add k.txt and the_last_question.txt
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k has atom, list (2;`c), dict `a`b!(2;`c) and func {[x;y]x+y}.
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20 primitives/verbs, 6 operators/adverbs and 3 system functions.
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Verb (unary) Adverb Noun (null)
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: gets ' each name `a`b `
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+ plus flip / over|join char "ab" " "
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- minus negate \ scan|split int 2 34 0N(nan)
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* times first ': eachprior float 2 .3 0n(nan) 0w(inf)
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% divide sqrt /: eachright date 2016.06.28 (.z.d)
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! mod|map enum|key \: eachleft time 12:34:56.789 (.z.t)
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& min|and where
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| max|or reverse System list (2;3.4;`ab)
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< less asc 0: file r/w(line) dict `a`b!(2;`c)
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> more desc 1: file r/w(byte) view f::32+1.8*c TODO
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= equal group 2: open/msg/close func {[c]32+1.8*c}
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~ match not
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, concat enlist
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^ except null \t:n x time
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# take|rsh count #[t;c;b[;a]] select \l a.k load
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_ drop|cut floor \w workspace
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$ cast|sum string $[c;t;f] COND \v variables
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? find|rnd distinct ?[x;I;[f;]y] insert \f functions
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@ at type @[x;i;[f;]y] amend \a ancestors
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. dot eval|val .[x;i;[f;]y] dmend \d directory
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atoms are ncif(name char int float) and mdhrst(month day hour min sec milli)
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vector is unitype list of atoms, e.g. (2;3) is 2 3 and ("a";"b") is "ab"
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matrix is uniform list of vectors, e.g. m:(0 1 2;1 2 3)
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atomic functions (+-*%!&|<>=$;-%~_^$) penetrate, e.g. 2 3+m is (2 3 4;4 5 6)
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default function parameters are x y z, e.g. {z+x*y}[3;2;1] is 7
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indexing and function call use []'s, e.g. m[1;2] is {x+y}[1;2] is 3
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no precedence among verbs: 2*4-3 is 2* 4- 3 is 2
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grammar: E:E;e|e e:nve|te| t:n|v v:tA|V n:t[E]|(E)|{E}|N
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unary list needs ",", e.g. 2(atom) ,2(list)
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unary verb arg needs ":", e.g. #'(take each) #:'(count each)
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unary call doesn't need []'s, e.g. f x is f[x]
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datetime: 2016.06.28+3 week:7*-7!d bar5:5*-5!r etc.
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generate: !n(enum) !N(odometer) ?n(uniform) ?-n(normal) n?(draw) -n?(deal) =n(identity matrix)
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0:""0:"prompt" /readline writeline
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/ comment
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\ exit
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on error(inspect locals etc.)
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> ' up
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> \ out
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2+ \3 trace
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while(c){..};if(c){..}
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exp log sin cos [x]cmb;in within
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count first last sum min max;[x]avg [x]var [x]dev
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TODO: parallel/mapreduce
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f':jobs / across machine
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handles 2:jobs / across cluster
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LIMITS: names8 params8 locals8 globals16 constants128 jump256 v[i]:m[i;j] {z}'/\
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Isaac Asimov, 1956
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The last question was asked for the first time, half in jest, on May 21, 2061,
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at a time when humanity first stepped into the light. The question came about as
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a result of a five dollar bet over highballs, and it happened this way:
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Alexander Adell and Bertram Lupov were two of the faithful attendants of
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Multivac. As well as any human beings could, they knew what lay behind the cold,
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clicking, flashing face -- miles and miles of face -- of that giant
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computer. They had at least a vague notion of the general plan of relays and
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circuits that had long since grown past the point where any single human could
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possibly have a firm grasp of the whole.
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Multivac was self-adjusting and self-correcting. It had to be, for nothing human
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could adjust and correct it quickly enough or even adequately enough -- so Adell
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and Lupov attended the monstrous giant only lightly and superficially, yet as
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well as any men could. They fed it data, adjusted questions to its needs and
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translated the answers that were issued. Certainly they, and all others like
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them, were fully entitled to share In the glory that was Multivac's.
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For decades, Multivac had helped design the ships and plot the trajectories that
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enabled man to reach the Moon, Mars, and Venus, but past that, Earth's poor
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resources could not support the ships. Too much energy was needed for the long
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trips. Earth exploited its coal and uranium with increasing efficiency, but
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there was only so much of both.
