A Conversation for Ask h2g2

2001

Post 1

Clive the flying ostrich: Amateur Polymath | Chief Heretic.

I'll be the first then,

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!! smiley - biggrinsmiley - bubbly

smiley - hugsmiley - hugsmiley - hug (as close to the auld lang syne handshake smilie as I could get>


2001

Post 2

Just zis Guy, you know? † Cyclist [A690572] :: At the 51st centile of ursine intelligence

But not until the second verse, obviously.


2001

Post 3

Still Incognitas, Still Chairthingy, Still lurking, Still invisible, unnoticeable, missable, unseen, just haunting h2g2

I see that one enterprising(?)tv channel has been showing 2001 all day today.Programme planners eh?smiley - smiley


2001

Post 4

Gnomon - time to move on

Happy New Millennium Everyone!

Incognitas, do you mean the TV channel has been showing "2001 a Space Odyssey"?


2001

Post 5

Still Incognitas, Still Chairthingy, Still lurking, Still invisible, unnoticeable, missable, unseen, just haunting h2g2

Oh don't start being British English with me please.It too soon after the 'holidays'for that.smiley - smiley


2001

Post 6

Gnomon - time to move on

I wasn't trying to be British English, I just wanted to know what you meant about showing 2001 all day.


2001

Post 7

Is mise Duncan

Do you think A.C.Clarke is dissappointed with our progress according to his grand scheme of things as expressed in "2001 A Space Odessy"?
Can I just say in our defence, we have spent the last 5 years fiddling around with this internet thingy which he completely failed to factor into the plans smiley - biggrin


2001

Post 8

Gandalf ( Got my own Comp Now!! Still Redundant!! )

No...
It's just that viewers of the UK Sci-Fi channel voted the Stan
Kubrik/ Arthur C. Clarke film the best Sci-Fi film of the last
millenium!!!!!!!!!

'G'


2001

Post 9

Is mise Duncan

I think they may have misunderstood the question smiley - winkeye


2001

Post 10

Xanatic(phenomena phreak)

Man hasn´t walked on the moon in my lifespan, personally I find that it is disturbing how little we do about space nowadays. I hope that we really soon give space exploration a boost.

Honestly, wasn´t Clarke also a bit too optimistic about it? A whole solar empire in 40 years.


2001

Post 11

Gnomon - time to move on

Arthur Clarke never suggested a Solar Empire. What Humankind had acheived by 2001 in the book was a space station and a moon base. These would have been achievable if the "space race" had not been cancelled in the 70's.

When they discovered the artefact on the moon and found out that there was something out near Jupiter waiting to hear from us, they built a once-off ship to carry a team to Jupiter.

The film included two technological advances which we haven't acheived yet: an intelligent computer and suspended animation. The suspended animation was just a handy literary device for simplifying the plot. Most of the crew were out of the way and we only had to deal with two crew members and Hal. But Hal still hasn't turned up in the real 2001. This may be a disappointment to Mr Clarke, but it is certainly a disappointment to the AI community. They really did think that we were close to creating Artificial Intelligence around that time. Now it appears to be further away than ever. Someone once said: "If the brain was simple enough for us to understand, we'd be too stupid to understand it".


2001

Post 12

Wand'rin star

Arthur C Clarke gave a fascinating interview on the World Service over the weekend. He thinks we should start being nice to our machines as they may be able to take over in 50 years and that 2020 is a reasonable date for what he predicted in 2001. He also thought the Internet was magic (sorry great) except that he spends far too much time answering his email when he would like to be reading or writing other stuff smiley - star


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