Answer-adapted for pre-intermediate level

  

Answer

By Fredric Brown

Level: pre-intermediate and up

This is a classic science fiction story about the topic of AI (artificial intelligence: intelligent machines). AI is becoming better and better. In the next hundred years, it’s very possible that we will have AI that can think as well as humans and perhaps even better than humans. This story imagines what might happen thousands of years in the future, if AI continues to improve. You can read the original version here.

Dwar Ev made the final connection to the machine with a piece of golden cable. Many television cameras watched him and sent pictures through the universe of what he was doing.

He gave a sign to Dwar Reyn, then moved to a position next to the button that would turn on the machine when he pressed it. The button that would connect all of the supercomputers of all the planets in the universe—ninety-six billion planets—into the super-link that would connect them all into one great supercomputer, one machine that would combine all the knowledge of all the galaxies.

Dwar Reyn spoke briefly to the trillions of people who were watching and listening. Then after a silence he said, "Now, Dwar Ev."

Dwar Ev pressed the button. There was a loud sound, the great flow of power from ninety-six billion planets. Lights flashed along the computer, which was as big as a city.

Dwar Ev stepped back and breathed deeply. "Dwar Reyn, you have the honor to ask the first question."

"Thank you," said Dwar Reyn. "It will be a question which no computer has been able to answer."

He turned to the machine. "Is there a God?"

The great voice of the machine answered without pause, without any of its lights flashing to calculate the answer.

"Yes, now there is a God."

Suddenly, the face of Dwar Ev showed fear. He jumped to hit the button to turn off the computer.

A flash of lightning from the cloudless sky hit him and broke the button, so that they could not turn off the computer.

Vocabulary:  To help learners fully understand the audio and transcript, most vocabulary that might be unknown for this lesson’s level is provided. Vocab in bold is more useful for learners at the lesson’s target level. Try to choose 8 to 10 new words to learn from the story (in general, it’s best to try to learn no more than 8-10 new words a day).

Definitions are written with the help of various sources including  Merriam-Webster’s Learner’s Dictionary

Science fiction: stories about how people and societies are affected by imaginary scientific developments in the future.

Intelligence: the ability to learn or understand things or to deal with new or difficult situations: smart.

Artificial intelligence: an area of computer science that deals with giving machines the ability to have intelligence.

To imagine: to think of or create (something that is not real) in your mind.

Connection: something that joins or connects two or more things.

Golden: made of gold.

Universe: all of space and everything in it including stars, planets, galaxies, etc.

Button: a small part of a machine that you push to make the machine work.

To press: the act of pushing or flattening something with your finger or hand or with a device (such as an iron) — usually singular.

Galaxy: any one of the very large groups of stars that make up the universe.

Flow: to move in a steady and continuous way.

Pause: a temporary stop: a period of time in which something is stopped before it is started again.

To flash: to appear quickly or suddenly.

To calculate: to get a general idea about the value, size, or cost of (something).

Suddenly: very quickly in usually an unexpected way: in a sudden way.

To turn off: to stop the operation or flow of (something) by pressing a button, moving a switch, etc.

Lightning: the flashes of light that are produced in the sky during a storm.

Broke: past tense of ‘to break’: to separate (something) into parts or pieces often in a sudden and forceful or violent way.

Discussion Questions:

1. Computers are getting more intelligent. What are the good and bad sides to this?

2. Will computers ever be able to be as intelligent or more than humans?

3. Do you think a computer could ever become almost like a ‘god’, almost all knowing and all powerful?

4. If a computer could be created like the one in the story, what do you think it would do and how would it act?

5. What question would you ask the computer in the story?