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But slowly Multivac learned enough to answer deeper questions more
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fundamentally, and on May 14, 2061, what had been theory, became fact.
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The energy of the sun was stored, converted, and utilized directly on a
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planet-wide scale. All Earth turned off its burning coal, its fissioning
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uranium, and flipped the switch that connected all of it to a small station, one
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mile in diameter, circling the Earth at half the distance of the Moon. All Earth
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ran by invisible beams of sunpower.
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Seven days had not sufficed to dim the glory of it and Adell and Lupov finally
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managed to escape from the public function, and to meet in quiet where no one
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would think of looking for them, in the deserted underground chambers, where
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portions of the mighty buried body of Multivac showed. Unattended, idling,
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sorting data with contented lazy clickings, Multivac, too, had earned its
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vacation and the boys appreciated that. They had no intention, originally, of
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disturbing it.
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They had brought a bottle with them, and their only concern at the moment was to
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relax in the company of each other and the bottle.
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"It's amazing when you think of it," said Adell. His broad face had lines of
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weariness in it, and he stirred his drink slowly with a glass rod, watching the
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cubes of ice slur clumsily about. "All the energy we can possibly ever use for
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free. Enough energy, if we wanted to draw on it, to melt all Earth into a big
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drop of impure liquid iron, and still never miss the energy so used. All the
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energy we could ever use, forever and forever and forever."
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Lupov cocked his head sideways. He had a trick of doing that when he wanted to
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be contrary, and he wanted to be contrary now, partly because he had had to
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carry the ice and glassware. "Not forever," he said.
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"Oh, hell, just about forever. Till the sun runs down, Bert."
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"That's not forever."
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"All right, then. Billions and billions of years. Twenty billion, maybe. Are you
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satisfied?"
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Lupov put his fingers through his thinning hair as though to reassure himself
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that some was still left and sipped gently at his own drink. "Twenty billion
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years isn't forever."
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"Will, it will last our time, won't it?"
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"So would the coal and uranium."
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"All right, but now we can hook up each individual spaceship to the Solar
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Station, and it can go to Pluto and back a million times without ever worrying
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about fuel. You can't do THAT on coal and uranium. Ask Multivac, if you don't
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believe me."
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"I don't have to ask Multivac. I know that."
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"Then stop running down what Multivac's done for us," said Adell, blazing
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up. "It did all right."
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"Who says it didn't? What I say is that a sun won't last forever. That's all I'm
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saying. We're safe for twenty billion years, but then what?" Lupov pointed a
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slightly shaky finger at the other. "And don't say we'll switch to another sun."
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There was silence for a while. Adell put his glass to his lips only
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occasionally, and Lupov's eyes slowly closed. They rested.
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Then Lupov's eyes snapped open. "You're thinking we'll switch to another sun
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when ours is done, aren't you?"
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"I'm not thinking."
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"Sure you are. You're weak on logic, that's the trouble with you. You're like
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the guy in the story who was caught in a sudden shower and Who ran to a grove of
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trees and got under one. He wasn't worried, you see, because he figured when one
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tree got wet through, he would just get under another one."
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"I get it," said Adell. "Don't shout. When the sun is done, the other stars will
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be gone, too."
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"Darn right they will," muttered Lupov. "It all had a beginning in the original
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cosmic explosion, whatever that was, and it'll all have an end when all the
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stars run down. Some run down faster than others. Hell, the giants won't last a
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hundred million years. The sun will last twenty billion years and maybe the
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dwarfs will last a hundred billion for all the good they are. But just give us a
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trillion years and everything will be dark. Entropy has to increase to maximum,
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that's all."
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"I know all about entropy," said Adell, standing on his dignity.
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"The hell you do."
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"I know as much as you do."
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"Then you know everything's got to run down someday."
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"All right. Who says they won't?"
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"You did, you poor sap. You said we had all the energy we needed, forever. You
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said 'forever.'"
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"It was Adell's turn to be contrary. "Maybe we can build things up again
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someday," he said.
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"Never."
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"Why not? Someday."
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"Never."
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"Ask Multivac."
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"You ask Multivac. I dare you. Five dollars says it can't be done."
