# Miles O'Brien's position on Deep Space Nine. **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 6, 2014, 10:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649 "2014-02-06T10:22:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/21 "2014-02-07T01:53:32Z")
> [@tonyfop](#): > > Actually, in the US Navy, a Chief, Senior Chief, or Master Chief can hold an Officer’s job, even though he is enlisted. I have had Division Officers who were enlisted. > > Another possibility is that O’Brien is an LDO, or Limited Duty Officer. They are Chiefs(and rarely E-6’s) who are given a commission without having to go through the Academy or ROTC. Custom today is not to call them Chief, but the ones that wer Chiefs still are “Initiated CPO’s” and have all the priveledges thereof. Later on, when O’Brien is seen with the 1 hollow pip on his collar, it is possible that he voluntarily reverted to his enlisted rank. From what was said on _ **TNG** _, we can assume there are two kinds of personnel in Starfleet: commissioned officers, who graduated from the Academy, and enlisteds, who did not [“The Drumhead”]. Presumably there was a table of ranks for enlisted personnel, but SFAIK it was never gone into in detail. This is, BTW, at odds with _ **TOS** _, where the Writer’s Guide stated clearly that everyone on board the _Enterprise_ was a qualified astronaut and therefore an officer, and that the “enlisted men” category did not exist. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/22 "2014-02-07T03:08:49Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > I’ve heard this many times, and it’s always completely wrong. While it’s true that Star Trek isn’t quite like a \*modern-day \*Navy, it’s almost note-for-note built off of Age of Sail tropes, with a few modern-ish tidbits thrown in. More to the point, rank wasn’t a huge deal until TNG, as back in the TOS era there wasn’t a lot of confusion over it. > > What happened in TNG was that the writers had no real concept of scale (a common problem with sci-fi writers). Hence it seemed that somehow everybody in Starfleet went to the Academy, and _everybody_ was an officer. O’Brian was nearly the only person mentioned who wasn’t at least an Ensign. But while many of the TOS writers were familiar with military life, TNG was mostly a product of rather oddball Hollywood types, some of whom were borderline crazy and all steeped heavily in the 1980’s. Those are merely the background facts. The story is told within the four corners of the screen, and what we see there is makes my statement completely true. Starfleet does not follow in any strict form the structures of our modern services, so it’s futile to try to squeeze them into that form. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/23 "2014-02-07T03:20:46Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > …(Troi, at least, was an MD)… Uh… cite? > **[Deanna Troi](https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Deanna_Troi)** > > Deanna Troi was a female Betazoid–Human hybrid Starfleet officer. Under the command of Captain Jean-Luc Picard, she served as the counselor aboard the USS Enterprise-D and the USS Enterprise-E. In 2379, Troi transferred to the USS Titan (Star Trek:... ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/24 "2014-02-07T03:30:38Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > Uh… cite? > > [Deanna Troi | Memory Alpha | Fandom](http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Deanna_Troi#Early_life_and_career) In one episode, I don’t remember which, she sat down opposite a troubled guest star and said in her own endearing, meddling way: “Perhaps I can help. I’m a qualified [or possibly trained] psychiatrist.” Correct me if I’m wrong, but if one is a qualified [and/or trained] psychiatrist, does that not mean he or she is a doctor of medicine? Surely she holds at least some sort of equivalent advanced degree if she’s allowed to serve as a Starfleet counselor. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/25 "2014-02-07T03:40:09Z")
She also habitually refers to those she “helps” as her “patients,” implying some kind of medical status. ---
**Author:** ![Dale\_Sams](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/779978/32.png) [@Dale\_Sams](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dale_Sams)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/26 "2014-02-07T03:58:36Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > From what was said on _ **TNG** _, we can assume there are two kinds of personnel in Starfleet: commissioned officers, who graduated from the Academy, and enlisteds, who did not [“The Drumhead”]. Presumably there was a table of ranks for enlisted personnel, but SFAIK it was never gone into in detail. > > This is, BTW, at odds with _ **TOS** _, where the Writer’s Guide stated clearly that everyone on board the _Enterprise_ was a qualified astronaut and therefore an officer, and that the “enlisted men” category did not exist. Even the guys setting the tables in ST:VI?? Poor slobs. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/27 "2014-02-07T04:00:45Z")
And in “Tin Man,” Troi mentions studying psychology at the university on Betazed. Presumably she was working on her doctorate. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/28 "2014-02-07T04:24:39Z")
