OT - Counting God

[AgentZero]

For some reason, this reminded me of an old sci-fi story I read years ago. Might have been Heinlein but no matter. It was about some religious order that had spent thousands of years trying to catalogue all the names of God according to some crazy mathematical formula. At the end of the story, they were successful, and the head of the order steps out onto a balcony and looks up into the night sky, only to see all the stars in the sky, one by one, going out.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

I think I read that story or one like it; I remember them using a computer and one of the computer guys seeing the stars go out.

[Ed Kolis]

Wow, that's even better than Douglas Adams' "discover the Ultimate Question to destroy the universe"... and most likely the inspiration for it as well

But yeah, that story vaguely rings a bell... might have been Heinlein, might have been Asimov, one of those awesome writers

Heck, Asimov even tackled sciences that you wouldn't even think of in his fiction, such as economics... I remember one story of his where people had built so many robots that the robots got out of control producing goods, and since it was for some reason impossible to shut the robots down (I think they would have gone on strike because robots live for work, or something ), it was decided that to curb the resulting market disaster, that more robots would be built for the express purpose of WASTING things!

And then there was the "numerics" story, where people became so reliant on calculators that they completely forgot how to do math - but apparently computers were still quite bulky, expensive, and slow, as this guy who was able to "predict" the results that the calculator would give using his "numerics" techniques was hailed as a genius, and it was decided that it would be more efficient to have someone aboard all the warships and even some of the guided missiles to perform course calculations!

Oh yeah, and then there was the one (though I don't think this was Asimov) where a scouting party of some feline looking aliens invaded the earth, landing their starship... and out came a bunch of these aliens dressed in chainmail, wielding swords, and anxious more than anything to use an outhouse... when they were surrounded by humans with machine guns and grenades, they quickly surrendered, as no one but humans had thought to develop more than the most primitive of weapons, armor, or latrines! Everyone else had focused their research first into bare-bones life support technology and then into propulsion; the felines and the humans were apparently the only two aggressive races in the galaxy, and since the humans never happened upon spaceflight while the felines did ages ago, the felines had plenty of time to expand their empire without much difficulty, not needing more than primitive weapons or waste disposal (hey, space is a big trash can!), while the humans needed to fight each other for room on the earth!

[Baron Munchausen]

Ed Kolis said:
Wow, that's even better than Douglas Adams' "discover the Ultimate Question to destroy the universe"... and most likely the inspiration for it as well
[/b]

Asimov had a different slant on this idea.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Question

He wondered if a computer could save the Universe by figuring out how to escape the laws of thermodynamics.

Ed Kolis said:
But yeah, that story vaguely rings a bell... might have been Heinlein, might have been Asimov, one of those awesome writers

Heck, Asimov even tackled sciences that you wouldn't even think of in his fiction, such as economics... I remember one story of his where people had built so many robots that the robots got out of control producing goods, and since it was for some reason impossible to shut the robots down (I think they would have gone on strike because robots live for work, or something ), it was decided that to curb the resulting market disaster, that more robots would be built for the express purpose of WASTING things!

And then there was the "numerics" story, where people became so reliant on calculators that they completely forgot how to do math - but apparently computers were still quite bulky, expensive, and slow, as this guy who was able to "predict" the results that the calculator would give using his "numerics" techniques was hailed as a genius, and it was decided that it would be more efficient to have someone aboard all the warships and even some of the guided missiles to perform course calculations!
[/b]

I can't recall the title, but the computer story is fairly early. Well before the solid state transistor took off and created modern consumer electronics.

Edit: found it -- The Feeling of Power (1958)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Feeling_of_Power

The Foundation series is basically about socio-economic science, though. The science of 'Psychohistory' is basically Karl Marx's 'dialectical materialism' re-imagined for science fiction. The course of history can be predicted, and then managed.