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Adell was just drunk enough to try, just sober enough to be able to phrase the
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necessary symbols and operations into a question which, in words, might have
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corresponded to this: Will mankind one day without the net expenditure of energy
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be able to restore the sun to its full youthfulness even after it had died of
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old age?
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Or maybe it could be put more simply like this: How can the net amount of
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entropy of the universe be massively decreased?
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Multivac fell dead and silent. The slow flashing of lights ceased, the distant
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sounds of clicking relays ended.
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Then, just as the frightened technicians felt they could hold their breath no
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longer, there was a sudden springing to life of the teletype attached to that
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portion of Multivac. Five words were printed: INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR MEANINGFUL
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ANSWER.
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"No bet," whispered Lupov. They left hurriedly.
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By next morning, the two, plagued with throbbing head and cottony mouth, had
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forgotten about the incident.
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Jerrodd, Jerrodine, and Jerrodette I and II watched the starry picture in the
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visiplate change as the passage through hyperspace was completed in its non-time
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lapse. At once, the even powdering of stars gave way to the predominance of a
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single bright marble-disk, centered.
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"That's X-23," said Jerrodd confidently. His thin hands clamped tightly behind
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his back and the knuckles whitened.
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The little Jerrodettes, both girls, had experienced the hyperspace passage for
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the first time in their lives and were self-conscious over the momentary
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sensation of inside-outness. They buried their giggles and chased one another
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wildly about their mother, screaming, "We've reached X-23 -- we've reached X-23
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-- we've ----"
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"Quiet, children," said Jerrodine sharply. "Are you sure, Jerrodd?"
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"What is there to be but sure?" asked Jerrodd, glancing up at the bulge of
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featureless metal just under the ceiling. It ran the length of the room,
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disappearing through the wall at either end. It was as long as the ship.
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Jerrodd scarcely knew a thing about the thick rod of metal except that it was
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called a Microvac, that one asked it questions if one wished; that if one did
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not it still had its task of guiding the ship to a preordered destination; of
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feeding on energies from the various Sub-galactic Power Stations; of computing
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the equations for the hyperspacial jumps.
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Jerrodd and his family had only to wait and live in the comfortable residence
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quarters of the ship.
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Someone had once told Jerrodd that the "ac" at the end of "Microvac" stood for
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"analog computer" in ancient English, but he was on the edge of forgetting even
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that.
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Jerrodine's eyes were moist as she watched the visiplate. "I can't help it. I
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feel funny about leaving Earth."
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"Why for Pete's sake?" demanded Jerrodd. "We had nothing there. We'll have
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everything on X-23. You won't be alone. You won't be a pioneer. There are over a
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million people on the planet already. Good Lord, our great grandchildren will be
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looking for new worlds because X-23 will be overcrowded."
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Then, after a reflective pause, "I tell you, it's a lucky thing the computers
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worked out interstellar travel the way the race is growing."
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"I know, I know," said Jerrodine miserably.
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Jerrodette I said promptly, "Our Microvac is the best Microvac in the world."
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"I think so, too," said Jerrodd, tousling her hair.
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It was a nice feeling to have a Microvac of your own and Jerrodd was glad he was
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part of his generation and no other. In his father's youth, the only computers
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had been tremendous machines taking up a hundred square miles of land. There was
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only one to a planet. Planetary ACs they were called. They had been growing in
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size steadily for a thousand years and then, all at once, came refinement. In
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place of transistors had come molecular valves so that even the largest
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Planetary AC could be put into a space only half the volume of a spaceship.
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Jerrodd felt uplifted, as he always did when he thought that his own personal
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Microvac was many times more complicated than the ancient and primitive Multivac
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that had first tamed the Sun, and almost as complicated as Earth's Planetary AC
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(the largest) that had first solved the problem of hyperspatial travel and had
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made trips to the stars possible.
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"So many stars, so many planets," sighed Jerrodine, busy with her own
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thoughts. "I suppose families will be going out to new planets forever, the way
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we are now."
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"Not forever," said Jerrodd, with a smile. "It will all stop someday, but not
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for billions of years. Many billions. Even the stars run down, you know. Entropy
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must increase."
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"What's entropy, daddy?" shrilled Jerrodette II.
