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Path: utzoo!utcsri!utai!utflis!brown
From: brown@utflis.UUCP (Susan Brown)
Newsgroups: net.startrek
Subject: Re: Vulcan arithmetic
Message-ID: <298@utflis.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 11-Oct-85 09:50:09 EDT
Article-I.D.: utflis.298
Posted: Fri Oct 11 09:50:09 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 12-Oct-85 00:24:47 EDT
References: <1137@rayssd.UUCP>
Reply-To: brown@utflis.UUCP (Susan Brown)
Distribution: net
Organization: FLIS, University of Toronto
Lines: 16
Keywords: seven tenths
Summary: 

In article <1137@rayssd.UUCP> m1b@rayssd.UUCP (M. Joseph Barone) writes:
>	In 'Errand of Mercy', where Kirk and Spock try to help
>the Organians from Klingon domination, Spock computes their odds
>of success to be some_large_number.7 to 1.  I want to know where
>the .7 came from.  Any number divided by 2 will have either an
>integral quotient or a quotient with a remainder of one (0.5).
>Did Spock put weights to each Klingon of the garrison in deter-
>mining that ratio?  What is the answer to this burning question?

The most satisfying answer to this that *I* have ever read is the one
Jean Lorrah (author of The Vulcan Academy Murders) has Amanda, Spock's 
mother, suggest in one of her earlier fanzine-published stories, namely 
that "I think they make those numbers up at least half the time."  Of 
course she had to live with two Vulcans around the house, so it might
be a necessary human defense mechanism.:-)
sb