The world has lost perhaps its most famous icon for promoting logic and science. Mr. Spock aka Leonard Nimoy.

Courtesy of The New York Times:

Leonard Nimoy, the sonorous, gaunt-faced actor who won a worshipful global following as Mr. Spock, the resolutely logical human-alien first officer of the Starship Enterprise in the television and movie juggernaut “Star Trek,” died on Friday morning at his home in the Bel Air section of Los Angeles. He was 83. 

His wife, Susan Bay Nimoy, confirmed his death, saying the cause was end-stage chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. 

Mr. Nimoy announced that he had the disease last year, attributing it to years of smoking, a habit he had given up three decades earlier. He had been hospitalized earlier in the week. 

I am one of a vanishing breed who remembers actually watching Star Trek when it made its first appearance on television in the sixties.

I, of course, was too young to pick up on the not so subtle messages inserted in each episode against war, against organized religion, and against racism. Instead I was incredibly fascinated with the whole beaming of people on and off the Enterprise, and of course the space monsters, aliens, and green skinned women.

However as the years have gone by, and I have seen every TV episode multiple times, and each of the movies at least once, I have become incredibly impressed with the concept of the show and its amazing cast.

And of course for me the most impressive cast member was always Leonard Nimoy.

For an awkward, precocious child trying to make sense of the world, and questioning the "facts" being presented by the adults, I always found myself relating to Mr. Spock most of all.

But let's face it, EVERYBODY loves Spock.

Even the President of the United States.
 
I personally have always thought that this Mr. Spock quote was his best:

"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one."

And one I should mention that I have adopted as a personal creed. Which of course puts me at odds with certain political ideologies I could name.

Finally I would offer Mr. Nimoy the traditional Vulcan send off of "Live long and Prosper" but considering the circumstances that would be.....illogical.

This one is for you Trekkies.

Original Spock, Leonard Nimoy, schools newfangled Spock, Zachary Quinto, on the power of Spock.

I thought this was very imaginative and it is especially relevant to me because my daughter and I are big fans of the OLD Star Trek series, and when she was very little she used to lie in my bed and watch it with me before she would go to sleep back when they showed reruns every night before her bedtime.

The new Star Trek movie comes out the weekend after this next one, and I have been informed that I WILL be taking her, and we WILL see it at the IMAX theater here in town.

I also assume I WILL be paying for it, and I WILL sit in the middle of the theater where, according to my daughter, the civilized people sit to watch a film.

(Psst! Between you and me, I was going to see it anyway, but I just let her think she is calling the shots.)