Google really does know everything.

[Alynn]

Step 1: Goto http://www.google.com

Step 2: Type "answer to life the universe and everything" into the search box

Step 3: Click the search button

Step 4: Feel emotions of mild bemusement to absolute delight 

[Darth Mandarb]

google = Deep Thought?

That's an interesting idea ...

I asked google/Deep thought for the ultimate question and it didn't know it.

So now we just need to figure out which search engine is earth ... they would know.

[Phemar]

Haha that's quite hilarious.

[space boy]

Deep thought gives you 1 answer after 7,5 million years.
Google gives you 141000 answers after 0,09 seconds.

[Pumaman]

Anyone or thing that answers the meaning of life question with 42 should be shot, castrated and then given an imaginationectomy.

[Sam.]

I would suggest that anything that answers 42 has already HAD an imaginationectomy. They require an imagionationoplasty.

[Ghost]

imagionationoplasty... superb. And I bet even Google can't figure it out.

oh wait. it can!

[Tuomas]

I don't get it

[space boy]

I don't get it

write "answer to life the universe and everything" without the quotation marks

and if you still don't get it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Answer_to_Life,_the_Universe,_and_Everything

[Tuomas]

pfft, never read the book, it's just dusting in the shelf.

[space boy]

never read it either. only got it after reading the spoiler on wikipedia.

[evenwolf]

I loved these books.  I have the giant volume sitting around here somewhere.  (incomplete of course because Adams kept writing more and more books!)

But I must go out on a limb here.   I like Adams but I also LOVE Kurt Vonnegut.  The Sirens of Titan was written in the fifities & it turns out to be a great source of inspiration to Adams:

"...this quote from Douglas Adams, recorded in 1979 and first published in the Darker Matter interview last month:

"Kurt Vonnegut I think is absolutely superb. I've read The Sirens of Titan six times now, and it gets better every time. He is an influence, I must own up. Sirens of Titan is just one of those books â€" you read it through the first time and you think it's very loosely, casually written. You think the fact that everything suddenly makes such good sense at the end is almost accidental. And then you read it a few more times, simultaneously finding out more about writing yourself, and you realise what an absolute tour de force it was, making something as beautifully honed as that appear so casual."

[R4L]

Ahh, what a great movie that was. 

[Nostradamus]

Nice, bur predictable.

I watched the movie and it was funny and now I have a huge book that contains all the books in Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy series (all 6) waiting to be read, bought it last week.
And since Douglas Adams is dead evewolf there won't be anymore in the series.

[evenwolf]

Now I can catch up with him!

[Radiant]

So, does Google still know where to find those WMDs?


Oh, and that movie was abysmal. The book is great but the way they treated in Hollywood is nothing short of horrific. Bad plot, bad cast, bad acting, bad special effects, and they even left out most of the well-known jokes!

[Ishmael]

WANHA

And indeed, the movie was horrible.

[Ashen]

I have a huge book that contains all the books in Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy series (all 6) waiting to be read, bought it last week.

What's the 6th? Salmon of Doubt - the unfinished 3rd Dirk Gently - I think Adams said could/should be reworked as a Hithchiker's book so as not to end the series on a downer, but AFAIK there's only 5 Hitchhikers books. If I'm missing one - gimme, gimme gimme.

And the film wasn't bad - not as good as it should have been, but not as bad as some make out. Martin Freeman was miscast, Marvin looked wrong, they buggered up some jokes, left out some 'famous' ones and included some obscure ones that only make sense if you've read the books, but it was mostly OK. It's in the history that the story changes slightly between versions, and the changes were mostly in keeping enough to work, IMO. The only unforgivable thing was getting Arthur & Trillian together, which pretty much goes against both characters.

[evenwolf]

It's unlikely he's glanced over the proposed sixth book but I imagine its just the manuscript notes for an unfinished book known as "Salmon of Doubt."     Which according to wikipedia was going to be a Dirk Gently book originally.

[Redwall]

The Hitchhikers omnibus (which I also have) has "Zaphod Plays it Safe", a short story, in addition to the five novels.

The Salmon of Doubt was still a Dirk Gently novel at the time of Adams' death. (I have the edition with essays, interviews, etc. along with what exists of the manuscript.)