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Old February 3rd, 2005, 03:07 PM   #3
Eric Paddon
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Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Morristown, NJ
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Senmut, I agree with you that the placement of the dust cloud and the "we're leaving our star system" dialogue does muddy things up considerably. So this was how I chose to rectify that problem, for which the answer IMO means going back to LPOTG.

In the wake of LPOTG and this failed attempt to find the precise coordinates for Earth, what accounts for the direction the Fleet takes up to the time of "War Of The Gods" when the SOL beings ultimately give them the coordinates? I take the view that Adama came away with one tangible piece of something from the Kobol tomb before the Cylon attack destroyed it. That Adama found time to read the first piece of information that let's say correlates to the first part of the information that the SOL give in WOTG. And that in fact if Adama had been able to read the whole thing he would have gotten the same information and no more than what Apollo, Starbuck and Sheba recite at the end of WOTG (thus the SOL were merely rectifying the injustice of LPOTG in that respect).

First part of the coordinates-"Quadrant Alpha". To me, this suggests that the known galaxy in Colonial civilization has been segmented into several components (I take the view that all of Galactica takes place in one galaxy only). The region surrounding the Colonies and most of known space would be the "Home Quadrant". Then in one "direction" of space if you will, you would have the Alpha Quadrant, Beta Quadrant, Delta Quadrant etc.

So let's say that Adama saw the "Quadrant Alpha" part of the coordinates in LPOTG and that at least told him which general section of the galaxy to go looking for Earth in. I can not imagine that he could have sustained support for the journey to Earth in the wake of LPOTG without having at least one tiny thread to build on to at least point them in a general direction.

Upon leaving the "Home Quadrant" and entry into the "Alpha Quadrant" the Fleet exits what might have been called as the "Colonial Frontier" indicating those outposts of humanity that were commonly travelled to as late as the Destruction. What lies beyond are older settlements that would have become forgotten as the demands of the war with the Cylons became greater. This could explain why some settlements like Proteus know of the war before contact was lost but other settlements like Equellas (The Lost Warrior) never knew about it. These would still consist of planet names and stars still known to Colonial astronomy but part of a more distant environment in the way the Rocky Mountains would have seen to America at the time of the Lewis and Clark expedition.

So as a result, in TLP, they are now entering the Alpha Quadrant and know that any human outposts they come across will be remnants or descendants of more distant settlements so it doesn't surprise them that they run into them. They also are aware of the Delphian Empire based in Gomorrah/Gamorray which as we see in LL is the last named planetary system suggesting that from the Colonial standpoint, the Delphian Empire represents the edge of "known" space to them and that beyond would lie any hope of finding keys to where the 13th Tribe went.

Just my take on things. Any parts of this theorizing of mine that fall apart?
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