The Clarke in the Multiverse

I read Childhood's End the first time when I was maybe 12. Another great novel of his was A Fall of Moon Dust- it was so full of suspense that I finished it in one sitting :-)

The strange thing is that I was watching Space Odyssey 2001 on Comcast in high-def just the day Sir Arthur C. Clarke died, and was mentioning to my wife how glad I was that he was still around.

Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan made me into what I am today. Clarke was the last living guru from my childhood. The three inspired me to work hard in science and maths and to get a PhD in Machine Learning (AI). Motivated by Isaac Asmiov's positronic brain, many scientists have been working on ideas that can bring AI brain-power closer to human-level intelligence, or even surpass it. Even if I personally don't succeed in something that big (though I am surely inspired enough to try), I believe one or more of the thousands of others inspired by the same great people will soon succeed in bringing about a new millenia-level shift for humanity; which breakthrough will be the first to affect us all is unknown, but that's what makes it exciting to live today - a Space Elevator, SETI discovering an alien signal from a nearby star, human-level AI, warp drive, unlimited human hibernation, ability to repair frost damaged cells, a cure for human aging, expansion of humanity on to Mars, terraforming of Mars, discovery of complex life-forms in the Europan ocean - the list is pretty long...

Here is another nice tribute article on Space.com for Clarke.

Another interesting idea: long live Arthur C. Clarke in our Multiverse; in some other Universe of our Multiverse, where longevity was discovered earlier than in ours (thanks again to one of his inspired pupils), he is still alive and kicking. Perhaps one day, from that Universe, he will figure out a way (with help from some other advances in physics and technology) to send a copy of himself back into ours. If it does not sound familiar, read Space Odyssey 3001 :-)