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The Last Question
- lowmagnet 14y agoThis is still my favorite Asimov story, and I've a big chunk of his canon.
- dreen 14y agoIt's not only yours and mine favorite - its also a favorite of Asimov himself. Here is what he written about The Last Question in the 1973 release of "The Best of Isaac Asimov": ‘The Last Question’ is my personal favorite, the one story I made sure would not be omitted from this collection. Why is it my favorite? For one thing I got the idea all at once and didn’t have to fiddle with it; and I wrote it in white-heat and scarcely had to change a word. This sort of thing endears any story to any writer. Then, too, it has had the strangest effect on my readers. Frequently someone writes to ask me if I can write them the name of a story, which they think I may have written, and tell them where to find it. They don’t remember the title but when they describe the story it is invariably ‘The Last Question’. This has reached the point where I recently received a long-distance phone call from a desperate man who began, ‘Dr. Asimov, there’s a story I think you wrote, whose title I can’t remember–’ at which point I interrupted to tell him it was ‘The Last Question’ and when I described the plot it proved to be indeed the story he was after. I left him convinced I could read minds at a distance of a thousand miles. No other story I have written has anything like this effect on my readers—producing at once an unshakeable memory of the plot and an unshakeable forgettery of the title and even author. I think it may be that the story fills them so frighteningly full, that they can retain none of the side-issues.
- geon 14y ago> I got the idea all at once and didn’t have to fiddle with it; and I wrote it in white-heat and scarcely had to change a word. This sort of thing endears any story to any writer. I have had that experience about code twice. The first was when I "got" how I could use recursion to draw a Koch curve fractal. That was in highschool, using VB5. The second time a few years later, when I (on my own) came up with the trie datastructure. I used it to count the frequencies of words in The Hichhikers Guide To The Galaxy.
- some_googler 14y agoThe "unshakeable forgettery of the author", and also the surprising nature of the ending for many readers, may be caused by the well-known fact that Asimov was a staunch Atheist, so you wouldn't normally expect even an oblique theogony to come out his typewriter. :)
- michielvoo 14y agoWell worth reading for the (unexpected) outcome, and the story has an underlying theory that has been discussed on HN before (you will find out which theory that is by reading the story, I don't want to spoil it). Also interesting is that Asimov starts out with the concept of a huge supercomputer, named MULTIVAC (which is not unexpected given that it was written in the 50's), but in the story the 'AC' gradually evolves into a system of interconnected computers.
- gruseom 14y agoWhat underlying theory do you have in mind? It seems like Nietzsche's eternal recurrence to me.
- michielvoo 14y agoI detect two theories relevant to HN readers. Spoilers ahead... . . . You have been warned... . The story moves towards a technological singularity [1]. This is a term Asimov could have been familar with at the time of writing. The name MULTIVAC is obviously inspired by the ENIAC and UNIVAC. So it's safe to assume Asimov was aware of the writings of Von Neumann. The unintended consequence of creating this artificial intelligence is creation as described in Genesis. I interpret the underlying message of this story to be 'our reality is a simulated reality [2]' since it was created by AI. I don't know if Asimov would have agreed. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_reality http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulated_reality
- Aldream 14y agoWhile reading this short story, I also couldn't help myself from thinking about these two articles posted few days ago, and their underlying connection: - "Physicists To Test If Universe Is A Computer Simulation" (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5562156 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5562156). - "European Researchers Win $1.3 Billion To Simulate The Human Brain" (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5575312 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5575312)
- alinajaf 14y agoIf you liked this, you will love Greg Egans Diaspora.
- some_googler 14y agoOr Clarke's Childhood's End...
- thetylerhayes 14y agoSo very, very good. I would also recommend The Light of Other Days.
- seren 14y agoWhat I found astonishing with the Light of Other Days is that with the massive sharing of pictures and videos on social network and the advent of Google Glass, it seems that at a point in the near future will be able to "browse" what's currently happening in the world from multi view point in real time. At the time it was released it was clearly science fiction, now not so much, it seems.
- gmaslov 14y agoI was inordinately tickled to discover that Wolfram|Alpha's database includes this question as an easter egg.
- habosa 14y agoLink for the curious: http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=What+is+the+last+question%3F http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=What+is+the+last+questi...
- theon144 14y agoI think he meant https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=How+may+entropy+be+reversed%3F https://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=How+may+entropy+be+rev...
