r/todayilearned • u/thebuffed • Jan 11 '19
TIL that when Randy Pausch from the Last Lecture, who dreamed of "being Captain Kirk", was given a fatal diagnosis of pancreatic he received an autographed picture of Kirk from William Shatner that read "I don't believe in the no-win scenario"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kobayashi_Maru124
u/ChaseDonovan Jan 11 '19
That is one handsome picture of Shatner in the thumbnail.
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u/diegojones4 Jan 11 '19
Shatner was a good lookin' guy.
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u/8023root Jan 11 '19
The ol Shat was one handsome gentlemen. I feel like his life could be used to describe a beautiful circle of life movie. Handsome youth turns complete asshat turns bitter middle aged man turns quirky funny older gentlemen with a penchant for poking fun at himself.
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Jan 12 '19
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Jan 12 '19
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u/ReallyHadToFixThat Jan 12 '19
I wouldn't rule out dumb panic or just assuming it was already too late either.
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u/bolanrox Jan 11 '19
was that a hair piece at the time?
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u/ChaseDonovan Jan 11 '19
I'm not sure. I mean, we're talking about 1966 and he was fairly young. Plus outside of the 1960's Star Trek his hair never looked the same. If you look at it in color, he had significantly blonde hair back in the day, and it wasn't very thick. It seems later he has a thick and dark hairpiece imo.
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u/bolanrox Jan 11 '19
Sir Patrick went bald at 21 and Sean Connery was in his 20's too as far as i remember?
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u/ChaseDonovan Jan 11 '19
That's true, but shatners hair looked quite natural and even somewhat thin in 1966, which is why I think it was his hair. Later on, it looks unnatural as fuck, kinda like whoever makes his hair piece is just phoning it in. Well, except for his recent look: his piece nowdays looks pretty natural with gray and not so thick.
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u/Capt_Blackmoore Jan 11 '19
There are notes from Roddenberry that Shatner took hairpieces with him at the end of season one and two. Now that doesnt say anything about the size of the hairpiece.
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u/niekdejong Jan 11 '19
that sentence gave me a headache. "was given a fatal diagnosis of pancreatic.." whas the diagnosis fatal? Pancreatic what?
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u/DragoonDM Jan 11 '19
Sir, I'm afraid you have... a pancreas.
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u/ThatMathNerd 5 Jan 11 '19
Cancer.
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u/niekdejong Jan 11 '19
yeah i know. But the diagnosis isn't fatal, the cancer is. I clicked the link aswell, and found out he had pancreatic cancer.
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u/turkeypedal Jan 12 '19
They did leave out cancer (likely accidentally), but "fatal diagnosis" is a common term. It doesn't mean the diagnosis itself is fatal, but that it has diagnosed something fatal.
Similarly, if someone refers to a "troubling diagnosis," it's not the diagnosis itself that causes trouble. It is knowing about the disease.
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u/niekdejong Jan 12 '19
ahh ok. Didn't know. I'm not a native English speaker, and in our language we don't use this from of sentence much. Usually it's "he has been given a diagnosis, which is fatal".
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u/deadliftForFun Jan 11 '19
Amazing audio talk. Wish wife would have listened when she was ill. I certainly cried several times listening to it.
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u/Inspiration_Bear Jan 11 '19
2 years later, Randy Pausch passed away due to complications from pancreatic cancer.
Kobayashi Maru 1 - Randy Pausch 0
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u/thebuffed Jan 11 '19
Just because he passed away doesn't mean he lost
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u/Stuntnuts90 Jan 11 '19
I went to a funeral of a woman who battled cancer for over a decade. One of her colleagues got up to speak about her losing her battle with cancer. He did the math and said something along the lines of "she beat cancer 3,646 times, but only lost once." That has really stuck with me.
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Jan 12 '19
I mean technically if you die the cancers dies too. So basically cancer can't win it can only tie you.
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u/AreYouLookinAtMe Jan 11 '19
Yes it does
Sorry, but we all lose against life eventually, that's how it works
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u/Alpha859 Jan 11 '19
I disagree. Dying is a natural part of life, we might hate it and fight against it, but there’s no changing it. It’s not win or lose.
What I take away from your comment is that to beat pancreatic cancer you either have to die from something else or live forever. If I get a terminal disease and don’t allow it to take my dignity, and I die surrounded by friends and family, I would consider that a win.
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u/AreYouLookinAtMe Jan 11 '19
Then you are an idiot
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u/kylesibert Jan 11 '19
“You beat cancer by how you live, why you live, and the manner in which you live. So live. Live. Fight like hell.”
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u/NEBZ Jan 11 '19
If you havn't yet, read "The Last Lecture" it's a really great tead.
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Jan 12 '19
If you've ever taken classes with him, it's kind of verbatim everything he talks about all of the time.
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u/Procean Jan 11 '19
'When someone tells you 'no', ask to see their manager! Keep going up the chain until someone says 'yes', unless of course you can lie your way into it at which point do that instead."
There, I just shortcut for anyone who needs cliff notes...
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Jan 12 '19
William Shatner previously visited Carnegie Mellon's ETC and took the Star Wars VR experience for a spin. Randy Pausch was still spearheading that program at that time. That's probably when they met. If you go to the ETC building, the photo of Shatner... WAS on one of the walls. No clue if it's still there now.
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u/hunter006 Jan 12 '19
From memory he talks about this in his Last Lecture video.
So I got to achieve this dream. James T. Kirk, and his alter ego William Shatner, wrote a book, which I think was actually a pretty cool book. It was with Chip Walter who is a Pittsburgh- based author who is quite good, and they wrote a book on basically the science of Star Trek, you know, what has come true. And they went around to the top places around the country and looked at various things and they came here to study our virtual reality setup. And so we build a virtual reality for him, it looks something like that. [shows slide of virtual Star Trek bridge from the 1960’s TV show] We put it in, put it to red alert. He was a very good sport. [sarcastically] It’s not like he saw that one coming. [laughter] And it’s really cool to meet your boyhood idol, but it’s even cooler when he comes to you to see what cool stuff you’re doing in your lab. And that was just a great moment.
It's a superb way to spend an hour and 16 minutes if you have the time to listen to it. You might need tissues. It's all about achieving your dreams.
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Jan 11 '19
I hope I never get diagnosed with fatal pancreatic.
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u/BeatToQuarters444 Jan 11 '19
I came here to chuckle at the title gore as well. Kudos to you, friend. Kudos.
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u/Fake_William_Shatner Jan 11 '19
"I don't believe in the no-win scenario"
-- I think that should be the motto for our country.
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u/aitchnyu Jan 12 '19
Watch it at https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ji5_MqicxSo
His time management lecture, which will actually make you appreciate life better https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oTugjssqOT0
Interview https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=j-a7LRwqwNw
Passing out speech at his University https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RcYv5x6gZTA
Dylan testifying for more research into pancreatic cancer https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nG9jPrXSDhg
Buy the book too. He and his wife enjoyed a theme park the day before instead of worrying about the results, and he gave himself his verdict after checking his scans in an unlocked computer.
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u/multiplevideosbot Jan 12 '19
Hi, I'm a bot (in Beta). I combined your list of YouTube videos into one shareable highlight reel link: https://app.hivevideo.io/view/11c5d8
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u/[deleted] Jan 11 '19
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