Conservative. Idaho. Software engineer. Historian. Trying to prevent Idiocracy from becoming a documentary.
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"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose." -- Rom. 8:28
“ It used to be said that 100 million monkeys pounding away randomly at 100 million keyboards would eventually produce the works of Shakespeare. Today, thanks to the Internet, we know that’s not true.”
They would eventually. The question is "how long"? R. A. Lafferty explored that question in the short story "Been a Long, Long Time". The angel Boshel, for refusing to take sides in the cosmic war of Light and Dark, is sentenced to supervise six randomly typing monkeys until they produce the works of Shakespeare.
By the time the expansion of the universe ends and contraction begins, they have produced one complete sentence. Then collapse and a new Big Bang.
"This happened again and again. Each cycle seemed damnably long while it was happening; but in retrospect, the cycles were only like a light blinking on and off.
And in the Longer Retrospect, they were like a high-frequency alternator, producing a dizzy number of such cycles every over-second, and continuing for tumbling ages."
I don't know that Lafferty did the math (or if anyone ever has), but he has a definite feel for the time required.
They would eventually. The question is "how long"? R. A. Lafferty explored that question in the short story "Been a Long, Long Time". The angel Boshel, for refusing to take sides in the cosmic war of Light and Dark, is sentenced to supervise six randomly typing monkeys until they produce the works of Shakespeare.
ReplyDeleteBy the time the expansion of the universe ends and contraction begins, they have produced one complete sentence. Then collapse and a new Big Bang.
"This happened again and again. Each cycle seemed damnably long while it was happening; but in retrospect, the cycles were only like a light blinking on and off.
And in the Longer Retrospect, they were like a high-frequency alternator, producing a dizzy number of such cycles every over-second, and continuing for tumbling ages."
I don't know that Lafferty did the math (or if anyone ever has), but he has a definite feel for the time required.