Douglas Adams
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Revision as of 01:33, 31 March 2011
Douglas Noël Adams (11 March 1952 – 11 May 2001) was an author and radio dramatist.
His best known work is the science fiction trilogy of five books based on the radio series called “The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy” (H2G2 or H²G²). This work includes – in no particular order - the books, the TV series, the film, the follow up (second) radio series, a comic book, a computer game and, naturally, a towel. It is important that the location of the towel is always known to the owner.
Adams (a well known atheist, referred to in The God Delusion as Richard Dawkins's tallest convert) frequently mocked religion in his works. One example of this is the Babel Fish, which proved God's existence, therefore ironically destroying him in a poof of logic. Another, slightly less well-known creation, was the Electric Monk. This was a machine capable of believing any weird, (often religious) idea which the intelligent owner was unable (or unwilling) to believe in and so had the machine carry it out for him. Adams also developed an amusing demolition of the argument from design, imagining himself in the role of the water in a puddle, and thinking "what a benevolent universe, to have made this hole shaped exactly to fit me!"[1]
Towel Day
Towel Day is an annual celebration on the 25th of May. On that day, fans around the universe proudly carry a towel in Adams' honour. [2]
Douglas Adams Society
Douglas Adams also spawned many Douglas Adams Appreciation Societies (DougSoc, for short) in various universities around the UK. The main aim of these societies was to get exceptionally drunk in the spirit of Adams, rather than dedicate time directly to the author's works although occasionally getting together to watch Hitchhiker's Guide was acceptable once per term. The first DougSoc was formed in Oxford and later in Exeter and York (where DougSoc is still going strong and as drunk as ever). Douglas himself allegedly/definitely[3] referred to the Oxford University chapter of "DougSoc" in conversation/writing[3] as "a bunch of cunts/wankers[3]". Recently, the University of York society was partially responsible for subverting their local democratic process and electing a pirate as Students Union President. Surely Douglas would have approved of that... maybe.
Footnotes
- ↑ ". . . imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, ‘This is an interesting world I find myself in - an interesting hole I find myself in - fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!’ This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, it’s still frantically hanging on to the notion that everything’s going to be all right, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise. I think this may be something we need to be on the watch out for." —From a Speech given by Adams at Digital Biota 2, Cambridge, UK, 1998. Later quoted in Richard Dawkins’ eulogy for Douglas Adams
- ↑ Towel day website
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Depending on who you ask.