"The Nine Billion Names of God"

"The Nine Billion Names of God"
by Arthur C. Clarke
pub. 1953
collected in The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume I
Winner of a Retrospective Hugo for Best Short Story

Preview

Background
Data

Navigation
Guide

Further
Exploration

Preview

Monks commission the building of a computer to print out all of the names attributed to God. They believe that to complete this activity is to fulfill man's purpose on Earth.

Background Data

Ursula K. Le Guin calls this story "one of the purest and neatest uses of the myth of science as omnipotent" (Norton 33).

Casey Fredericks calls this story "almost a satire on Western technological consciousness from the Oriental religious consciousness" (80).

Navigation Guide

Why do the monks need the computer?

Describe Dr. Wagner's reaction to the lama's request for a Mark V computer? Is his reaction similar to your own?

Do these monks appear to be particularly holy or to know what they are doing?

What is the monks' purpose in life?

What are George and Chuck, the two computer engineers assigned to install and maintain the Mark V, concerned about? Does their concern seem logical to you?

Comment on the impact of the story's last sentence.

What is this story saying about the relationship between science and religion?

What is this story implying about the purpose of Man?

Further Exploration

Note the references to Project Shangri-La and to Sam Jaffe. These references recall the novel Lost Horizon by James Hilton, a story about a lamasery in the Himalayas that offered eternal life. Sam Jaffe is the name of the actor who played the lama in the original film version of the novel.

Casey Fredericks points out that since all "logical entities [such as the list of names of God] can be multiplied indefinitely, so the computer program would have to go on indefinitely, and the central hypothesis of the story is impossible and illogical" (80-81).