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"Entropy, little sweet, is just a word which means the amount of running-down of
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the universe. Everything runs down, you know, like your little walkie-talkie
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robot, remember?"
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"Can't you just put in a new power-unit, like with my robot?"
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The stars are the power-units, dear. Once they're gone, there are no more
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power-units."
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Jerrodette I at once set up a howl. "Don't let them, daddy. Don't let the stars
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run down."
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"Now look what you've done, " whispered Jerrodine, exasperated.
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"How was I to know it would frighten them?" Jerrodd whispered back.
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"Ask the Microvac," wailed Jerrodette I. "Ask him how to turn the stars on
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again."
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"Go ahead," said Jerrodine. "It will quiet them down." (Jerrodette II was
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beginning to cry, also.)
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Jarrodd shrugged. "Now, now, honeys. I'll ask Microvac. Don't worry, he'll tell
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us."
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He asked the Microvac, adding quickly, "Print the answer."
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Jerrodd cupped the strip of thin cellufilm and said cheerfully, "See now, the
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Microvac says it will take care of everything when the time comes so don't
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worry."
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Jerrodine said, "and now children, it's time for bed. We'll be in our new home
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soon."
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Jerrodd read the words on the cellufilm again before destroying it: INSUFFICIENT
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DATA FOR A MEANINGFUL ANSWER.
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He shrugged and looked at the visiplate. X-23 was just ahead.
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VJ-23X of Lameth stared into the black depths of the three-dimensional,
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small-scale map of the Galaxy and said, "Are we ridiculous, I wonder, in being
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so concerned about the matter?"
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MQ-17J of Nicron shook his head. "I think not. You know the Galaxy will be
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filled in five years at the present rate of expansion."
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Both seemed in their early twenties, both were tall and perfectly formed.
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"Still," said VJ-23X, "I hesitate to submit a pessimistic report to the Galactic
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Council."
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"I wouldn't consider any other kind of report. Stir them up a bit. We've got to
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stir them up."
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VJ-23X sighed. "Space is infinite. A hundred billion Galaxies are there for the
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taking. More."
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"A hundred billion is not infinite and it's getting less infinite all the
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time. Consider! Twenty thousand years ago, mankind first solved the problem of
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utilizing stellar energy, and a few centuries later, interstellar travel became
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possible. It took mankind a million years to fill one small world and then only
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fifteen thousand years to fill the rest of the Galaxy. Now the population
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doubles every ten years --"
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VJ-23X interrupted. "We can thank immortality for that."
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"Very well. Immortality exists and we have to take it into account. I admit it
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has its seamy side, this immortality. The Galactic AC has solved many problems
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for us, but in solving the problems of preventing old age and death, it has
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undone all its other solutions."
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"Yet you wouldn't want to abandon life, I suppose."
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"Not at all," snapped MQ-17J, softening it at once to, "Not yet. I'm by no means
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old enough. How old are you?"
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"Two hundred twenty-three. And you?"
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"I'm still under two hundred. --But to get back to my point. Population doubles
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every ten years. Once this Galaxy is filled, we'll have another filled in ten
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years. Another ten years and we'll have filled two more. Another decade, four
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more. In a hundred years, we'll have filled a thousand Galaxies. In a thousand
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years, a million Galaxies. In ten thousand years, the entire known
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Universe. Then what?"
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VJ-23X said, "As a side issue, there's a problem of transportation. I wonder how
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many sunpower units it will take to move Galaxies of individuals from one Galaxy
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to the next."
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"A very good point. Already, mankind consumes two sunpower units per year."
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"Most of it's wasted. After all, our own Galaxy alone pours out a thousand
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sunpower units a year and we only use two of those."
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"Granted, but even with a hundred per cent efficiency, we can only stave off the
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end. Our energy requirements are going up in geometric progression even faster
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than our population. We'll run out of energy even sooner than we run out of
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Galaxies. A good point. A very good point."
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"We'll just have to build new stars out of interstellar gas."
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"Or out of dissipated heat?" asked MQ-17J, sarcastically.
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"There may be some way to reverse entropy. We ought to ask the Galactic AC."
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VJ-23X was not really serious, but MQ-17J pulled out his AC-contact from his
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pocket and placed it on the table before him.
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"I've half a mind to," he said. "It's something the human race will have to face
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someday."
