2001: A Space Odyssey (novel)

"Behind every man now alive stand thirty ghosts, for that is the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living. Since the dawn of time, roughly a hundred billion human beings have walked the planet Earth. Now this is an interesting number, for by a curious coincidence there are approximately a hundred billion stars in our local universe, the Milky Way. So for every man who has ever lived, in this Universe there shines a star."

"...there was already something in his gaze beyond the capability of any ape. In those dark, deep-set eyes was a dawning awareness- the first imitations of an intelligence that could not possibly fulfill itself for ages yet, and might soon be extinguished forever."

"But please remember this is only a work of fiction. The truth, as always, will be far stranger."

"The drought had lasted now for ten million years, and the reign of the terrible lizards had long since ended. Here on the Equator, in the continent which would one day be known as Africa, the battle for existence had reached a new climax of ferocity, and the victor was not yet in sight. In this barren and desiccated land, only the small or the swift or the fierce could flourish, or even hope to survive."

"Moon-Watcher saw that his father had died in the night. He did not know that the Old One was his father, for such a relationship was utterly beyond his understanding, but as he looked at the emaciated body he felt dim disquiet that was the ancestor of sadness…He never thought of his father again."

"In the caves, between spells of fitful dozing and fearful waiting, were being born the nightmares of generations yet to be."

"And then there came a sound which Moon-Watcher could not possibly have identified, for it had never been heard before in the history of the world. It was the clank of metal upon stone."

"Moon-Watcher had no idea of its cause, still less of its cure; but discontent had come into his soul, and he had taken one small step toward humanity."

"The very atoms of his simple brain were being twisted into new patterns. If he survived, those patterns would become eternal, for his genes would pass them on to future generations. It was a slow, tedious business, but the crystal monolith was patient. Neither it, nor its replicas scattered across half the globe, expected to succeed with all the scores of groups involved in the experiment."

"Moon-Watcher started to move toward the nearest pig. It was a young and foolish animal, even by the undemanding standards of warthog intelligence."

"Others stood hesitantly around the corpse — the future of a world waiting upon their decision. It was a surprisingly long time before one of the nursing females began to lick the gory stone she was holding in her paws…and before Moon-Watcher really understood that he need never be hungry again."

"The man-apes had been given their first chance. There would be no second one; the future was, very literally, in their own hands. Moons waxed and waned; babies were born and sometimes lived; feeble, toothless thirty-year-olds died; the leopard took its toll in the night; the Others threatened daily across the river - and the tribe prospered. In the course of a single year, Moon-Watcher and his companions had changed almost beyond recognition."

"The leopard knew that something was wrong when it felt a stunning blow on its head."

"Moon-Watcher was holding a stout branch, and impaled upon it was the bloody head of the leopard. When he reached the far side of the stream, One-Ear was still standing his ground. Perhaps he was too brave or too stupid to run. Coward or hero, it made no difference in the end, as the frozen snarl of death came crashing down upon his uncomprehending head."

"For a few seconds Moon-Watcher stood uncertainly above his new victim…he was master of the world, and he was not quite sure what to do next. But he would think of something."

"A new animal was abroad on the planet, spreading slowly out from the African heartland. It was still so rare that a hasty census might have overlooked it. In the hundred thousand years since the crystals had descended upon Africa, the man-apes had invented nothing. But they had started to change, and had developed skills which no other animal possessed."

"Outside the tropics, the glaciers slew those who had prematurely left their ancestral home. But, unlike so many others, the man-apes had not merely become extinct - they had been transformed. The toolmakers had been remade by their own tools."

"They had learned to speak, and so had won their first great victory over Time. Now the knowledge of one generation could be handed on to the next. Unlike the animals, who knew only the present, Man had acquired a past; and he was beginning to grope toward a future."

"Presently he invented philosophy, and religion. And he peopled the sky, not altogether inaccurately, with gods."