Troi says she is a psychologist (not a psychiatrist) on a couple of occasions. Psychiatrists are MDs; psychologists may or may not have a Ph.D. In any case, Troi is most definitely not an MD. She is a Lt. Commander (later full Commander) in the medical division, though. She’s not a line officer; even in the real navy your local O-4 dentist would not be expected to command a ship if the captain is killed by a tooth abscess. On TNG, Data was third-in-command after Riker, despite being only a Lt. Commander, while Dr. Crusher (a full commander for the whole series) only got the occasional nightwatch shift. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/29 "2014-02-07T04:39:15Z")
> [@friedo](#): > > Dr. Crusher (a full commander for the whole series) only got the occasional nightwatch shift. Except the time she was left in command in hostile territory with a bridge crew straight out of the Academy. :eek: Presumably all of the senior Operations officers were either down on the planet looking for Data (who had been kidnapped by Lore’s Borg drones) or looking after the children in the nursery… :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/30 "2014-02-07T04:41:10Z")
> [@friedo](#): > > Troi says she is a psychologist (not a psychiatrist) on a couple of occasions. Psychiatrists are MDs; psychologists may or may not have a Ph.D. In any case, Troi is most definitely not an MD. She is a Lt. Commander (later full Commander) in the medical division, though. Do psychologists analyze patients and dispense advice the way psychiatrists do? 😕 ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/31 "2014-02-07T05:12:23Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > Except the time she was left in command in hostile territory with a bridge crew straight out of the Academy. :eek: > > Presumably all of the senior Operations officers were either down on the planet looking for Data (who had been kidnapped by Lore’s Borg drones) or looking after the children in the nursery… :rolleyes: In that episode it is expressly made clear that the situation is a out of the ordinary one and Crusher is ordered to do nothing but watch and get the hell away if needed. She is also stated to be a qualified bridge officer. It makes sense that in an intersteller Navy like Starfleet, where the ship is far from help, you don’t have any deadweights around. If its standard to give medical personnel some ship driving training, I don’t see a problem with it. In one of Clancy’s novels, an Intelligence officer ends up with the conn of an aircraft carrier in the USN. So I wonder how possible that it. Hell, even in the modern Astronaut corps, some mission specialists are taught to fly the spacecraft (and all Russian Cosmonauts are IIRC). For example Shannon Lucid, a bio chemist was so trained. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 7:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/32 "2014-02-07T07:05:15Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > Do psychologists analyze patients and dispense advice the way psychiatrists do? 😕 They can; there are lots of different kinds of psychologists and they are regulated differently in each jurisdiction. Psychiatrists more commonly treat psychiatric conditions with medication and don’t typically do a lot of therapy, although some do. ---
**Author:** ![DWMarch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dwmarch/32/1010_2.png) [@DWMarch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DWMarch)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 8:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/33 "2014-02-07T08:27:36Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > In one of Clancy’s novels, an Intelligence officer ends up with the conn of an aircraft carrier in the USN. So I wonder how possible that it. Cmdr. Toland in Red Storm Rising. I am pretty sure he was a ship captain beforehand but he parked his destroyer on a sand bar and was transferred to Intel. It’s a shame Tom Clancy is no longer with us. I want to read a book about an O-4 dentist taking over after the captain dies from a tooth abscess! ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/34 "2014-02-07T10:37:45Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > > [@Shakes](#): > > > > Seriously? Miles has to take orders from the stations counselor? > > As combination pshrinks/psocial workers (what Roddenberry referred to as “human engineers”), counselors are considered semi-medical personnel (Troi, at least, was an MD) and have broad powers over officers and crew. Other posters have already established that Troi is not an MD. Regardless, O’Brien had to take orders from Dax and Crusher because they outranked him, not because they were medical personnel. The only “broad power” medical staff have over officers is to forcibly relieve them of duty for medical reasons. This power isn’t something which the Star Trek writers dreamed up; it’s been standard military practice for centuries, and crops up all the time in older historical fiction. (For example, C. S. Forester’s _Lieutenant Hornblower_ is largely about a 19th-century British navy captain with paranoid schizophrenia. Soon after setting sail he begins to act erratically, torturing the crew and jeopardizing their mission. The ship’s doctor is reluctant to exercise his legal power to declare him unfit for command but is eventually forced to act.) ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 12:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/35 "2014-02-07T12:11:23Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > Do psychologists analyze patients and dispense advice the way psychiatrists do? 😕 Of course they do. The essential difference between them is that psychiatrists, being licensed physicians, have the authority to prescribe drugs, and psychologists don’t have that authority. ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/36 "2014-02-07T12:26:24Z")
Regarding ranks and positions in Starfleet, I think it’s worth noting there is probably no real continuity between Starfleet and any Real Life military force on Earth, given the whole Eugenics Wars and WWIII kind of wiped the slate in that regard. I get the distinct impression that Starfleet’s rank structure is based off of some DVDs of old war movies and a couple seasons of JAG which managed to survive the end of the world in the early 21st. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 3:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/37 "2014-02-07T15:27:44Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > Of course they do. The essential difference between them is that psychiatrists, being licensed physicians, have the authority to prescribe drugs, and psychologists don’t have that authority. They have the ability to do so, sure, but the vast majority don’t. There are too few psychiatrists per patient and so they have to focus on the medicine aspects and have a psychologist or even case worker/therapist handle the rest. It’s pretty rare to find a psychiatrist who will also do psychotherapy these days. Though, based on Troi’s encounters with Barclay, I’d say she can’t give out medicine. There were some times where an emergency medication would have been useful. Instead, she teaches some woo-ish thing called “plexing,” (which I fanwank by believing it was a placebo). ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/38 "2014-02-07T20:24:10Z")
FWIW, here is an interesting thread I found at another website: > **[Queston about ST:TNG and Deanna Troi - GateWorld Forum](https://forum.gateworld.net/sci-fi-and-fantasy-television/star-trek/8096-queston-about-st-tng-and-deanna-troi)** > > Visit the feature site at SciFi Stream! If you don’t need an advanced degree to become a Starfleet counselor, the position isn’t what it’s cracked up to be (as I’ve always suspected). ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/39 "2014-02-07T20:34:53Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Star Trek has always been pretty shaky with issues of rank. I’ve just come to assume that, in general, Starfleet is rather informal with rank, as well as giving lots of latitude to commanding officers. So if the Captain wants to make an enlisted man a department/division head, then he’s free to do so – just like a Captain can make a skinny 15 year old an ‘Acting Ensign’ if he wants. > > It’s even worse in the JJ Abrams Star Trek (which I enjoyed, despite the many flaws) – Kirk somehow goes straight from the Academy to First Officer of the flagship (!!), a position which in the US Navy today would require close to 20 years of service, and shortly after, to Commanding Officer! > > As for O’Brien, he’s clearly qualified for any position up to and including Chief Engineer of a starship or space station, so I don’t really have much of a problem with Picard/Sisko/Starfleet giving him more responsibility and authority than a CPO or even Senior Chief would have in the US Navy. I’d say that O’Brien was a more competent chief engineer than LaForge. Unlike LaForge, he did not succumb to (or even demonstrate) the desire to experiment or research at the expense of keeping things run smoothly. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2014, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649/40 "2014-02-07T20:40:28Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > Hell, even in the modern Astronaut corps, some mission specialists are taught to fly the spacecraft (and all Russian Cosmonauts are IIRC). For example Shannon Lucid, a bio chemist was so trained. When you have a crew of seven, that makes sense. When you have a crew of over a thousand, not so much. So long as there are experienced and qualified Operations (or even Engineering) specialists aboard, the Chief Medical Officer belongs in Sickbay, not on the bridge, especially in a dangerous tactical situation. On _ **TOS** _, the chain of command was Kirk, Spock, Scotty, and (despite revisionist attempts to prove otherwise) Sulu (not Uhura). The only time McCoy had anything remotely like a Command function was in “Court Martial,” and then only because he was the senior officer present. His only orders were to place Spock under arrest and turn the ship around to retrieve the Captain. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/miles-obriens-position-on-deep-space-nine/680649.md?page=3)