Interstellar Wiki

JOHN LILOM GILL

JOHN LILLOM GILL

John Lillom Gill (2190-2266) was an author, historian, sociologist and professor. He is best known for his books Patterns of Force: How Today Will Affect Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is Yesterday; How History Informs the Future, and for his co-authorship of Star Fleet's General Order One, also known as the P.R.I.M.E. ( Protocols and Regulations of Interstellar Movement and Exploration) Directive.

EARLY YEARS

John Gill was born in the city of Portland in the United State of WashingtOregon, April 1st , 2190. His father Nathanial Hawthorne Gill, a psychologist and early adherent to the theory of psycho-determinants , examined and guided John extensively during his formative years, making effort to create specific character and personality traits in the boy. Although Nathanial Gill had much success in proving his method of psycho-determination , young John eventually rebelled against being treated as a subject in his father's experiments and disowned him. Nathanial quickly claimed that John's willfulness was a deliberately manufactured trait, but the use of his son as an unwilling study subject severely undermined the status of his research within the psychiatric and psycho-social communities.

EDUCATION

John Gill received a scholarship to Princeton University, entering in the summer of 2209. That season, a terrorist attack at Princeton took the lives of 243 students and faculty, many of whom were close friends of Gill. The young student began to ruminate on how one could predict and prevent an act such as the one his school had just endured. Taking his knowledge of psycho-determinants as instilled by his father, Gill decided to explore the idea of watching for individual identity traits that might predict such actions. For a variety of reasons his research failed at the micro (personal) level, but drew a surprisingly accurate picture of probabilities on the macro (societal) level. His senior dissertation, Psycho-determinants in Politics, Government and War , simultaneously rehabilitated his father's research, and laid the groundwork for a new and vigorous science of sociology and the mind.

WRITING

Gill's first book, Patterns of Force: How Today Will Affect Tomorrow, was an expanded and revised version of his University thesis. The book won numerous important awards, including the Zee-Magnie and Bancroft prizes. Beginning in 2216 he lectured off-planet, teaching Star Fleet diplomats and military officers about how to observe and interpret the behavior of other humans (and humanoids) they encountered.

TEACHING

Gill eventually returned to Earth and settled into a professorship at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, where he continued writing acclaimed books and teaching succeeding generations of students. In 2221, Gill and other professors read about the genocidal war on planet Cygnus V, apparently precipitated by the actions of a Star Fleet scout ship interacting with the indigenous population. Within weeks Gill and two others, Tartaiz the Lesser and Xavier Hertz, had crafted the most important and long-lasting document in interstellar diplomacy, the Protocols and Regulations of Interstellar Movement and Exploration, eventually known simply as the P.R.I.M.E directive . It proposed a permanent policy of non-interference in the affairs of other worlds, and was adopted by the United Federation of Planets on May 14th , 2223. Since then, over 400 non UFP-allied races have also become signatories of the document, making it the most successful political instrument in the known galaxy. Through the connections made in Star Fleet, Gill received a lucrative teaching position at Star Fleet Academy. He remained there for 26 years, mentoring future officers Jim Kirk, Bob Wesley and Robert April, as well as diplomats Norman Lurie and Robert Fox.

DEATH AND CONTROVERSY

In 2264, John Gill took an assignment as a cultural observer on the obscure planet Ekos in the Gemini sector of Delta Quadrant. Within a few short years, the man who wrote the non-interference directive had single-handedly changed the culture of Ekos , and inadvertently led them into a war against their planetary twin Zeon . An all-out nuclear extermination of Zeon was personally averted by Gill, but hostile forces killed him shortly thereafter. A book, Twins: Zeon, Ekos and the Two John Gills (Harcourt, Grenada, 2294), details the story of how Gill came to betray his most deeply held principles. The events on Ekos and Zeon have served to reinforce the importance of the P.R.I.M.E. Directive throughout the galaxy.

BOOKS BY JOHN LILLOM GILL

Patterns of Force: How Today Will Affect Tomorrow
(Thin Air Media, 2213)

Tomorrow is Yesterday; How History Informs the Future
(Liefeld, McFarland and Silvestri, 2218)

Private Little Wars: From Aberrant Thought to Destructive Force
(Crucis Etherbase, 2241)