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Show HN: Babel – browse every book that will ever be written using simple math

6 points by tdjsnelling 3y ago

tomaslau 3y ago
I can’t comprehend how this is built but it’s impressive. It reminds me of the book “A Short Stay in Hell” by Steven L. Peck. “As a faithful Mormon, Soren Johansson has always believed he'll be reunited with his loved ones in an eternal hereafter. Then, he dies. Soren wakes to find himself cast by a God he has never heard of into a Hell whose dimensions he can barely grasp: a vast library he can only escape from by finding the book that contains the story of his life. In this haunting existential novella, author, philosopher, and ecologist Steven L. Peck explores a subversive vision of eternity, taking the reader on a journey through the afterlife of a world where everything everyone believed in turns out to be wrong.“
- KetoManx64 3y ago
  Thanks for sharing, i just read it after seeing your comment. What a dark and dreary ending. The book reminded me a lot of the Riverworld series by Philip Jose Farmer
- tdjsnelling 3y ago
  Thank you for sharing, I'll be sure to give that a read.
buzzm 3y ago
Fascinating. Well done! There is a certain eerieness to seeing this actually work. Although Borges lived to see computers becoming mainstream, I am sure he never imagined his artistic vision being implemented in such a strangely convenient and easy way.
- tdjsnelling 3y ago
  Thank you! Yes, if only he could have seen for himself.
ReD_CoDE 3y ago
Could you please explain what's it? And how does it work? It can search every possible book has written? It's something like character-based embedding? Also, it reminds me "category theory"
- tdjsnelling 3y ago
  It's an implementation of the 'Library of Babel', as described by Borges in his short story of the same name. It is a library of every possible permutation of a limited alphabet, of books 1,312,000 characters long. The FAQ page [1] and the GitHub readme [2] explain it in much more detail. [1] https://libraryofbabel.app/about https://libraryofbabel.app/about [2] https://github.com/tdjsnelling/babel https://github.com/tdjsnelling/babel

6 points by tdjsnelling 3y ago

I can’t comprehend how this is built but it’s impressive. It reminds me of the book “A Short Stay in Hell” by Steven L. Peck. “As a faithful Mormon, Soren Johansson has always believed he'll be reunited with his loved ones in an eternal hereafter. Then, he dies. Soren wakes to find himself cast by a God he has never heard of into a Hell whose dimensions he can barely grasp: a vast library he can only escape from by finding the book that contains the story of his life. In this haunting existential novella, author, philosopher, and ecologist Steven L. Peck explores a subversive vision of eternity, taking the reader on a journey through the afterlife of a world where everything everyone believed in turns out to be wrong.“

KetoManx64 3y ago
Thanks for sharing, i just read it after seeing your comment. What a dark and dreary ending. The book reminded me a lot of the Riverworld series by Philip Jose Farmer
tdjsnelling 3y ago
Thank you for sharing, I'll be sure to give that a read.

buzzm 3y ago

Fascinating. Well done! There is a certain eerieness to seeing this actually work. Although Borges lived to see computers becoming mainstream, I am sure he never imagined his artistic vision being implemented in such a strangely convenient and easy way.

tdjsnelling 3y ago
Thank you! Yes, if only he could have seen for himself.

ReD_CoDE 3y ago

Could you please explain what's it? And how does it work? It can search every possible book has written? It's something like character-based embedding? Also, it reminds me "category theory"

tdjsnelling 3y ago
It's an implementation of the 'Library of Babel', as described by Borges in his short story of the same name. It is a library of every possible permutation of a limited alphabet, of books 1,312,000 characters long. The FAQ page [1] and the GitHub readme [2] explain it in much more detail. [1] https://libraryofbabel.app/about https://libraryofbabel.app/about [2] https://github.com/tdjsnelling/babel https://github.com/tdjsnelling/babel