The Answer (1954)

Posted3 months agoActive3 months ago

dash2

37 points

23 comments

sfshortstories.comOtherstory

calmpositive

Debate

20/100

Science Fiction1950s LiteratureNuclear Anxiety

Key topics

Science Fiction

1950s Literature

Nuclear Anxiety

The post shares a 1954 science fiction short story 'The Answer' about a world where computers provide all the answers, sparking discussion on the themes of technological reliance and societal complacency.

Snapshot generated from the HN discussion

Discussion Activity

Moderate engagement

First comment

18m

Peak period

0-2h

Avg / period

3.3

Comment distribution23 data points

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Based on 23 loaded comments

Key moments

01Story posted
Oct 2, 2025 at 2:13 PM EDT
3 months ago
Step 01
02First comment
Oct 2, 2025 at 2:31 PM EDT
18m after posting
Step 02
03Peak activity
8 comments in 0-2h
Hottest window of the conversation
Step 03
04Latest activity
Oct 3, 2025 at 5:25 PM EDT
3 months ago
Step 04

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Analyzing up to 500 comments to identify key contributors and discussion patterns

Discussion (23 comments)

Showing 23 comments

dash2Author

3 months ago

1 reply

Direct link: https://archive.org/details/angelsspaceships0000fred/page/36...

dooglius

3 months ago

The review is only a little shorter than the story!

ajkjk

3 months ago

2 replies

I think if a story gives you a sense of wonder when you're young, it's a good story, even if it seems cheesy later. Probably the reason it doesn't later is that you saw so many things like that when you were young and they don't surprise you anymore.

antisthenes

3 months ago

1 reply

I agree.

I would give anything to feel a sense of wonder that I used to get when reading sci-fi in my youth.

But "can't enter the same river twice" and all that.

xmprt

3 months ago

1 reply

Who's writing good scifi these days which evoke that same sense of wonder? Project Hail Mary was a fun read but felt a bit too in the weeds with the details.

bobbiechen

3 months ago

Gotta be Ted Chiang. Try his short story collection titled Exhalation: Stories.

AnotherGoodName

3 months ago

A bit like saying Shakespeare is full of cliché’s. Which it is, but it literally invented those cliché’s.

joblessjunkie

3 months ago

2 replies

Reminds me quite a bit of Asimov’s “The Last Question”, which mines the same “computer-as-God” vein, is also very short, and has a suspiciously related title. Asimov’s story appeared in 1956, just two years later.

gjm11

3 months ago

My exact thought process on seeing the title here: "Ah, 'insufficient data for meaningful answer'. No, wait, that one's called 'The Last Question'. So perhaps it's 'There is now'." :-)

(Asimov's is better. Also, the version of this one in my memory is better than the actual story, in that "There is now" is better than the rather clunky equivalent in the story. I suppose it's possible that I'm remembering a different, slightly better written, story with the exact same idea.)

igravious

3 months ago

Came here to ask what was the Asimov story that echoed this ...

Animats

3 months ago

1 reply

It's the same story as "Company Man", posted here yesterday. But it was a new idea when Asimov wrote it.

dredmorbius

3 months ago

<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45443298>

rbanffy

3 months ago

1 reply

You might call it weak and gimmicky all you want, but it entrenched itself deeply into our collective imagination.

I saw many people come up independently with a direct quote from this story when they saw the IBM promotional image of a man standing in front of an IBM Quantum System One machine.

The image: https://www.techmonitor.ai/wp-content/uploads/sites/29/2023/...

imglorp

3 months ago

1 reply

I think humans are weak and prone to leaping on gimmicks and extrapolating with limited information to wherever their imagination takes them.

If shown a dazzling, mysterious, $10m glass cube draped with all that hyperbolic "quantum future wow!!" marketing, ordinarily smart people will leap to anything. In reality, QC doesn't seem to have a ton of applications yet.

rbanffy

3 months ago

1 reply

A lot, if not all, of those references were in jest. Nobody was expecting the machine to be an actual deity.

IAmBroom

3 months ago

1 reply

The post you're replying to doesn't suggest anyone expected deification.

The post suggests sparkly marketing hooplah wrapping up meager actuality.

rbanffy

3 months ago

> The post suggests sparkly marketing hooplah wrapping up meager actuality.

I don't think any of those who quoted from this story fell into the marketing hyperbole. We all know these machines are interesting engineering marvels, but far from actually useful at the moment, with the exception of a very narrow set of problems that fall within the narrow capabilities. The people who fell for it probably never heard of this story.

readthenotes1

3 months ago

1 reply

Fred Brown is also responsible for a famous Star Trek episode

anonymousiam

3 months ago

https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Fredric_Brown

igravious

3 months ago

1 reply

Was there a similar Asimov story that ended with the words, "let there be light!" ?

JKCalhoun