Re: [Vo]:The Twinkle in Clarke's sk(eye)

[Terry Blanton]

One of my favs.  Here's the whole short story:

http://lucis.net/stuff/clarke/9billion_clarke.html

Terry

On Fri, Mar 28, 2008 at 10:48 AM, Jones Beene <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Author-Authur wrote a short story 55 years ago -  "The Nine Billion Names of 
> God" which has not received as much comment in the various obits which have 
> come out -- as the more famous "Childhood's End" ... which curiously, was 
> written at almost the exact same time.
>
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Nine_Billion_Names_of_God
>
>
>
> ... in which  story, computer programmers were sent to a remotemonastery in 
> Tibet to help the monks compile alist of all the names of God. The story 
> offers more surprising insight into the kind of "spiritual atheism" which 
> Clarke is suspected of harboring. His was a kind of Buddhist outlook, more so 
> than atheistic.
>
>
> Never mind that in a rewrite of the tale in 2008, any old X-boxes could do 
> the job of figuring our all the permutations of the possible names in about 
> 10 microseconds. That is part of the quaint naiveté of many Sci-Fi stories 
> from the fifties, when looked back in retrospect. Anyway, ACC's story came 
> around long before the X-box was available; and to make the plot work, it was 
> said that once the list was complete the monksbelieved that the pre-ordained 
> cosmic destiny of our planet would be fulfilled; and the "worldwould end." 
> This is somewhat reminiscent of the denouement of "Childhood's End" ... at 
> least in transactional relevance. Take the two plots together, and you have 
> the insight into Clarke's kind of Zen.
>
>
>
> The reason this came to mind just now, was not only the recnet changes in the 
> night sky - but also a song playing on internet radio as I was stargazing 
> last night, The song was titled "9 million bicycles in Beijing." Isn't the 
> human mind a very strange kind of information processor ?
>
>
> BTW the short story ends with the programmers fleeing the monastery to
> escape the monks' disfavor -- since the program finished the task, and the 
> world was
> still there, but oops... one of them looks up:
>
>
> "Overhead, without any fuss, the stars were going out."
>
> Come to think of it.... without Authur around, the night sky does seem to 
> twinkle less that before.
>
> Jones
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