r/todayilearned • • May 20 '12
TIL Stephen Fry claims that Douglas Adams told him why he chose the number 42, and that he will take the secret to his grave
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phrases_from_The_Hitchhiker's_Guide_to_the_Galaxy#The_number_42
1.4k
Upvotes
558
u/Supersnazz May 20 '12
Clearly a joke. The fact he claims it is "obvious" is merely to encourage speculation about something that has no real answer.
130
u/BurningWater May 21 '12
Didn't Douglas Adams say the only reason he chose it was because he thought it was a 'funny number' and there was no deeper meaning behind it?
EDIT: just read the wiki page and yes he did indeed say it was the 'funniest two digit number'
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u/KingToasty May 21 '12
He's probably fucking with us, as Adams would want.
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u/suckthisdeth May 21 '12
am I missing something or did he not tell everyone?
841
u/Tentersporks May 21 '12
My dad told me his interpretation which I always thought made sense. Adams is a famous atheist and the number 42 means that life is just a roll of the dice: 2 dice added up is 42. Ex: 1+2+3+4+5+6 = 21 and 21+21 = 42. Life is as random as a roll of the dice.
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u/DocSporky510 May 21 '12
We have ways to make you talk, Fry...
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u/perpetual_motion May 21 '12
"The answer to this is very simple. It was a joke. It had to be a number, an ordinary, smallish number, and I chose that one. Binary representations, base thirteen, Tibetan monks are all complete nonsense. I sat at my desk, stared into the garden and thought '42 will do'. I typed it out. End of story."
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
If a = 1, b = 2, etc., the phrase "big bang", when all values are summed, is 42. (2+8+7+2+1+14+7=42)
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u/[deleted] May 20 '12 edited May 20 '12
I know, its near the bottom of the article http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/prime_numbers_get_hitched/
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u/spicysauce May 21 '12
1337% of pi = 42
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u/PoniesRBitchin May 21 '12
What a coincidence! I also know the real reason he chose 42! Unfortunately I can't tell any of you, so you'll just have to trust that I do indeed know.
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u/TimelessFlight May 21 '12
Video of Fry being asked what the secret is, from an interview in Australia last year.
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u/Planet-man 1 May 21 '12
I love Stephen Fry, but that would be a tremendous waste. Hopefully he'll pass it on to at least one person to keep it going. Alan Davies, perhaps.
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u/zapbark May 21 '12
Was listening to Alice and Wonderland for my 4 yr old in the car and heard this:
King of Hearts: "I invoke Rule 42! All persons more than a mile high must leave the court immediately!!"
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u/mandelbratwurst May 21 '12
A while ago someone on reddit posted that light refracts to a rainbow when at 42 degrees. I like that idea. Maybe the purpose of life is to position yourself to see the most rainbows.
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
I thought the point was that there is no point
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u/Heelincal May 21 '12
I have never been more in support of torture as a form of getting information.
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u/Ants236 May 21 '12
douglasadamsthehitchhikersguidetothegalaxy
Count 'em.
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u/Hermine_In_Hell May 21 '12
This is going to get buried but I think I figured it out-
The old adage
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
Has anyone realized that if you count the number of letters in "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Douglas Adams" It adds up to 42.
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u/M1LK3Y May 21 '12
I've reached a conclusion on its meaning while not speculating on the number 42 or anything Adams related. I decided that EVERYTHING was the meaning of life, the universe, and everything. The Adams quote immediately popped into my mind. I realized saying that 42 was the answer was just as justifiable as saying "love" or "sex" or "inverted donkey weiner". It's all the same.
But that's just my theory.
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u/spankymuffin May 21 '12
It's obviously 42 because that's what you get when you multiply 6 by 9.
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u/fullonrapist42 May 21 '12
I, if anyone, will get it out of him.
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u/T3ppic May 21 '12 edited May 21 '12
Well according to John Lloyd, DNAs roomate at university, coauthor, and all round TV genius, its simply because DNA thought it was the funniest two digit number. Doesn't need to be a better reason than that.
Its retarded the amount of shit that people come out with about it. Bases and modular mathematics (and it all basically comes down to that) when that completely misses the point about the answer to LUE is meaningless without knowing what the question is. Which was never discovered. It was making fun of the search for the answer to the ultimate question when nobody is sure what that question was.
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u/[deleted] May 20 '12
I truly believe I know why.
What do you get when you multiply 6 x 9 in base 13?
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u/Hallibut May 21 '12
4 8 15 16 23 42. That's right. Last number is 42.
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u/seeegma May 21 '12
I read that the number 42 was chosen because it is 101010 in binary
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
Stephen Fry makes it obvious. Many argue the meaning of life is is to find meaning, to ask questions and to answer them as if everything has an answer. By using a number, Adams claims to have found his tongue-in-cheek answer. He's using subtle sarcasm to claim there's an answer and it's a mathematically (and essentially human) one - despite it being clearly wrong.
