Kobayashi Maru

A flashback this morning on Facebook to three years ago, when a friend of mine, Tracy, also my wilderness first responder instructor, posted this photo: 

It seemed familiar, but I couldn't place it. The Usual Suspects? I asked. (There is a Kobayashi in that movie, and there is a ship.) Not even close. Star Trek, he answered. "It is actually a very famous reference to no-win situations or situations that can only be 'won' by redefining the problem. I actually named one of my pre-hospital [EMT training] scenarios after the Kobayashi Maru, but I call it the 'Little Wooden Ship,' which is the translation, so the students who are familiar with Star Trek don't realize that they are walking into a no-win scenario." Tracy teaches EMTs and paramedics. His scenario involves a room filling with poison gas. What do you do? Do you keep working on your patient, or do you get out, fast, dragging them with you if you can? 

The answer should be obvious—as first responders, our first duty is always to ourselves and our fellow workers—but in the heat of the moment, of course you want to do what you are trained to do: save lives.

The situation originally plays out at the start of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Saavik (Kirstie Alley) is in command of the USS Enterprise when a distress call from a civilian freighter is logged. She orders Helm Officer Sulu to plot an intercept course with the imperiled ship, but he warns her that this violates the Neutral Zone declared by Federation/Klingon treaty. She overrules him. Soon contact with the Kobayashi Maru is lost and three Klingon battle cruisers appear headed toward them. Outgunned, Saavik orders a retreat, but it's too late. The Klingons overwhelm the Enterprise, and most key personnel—including Uhura, Sulu, McCoy, and Spock—are killed. 

It turns out—of course, because why wasn't Kirk in charge of the ship?—that this is a training exercise. Saavik failed. She protests that the test didn't properly reflect her command abilities, but Kirk explains that it is intended to reveal how the subject confronts an impossible situation, and that how one deals with death is as important as how one deals with life. There is no correct resolution; the scenario is a test of character.

As backstory, we learn that Kirk himself took the test three times while at Starfleet Academy, and on the third occasion he cheated by reprogramming the simulator—for which "original thinking" he received a commendation. ("I don't like to lose," he shrugged.) When Saavik protests that he's never actually faced a no-win situation, he replies that he doesn't believe in such a thing. 

Later in the film, of course, Kirk gets his own Kobayashi Maru experience, which results in Spock's selfless death to save the Enterprise.

Here is a flowchart showing various possibilities one could follow in the simulation. All of them, of course, lead to failure.

As one critic points out, the fact that Kobayashi Maru is a simulation—which, naturally, everyone involved knows—renders it somewhat moot. I've certainly experienced the frustration of training in a serious skill—Search & Rescue technical rope rescue and medical triage, Red Cross crashed-plane and active-shooter scenarios—knowing that, in a sense, it "didn't matter" what I did because the point was to learn, not to save actual lives. 

And how often do we find ourselves in truly impossible situations? They do happen, to be sure—if by "impossible" we mean that death could result, depending on choices we make in an instant. I'm flashing now to Captain Sully Sullenberger and Flight 1549—or to those in command of wartime battles. Even to a more mundane situation, such as a motorist traveling at 65 on a freeway whose car all of a sudden malfunctions. Never mind the sheer helplessness of being in a plane that is about to crash, which I can't begin to imagine.

I hereby resolve to keep my life as event-free (along those lines, at any rate) as possible.

My point in writing about this today? No point, really. I was just surprised to rediscover that old Facebook conversation with Tracy, which I'd completely forgotten about. I don't see Tracy anymore except on FB, and probably never will again in person (he's moved, I'm no longer in SAR), so it was nice to have some old, pleasant memories float up. Tracy is a mensch, and as I commented in signing off from that conversation, I am happy to know his good noble indefatigable self. 

N.B. 7/5/21. I am FB friends with a woman, Amanda Sowards, who happens to be the daughter of the screenwriter of Star Trek II, Jack B. Sowards. She posted today about having to curate some uninvited additions to her father's Wikipedia page—and deletions, since this non-invitee edited Amanda and her two siblings right out of that page. (As she said, "Ouch!") Curious, I took a look at the page and learned this: "Sowards created the term Kobayashi Maru . . . , naming it for his next-door neighbors in Hancock Park." So, there's that as well.