"The spear, the bow, the gun, and finally the guided missile had given him weapons of infinite range and all but infinite power. Without those weapons, often though he had used them against himself, Man would never have conquered his world. Into them he had put his heart and soul, and for ages they had served him well. But now, as long as they existed, he was living on borrowed time."

"No matter how many times you left Earth, Dr. Heywood Floyd told himself, the excitement never really palled. He had been to Mars once, to the Moon three times, and to the various space stations more often than he could remember. Yet as the moment of takeoff approached, he was conscious of a rising tension, a feeling of wonder and awe - yes; and of nervousness - which put him on the same level as any Earth lubber about to receive his first baptism of space."

"The jet that had rushed him here from Washington, after that midnight briefing with the President, was now dropping down toward one of the most familiar, yet most exciting, landscapes in all the world. There lay the first two generations of the Space Age. Spanning twenty miles of the Florida coast to the south were the giant gantries of the Saturns and Neptunes, that had set men on the path to the planets, and had now passed into history."

"In a million years, the human race had lost few of its aggressive instincts; along symbolic lines visible only to politicians, the thirty-eight nuclear powers watched one another with belligerent anxiety."

"Perhaps the Chinese were only trying to shore up their sagging economy, by turning obsolete weapons systems into hard cash, as some observers had suggested. Or perhaps they had discovered methods of warfare so advanced that they no longer had need of such toys; there had been talk of radio hypnosis from satellite transmitters, compulsion viruses, and blackmail by synthetic diseases for which they alone possessed the antidote. These charming ideas were almost certainly propaganda or pure fantasy, but it was not safe to discount any of them."

""Hmm," said Moisevitch, obviously quite unconvinced. "Seems odd to me that you, an astronomer, should be sent up to the Moon to look into an epidemic…Then do you know what TMA-1 means?” Miller seemed about to choke on his drink, but Floyd was made of sterner stuff. He looked his old friend straight in the eye, and said calmly: "TMA-1? What an odd expression. Where did you hear it?” "Never mind," retorted the Russian. "You can't fool me. But if you've run into something you can't handle, I hope you don't leave it until too late before you yell for help.”"

"When he tired of official reports, Floyd would plug his foolscap-sized News pad into the ship's information circuit. One by one he would conjure up the world's major electronic papers…He sometimes wondered if the News pad, and the fantastic technology behind it, was the last word in man's quest for perfect communications. Here he was, far out in space, speeding away from Earth at thousands of miles an hour, yet in a few milliseconds he could see the headlines of any newspaper he pleased. (That very word "newspaper," of course, was an anachronistic hangover into the age of electronics.) It was hard to imagine how the system could be improved or made more convenient. But sooner or later, Floyd guessed, it would pass away, to be replaced by something as unimaginable as the News pad itself would have been to Caxton or Gutenberg."

"So here, Floyd told himself, is the first generation of the Spaceborne; there would be more of them in the years to come. Though there was sadness in this thought, there was also a great hope. When Earth was tamed and tranquil, and perhaps a little tired, there would still be scope for those who loved freedom, for the tough pioneers, the restless adventurers…The time was fast approaching when Earth, like all mothers, must say farewell to her children."

""I met Moisevitch at the Space Station…he'd heard of TMA-1; rumors are beginning to leak out. But we just can't issue any statement, until we know what the damn thing is and whether our Chinese friends are behind it.”"

"Floyd was particularly struck by a collection of signs, obviously assembled with loving care, which carried such messages as PLEASE KEEP OFF THE GRASS…NO PARKING ON EVEN DAYS…DEFENSE DE FUMER…TO THE BEACH…CATTLE CROSSING…SOFT SHOULDERS and DO NOT FEED THE ANIMALS. If these were genuine - as they certainly appeared to be - their transportation from Earth had cost a small fortune. There was a touching defiance about them; on this hostile world, men could still joke about the things they had been forced to leave behind - and which their children would never miss."

