42: The answer to the ultimate question? A discussion of why it might be...
Created | Updated May 27, 2003
INTRODUCTION
The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams was an extraordinarily popular fictional creation that started as a radio play and developed into a five part trilogy of novels and a TV series. In that work DEEP THOUGHT, the second greatest computer of all time, after millions of years calculation, delivered the answer to life, teh universe and everything. It was 42.
In response to the dismay of his operatiors (after all 42 was not a particularly useful answer) DEEP THOUGHT was reported to have designed the greatest computer of all time - the EARTH - which was to work out what the question was, to which the answer was 42.
The Hitch Hikers Guide then recounted how EARTH was destroyed to make way for a hyperspace bypass just before the question was found. That hyperspace bypass appears to have been a bit late in coming (assuming it eventually happens....) because on Thursday the 3rd of March 1983 students of Greenhead College, Huddersfield in West Yorkshire, England used elementary computing technology to derive a possible question to which the answer 42 makes cryptic sense.
At the time this result was derived, most calculators had only 8 digits and spreadssheets were in their infancy (visi-calc was one of the most sophisticated tools). So the mathematical expansion used here needed the college computer to derive the starting point! I think it quite approriate that the most sophisticated computer in the universe should produce the question from a rudimentary version of itself......
ANALYSIS
42 was used in the following way to find a more meaningful answer to which the question was then reasonably obvious (albeit cryptic).
Method 1:
2 to the power 42 = 4398046511104
This number is then translated into morse code by first substituting dots for all digits less than 5 and dashes for all digits greater than or equal to 5, secondly the process is repeated substituting dashes for all digits less than 5 and dots for digits greater than or equal to 5.
The coding gives:
U T P I E
..-- .--... .
4398046511104
--.. -..--- -
G E X M T
Taking the digit 0 for spaces we have the letters UTPIEGEXMT
These letters are an anagram of GET UP ET MIX. As the ultimate question is of very general interest and was discovered on Earth, its code uses the two of the most widely used Earth languages - English and French.
When translated entirely into English the answer is therefore GET UP AND MIX. In many cultures where these languages are spoken social interaction with other members of the species may lead to the environment and conditions for procreation, this is an answer to a very basic question of survival.
So the ultimate question is HOW DO WE CONTINUE THE SPECIES ???
and the answer is GET UP AND MIX - which reduces to 42
Method 2
2 to the power 42 = 4398046511104
Summing each consecutive digit, and keeping only the unit digit where the result is greater than 10 we get the following series:
4 3 9 8 0 4 6 5 1 1 1 0 4
7 2 7 8 4 0 1 6 2 2 1 4
9 9 5 2 4 1 7 8 4 3 5
8 4 7 6 5 8 5 2 7 8
2 1 3 1 3 3 7 9 5
3 4 4 4 6 0 6 4
7 8 8 0 6 6 0
5 6 8 6 2 6
1 4 4 8 8
5 8 2 6
3 0 8
3 8
1 The ultimate digit
OK - this is not actually a question. But it does demonstrate that 42 can be reduced to a more fundamental unit - without which most measurement systems would fail to be meaningful. In the comuter context, without 1 there is nothing....... therefore this is a pretty ultimate reduction.
The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams was an extraordinarily popular fictional creation that started as a radio play and developed into a five part trilogy of novels and a TV series. In that work DEEP THOUGHT, the second greatest computer of all time, after millions of years calculation, delivered the answer to life, teh universe and everything. It was 42.
In response to the dismay of his operatiors (after all 42 was not a particularly useful answer) DEEP THOUGHT was reported to have designed the greatest computer of all time - the EARTH - which was to work out what the question was, to which the answer was 42.
The Hitch Hikers Guide then recounted how EARTH was destroyed to make way for a hyperspace bypass just before the question was found. That hyperspace bypass appears to have been a bit late in coming (assuming it eventually happens....) because on Thursday the 3rd of March 1983 students of Greenhead College, Huddersfield in West Yorkshire, England used elementary computing technology to derive a possible question to which the answer 42 makes cryptic sense.
At the time this result was derived, most calculators had only 8 digits and spreadssheets were in their infancy (visi-calc was one of the most sophisticated tools). So the mathematical expansion used here needed the college computer to derive the starting point! I think it quite approriate that the most sophisticated computer in the universe should produce the question from a rudimentary version of itself......
ANALYSIS
42 was used in the following way to find a more meaningful answer to which the question was then reasonably obvious (albeit cryptic).
Method 1:
2 to the power 42 = 4398046511104
This number is then translated into morse code by first substituting dots for all digits less than 5 and dashes for all digits greater than or equal to 5, secondly the process is repeated substituting dashes for all digits less than 5 and dots for digits greater than or equal to 5.
The coding gives:
U T P I E
..-- .--... .
4398046511104
--.. -..--- -
G E X M T
Taking the digit 0 for spaces we have the letters UTPIEGEXMT
These letters are an anagram of GET UP ET MIX. As the ultimate question is of very general interest and was discovered on Earth, its code uses the two of the most widely used Earth languages - English and French.
When translated entirely into English the answer is therefore GET UP AND MIX. In many cultures where these languages are spoken social interaction with other members of the species may lead to the environment and conditions for procreation, this is an answer to a very basic question of survival.
So the ultimate question is HOW DO WE CONTINUE THE SPECIES ???
and the answer is GET UP AND MIX - which reduces to 42
Method 2
2 to the power 42 = 4398046511104
Summing each consecutive digit, and keeping only the unit digit where the result is greater than 10 we get the following series:
4 3 9 8 0 4 6 5 1 1 1 0 4
7 2 7 8 4 0 1 6 2 2 1 4
9 9 5 2 4 1 7 8 4 3 5
8 4 7 6 5 8 5 2 7 8
2 1 3 1 3 3 7 9 5
3 4 4 4 6 0 6 4
7 8 8 0 6 6 0
5 6 8 6 2 6
1 4 4 8 8
5 8 2 6
3 0 8
3 8
1 The ultimate digit
OK - this is not actually a question. But it does demonstrate that 42 can be reduced to a more fundamental unit - without which most measurement systems would fail to be meaningful. In the comuter context, without 1 there is nothing....... therefore this is a pretty ultimate reduction.