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He stared somberly at his small AC-contact. It was only two inches cubed and
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nothing in itself, but it was connected through hyperspace with the great
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Galactic AC that served all mankind. Hyperspace considered, it was an integral
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part of the Galactic AC.
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MQ-17J paused to wonder if someday in his immortal life he would get to see the
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Galactic AC. It was on a little world of its own, a spider webbing of
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force-beams holding the matter within which surges of sub-mesons took the place
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of the old clumsy molecular valves. Yet despite it's sub-etheric workings, the
|
||||
Galactic AC was known to be a full thousand feet across.
|
||||
|
||||
MQ-17J asked suddenly of his AC-contact, "Can entropy ever be reversed?"
|
||||
|
||||
VJ-23X looked startled and said at once, "Oh, say, I didn't really mean to have
|
||||
you ask that."
|
||||
|
||||
"Why not?"
|
||||
|
||||
"We both know entropy can't be reversed. You can't turn smoke and ash back into
|
||||
a tree."
|
||||
|
||||
"Do you have trees on your world?" asked MQ-17J.
|
||||
|
||||
The sound of the Galactic AC startled them into silence. Its voice came thin and
|
||||
beautiful out of the small AC-contact on the desk. It said: THERE IS
|
||||
INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR A MEANINGFUL ANSWER.
|
||||
|
||||
VJ-23X said, "See!"
|
||||
|
||||
The two men thereupon returned to the question of the report they were to make
|
||||
to the Galactic Council.
|
||||
|
||||
Zee Prime's mind spanned the new Galaxy with a faint interest in the countless
|
||||
twists of stars that powdered it. He had never seen this one before. Would he
|
||||
ever see them all? So many of them, each with its load of humanity - but a load
|
||||
that was almost a dead weight. More and more, the real essence of men was to be
|
||||
found out here, in space.
|
||||
|
||||
Minds, not bodies! The immortal bodies remained back on the planets, in
|
||||
suspension over the eons. Sometimes they roused for material activity but that
|
||||
was growing rarer. Few new individuals were coming into existence to join the
|
||||
incredibly mighty throng, but what matter? There was little room in the Universe
|
||||
for new individuals.
|
||||
|
||||
Zee Prime was roused out of his reverie upon coming across the wispy tendrils of
|
||||
another mind.
|
||||
|
||||
"I am Zee Prime," said Zee Prime. "And you?"
|
||||
|
||||
"I am Dee Sub Wun. Your Galaxy?"
|
||||
|
||||
"We call it only the Galaxy. And you?"
|
||||
|
||||
"We call ours the same. All men call their Galaxy their Galaxy and nothing
|
||||
more. Why not?"
|
||||
|
||||
"True. Since all Galaxies are the same."
|
||||
|
||||
"Not all Galaxies. On one particular Galaxy the race of man must have
|
||||
originated. That makes it different."
|
||||
|
||||
Zee Prime said, "On which one?"
|
||||
|
||||
"I cannot say. The Universal AC would know."
|
||||
|
||||
"Shall we ask him? I am suddenly curious."
|
||||
|
||||
Zee Prime's perceptions broadened until the Galaxies themselves shrunk and
|
||||
became a new, more diffuse powdering on a much larger background. So many
|
||||
hundreds of billions of them, all with their immortal beings, all carrying their
|
||||
load of intelligences with minds that drifted freely through space. And yet one
|
||||
of them was unique among them all in being the originals Galaxy. One of them
|
||||
had, in its vague and distant past, a period when it was the only Galaxy
|
||||
populated by man.
|
||||
|
||||
Zee Prime was consumed with curiosity to see this Galaxy and called, out:
|
||||
"Universal AC! On which Galaxy did mankind originate?"
|
||||
|
||||
The Universal AC heard, for on every world and throughout space, it had its
|
||||
receptors ready, and each receptor lead through hyperspace to some unknown point
|
||||
where the Universal AC kept itself aloof.
|
||||
|
||||
Zee Prime knew of only one man whose thoughts had penetrated within sensing
|
||||
distance of Universal AC, and he reported only a shining globe, two feet across,
|
||||
difficult to see.
|
||||
|
||||
"But how can that be all of Universal AC?" Zee Prime had asked.
