by Greg Mayer

Jerry of course has already noted the passing yesterday of Leonard Nimoy, and many readers have weighed in with memories and encomia in the comments. Jerry was not a big Star Trek fan, so I thought I’d add a few thoughts here above the fold.

Star Trek, with Spock at its moral core, became a cultural touchstone for multiple generations. In a statement yesterday, President Obama (perhaps thinking of himself a little too!), said

[Spock was] Cool, logical, big-eared and level-headed, the center of Star Trek’s optimistic, inclusive vision of humanity’s future.

It is this latter aspect of Star Trek— it’s vision– that I wish to comment on here. Star Trek‘s basic message, continued over 36 years of films and television shows, is this: When sentient beings of good will act together, there is no problem in the Universe that cannot be overcome. The Star Trek world was a meditation on, and most often a celebration of, humanism, in the broad philosophical sense– the capacity of the human species, by reason and reflection and good works to come to know the world and to establish a just social order. What Nimoy’s Spock gave to this world was, among other things, its inclusivity. It was not just for us, or just the human species– it was for everyone.

The Star Trek world did not come to the full realization of this ethos on first pass, but like all human institutions, grew into its fuller development over time. It was at the end of the film The Undiscovered Country from 1991, after concluding peace with the Klingons, that Captain Kirk repeats Star Trek‘s mantra, but alters it: “To boldly go where no man– where no one— has gone before”, not as a reference to the decreasing usage of “man” in the sense of the whole species, but as the inclusion of all sentient beings– including the previously implacable foe, the Klingons– in the community that was to be grown and perfected. Star Trek maintained this optimistic, inclusive vision for over three decades.

(The Star Wars universe, introduced a decade after Star Trek, paled in comparison– it was, at best, Nordic in it’s resignation in the face of humanity’s inabilities and failings, but in fact nearer a mystical cult in its Colbertesque obeisance to the “force” as a feeling in the gut, to be embraced against the false lure of skill and reason.)

While many (including me) have commented on how Nimoy’s Spock served as an inspiration to budding scientists, some have also commented on his later hosting of a rather wacko show devoted to pseudoscience and paranormal claims called In Search of…. I’ve never investigated Nimoy’s personal views on these subjects, nor much watched the show, but I would like to think that Nimoy’s views are reflected in his guest appearance on one of my favorite episodes of The Simpsons, a parody of the paranormal police procedural, The X-files, in which Nimoy also parodies In Search of…:

Star Trek, and Nimoy in particular, have given us (including here at WEIT, where you can get your evolutionary biology and Star Trek jokes all in one place) much to enjoy, and to think about, over the years. To paraphrase T’Pring, we have been honored.