourselves only to explicit information then Federation in 2370 has 150 or so planets.

The only reasonable way to explain the difference in numbers is to say that Kirk the explorer is talking about inhabiting while Picard the diplomat is talking about political membership - saying there are 150+ planets in the Federation is like saying there were 15 republics in the USSR. Now that we've ruled out the possibility that Kirk and Picard are actually talking about the same thing, though, we wind up back at square one: The Federation is growing rapidly. It's added numerous members since Kirk said that, and presumably colonies as well. Therefore, we can only conclude that the Federation, while being a Federation of 150+ planets, inhabits more than a thousand planets.

You simply make up that Kirk and Picard aren't talking about the same thing when neither provides any specification to his number other than "planet" or "world" and then say we have "ruled out" the possibility that they are talking about the same thing. We didn't rule anything out. You just made it up.
Nor have you demonstrated that talking about 150 planets of Federation is like talking about USSR republics as opposed to saying that Japan consists of 4 islands which is a geographical information.
As for Federation growing see previous paragraph.
We know two things: in 2260 Federation had 1000 worlds. In 2370 Federation had 150 planets. Out of this two facts you conclude that Federation is "growing rapidly". This is not reasoning based on facts.

The final step - the assertion that Kirk is talking about human colonies? Well, that's less defensible. It's quite possible that he's counting all inhabited worlds controlled by the Federation. He also could be speaking hyperbolically. We don't need to conclude that Kirk, a human, speaking to a human who disappeared before the founding of the Federation, back when the Vulcans were carefully holding back human progress, is necessarily speaking of humans - but it's an assumption we have to make if you want to truly generate an upper bound.

No it really isn't an assumption we need to make nor is it even a justified one. This reasoning is again based on outright inventions on your part: that Cochrane was interested only in Humans which he never states, that he held a grudge against Vulcans and thus didn't consider them as "we", that Kirk was aware of that grudge and then decided only to include human colonies, that there are exclusive human colonies as opposed to colonies with, for example, 5 million Vulcans 6 million Humans and 8 million Andorians.

See, we don't know how much larger than 1,000 systems the Federation inhabits. We do expect that most colonies are lightly inhabited worlds, and we do expect that humans are the most widely spread members, but beyond knowing that little bit, the Federation could easily have colonies on a hundred thousand worlds. Given its terraforming technology and the small population of many colonies, it's quite believable.

There is zero presented evidence that Federation is larger than 1000 system and as of 2370s Picard, Sisko and Janeway have all put the number at 150 planets. The fact that Federation could have thousands of small colonies is as irrelevant as the fact that Republic could have hundred million small colonies given Coruscant's population. What theoretically could be is irrelevant. We are discussing about what is.
Federation is on three separate occasions, by three separate people stated to consist of 150 planets. Not "member" planets or homeworld planets or important planets but simply planets. What happened a century ago in Kirk's time is about as relevant as the total land area of British Empire in 1910 for today's UK.

I'd particularly be interested in seeing what you have indicating that Mars is a Federation member.

Since Picard, Janewas or Sisko simply said planets there is no reason why Mars wouldn't be in the count regardless of what is its administrative status within the Federation.

[Youngla0450]

This is a link to a story concerning my "Orange Star", a more advanced version of the Death Star: http://imagine.wikia.com/wiki/Orange_Star.

[Youngla0450]

I am sorry for any trolling I might have done here. I refute any statements that may have been hostile. However, I am trying to state my claims on Star Wars and Star Trek, but yet you guys keep on refuting over and over.

[Praeothmin]

Yes but which Sullust (provided that there are several) is the big one? The Sullust at which Rebel fleet gathered might be only a smaller system only significant for that battle while the other one could be a much larger system.

Except you have one source saying a big Galaxy, and many saying a small one (ANH novel, AotC Parsec comment, Maps putting Sullust and Endor between 1/5th and 1/10th of the Galactic diameter while being "hundreds of LY apart", etc...).

And where do we see any indication at all that there are more then 1 Sullust?
Especially since planets in SW resemble modern-Earth countries a lot more then they do cities.
And how many countries named France do you know?