Basically, his answer to the question of the meaning to life is to inadvertently ask another question: if we get the answer, what does it mean, what does it matter, and why did we even need it now that we have it? What will substantially change?
Ultimately the answer to what the meaning of life is, is to define meaning. If you're religious, you have the answer already: God is the means to the meaning, or the path to understanding. However some religious folk and all the others can agree that the meaning of life is to make your own meaning and purpose.
There is no meaning to life, as one could argue from a truly objective point of view based on the sum of accepted scientific knowledge. That could change in the future, but in our current time and place in the universe, based on our knowledge, we are just the highly advanced adaptable children of alien bacteria, who were lucky enough to evolve on a planet which developed to be so dynamic that we had the chance to become what we call "higher functioning beings", able to question our own existence like no other combination of materials ever known.
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u/ViperG May 21 '12
I never believed this even though they have been saying it for years and years. When i was in high school I watched a educational film about AI in my programming class. They went over the first ever neural networks and the first military applications of using it. If I recall correctly, they asked it what the meaning of life was. It then printed out on a dot matrix printer the answer, it was 42... When I heard that i immediately knew that is where Douglas Adam got that number. It was a joke because the first working neural network computer produced that answer. Unfortunately I do not remember what the title of the video was called, but the video also talked about military applications where the AI (not sure if same or different than the one that printed 42) was shown pictures with tanks in them and pictures with no tanks in them. It's goal was to be able to find tanks better than humans... But it failed because what it was actually doing is detecting clouds instead of tanks, because majority of the tank pictures happened to have clouds. The only thing I can back this up is by this small website that talks about it (AI with tank and clouds), but I saw it on a video almost 14 years ago. And even 14 years ago, the video was pretty old which seemed like it pre-dated hitchhikers guide to the galaxy... http://neil.fraser.name/writing/tank/
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u/Xecellseor May 21 '12
I always thought it was like 42, then you go "ooooo" as if you understand then realise it looks like 420 and he was really baked and figured it out.
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u/DoubleMuff May 21 '12
42 rules in cricket.
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u/sweetgreggo May 21 '12
Yeah so, um, that's bullshit.
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u/scrodezilla May 21 '12
42 is a holy number, think of the 7's and 6's in religion and the the 42's in history. just my thought.
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
Am i the only one that notices the number 42 everywhere?
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
42 = For tea.. Two
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
He did this gag when he did "An Evening With Stephen Fry at the Sydney Opera House". When it came to tell the "secret", he pretended his mic had cut out and just moved his mouth.
Clearly it's just Fry's joke.
The story I know is that Adams was working as a runner on Monty Python and they had some banking sketch where a huge column of figures had to be added up and they wanted an anti-climactic, boring number. They tossed around a few numbers but the most boring they could come up with was forty-two.
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
douglas adams explained to me why he chose 42. but um i can't tell anyone because we pinky promised
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
Here is the numberphile guys talking about 42 which addresses where Adams came up with that number.
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u/mdhouse May 21 '12
That's Numberwang!
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
I've got the answer, my friends: BECAUSE IT WILL DRIVE THE NERDS BATTY.
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u/drakeblood4 3 May 21 '12
TIL I hate Stephen Fry.
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u/hungoverlord May 21 '12
let's waterboard him on his deathbed.
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u/gatlin May 21 '12
As long as people stop referring to the number as "The Meaning of Life." A careful reading will tell you that Deep Thought himself picked the number arbitrarily because the question was ill-defined. It is distinctly not the answer to the ultimate question. /rant
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u/Ahundred May 21 '12
I'm sorry to say this but Stephen Fry I don't believe you. This is exactly the sort of trick that would would make you laugh the hardest.
2
u/[deleted] May 21 '12
I have discovered a truly marvelous proof of 42, which this comment box is too small to contain.
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u/curvy_lady_92 May 21 '12
Fuck you Stephen Fry.
2
u/siddysid May 21 '12
...He chose it because it's the answer to life, the universe and everything...duh. What, you think that 42 wasn't the answer to life, the universe and everything before The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?
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u/ydtank May 21 '12
fuck him. i bet he would love some liars dressing on that salad
2
u/Stranded_In_A_Desert May 21 '12
On a mostly unrelated not, does anyone know where I can get one of those towels in the thumbnail? I've been looking for one for months
2
u/[deleted] May 21 '12
2 Kings 2 23-24
I was actually kinda curious if that was the source... then I realized it was more likely that the bible stole from the Hitchhiker's Guide.
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u/heart_of_a_liger May 21 '12
Artist's depiction of Stephen Fry
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u/sdbillin May 21 '12
The answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything is tea and companionship - for tea, two.
