Encyclopedia Wand
I was reading Haruki Murakami (Hard Boiled Wonderland and The End of the World) and there was a fascinating discussion of the Encyclopedia Wand.
It goes something like this: How can you convey an infinite amount of data into a single point on a toothpick? Well, theoretically, the answer goes like this:
Take your data, say, the Encyclopedia Britannica, and code it. An "A" would be 1, a "B" would be 2, so 214 would be BAD. Also code spaces and punctuation. This way you would get an incredibly long number. Then put a period just preceding the number. That turns it into a fraction. So the Encyclopedia that started with the entry on BAD would begin with the fraction .214.... Now, the exact middle of the toothpick is considered .5000000
If we had the technology to make a PRECISE MARK at the EXACT point on the toothpick that represented the precise fraction and we could measure such precise mark EXACTLY, the entire fraction could be decoded back into the Encyclopedia. If the fraction was repeating, the number would be ETERNAL. It would be an immortal tautology, in other words.
I really, really liked this idea.
It goes something like this: How can you convey an infinite amount of data into a single point on a toothpick? Well, theoretically, the answer goes like this:
Take your data, say, the Encyclopedia Britannica, and code it. An "A" would be 1, a "B" would be 2, so 214 would be BAD. Also code spaces and punctuation. This way you would get an incredibly long number. Then put a period just preceding the number. That turns it into a fraction. So the Encyclopedia that started with the entry on BAD would begin with the fraction .214.... Now, the exact middle of the toothpick is considered .5000000
If we had the technology to make a PRECISE MARK at the EXACT point on the toothpick that represented the precise fraction and we could measure such precise mark EXACTLY, the entire fraction could be decoded back into the Encyclopedia. If the fraction was repeating, the number would be ETERNAL. It would be an immortal tautology, in other words.
I really, really liked this idea.
posted by Balázsy András at 10:33 AM
8 Comments:
Murakami has some cool ideas in that book. In fact, that book was a direct inspiration for my latest work, a screenplay dealing with infinity. Let us know what you think about the book as a whole when you get done.
Yeah, what he said.
Maybe I'm just dumb, but how does one know that 214 is BAD and not BN?
well, how about 002001004 as BAD and 002014 as BN? So it will be a mark really close to the tip of the toothpick... This way there can be values assigned for punctuation and spacing, carriage returns or whatever.
i see.
It was the first Murakami book I read, and I must say that as i got further into the book my estimation of him as a writer just grew. As soon as I got that idea, I thought it was brilliant. It's like something out of The Third Policeman, another of my fave books (and no, I don't watch Lost). I also think it's genius the way the End of The World mirrors the narrative more and more closely.
I would claim to wish that this sort of philosophical, mental work was a specific genre, but then it'd probably be too emulated.
Damn, this stuff gives me a literature boner. It's that good.
In the book each character was represented by two digits. 00=A, 01=B, 02=C. You can also code periods and commas unused pairs (33=comma, 44=period, that sort of thing).
BAD would be 010003
201
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