Dwar Ev ceremoniously
soldered the final connection with gold. The eyes of a dozen television
cameras watched him and the subether bore through the universe a dozen
pictures of what he was doing.
He straightened and
nodded to Dwar Reyn, then moved to a position beside the switch that would
complete the contact when he threw it. The switch that would connect, all
at once, all of the monster computing machines of all the populated planets
in the universe, ninety-six billion planets, into the supercircuit that
would connect them all into the one supercalculator, one cybernetics machine
that would combine all the knowledge of all the galaxies.
Dwar Reyn spoke briefly
to the watching and listening trillions. Then, after a moment's silence,
he said, "Now, Dwar Ev."
Dwar Ev threw the
switch. There was a mighty hum, the surge of power from ninety-six billion
planets. Lights flashed and quieted along the miles-long panel.
Dwar Ev stepped back
and drew a deep breath. "The honor of asking the first question is yours,
Dwar Reyn."
"Thank you," said
Dwar Reyn. "It shall be a question that no single cybernetics machine has
been able to answer."
He turned to face the
machine. "Is there a God?"
The mighty voice answered
without hesitation, without the clicking of single relay.
"Yes, now there is
a God."
Sudden fear flashed
on the face of Dwar Ev. He leaped to grab the switch.
A bolt of lightning
from the cloudless sky struck him down and fused the switch shut.
~
The above short story "Answer", is from "Angels & Spaceships" by Fredric Brown.