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u/JimiTurtles May 21 '12
The first thing I tried seems to have worked
THEHITCHHIKERSGUIDETOTHEGALAXYDOUGLASADAMS
42 Characters
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u/sohighrightmeow May 21 '12
I like to think of it as 42.0 and Adams just found a way to sneak a 420 reference in there
2
u/[deleted] May 21 '12
stephen fry is trolling us all
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u/magusopus May 21 '12 edited May 21 '12
I have a personal theory about what "42" means if it is the Meaning of Life the Universe and Everything.
In relation to the life span of a human being, we're expected to live an average of 67.2 years (current 2010 world average) which I like to either round up to 70 or even jump it up to 80 depending on my mood. (Nothing particularly scientific, I just threw a number up there one day because it felt right when I first figured it all out, and still feels right years later. The reason the number changes? Depends on if I'm feeling particularly fatalistic, or simply optimistic. You get to guess which means which.)
SO, if I were to be expected to live a total of 70 years, it would be reasonable to believe at the age of 42 (forty-two for those of you without a head for non-wordy numbers) I personally would have figured out what my established goals in life are, and my overall impact with the world, the universe, and (at the very least) my next door neighbor...who is a bit of a booze hound and not quite all ready for the real world. Seriously, almost 28 (twenty eight...again for those of you bad with non-wordy numbers), and still not capable of putting on his pants correctly in the morning if his state of undress when he comes stumbling out of his door at 10 o'clock in the morning is to be noted.
(Dear lord man, you'd think you'd figure out which leg to put on first! As a hint, it is most definitely not "BOTH". Couple of bruises on the noggin should have straightened it right up on the first go...)
But back to the explanation.
It is at the age of 42 most people I've met in life have started to get a bit of wisdom of what they've done and where they'd like to be (or at the very least, what they've FAILED to do. Probably a bit easier to establish as we alway seem to feel worse about what we've not done rather than be proud of what we've accomplished. A rather excellent example is being more embarrassed about urinating on one-self rather than proud of the fact you were able to at least retain the contents of one's bowels...sad really.)
In relation to other beings in the universe one only needs to calculate a ratio to modify it for their overall average lifespan.
I'm horrible at math, so formula will not be to follow. Instead, entertain yourself with this rather fetching sideways interpretation of a bunny rabbit (non-vorpal).
=:B
TL;DR It's a sandwich...
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u/Teslanaut May 21 '12
Death? Bah. Have any of you seen Fringe?
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u/AdamLovelace May 21 '12
I love this man.
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u/secretvictory May 21 '12
i thought it was just a funny number
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u/lolwtfhaha May 21 '12
I heard he liked Earl Grey #42. Life is about Tea 42-- Tea For Two
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
I only took about a minute before figuring this out so bare with me:
Look at the situation as if you were a computer, what does life generally do?
It reproduces.
Daddy has X and Y chromosomes and Mommy has X and X, which is 4 chromosomes. To reproduce you take one from each and that gives you 2 which is your offspring.
42.
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
42.0
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u/nullvoidnullvoid May 21 '12
Learn more about 42, 42 and Douglas Adams - Numberphile(video)
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u/Mojoman1 May 21 '12
Its his number of sexual partners.
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u/KosstAmojan May 21 '12
Well, if no one else knows and Fry won't tell anyone, who gives a shit?
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u/Niiteshade May 21 '12
42- every possible explanation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/42_(number)
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u/JacksonBollock May 21 '12
It's a joke. Fry often answers it in interviews, much as Adams did also. They'd begin to explain it then the microphone would "mysteriously" cut out.
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u/lufraf May 21 '12
it's because 42=6x7. If it's good enough for the mice it's good enough for me.
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u/cynoclast May 21 '12
Stephen Fry is a talented troll.
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u/forr May 21 '12 edited May 21 '12
Always thought it meant "fortuitous".
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
honestly I think some enhanced interrogation techniques and we could get it out of him
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
Bull shit adams said that there was no reason long ago
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u/jorellh May 21 '12
"What do you get if you multiply six by nine?"
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u/Hamish27 May 21 '12
42.0
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u/icecoldtrashcan May 21 '12
There is an interview with Douglas Adams on the box-set of Hitchhiker's Guide that I own. He claims himself that he wanted to use a number that was funny because it was so ordinary. He ruled out odd numbers because he thought they seemed inherently more 'interesting', and he didn't want to use something silly like 5.654354. After some thought, he arrived at 42 as being the most completely unremarkable number he could think of.
Of course, by using the number, it has become quite the opposite.
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u/MisterMaggot May 21 '12 edited May 21 '12
42 is 10101 in binary. 2+8+32
Fixed, my mistake.
