The infinite monkeys theorem proposes if an infinite number of monkeys hit the keys of their computers at random an infinite number of times, eventually one of the monkeys will type the entire works of Shakespeare. Following is a dramatization of this experiment.
(A thirty-year-old Western chimpanzee, hair billowing wildly atop his head, arms waving enthusiastically, jumps up and down next to his computer. A bell above the computer still vibrates in triumph. He hoots with pride as he waits for Dr. Bergstrom, a human, to check his work.)
Bergstrom: Bingo, you moron, these aren’t the entire works of Shakespeare. They’re the collected poems of John Keats.
(Bingo, ashamed, slinks back to his chair. Another bell rings nearby. A weary Bergstrom, sorry he ever accepted his thankless position, approaches the next chimp, who is glowing with satisfaction. Bergstrom reads through the pages. His face lights up with joy.)
Bergstrom (signaling to a white-coated associate): Nichols! We did it! After only twenty-seven years, three months, and two days, Sparkles has typed Shakespeare’s whole oeuvre! No more of these freaking bells! We’re free! We’re free!
(Nichols scans the pages. His shoulders slump.)
Nichols: It’s all good until Hamlet’s big soliloquy. Look here: “To bo or not to bo.” Back to the drawing board, Doctor.
(A bell rings nearby.)
The chimps continue, unflaggingly, to type. It emerges that the Western chimpanzees feel superior to the Nigeria-Cameroon chimps and seek to dominate by typing faster, causing more mistakes and inveterate squabbling.
The Central chimps are not only lazy, but also gluttonous. They would rather swing from the rafters, munching on umbrella tree fruit and arboreal leaves, than type.
The Eastern chimps are just stupid. At least Dr. Bergstrom thinks so. They type only books by Dr. Suess and Judy Blume.
The whole ambitious venture ends when the Western chimps start throwing coconuts at the doctors’ heads.
All that the chimpanzees have typed correctly are Beowulf (in Old English), Finnegan’s Wake by James Joyce, and everything written by Charles Dickens, including The Chimes, The Cricket on the Hearth, and Household Words.
Nothing else? Well, Boomer has licked all the computer screens.
(A thirty-year-old Western chimpanzee, hair billowing wildly atop his head, arms waving enthusiastically, jumps up and down next to his computer. A bell above the computer still vibrates in triumph. He hoots with pride as he waits for Dr. Bergstrom, a human, to check his work.)
Bergstrom: Bingo, you moron, these aren’t the entire works of Shakespeare. They’re the collected poems of John Keats.
(Bingo, ashamed, slinks back to his chair. Another bell rings nearby. A weary Bergstrom, sorry he ever accepted his thankless position, approaches the next chimp, who is glowing with satisfaction. Bergstrom reads through the pages. His face lights up with joy.)
Bergstrom (signaling to a white-coated associate): Nichols! We did it! After only twenty-seven years, three months, and two days, Sparkles has typed Shakespeare’s whole oeuvre! No more of these freaking bells! We’re free! We’re free!
(Nichols scans the pages. His shoulders slump.)
Nichols: It’s all good until Hamlet’s big soliloquy. Look here: “To bo or not to bo.” Back to the drawing board, Doctor.
(A bell rings nearby.)
The chimps continue, unflaggingly, to type. It emerges that the Western chimpanzees feel superior to the Nigeria-Cameroon chimps and seek to dominate by typing faster, causing more mistakes and inveterate squabbling.
The Central chimps are not only lazy, but also gluttonous. They would rather swing from the rafters, munching on umbrella tree fruit and arboreal leaves, than type.
The Eastern chimps are just stupid. At least Dr. Bergstrom thinks so. They type only books by Dr. Suess and Judy Blume.
The whole ambitious venture ends when the Western chimps start throwing coconuts at the doctors’ heads.
All that the chimpanzees have typed correctly are Beowulf (in Old English), Finnegan’s Wake by James Joyce, and everything written by Charles Dickens, including The Chimes, The Cricket on the Hearth, and Household Words.
Nothing else? Well, Boomer has licked all the computer screens.