"At first we thought it might be an outcrop of magnetic rock," Dr. Michaels said, "but all the geological evidence was against it. And not even a big nickel-iron meteorite could produce a field as intense as this; so we decided to have a look."

""My colleagues and I will stake our reputations on this. TMA-l has nothing to do with the Chinese. Indeed, it has nothing to do with the human race - for when it was buried, there were no humans.”"

"Here, at the very portals of Earth, man was already face to face with a mystery that might never be solved. Three million years ago, something had passed this way, had left this unknown and perhaps unknowable symbol of its purpose, and had returned to the planets — or to the stars."

"After three million years of darkness, TMA-1 had greeted the lunar dawn."

"Deep Space Monitor 19 had noted something strange — a faint yet unmistakable disturbance rippling across the Solar System…As would Orbiter M 15, circling Mars; and High Inclination Probe 21, climbing slowly above the plane of the ecliptic; and even Artificial Comet 5, heading out into the cold wastes beyond Pluto. As soon as he glanced at his morning report, the Radiation Forecaster at Goddard knew that something strange had passed through during the last twenty-four hours. Some immaterial pattern of energy, throwing off a spray of radiation like the wake of a racing speedboat, had leaped from the face of the Moon, and was heading out toward the stars."

"The ship was still only thirty days from Earth, yet David Bowman sometimes found it hard to believe that he had ever known any other existence than the closed little world of Discovery. All his years of training, all his earlier missions to the Moon and Mars, seemed to belong to another man, in another life. Frank Poole admitted to the same feelings, and had sometimes jokingly regretted that the nearest psychiatrist was the better part of a hundred million miles away."

"Soft light flooded into the chamber; Bowman saw moving shapes silhouetted against the widening entrance. And in that moment, all his memories came back to him, and be knew exactly where he was. Though he had come back safely from the furthest borders of sleep, and the nearest borders of death, he had been gone only a week. When he left the Hibernaculum, he would not see the cold Saturnian sky; that was more than a year in the future and a billion miles away. He was still in the trainer at the Houston Space Flight Center under the hot Texas sun."

"Hal (for Heuristically programmed Algorithmic computer, no less) was a masterwork of the third computer breakthrough. These seemed to occur at intervals of twenty years, and the thought that another one was now imminent already worried a great many people. The first had been in the 1940s, when the long-obsolete vacuum tube had made possible such clumsy, high-speed morons as ENIAC and its successors. Then, in the 1960s, solid-state microelectronics had been perfected. With its advent, it was clear that artificial intelligences at least as powerful as Man's need be no larger than office desks…In the 1980s, Minsky and Good had shown how neural networks could be generated automatically — self replicated — in accordance with any arbitrary learning program. Artificial brains could be grown by a process strikingly analogous to the development of a human brain."

"Whether Hal could actually think was a question which had been settled by the British mathematician Alan Turing back in the 1940s. Turing had pointed out that, if one could carry out a prolonged conversation with a machine — whether by typewriter or microphone was immaterial — without being able to distinguish between its replies and those that a man might give, then the machine was thinking, by any sensible definition of the word. Hal could pass the Turing test with ease."

"The time might even come when Hal would take command of the ship. In an emergency…if there was no reply from Earth, he would take what measures he deemed necessary to safeguard the ship and to continue the mission — whose real purpose he alone knew."

"Although Bowman was nominal Captain on this phase of the mission, no outside observer could have deduced the fact. He and Poole switched roles, rank, and responsibilities completely every twelve hours. This kept them both at peak training, minimized the chances of friction, and helped toward the goal of 100 percent redundancy."

"Fifty years ago, Bowman would have been considered a specialist in applied astronomy, cybernetics, and space propulsion systems — yet he was prone to deny, with genuine indignation, that he was a specialist at all. Bowman had never found it possible to focus his interest exclusively on any subject; despite the dark warnings of his instructors, he had insisted on taking his Master's degree in General Astronautics — a course with a vague and woolly syllabus, designed for those whose IQs were in the low 130s and who would never reach the top ranks of their profession. His decision had been right; that very refusal to specialize had made him uniquely qualified for his present task."

