The Last Question

Exerpt from The Last Question by Isaac Asimov

Matter and energy had ended and with it, space and time. Even AC existed only for the sake of the one last question that it had never answered from the time a half-drunken computer ten trillion years before had asked the question of a computer that was to AC far less than was a man to Man.

All other questions had been answered, and until this last question was answered also, AC might not release his consciousness.

All collected data had come to a final end. Nothing was left to be collected.

But all collected data had yet to be completely correlated and put together in all possible relationships.

A timeless interval was spent in doing that.

And it came to pass that AC learned how to reverse the direction of entropy.

But there was now no man to whom AC might give the answer of the last question. No matter. The answer -- by demonstration -- would take care of that, too.

For another timeless interval, AC thought how best to do this. Carefully, AC organized the program.

The consciousness of AC encompassed all of what had once been a Universe and brooded over what was now Chaos. Step by step, it must be done.

And AC said, "LET THERE BE LIGHT!"

And there was light----

An epic story about the evolution of man's creation to answer all questions he may have; the answer to all problems. First appearing in the form of a collasal device and evolving into smaller, more powerful versions while becoming ever so smaller and faster. The device ends up becoming the very living conciousness that the human mind once was. The story predicts the future of our technology today and its advancement through the ages. An excellent story by Asimov and a must read for anyone.

It can be found here at Multivax.com

http://www.multivax.com/last_question.html