- habosa 14y agoThat's way cooler, you're right.
- kevinpet 14y agoWhat's really awesome about this is that it doesn't appear to be an easter egg. WA simply interprets this unusual question as being a reference to something it knows about.
- habosa 14y agoI think it has to be an easter egg considering that WA does not provide answers to many "How .... ?" questions. It's much more of a service for "What" questions. But I do like that it's displayed like any other answer. It gives a Watson feeling.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- elliptic 14y agoOdd that this is Asimov's favorite - it seems so inferior to Nightfall, or The Dead Past, or probably some others that I am forgetting.
- riffraff 14y agothank you for reminding me of a couple more great stories! But, if you believe these are superior writings to the one in TFA you should probably expand on why. IMO The Last Question is so loved because it hits readers with a much stronger emotional force than Nightfall or The Dead Past. Possibly it's the usage of that specific formula, at the end, which already carries so much weight. I, for one, believe only another short fiction had the same effect on me when i first read it as a kid: Frederic Brown's "Sentry".
- elliptic 14y agoWell, that's fair. I suppose I don't in general think much of stories that are essentially philosophical inquiries, with a little bit of "plot" added on. I'm just not emotionally affected by the "Wow" at the end, like I was in Nightfall, or how I was affected by the dead child aspect of "The Dead Past." Also, I think that "The Dead Past" really demonstrates the apex of Asimov's technical writing ability in a way that the format of "The Last Question" doesn't really allow.
- Tycho 14y agoC'mon, it's like the best plot twist ever, and Asimov prided himself on plot twists.
- tripzilch 14y agodreen quoted Asimov upthread, on why he considers it his favourite: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5585271 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5585271
- Nav_Panel 14y agoAs much as I love "The Last Question," My favorite Asimov short story is "Profession" (I read it in the same story anthology as "The Last Question): http://www.abelard.org/asimov.php http://www.abelard.org/asimov.php Described on that site as "an allegorical description of the manner in which education currently functions in our primitive western societies," I found it (as a child/early teen especially) to be one of his more engaging and relevant works. Check it out if you get a chance, although note that it's somewhat longer than "The Last Question."
- IvyMike 14y ago"Profession" is the first thing I think about whenever I start to think about my own career development. In the end, the question is which kind of engineer do I really want to be? And my answer is that the world has enough Amand Trevelyans. I want to be George Platen.
- Apreche 14y agoA true classic. This comes up in discussions among my friends often. It's at the point where someone can just say "that's the Last Question," and everyone knows.
- greatquux 14y agoThe last time this discussion came up, someone posted a link to the related-but-not-really-but-still-a-good-story "The Last Answer" http://www.thrivenotes.com/the-last-answer/ http://www.thrivenotes.com/the-last-answer/ and I greatly enjoyed reading it.
- RaSoJo 14y agoWow! The ending literally made me feel giddy. I got goosebumps.
- sigkill 14y agoThere's another piece called "The Last Answer" - http://www.thrivenotes.com/the-last-answer/ http://www.thrivenotes.com/the-last-answer/ which is pretty awesome in its own right.
- notahacker 14y agoI like Fredric Brown's Answer which is a more cynical take on the Question theme... http://www.roma1.infn.it/~anzel/answer.html http://www.roma1.infn.it/~anzel/answer.html
- bayesianhorse 14y agoSilence must fall when the last question is asked.
- mindcrime 14y agoOn the Fields of Trenzalore, on the Fall of the Eleventh, when no living creature can speak falsely or fail to answer, a question will be asked...
- fennecfoxen 14y agoYes, but that's the first question in the universe, not the final question.
- mindcrime 14y agoApparently it's going to be the last as well. Otherwise, why are they trying so hard to stop it? :-)
- fennecfoxen 14y agoWell. There's definitely a good chance it will be the last question for Eleven.
- mindcrime 14y ago"Eleven is the best. You'll cry your eyes out".
- trumbitta2 14y agoAnd now I know where Charles Stross did find inspiration for Accelerando. Great story.
- trumbitta2 14y agoAnd now I know where Charles Stross did find inspiration for Accelerando. Great story.
- DaNmarner 14y agoThe story boils down to: 1. Is the second law of thermodynamic wrong? 2. Does P equals NP (or, if 1 is true, then how and how long will it take to solve it?) 3. What's God?
