there's a short story i haven't read called Library of Babel. its about a universe that is simply a library that contains books which have every possible combination of letters, spaces, and punctuation. think of the possibilities.
think of the horror.
with every possible permutation of letters in these books...simply by chance...you would have every conceived work of literature EVER. just by chance. you would have every biography. every historical fact. accurate predictions of the future. every bit of useful information you could ever desire! think of anything you have ever wondered about. THAT IS WRITTEN IN ONE OF THESE BOOKS!
but chances are you'll never find it.
because even though the random chance that the permutations will create a work of shakespeare, it will also create trillions of combinations of letters and spaces and punctuation that do not make any sense at all.
the people in this universe are hopelessly bound to filtering through literally trillions of books of NOTHING before they even come across one useful fact. let alone a masterpiece. sure there's probably also a book that lists where to find other books. by chance, it would be there. since the letters required to write out where to find other books ARE in fact a plausible combination of letters, spaces, and punctuation. that has got to be brutal for those people.
and you think writing a research paper is bad.
wow.
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