| As much about computers as it is about mathematics, we join two
programmers hired by a Buddhist sect seeking to find all true names of
God by exhausting a combinatorial library of possibilities.
Appears in Mathematical Magpie.
| Contributed by
Nelson Walker
One of ACC's best short stories ever, and an glimpse of 1960s era computer science.
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| Contributed by
Ken Miller
This is as suspenseful as any story I've read. I actually had to strain to keep my eyes from prematurely reading the last line. Excellent.
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| Contributed by
Kate Miller
One of the most chilling, disturbing endings I've read.
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| Contributed by
marcus wright
This story has always reminded me of the Towers of Hanoi myth. Each move is a holy act (analogous to a name of God), and the purpose of man is to do the 2^64-1 holy acts.10^30 is somewhat larger than nine billion. When I teach the towers of Hanoi, I always quote Clarke's story.
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| Contributed by
Maciej
The final sentence of the story has become a very popular cliché expression in the Polish fandom.
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| Contributed by
Heather MacDonald
I read this story many years ago in a Sci Fi paperback pocket bood. My twin sister and I grew up in the fifties and devoured every anthology we could lay our hands on by Asimov, Heinlein, Clarke, Kornbluth etc. This story seems more metaphysical than mathematical to me but it really blew my mind and for years, I searched around for it so that I could read it to my own students. Alas, until I happened on this web page, I couldn't even remember who wrote it. Thanks for the info. Now I will hunt the story down. I rate it a 10 out of 10 but I am not a mathematician!
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| Contributed by
Bill Reich
It is a work that depends largely on the value of the ending. One of the best of that kind. Easily compared with Isaac Asimov's "Nightfall" except that no one can convince anyone else which of them is better. - Will
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| Contributed by
Douglas Borsom
In chapter 12 of "Adventures of a Mathematician," Stan Ulam's autobiography, Ulam has a passage about the efforts of John von Neumann to build a general purpose computer at the Institute for Advanced Studies at Princeton University. Ulam quotes Neumann as telling him, "I don't know how really useful this will be. But at any rate it will be possible to get a lot credit in Tibet by coding 'Om Mane Padme Hum' [Oh thou flower of lotus] a hundred million times in an hour. It will far exceed anything a prayer wheel can do." (page 230).
Clarke's story appeared in 1953. Ulam's book is vague as to when Neumann made the statement.
Neumann's computer was completed in 1952. Ulam says that Neumann made the comment "When the machine neared completion." Despite this, I suspect Neumann got the idea from Clarke's story, rather than the other way 'round, and that Ulam was confused about when that particular conversation occurred.
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A most unusual "short story" by Carter Scholz is called "The Nine Billion Names of God" and takes the form of letters between Scholz and an editor at a science fiction magazine discussing the fact that Scholz submitted a copy of Clarke's story with his name on the byline. Scholz claims that even though it is a word-for-word copy that he submitted, this is not plagiarism since there are important differences. For instance, he gives the same words different interpretations...and the story has a different meaning precisely because it was written now instead of in the 1950's! Entertaining, and thought provoking, but not itself a work of mathematical fiction, you might want to check it out in the collection The Amount to Carry (which also contains the story A Catastrophe Machine).
| Contributed by
Tina Chang
This is one of my absolute favorites of all time!
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| Contributed by
Jose Brox
The story is just topical and has barely any math on it. There are plenty of sf tales more original and better written than this one!
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