[Praeothmin]

I am sorry for any trolling I might have done here. I refute any statements that may have been hostile. However, I am trying to state my claims on Star Wars and Star Trek, but yet you guys keep on refuting over and over.

That is what is called "debating".
It is then your job to come up with a counter-argument refuting our counter-arguments, instead of reposting the same refuted "evidence"...

[Mike DiCenso]

Also, Picard stated in Star Trek: First Contact that the Federation "over one hundred and fifty worlds, spread across 8,000 light years". So that backs up my claims concerning the number of Federation member worlds. And according to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Battle Lines", and Star Trek: Voyager episode "Innocence", the Federation had at least 1,000 semi-autonomous colonies.

Interesting you bring those episodes up as they back up the idea that the Federation has more than 150 member worlds, though it says nothing about colonies. From "Innocence":


JANEWAY: The Federation consists of over 150 different worlds who have agreed to share their knowledge and resources in peaceful co-operation.

Note the emphasis is mine to point out the critical definition of what we would expect of a member world versus colonies here. Also of note, the episode "Innocence" aired in April of 1996, while the movie ST:FC was released some 8 months later in December of that year. The DS9 episode "Battle Lines" is three years older, and has Sisko stating the following:


SISKO: The Federation is made up of over a hundred planets who have allied themselves for mutual scientific, cultural and defensive benefits. The mission that my people and I are on is to explore the galaxy

Now if we really want to go down the literalist interpretation route that Saxtonites love to, then we have to assume that in just three years the Federation gained over 50 new members! Also note the definition here, one of members who are allied, and no reference to colonies. So while we have no information on colony numbers in the TNG-era, we do have a good solid pegging of member worlds. No reference on the curious "associate membership" (As per TNG's "Attached" ST: Insurrection) status numbers, or how many protectorates worlds (The planet Haven from TNG's "Haven", or the Evora from ST:FC are examples of this) there are. But one thousand worlds total would be an absolute mimimum given Kirk's TOS-era statement and the apparent rapid growth between "Battle Lines" and "Innocence".
, not a maximum.
-Mike

[Kane Starkiller]

Except you have one source saying a big Galaxy, and many saying a small one (ANH novel, AotC Parsec comment, Maps putting Sullust and Endor between 1/5th and 1/10th of the Galactic diameter while being "hundreds of LY apart", etc...).
And where do we see any indication at all that there are more then 1 Sullust?
Especially since planets in SW resemble modern-Earth countries a lot more then they do cities.
And how many countries named France do you know?

Actually there are two sources I mentioned: maps in ITW EP1 and ITW Ep2 probably EP3 but I don't own that one so I'm not sure. They explicitly state the size of the galaxy complete with scale. Other sources do not.
I never said that I have evidence of more than one Sullust or Endor merely that it is one possible explanation for apparent conflict even disregarding that "hundreds of ly" is not intended to be an accurate or reliable number.
The likelihood of name repetition increases with number of entities to be named and SW planets are far more numerous than countries on Earth. Even so there are two Congos and two Koreas for example.

[Praeothmin]

Actually there are two sources I mentioned: maps in ITW EP1 and ITW Ep2 probably EP3 but I don't own that one so I'm not sure. They explicitly state the size of the galaxy complete with scale. Other sources do not.
I never said that I have evidence of more than one Sullust or Endor merely that it is one possible explanation for apparent conflict even disregarding that "hundreds of ly" is not intended to be an accurate or reliable number.
The likelihood of name repetition increases with number of entities to be named and SW planets are far more numerous than countries on Earth. Even so there are two Congos and two Koreas for example.

Either country are next to their counterparts, so the issue with Endor and Sullust would stay even if there were more then 1 of each.
And there are still all the other events or facts pointing to a smaller Galaxy.
And the smaller Galaxy fits well with all known Canon, while the big Galaxy doesn't fit with many events and interpretations and requires some contrived explanations to believe...

[Kane Starkiller]

The point is even with as little as 200 or so countries there are name repetition. In a galaxy with million world it is going to be much more likely.
I don't see how you can conclude that because Congos and Koreas are close then Sullusts will be close also. What logic does that follow?
I'm not aware of any events or facts from the films which are incompatible with 100,000ly galaxy.