
Ekkah's Search for Extra-Universal Intelligence
-----------------------------------------------

     To install this program, select File... Run from the Windows
Program Manager menu.  Then put Disk 1 in drive A: (or, if your
3.5" floppy is drive B:, substitute as appropriate below) and
enter as your File Run Command Line:

     A:SETUP

     You will be prompted for where you wish to install the actual
application, which defaults to C:\SEUI.  Change this as necessary,
and hit Enter.  That's all there is to it.


Concept
-------

     You are no doubt familiar with SETI, the Search for Extra-
Terrestrial Intelligence.  This requires millions of dollars worth
of radio telescopes and supercomputers, scanning every conceivable
radio frequency in every conceivable sector of the sky for every
conceivable pattern of radiated energy.

     The question as to whether intelligence exists elsewhere in the
Universe is a very profound one.  To tap the wisdom of such
intelligence, if it exists, would be a turning point in the history
of our planet.

     Yet a much deeper question exists: how did our Universe itself
come to be, with its matter, energy, laws of physics and so forth?
Is it just happenstance that the physics of this Universe gave rise
to life, and that this life has evolved to the point at which it has
begun to inquire into its own origins?  Is there a "Creator" which in
any sense "loves" its creatures?  Might the advent of intelligence be
part of some unknowable Grand Plan, in which the Creator's "Capacity
to Experience" experiences Itself through the "consciousness" of its
creations?  And, like the signature of a great Artist, might there be
a pattern embedded in the fabric of reality -- a Puzzle -- which,
when solved, allows us to see ourselves and our Oneness with one
another in a new light?

     These are unanswerable questions.  Or are they?

     Suppose that pi, or e, is such a Puzzle.  Suppose that by
applying cryptanalysis, we were to stumble across the fact that a
Message of profound significance lies encoded in one of these
numbers.  Could this be?

     We know for a fact that messages of arbitrary profundity lie
encoded in certain numbers.  This is tautological: take any message
you like, encode it into a sequence of digits, and there you have it,
a message of arbitrary profundity encoded in that number.  There are
an infinite number of possible numbers, and there are an infinite
number of possible messages.

     We also know for a fact that messages of arbitrary profundity
lie encoded in pi, and e.  This is because the infinite expansions of
pi and e contain every possible sequence of digits of finite length
-- not just once, but an infinite number of times.  Therefore, if we
decode the digits of pi and e into ASCII symbols, we know for a fact
that here and there, using any given decoding scheme, every possible
message will appear at some point.  However, the first occurrence of
each such message is likely to start very, very far out in the
expansions of these numbers.

     We even know for a fact that messages of arbitrary profundity
can be found in pi and e, starting with their very first digits -- if
we are allowed complete freedom in our choice of decoding scheme.  We
just pick a decryption key of length equal to that of the message we
want to see, and special-case each of its characters.

     The question is, does there exist, in pi or e, a Message of
non-trivial length, starting within their first few billion digits or
so, which can be decoded using keys of much shorter length than the
Message itself?  Perhaps, with the right decoding scheme, ALL of pi
or e is a Message, of infinite length, such that it will take us the
rest of Eternity to read and understand it all.  If you were the
Creator (and I would argue that you are, or at least that there is no
way you can be sure that you are not), wouldn't YOU encode YOUR
infinite wisdom into a number like this, for your creatures to
stumble across and ponder the significance of one day?

     Well, maybe today is that day -- and maybe it's not.  The only
way to tell is to give it a shot.

     So, welcome to the wonderful world of Ekkah's Search for Extra-
Universal Intelligence:  a Search which, if successful, would be of
infinitely greater Significance than the discovery of an
extraterrestrial civilization -- yet a Search which can be undertaken
in the comfort of your own home using equipment costing a grand or
two.  Not only that, it's equipment that you already own, or you
wouldn't be reading this!

     Best of luck in your Search!


Credits
-------

     This software, including all text and graphics files, are by
yours truly Tim Stryker.  Scott Hemphill wrote the programs that
generated pi and e to a million digits each, and Ken Maier located
Scott's work for me over the Internet, for which I am eternally
grateful.  With the exception of Scott's PI.TXT and E.TXT files, the
entire package is Copyright 1995 by Consensus Systems, Inc. -- but
it is freely distributable by anyone, without restriction.

     Dr. Carl Sagan's first novel "Contact" gave me the idea for
this program, although the works of Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke,
and many others have anticipated it.  Actually, it wouldn't surprise
me to learn that this sort of thing has been attempted before by the
CIA or NSA.  Treating the digits of pi or e as a test datastream to
be decrypted would be child's play for the computers at their
disposal.  If they've discovered anything, they've kept it to
themselves so far.  (Or does anybody exposed to the Message simply
vanish into thin air?  The spooks would tend to keep developments of
that nature secret too.  Sounds like a cool premise for a spy
novel... hmmm...)


Speaking of books
-----------------

     This software and all of the foregoing exists for the sole
purpose of enticing you into buying a copy of my recently-completed
book, "Hacking Reality".

     Since you have read this far, it's clear that you enjoy techno-
philosophical mindgames.  Rather than offer Ekkah's SEUI as
shareware, and hit you up for a $20 "registration fee", I figured I
would release it as freeware, and ship you something substantial in
return for your 20 bucks.

     Hacking Reality is about 96,000 words long.  It's a novel of one
person's bizarre journey of personal discovery and awakening.
Concepts of virtual reality and reality-as-virtual are just the
beginning -- it morphs into conjurings of neutron torpedoes over the
breakfast table, a vacuum-packed ambulance ride with levitating
morphine syringes, discourses on memetic and cultural evolution, the
Karma of inverse-money, a takeoff on the Christian mythos, and a sex
scene guaranteed to enlarge your view of the world.  Then it segues
smoothly into a Kahlil-Gibran-esqe exposition of the end of the world
as we know it, smashing skulls and daring damsels, an encounter with
the Hypersphere of Totality, and the Church of Your Name Here, whose
guardian angels include Kurt Goedel, E. O. Wilson, Richard Dawkins,
and Robert Axelrod.  I won't give away the ending, but Ekkah and the
House of Addled Hackers of Digits for Fun do figure into the story in
a cameo role.

     My favorite authors are people like Isaac Asimov, William
Gibson, Barbara Tuchman, Keith Laumer, William Manchester, Ayn Rand,
Kurt Vonnegut, and of course Douglas Adams.  Although the Answer to
the Great Question of Life, the Universe and Everything is not 42, it
may differ from this by less than a ten-trillionth of a percent (see
the sample USER.TXT file in your SEUI directory for an example).

     Anyhow, Hacking Reality is not yet published, so Consensus
Systems is making the following offer, valid until 31 December 1995.
For a copy of Hacking Reality in manuscript form, signed by the
author, send $20 plus $3 postage ($10 if outside the U.S.) to:

     Consensus Systems, Inc.
     12351 N.W. 2nd St.
     Plantation, FL  33325

Florida residents please add 6% sales tax.