|
||||
|
||||
"Most of it, " had been the answer, "is in hyperspace. In what form it is there
|
||||
I cannot imagine."
|
||||
|
||||
Nor could anyone, for the day had long since passed, Zee Prime knew, when any
|
||||
man had any part of the making of a universal AC. Each Universal AC designed and
|
||||
constructed its successor. Each, during its existence of a million years or more
|
||||
accumulated the necessary data to build a better and more intricate, more
|
||||
capable successor in which its own store of data and individuality would be
|
||||
submerged.
|
||||
|
||||
The Universal AC interrupted Zee Prime's wandering thoughts, not with words, but
|
||||
with guidance. Zee Prime's mentality was guided into the dim sea of Galaxies and
|
||||
one in particular enlarged into stars.
|
||||
|
||||
A thought came, infinitely distant, but infinitely clear. "THIS IS THE ORIGINAL
|
||||
GALAXY OF MAN."
|
||||
|
||||
But it was the same after all, the same as any other, and Zee Prime stifled his
|
||||
disappointment.
|
||||
|
||||
Dee Sub Wun, whose mind had accompanied the other, said suddenly, "And Is one of
|
||||
these stars the original star of Man?"
|
||||
|
||||
The Universal AC said, "MAN'S ORIGINAL STAR HAS GONE NOVA. IT IS NOW A WHITE
|
||||
DWARF."
|
||||
|
||||
"Did the men upon it die?" asked Zee Prime, startled and without thinking.
|
||||
|
||||
The Universal AC said, "A NEW WORLD, AS IN SUCH CASES, WAS CONSTRUCTED FOR THEIR
|
||||
PHYSICAL BODIES IN TIME."
|
||||
|
||||
"Yes, of course," said Zee Prime, but a sense of loss overwhelmed him even
|
||||
so. His mind released its hold on the original Galaxy of Man, let it spring back
|
||||
and lose itself among the blurred pin points. He never wanted to see it again.
|
||||
|
||||
Dee Sub Wun said, "What is wrong?"
|
||||
|
||||
"The stars are dying. The original star is dead."
|
||||
|
||||
"They must all die. Why not?"
|
||||
|
||||
"But when all energy is gone, our bodies will finally die, and you and I with
|
||||
them."
|
||||
|
||||
"It will take billions of years."
|
||||
|
||||
"I do not wish it to happen even after billions of years. Universal AC! How may
|
||||
stars be kept from dying?"
|
||||
|
||||
Dee sub Wun said in amusement, "You're asking how entropy might be reversed in
|
||||
direction."
|
||||
|
||||
And the Universal AC answered. "THERE IS AS YET INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR A
|
||||
MEANINGFUL ANSWER."
|
||||
|
||||
Zee Prime's thoughts fled back to his own Galaxy. He gave no further thought to
|
||||
Dee Sub Wun, whose body might be waiting on a galaxy a trillion light-years
|
||||
away, or on the star next to Zee Prime's own. It didn't matter.
|
||||
|
||||
Unhappily, Zee Prime began collecting interstellar hydrogen out of which to
|
||||
build a small star of his own. If the stars must someday die, at least some
|
||||
could yet be built.
|
||||
|
||||
Man considered with himself, for in a way, Man, mentally, was one. He consisted
|
||||
of a trillion, trillion, trillion ageless bodies, each in its place, each
|
||||
resting quiet and incorruptible, each cared for by perfect automatons, equally
|
||||
incorruptible, while the minds of all the bodies freely melted one into the
|
||||
other, indistinguishable.
|
||||
|
||||
Man said, "The Universe is dying."
|
||||
|
||||
Man looked about at the dimming Galaxies. The giant stars, spendthrifts, were
|
||||
gone long ago, back in the dimmest of the dim far past. Almost all stars were
|
||||
white dwarfs, fading to the end.
|
||||
|
||||
New stars had been built of the dust between the stars, some by natural
|
||||
processes, some by Man himself, and those were going, too. White dwarfs might
|
||||
yet be crashed together and of the mighty forces so released, new stars built,
|
||||
but only one star for every thousand white dwarfs destroyed, and those would
|
||||
come to an end, too.
|
||||
|
||||
Man said, "Carefully husbanded, as directed by the Cosmic AC, the energy that is
|
||||
even yet left in all the Universe will last for billions of years."
