The Library of Babel is one of my favorite science fiction concepts of all time! Especially because now that the digital version of the Library exists, we may be on the verge of resolving the Perplexing Nexus.
So in the book, the library of Babel consists of a bunch of hexagonical rooms, arranged more or less like a beehive. Two walls are doors connecting them to adjoining hexagons. One wall contains the supplies necessary for human life. the other three walls contain these 410-page books (it’s 410 pages because that’s how long Borges’ copy of Don Quixote was), most of which are gibberish.
The story is mostly focused on what life is like for the humans inside the Library- their only source of stimulation is the books, they have no idea why they’re here, and they can’t get out. It’s generally agreed that the answer to why they’re here and how to get out is somewhere in the library, but there are literally TRILLIONS of books, and as stated above, even if you find one that makes sense, there’s no way to know if it’s true. some people have devoted themselves to searching for the way out, some just collect anything that makes sense, and some are wholesale burning every book they find to try to break the library.
Borges wrote his story in the 1930’s well before the advent of databases, and the mechanics of the library weren’t the main focus- the effect on people when confronted with the dubiousness of The Truth was. We now live in an era where the Library is Real- or at least, a digital version of it is, and we may be able to do something none of Borges’ characters could:
Actually sort the damn thing.
Text AI is unfortunately being used for stupid purposes, but we’re getting close to machines that can read text and reasonably judge if the text is gibberish or Real Words, and do so at speed. There are Trillions of Books, but we crunch bigger datasets than that.
Imagine a sorting algorithm that moves through the library, room by room, reading every book in the room in a flash, and flagging it as “total gibberish” or “some comprehensible text”, highlighting any comprehensible text, and perhaps even searching for cryptographic clues in the nonsense. It’s going through the library much, much faster than any human can, and methodically, room-by-room, never returning to a room it’s already processed, a but like the old phone game of Snake.
Acutally, kind of literally. I imagine it would manifest in the database as a sort of enormous serpent, twisting through the labyrinthine library, devouring books whole. The Comprehensible ones are left standing on the shelves in its wake, survivors not of a force of nature, but a cataclysm of technology.
Who created this monster? What parameters did they use? Why the hell did they make this thing? Can you trust the creator’s motives? and what about the serpent itself? Is it a mindless thing, following it’s creator’s orders, or is there a spark of self with in it? Has the consumption of this data changed it? Or are we talking to
So how about a sequel: The Serpent of Babel.
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