Ed Kolis said:
Oh yeah, and then there was the one (though I don't think this was Asimov) where a scouting party of some feline looking aliens invaded the earth, landing their starship... and out came a bunch of these aliens dressed in chainmail, wielding swords, and anxious more than anything to use an outhouse... when they were surrounded by humans with machine guns and grenades, they quickly surrendered, as no one but humans had thought to develop more than the most primitive of weapons, armor, or latrines! Everyone else had focused their research first into bare-bones life support technology and then into propulsion; the felines and the humans were apparently the only two aggressive races in the galaxy, and since the humans never happened upon spaceflight while the felines did ages ago, the felines had plenty of time to expand their empire without much difficulty, not needing more than primitive weapons or waste disposal (hey, space is a big trash can!), while the humans needed to fight each other for room on the earth!

That I cannot recall. But Asimov wrote so **^@!#* much that I cannot say he didn't write that.

[capnq]

Ed Kolis said: Oh yeah, and then there was the one (though I don't think this was Asimov) where a scouting party of some feline looking aliens invaded the earth, landing their starship... and out came a bunch of these aliens dressed in chainmail, wielding swords, and anxious more than anything to use an outhouse... when they were surrounded by humans with machine guns and grenades, they quickly surrendered, as no one but humans had thought to develop more than the most primitive of weapons, armor, or latrines! Everyone else had focused their research first into bare-bones life support technology and then into propulsion; the felines and the humans were apparently the only two aggressive races in the galaxy, and since the humans never happened upon spaceflight while the felines did ages ago, the felines had plenty of time to expand their empire without much difficulty, not needing more than primitive weapons or waste disposal (hey, space is a big trash can!), while the humans needed to fight each other for room on the earth!

I remember that story, definitely not Asimov, but my Google fu is failing me to come up with the correct author. The title was something like "The Road Less Travelled" (Frost's famous poem was quoted towards the end), the invading aliens were ursine, not feline, and used black powder muskets. The story was a sequel to another where humanity had used the captured FTL tech to dismantle the ursine empire; the first story was about our first encounter with another species that followed our tech path rather than the "normal" focus on the FTL drive, which most species discovered during their Iron Age. (There was mention of one species who found it during their Bronze Age.) Both stories were published in Analog.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

That seems...Rather improbable.

[Randallw]

I have a book where an alien empire sends a scout to land in medieval England. They do the big "tremble at the might of our energy weapons bit" before being cut down by arrow fire. The Knights, and their men at arms, then take the ship and conquer the aliens

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_High_Crusade

I have the 2003 edition.

My favourite bit is right at the end when they encounter humanity again and ask the captain if the Holy Land is free of the pagans. The captain, a loyal servant of the Israeli empire, says yes it is.

I didn't know there was a movie, and I was interested in seeing it, that is until I realised it was German. I have seen exactly two German fantasy comedies, one about the 7 dwarfs, whose favourite game is beating themselves with wood, and a Star Trek spoof where the Spock character wears a pink uniform and gets worse after that. German humour escapes me.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Think I read that book. Rather improbable, too. Most people who practice war would be good at it.

[capnq]

capnq said: I remember that story, definitely not Asimov, but my Google fu is failing me to come up with the correct author.

Eureka!

"The Road Not Taken", by Harry Turtledove, prequel to "Herbig-Haro" by "Eric Iverson".

[Randallw]

I had trouble tracking down that one. I'm used to associating Turtledove with alternate history, along with series that continue long past my patience, and so naturally tried to track it down at Uchronia. Not helped by the fact that the term "the road not taken" is used quite alot in alternate history. It sounds like a story I'd like to read. I thought the name Eric Iverson sounded familiar. It's one of Turtledove's psuedonyms I think.

In a like vein is Turtledove's series where Aliens invade earth because they sent a probe 800 years ago, and how much could a race grow in a mere 800 years?. Personally the first trilogy was good, the second series rode the fame of the first in my opinion, and the finale went absolutely nowhere, in a narrative sense. I kept expecting something to actually happen, but no at the last page I went "What the?" when I realised it was finished.