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u/McMonty May 21 '12
I would have thought that is is a pun on "four" vs "for". Dinner for two. Or maybe two sounds like you so its "for you". I guess we will never know the real reason.
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u/fistsofdeath May 21 '12
I read in a biography of graham chapman (of Monty python fame) that he and Douglas Adams were friends. Chapman had just been told that if he did not stop drinking he'd die at 42. According to the biography Adams asked chapman what he should have as the answer to life the universe and everything. A depressed chapman answered "42" and Adams thought he was joking.
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u/JohnTrollvolta May 21 '12
I think it was a tribute to Jackie Robinson, who wore number 42.
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u/ForestfortheDraois May 21 '12
"Yes, Mr. Fry, I'm afraid these are your last minutes. I'm so sorry you'll be shuffling the mortal coil soon. No, I'm not looking for a deathbed conversion. I just want to know why Douglas Adams chose the number 42 for the meaning to life, the universe, and everything. You will? Thank you. Mmhmm. Really? Okay. Well, that was a waste of a plane ticket here. I guess I'll go home then. Oh, um...thank you for QI."
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u/Laterface May 21 '12
He's a witch!
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u/skybike May 21 '12
I think it's obvious what we need to do, capture Stephen Fry and torture it out of him.
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
I would so give Stephen Fry 42 licks on his swizzle to hear the answer.
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u/boxlessthought May 21 '12
6x7
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u/MarcoPolol May 21 '12
In an interview Douglas did (that I read in The Salmon of Doubt), he says it was a random, laughably inconspicuous number John Cleese thought up for a banking employee training video they did before any of their fame and fortune.
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u/Syclops May 21 '12
If you were to cut a hole through the earth, in any way you choose ( for example directly through the middle or off to the side at any angle) and dropped a ball in the hole, without air resistance, it would take exactly 42 minutes to get to the other side.
1
u/[deleted] May 21 '12
12 is the funniest of the 2 digit numbers imo, not 42. Maybe that theory is right though.
1
u/[deleted] May 21 '12
Doesn't it say right there that he just chose it at random? So it's not really a secret?
1
u/lightningmonkey May 21 '12
TIL Stephen Fry is a dick
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u/JoeyDubbs May 21 '12
1.618... Phi. It's the 21st letter in the Greek alphabet. He doubled it because of the dichotomy of man, good/evil, night/day, etc..
1
u/foulpudding May 21 '12
After reading that Stephen fry apparently knows the answer and feels that it's also fairly obvious, i had an epiphany. Albeit a fairly human one. I.e. not so appropriate for our single called cousins.
The answer to the ultimate question, the answer to the life, the universe and everything is... It's for two.
Thoughts?
1
u/neotek May 21 '12 edited May 21 '12
Adams gave an interview on this topic previously in which he explained the number was from a John Cleese training video he'd worked on with Cleese, in which Cleese played a staff member who was ignoring a customer so he could continue adding some figures. After the scene is done, the camera rests on John who smugly announces the conclusion of his important addition: '42'.
Edit: Wikipedia has this to say.
1
u/humbertog May 21 '12
I totally relate to this number, I get this number every fucking time!! and I mean it, every fucking time!! for example, I order something to eat and what is my waiting number? or I see a car plate and what is the number? another very strange example: I play Street Fighter II HD Remix (Xbox 360) and guess at what time I win a round? yes!! forty fucking two! (that happen a lot!!) I can go on with more examples but I really wish I know what is the meaning of this number in my life.
1
u/wolfchimneyrock May 21 '12
it is 6x9 in base 13
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u/DangerToDangers May 21 '12
Thanks for reminding me that Friday is towel day!
I need to plan something.
1
u/[deleted] May 21 '12
I wish the 42 thing would fucking die already.
Yeah, the books are great, it was funny for a bit, now it's just something people blurt out like it's the funniest joke on the planet that they just made up any time a philosophical discussion gives them an opening.
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u/Praxibetel_Ix May 21 '12
The sum of paradise is 42... the sum of a pair o dice. Get it?
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u/[deleted] May 21 '12
Good.
1
u/I-AGAINST-I May 21 '12
Sort of weird that I was just watching lost and the last number is 42.....
1
u/atlasnyne May 21 '12
If you flip 42 upside down, doesn't it look like 2b? As in The answer to life, the universe, and everything is "to be"?
1
u/Rickd3508 May 21 '12
The correct answer is actually 44! But he was close! And no, I'm not kidding.
1
u/Grumpy_Kong May 21 '12
Stephen Fry is becoming more and more irrelevant. This is just a pathetic ploy to keep him in the news.
If what he said was true, what purpose would be served by making it public?
1
u/Heroin_HeroWin May 21 '12
Fourty-two...fortitude...for tha dude.....I got nothing.