"That should keep the Americans preoccupied for a while."
June 30, 2017 7:29 PM   Subscribe

The Spring 2017 issue of Big Echo features five literary responses to the short fiction of Arthur C. Clarke. Among them is Vajra Chandrasekera's short story "The Negation of the Negation of the Negation," which builds on the events of Clarke's well-known story "The Nine Billion Names of God" (HTML; PDF).
posted by Wobbuffet (12 comments total) 26 users marked this as a favorite
 
that's brilliant.
posted by You Can't Tip a Buick at 7:37 PM on June 30, 2017 [1 favorite]


Overhead, without any fuss, the stadium lights were going out.
posted by oneswellfoop at 7:49 PM on June 30, 2017 [3 favorites]


which builds on the events of Clarke's well-known story "The Nine Billion Names of God"

Say no more!
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 8:53 PM on June 30, 2017 [1 favorite]


Why did they have to brute-force the names anyway? They should have just gone to God's Yahoo account and tried his password reset questions.
posted by Guy Smiley at 8:53 PM on June 30, 2017 [5 favorites]


Clearly it was an interview question. There's probably a follow up about big O notation.
posted by Artw at 8:59 PM on June 30, 2017 [7 favorites]


They should have just gone to God's Yahoo account and tried his password reset questions.

Thou shalt not spearphish the Lord thy God.
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 11:45 PM on June 30, 2017 [11 favorites]


Nice little story, even though I prefer Clarke's final note of cosmic awe to the idea of a weaponized Spin membrane.
posted by informavore at 5:05 AM on July 1, 2017 [1 favorite]


See Vernor Vinge, The Peace War, for what happens next.
posted by bonehead at 7:54 AM on July 1, 2017 [1 favorite]


Vinge was cuter before we had Libertarians destroying actually succeeding in destroying the government and the actual consequences coming to light, mind.
posted by Artw at 7:56 AM on July 1, 2017 [1 favorite]


Nice little story, even though I prefer Clarke's final note of cosmic awe to the idea of a weaponized Spin membrane.

Nice little story, even though I prefer Clarke's final note of cosmic awe to the idea of a weaponized Spin device in the hands of white-supremacist (because what else do we call people who think the British Empire was the best possible world?) mad scientists (because what else do we call people who are willing to risk millions of lives to prove a point of theoretical physics?).
posted by WizardOfDocs at 3:37 PM on July 1, 2017


/suspect that bobbling both the UK and the US would not be an entirely bad thing at this point in time.
posted by Artw at 4:42 PM on July 1, 2017


Well, the Peace Authority was well meant, at least.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:32 PM on July 4, 2017 [1 favorite]


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