Synopsis: Dr. Bashir is accused of being a Dominion agent.
This episode can be seen as an illustration of the difference between the ways of being of the Logos-driven rational conscious ego and the Eros-driven irrational unconscious.
In “Inquisition” an individual who identifies himself as Deputy Director Luther Sloan of Starfleet Internal Affairs, arrives on Deep Space Nine just as Dr. Julian Bashir was about to leave for a medical conference. All the senior officers are ordered to Captain Benjamin Sisko’s office and informed that they are confined to quarters while Sloan conducts an investigation. It seems Starfleet Intelligence believes there is a Dominion agent aboard the station. Quickly, Sloan identifies Bashir as the target of his inquiries and the doctor is brought in for further questioning. Because Sloan believe that Bashir’s enhanced mind could be sufficiently disciplined to compromise conflicting information, that is “believing one thing while doing another,” he further postulates that Bashir may be suffering from “engrammatic disassociation” (Thompson et al., 1998). Meaning that Bashir could be a Dominion agent without knowing it. Sloan puts Bashir in the Brig and then serendipitously transports him into a holodeck program on his ship, where he tries to get Bashir to admit that he is an agent for the Dominion. Bashir realizes that it is a holodeck program and Sloan shuts down the program and appears to Bashir now wearing all black and saying that he is not with Starfleet Internal Affairs, but is with a secret Starfleet agency, Section 31, which he invites Bashir to join. Bashir refuses, but when he reports this all back to Sisko and the other senior officers, Sisko tells him that if Sloan contacts him again, he should accept his offer.
In this episode, when Sloan exposes his true identity to Bashir, it is evident that Section 31 operates by very different rules than the rest of Starfleet, much like the Eros-driven unconscious uses entirely different means than does the Logos-driven conscious ego. Like the unconscious, Section 31 does not rationalize or justify its actions, it just does what it feels it must do. Whereas just as the conscious ego wants to believe it operates by logic and rational thinking, these are standards that Starfleet officers hold themselves up to. Yet, as Chief of Security Odo tells the group of senior officers, all the political powers in the Alpha Quadrant have similar secret organizations, so why should the Federation be different. This statement is quite true for individuals as well. We all have an unconscious, as much as the conscious ego may want to deny it. Truly accepting this is not necessarily easy in our culture, but it is the first step to allowing the psyche to become more whole.
Reference:
Thompson, B, & Weddle, D. (Writers), & Dorn, M. (Director). (1998, April 8). Inquisition (Season 6, Episode 18) [TV series episode]. In I. S. Behr & R. Berman (Executive Producers), Star trek: Deep space nine. Paramount Television.
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