- GuiA 14y agoOh goodness, this hilarious. Someone posting a link to a short story by one of the greatest SF writers all of time, whose writings spawned entire threads of reflexion and discussion in many disciplines; and a HN comment being a dismissive tl;dr.
- andrewljohnson 14y agoI didn't find the comment to be dismissive actually. What's wrong with writing a story that explores the boundaries of science and god? That must have been a pretty natural thing for someone living in Asimov's era to do.
- davidw 14y agoDe gustibus non est disputandum, as they say. I don't care for this story either, it's less of an actual story, and more of a "what if" that feels somehow a bit corny to me.
- DaNmarner 14y agoI actually consider pointing out the scientific elements of a SF piece is the best kind of compliment.
- _debug_ 14y agoWhat a waste of time that was! I felt greatly cheated by the ending. It was exactly as if I had met a friendly, neatly dressed, smiling person on the street who, after 5 minutes, turned out to be peddling his religion after all. Honestly, I have thought of much better stories myself. I remember GREATLY enjoying Asimov as a teenager, and I am pretty sure this is not his best story.
- andrewljohnson 14y agoYou have _thought_ of better stories yourself, but have you ever _written_ a better story. I'm pretty incredulous of anyone who claims to write better than Isaac Asimov. Strikes me the same way people who never built anything go around ripping on other people's products. Truly classic internet delusions of grandeur.
- _debug_ 14y ago> Truly classic internet delusions of grandeur. The delusion is yours : you don't know who you are talking to on the Internet, and you have assumed that the other anonymous writer is as mundane as you are. Says something about you, not me. The irony of thinking, "Since I think Asimov / Steve Jobs / Linus / whoever is awesome, and so many other people agree, it MUST mean that the dissenting commentor is a troll or having 'delusions of grandeur'" is that when these people started out, I'm pretty sure self-appointed X Factor judges of the world future such as yourself told them exactly the same thing. "How deluded to think you can write an Operating System, you puny mortal, you Linus?!" You are a follower, not a leader. Edit : the person who wrote, "Asimov was an atheist. You misunderstood the story" is the one you have to learn from.
- otikik 14y agoNo.
- a3n 14y agoIt doesn't necessarily need to be a religion. It's clear that something like what we call The Big Bang happened. But we can only trace back time and space to the origin. What happened "before" the origin is probably unknowable to us on this side of the origin. The best we can do is speculate, in scientific or literary terms. So think of this as speculative fiction, expressed in terms of the author's time. Personally I thought the progression of man through the ages was the most interesting part of the story.
- dvanduzer 14y agoDoes anyone know what happened to multivax.com?
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- alanh 14y agoPreviously discussed on HN, including: Most comments, over a year ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3691113 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3691113 4 years previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=595419 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=595419
- Apocryphon 14y agoHow poetic that this story be the one to be reposted and retold, again and again, until-
- smoyer 14y agoUntil the entropy of HN makes it impossible to post or read a final time?
- AlexanderDhoore 14y ago42
- CurtMonash 14y agoIt's a great story because it's a straightforward technological speculation which then takes a twist. That said, Arthur C. Clarke's The Star -- http://www.uni.edu/morgans/astro/course/TheStar.pdf http://www.uni.edu/morgans/astro/course/TheStar.pdf -- is weaker on the technology but stronger on the heartstring-tugging. It is also a great story, in a similar vein. And relevant to The Star, but not really in the same vein, there's James Blish's novel A Case of Conscience ... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Case_of_Conscience http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Case_of_Conscience
- Fzzr 14y agoFor something a little lighter, "The Last-but-One Question" by Sam Hughes. http://qntm.org/question http://qntm.org/question
- _kst_ 14y agoIsn't this a copyright violation, or has the story entered the public domain?
- stat 14y agoI reformatted the story for better readability and included audio, read by Henry Goodman: https://googledrive.com/host/0B2j3XwTC5tA6dUg5QXBTQVNtV2c/TheLastQuestion.html https://googledrive.com/host/0B2j3XwTC5tA6dUg5QXBTQVNtV2c/Th...
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- j0j0r0 14y agoi saw this as a little kid with my dad as a slide show at a planetarium...(omnisphere in wichita, ks) as a kid, it was ok, but slightly boring until the very end, when after minutes of complete darkness very bright lights came and the planetarium stars went spinning ... it made the whole room seem to spin. i remembered it all that time, but could never discover who wrote it... so, thanks.