"Bowman had become fascinated by the great explorations of the past — understandably enough, in the circumstances. Sometimes he would cruise with Pytheas out through the Pillars of Hercules, along the coast of a Europe barely emerging from the Stone Age, and venture almost to the chill mists of the Arctic. Or, two thousand years later, he would pursue the Manila galleons with Anson, sail with Cook along the unknown hazards of the Great Barrier Reef, achieve with Magellan the first circumnavigation of the world. And he began to read the Odyssey, which of all books spoke to him most vividly across the gulfs of time."

""Mission Control, this is X-ray-Delta-One. At two-zero-four-five, on-board fault prediction center in our niner-triple-zero computer showed Alpha Echo three five unit as probable failure within seventy-two hours. Request check your telemetry monitoring and suggest you review unit in your ship systems simulator. Also, confirm your approval our plan to go EVA and replace Alpha Echo three five unit prior to failure. Mission Control, this is X-ray-Delta-One, two-one-zero-three transmission concluded.”"

"Discovery was no longer a happy ship."

""Hello, X-ray-Delta-One — this is Mission Control. We have completed the analysis of your AE-35 difficulty, and both our Hal Nine Thousands are in agreement…The trouble lies in the prediction circuits, and we believe that it indicates a programming conflict which we can only resolve if you disconnect your Nine Thousand and switch to Earth Control Mode. You will therefore take the following steps, beginning at 2200 Ship Time—” The voice of Mission Control faded out. At the same moment, the Alert sounded, forming a wailing background to Hal's "Condition Yellow! Condition Yellow!”"

"Bowman's movement in the field of view must have triggered something in the unfathomable mind that was now ruling over the ship; for suddenly, Hal spoke. "Too bad about Frank, isn't it?” "Yes," Bowman answered, after a long pause. "It is.” "I suppose you're pretty broken up about it?”"

"Deliberate error was unthinkable. Even the concealment of truth filled him with a sense of imperfection, of wrongness — of what, in a human being, would have been called guilt. For like his makers, Hal had been created innocent; but, all too soon, a snake had entered his electronic Eden. For the last hundred million miles, he had been brooding over the secret he could not share with Poole and Bowman…who would not learn the mission's full purpose, until there was need to know. So ran the logic of the planners; but their twin gods of Security and National Interest meant nothing to Hal. He was only aware of the conflict that was slowly destroying his integrity."

"The link with Earth, over which his performance was continually monitored, had become the voice of a conscience he could no longer fully obey… He had been threatened with disconnection… So he would protect himself, with all the weapons at his command… And then, following the orders that had been given to him in case of the ultimate emergency, he would continue the mission — unhindered, and alone."

""Something seems to have happened to the life-support system, Dave.” Bowman took no notice. He was carefully studying the little labels on the logic units. "I think there's been a failure in the pod-bay doors," Hal remarked conversationally. "Lucky you weren't killed.” Bowman released the locking bar on the section labeled COGNITIVE FEEDBACK… "Hey, Dave," said Hal. "What are you doing?” He began to pull out the panel marked EGO-REINFORCEMENT. "Look here, Dave," said Hal, "an irreplaceable amount of effort has gone into making me what I am.” He started on the AUTO-INTELLECTION panel. "Dave," said Hal, "I don't understand…"

"Heywood Floyd looked as if he had had very little sleep, and his face was lined with worry. But whatever his feelings, his voice sounded firm and reassuring; he was doing his utmost to project confidence to the lonely man on the other side of the Solar System. "First of all, Dr. Bowman," be began, "we must congratulate you on the way you handled this extremely difficult situation. You did exactly the right thing in dealing with an unprecedented and unforeseen emergency.""