10 Biggest WTF Moments From Star Trek: The Next Generation

Lots of Starfleet's technology has the potential to be very dangerous in the wrong hands. Specifically, one procedure developed by Dr. Pulaski in season two of Next Gen raises many ethical questions.

In the episode Pen Pals, Dr. Pulaski erased the memories of a pre-warp alien girl named Sarjenka to prevent her from remembering her time on the Enterprise. The crew decided that the memory wipe was necessary to avoid violating the prime directive, but this technique could definitely be used in more sinister ways, especially in the hands of the Federation's enemies or Section 31. We know that someone's short term memory could be erased this way, but it's likely that their entire life could be forcibly forgotten.

Since Pen Pals, memory wipes were also mentioned in the episodes Who Watches The Watchers and Homeward, and performed on the characters Kurn (from Deep Space Nine) and Rutherford (from Lower Decks), but it seems like Dr. Pulaski's method was one of the earliest evolutions of this dangerous and unnerving medical practice.