|
||||
|
||||
"But even so," said Man, "eventually it will all come to an end. However it may
|
||||
be husbanded, however stretched out, the energy once expended is gone and cannot
|
||||
be restored. Entropy must increase to the maximum."
|
||||
|
||||
Man said, "Can entropy not be reversed? Let us ask the Cosmic AC."
|
||||
|
||||
The Cosmic AC surrounded them but not in space. Not a fragment of it was in
|
||||
space. It was in hyperspace and made of something that was neither matter nor
|
||||
energy. The question of its size and Nature no longer had meaning to any terms
|
||||
that Man could comprehend.
|
||||
|
||||
"Cosmic AC," said Man, "How may entropy be reversed?"
|
||||
|
||||
The Cosmic AC said, "THERE IS AS YET INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR A MEANINGFUL ANSWER."
|
||||
|
||||
Man said, "Collect additional data."
|
||||
|
||||
The Cosmic AC said, "I WILL DO SO. I HAVE BEEN DOING SO FOR A HUNDRED BILLION
|
||||
YEARS. MY PREDECESSORS AND I HAVE BEEN ASKED THIS QUESTION MANY TIMES. ALL THE
|
||||
DATA I HAVE REMAINS INSUFFICIENT."
|
||||
|
||||
"Will there come a time," said Man, "when data will be sufficient or is the
|
||||
problem insoluble in all conceivable circumstances?"
|
||||
|
||||
The Cosmic AC said, "NO PROBLEM IS INSOLUBLE IN ALL CONCEIVABLE CIRCUMSTANCES."
|
||||
|
||||
Man said, "When will you have enough data to answer the question?"
|
||||
|
||||
"THERE IS AS YET INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR A MEANINGFUL ANSWER."
|
||||
|
||||
"Will you keep working on it?" asked Man.
|
||||
|
||||
The Cosmic AC said, "I WILL."
|
||||
|
||||
Man said, "We shall wait."
|
||||
|
||||
"The stars and Galaxies died and snuffed out, and space grew black after ten
|
||||
trillion years of running down.
|
||||
|
||||
One by one Man fused with AC, each physical body losing its mental identity in a
|
||||
manner that was somehow not a loss but a gain.
|
||||
|
||||
Man's last mind paused before fusion, looking over a space that included nothing
|
||||
but the dregs of one last dark star and nothing besides but incredibly thin
|
||||
matter, agitated randomly by the tag ends of heat wearing out, asymptotically,
|
||||
to the absolute zero.
|
||||
|
||||
Man said, "AC, is this the end? Can this chaos not be reversed into the Universe
|
||||
once more? Can that not be done?"
|
||||
|
||||
AC said, "THERE IS AS YET INSUFFICIENT DATA FOR A MEANINGFUL ANSWER."
|
||||
|
||||
Man's last mind fused and only AC existed -- and that in hyperspace.
|
||||
|
||||
Matter and energy had ended and with it, space and time. Even AC existed only
|
||||
for the sake of the one last question that it had never answered from the time a
|
||||
half-drunken computer ten trillion years before had asked the question of a
|
||||
computer that was to AC far less than was a man to Man.
|
||||
|
||||
All other questions had been answered, and until this last question was answered
|
||||
also, AC might not release his consciousness.
|
||||
|
||||
All collected data had come to a final end. Nothing was left to be collected.
|
||||
|
||||
But all collected data had yet to be completely correlated and put together in
|
||||
all possible relationships.
|
||||
|
||||
A timeless interval was spent in doing that.
|
||||
|
||||
And it came to pass that AC learned how to reverse the direction of entropy.
|
||||
|
||||
But there was now no man to whom AC might give the answer of the last
|
||||
question. No matter. The answer -- by demonstration -- would take care of that,
|
||||
too.
|
||||
|
||||
For another timeless interval, AC thought how best to do this. Carefully, AC
|
||||
organized the program.
|
||||
|
||||
The consciousness of AC encompassed all of what had once been a Universe and
|
||||
brooded over what was now Chaos. Step by step, it must be done.
|
||||
|
||||
And AC said, "LET THERE BE LIGHT!"
|
||||
|
||||
And there was light----
|
||||
Loading…
Reference in New Issue