The Nine Billion Names of God

"The Nine Billion Names of God" is a 1953 science fiction short story by British writer Arthur C. Clarke. The story was among the stories selected in 1970 by the Science Fiction Writers of America as one of the best science fiction short stories published before the creation of the Nebula Awards. It was reprinted in '' The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume One, 1929–1964''.

Plot summary

In a Tibetan lamasery, the monks seek to list all of the names of God. They believe the Universe was created for this purpose, and that once this naming is completed, God will bring the Universe to an end. Three centuries ago, the monks created an alphabet in which they calculated they could encode all the possible names of God, numbering about 9,000,000,000 ("nine billion") and each having no more than nine characters. Writing the names out by hand, as they had been doing, even after eliminating various nonsense combinations, would take another 15,000 years; the monks wish to use modern technology to finish this task more quickly.

They rent a computer capable of printing all the possible permutations, and hire two Westerners to install and program the machine. The computer operators are skeptical but play along. After three months, as the job nears completion, they fear that the monks will blame the computer (and, by extension, its operators) when nothing happens. The Westerners delay the operation of the computer so that it will complete its final print run just after their scheduled departure. After their successful departure on ponies, they pause on the mountain path on their way back to the airfield, where a plane is waiting to take them back to civilization. Under a clear night sky they estimate that it must be just about the time that the monks are pasting the final printed names into their holy books. Then they notice that "overhead, without any fuss, the stars were going out."

Mathematical note

Assuming the monks' alphabet has $n$ letters, then according to the Lama's description, the set of all possible names of God is the set of strings following two conditions:

* It has length in $\$ with $k = 9$
* It has no more than three consecutive equal letters.

The number of such strings is $\sum_^ \begin n & 0 & 0 \end\begin n-1 & 1 & 0\\ n-1 & 0 & 1 \\ n-1 & 0 & 0 \end^l \begin 1\\ 1\\ 1 \end$Setting $n= 12$ gives 5.6 billion names of God, and $n= 13$ gives 11.5 billion names of God.

Reception

In 2004, "The Nine Billion Names of God" won the retrospective Hugo Award for Best Short Story for the year 1954.1954 Retro Hugo Awards
at TheHugoAwards.org; retrieved January 14, 2017 ''Kirkus Reviews'' called it "quietly remarkable""The Nine Billion Names of God - The Best Short Stories by Arthur C. Clarke"
reviewed at ''Kirkus Reviews''; published May 1, 1967; archived online September 21, 2011; retrieved January 14, 2017 and ''The Guardian'' considered it to be a "wonderful apocalyptic rib-tickler"."Master of the Universe: A collection of stories from Arthur C Clarke is released with impeccable timing"
by Robin McKie, in ''The Guardian''; published January 21, 2001; retrieved January 14, 2017 Stating that the story "introduced many Western readers to an intriguing speculation in Oriental religions", Carl Sagan in 1978 listed "The Nine Billion Names of God" as among the "rare few science‐fiction tories thatcombine a standard science‐fiction theme with a deep human sensitivity". In 1986 it was included in the anthology ''Isaac Asimov Presents The Great SF Stories 15'' as one of the best science fiction short stories of 1953.

Gary K. Wolfe noted that the story is "patently at odds with Clarke's scientific rationalism"."The Grand Tours of Arthur C. Clarke"
by Gary K. Wolfe, in ''The New York Times''; published March 9, 1997; retrieved January 14, 2017 Paul J. Nahin has pointed out that, due to the delay imposed by the speed of light, an omniscient God would have had to destroy all the stars in the universe years earlier so that their "synchronized vanishing" would be visible at exactly the time that the monks completed their task.

In 2003, Clarke reported having been told that the Dalai Lama had found the story "very amusing"."The Other Side of the Sky:
reviewed by Alma A. Hromic, at ''SF Site''; published 2003; retrieved January 14, 2017

Cinematization

In 2018, the story was adapted into a 2018 short film by Dominique Filhol. Seven years before it had already been adapted (more loosely) into a Portuguese short film (under the title ''Scr1ptum'') by Swiss director Matthias Fritsche.Scr1ptum (2011) pictures
at IMDb. Retrieved March 22, 2020.

See also

* Names of God
* Brute-force attack
* Tower of Hanoi, a puzzle whose legendaria incorporate a similar end to the Universe
* "The Library of Babel", a 1941 short story by Jorge Luis Borges which also deals with collecting all the possible permutations of a character string
* "The Fife of Bodidharma", a 1959 short story by Cordwainer Smith, reprinted in ''The Rediscovery of Man''
* Jorge Palma, a Portuguese singer whose 1972 song was named after and inspired by the story
* " The Nine Billion Names of God", a 1984 short story by Carter Scholz about an exact replica of Clarke's storySee article by Arnaud Regnauld
« Du nom d’auteur au non-auteur : la signature en question dans les nouvelles de Carter Scholz »
Cahiers du GRAAT n°35, « La négation : formes, figures, conceptualisation », Stéphanie Bonnefille et Sébastien Salbayre dir., Presses de l’université François Rabelais, Tours, octobre 2006, pp. 191–204
* Darren Aronofsky's '' Pi'' (1998), in which a computer is used to divine the 216-character name of God
* " Seventy-Two Letters", a 2000 novella by Ted Chiang
* " Godfellas", a 2002 ''Futurama'' episode partially inspired by the story
* " Last Contact", a 2007 short story by Stephen Baxter about humans experiencing the universe ending in a Big Rip

Notes

References

External links

*
James Randi praising The Nine Billion Names of God as his favourite Clarke story
Audio interview the day after Clarke's death

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nine Billion Names of God, The
Short stories by Arthur C. Clarke
1953 short stories
Hugo Award for Best Short Story winning works
Apocalyptic fiction
Religion in science fiction
Names of God in literature and fiction
Tibet in fiction
End of the universe in fiction
Short stories adapted into films