Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!floyd!harpo!ihnp4!inuxc!pur-ee!uiucdcs!friedman From: friedman@uiucdcs.UUCP (friedman ) Newsgroups: net.startrek Subject: Re: Spock, Sarek, and Amanda - (nf) Message-ID: <6307@uiucdcs.UUCP> Date: Wed, 21-Mar-84 22:36:53 EST Article-I.D.: uiucdcs.6307 Posted: Wed Mar 21 22:36:53 1984 Date-Received: Fri, 23-Mar-84 08:37:32 EST Lines: 34 #R:psuvm:-55400:uiucdcs:24900032:000:1763 uiucdcs!friedman Mar 21 08:14:00 1984 Mike Hyman says: Now, I ask you: Under what circumstances would the marriage of Sarek to Amanda be the only logical thing to do ??? The ONLY possible reason was that Sarek got Amanda pregnant and was forced to marry her to spare them both the shame and embarrasement that would follow if they didn't. Thus, Spock is the illegitimate son of Sarek and Amanda. There are a couple of things wrong with this line of reasoning. First, Sarek didn't say marrying amanda was the ONLY logical thing to do; he merely said it was logical (or, rather, seemed at the time to be -- not quite the same thing). There are lots of other logical reasons possible: political; affection (even though he disclaims emotion, he could care for another person enough that the difference from what a human would call love might be negligible); convenience of some sort other than preganancy; and on and on. Second, how would Sarek have gotten Amanda pregnant without intending to do so? Spare me, please, the cliche of his coming to pon far with no other female available. But in the absence of such a scenario (which, to me, is far fetched indeed), he could have had no sexual interest in a human female -- or indeed in any female. Third (minor semantic point): if they married after Amanda was pregnant, that would not make Spock illegitimate, at least in most western (human) traditions. Any explanation of Sarek and Amanda's marriage has a lot to explain: What happened to the Vulcan woman to whom Sarek was presumably betrothed as a child (on the model suggested by Spock's explanations of his pon far)? What brought Sarek and Amanda together? And, of course, what was the logical reason for the marriage, in the face of all the difficulties that had to arise from it?