經典科幻文學:《銀河系漫遊指南》第12章 Part1

"Improbability Drive," she said patiently. "You explained it to me yourself. We pass through every point in the Universe, you know that."
"Yeah, but that's one wild coincidence isn't it?"
"Yes."
"Picking someone up at that point? Out of the whole of the Universe to choose from? That's just too ... I want to work this out. Computer!"
The Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Shipboard Computer which controlled and permeated every particle of the ship switched into communication mode.
"Hi there!" it said brightly and simultaneously spewed out a tiny ribbon of ticker tape just for the record. The ticker tape said, Hi there!
"Oh God," said Zaphod. He hadn't worked with this computer for long but had already learned to loathe it.
The computer continued, brash and cheery as if it was selling detergent.
"I want you to know that whatever your problem, I am here to help you solve it." "Yeah yeah," said Zaphod. "Look, I think I'll just use a piece of paper."
"Sure thing," said the computer, spilling out its message into a waste bin at the same time, "I understand. If you ever want ..."
"Shut up!" said Zaphod, and snatching up a pencil sat down next to Trillian at the console.
"OK, OK ..." said the computer in a hurt tone of voice and closed down its speech channel again.
Zaphod and Trillian pored over the figures that the Improbability flight path scanner flashed silently up in front of them.
"Can we work out," said Zaphod, "from their point of view what the Improbability of their rescue was?"
"Yes, that's a constant", said Trillian, "two to the power of two hundred and seventy-six thousand seven hundred and nine to one against."
"That's high. They're two lucky lucky guys."
"Yes."

“非概率驅動。”她耐心地說，“你自己還解釋給我聽過的。我們穿越了宇宙中的每一個點，這你知道。”
“沒錯，但那只是一個巧合，不是嗎？”
“是的。”
“正好在那個點上救起了這兩個人？在整個宇宙所有可能的點中間？這也太……我得算一算。電腦！”
天狼星控制系統艦載電腦，這個控制、滲透了飛船每一個角落的傢伙，立刻切換到了交流模式。
“你好！”它的聲音生氣勃勃，同時還輸出了一小段記錄紙帶，上面寫着“你好”。
“噢，上帝呀。”贊福德說。雖然他和這臺電腦共事的時間並不長，但已經開始很厭惡它了。
電腦繼續說着，語速很快，興高采烈，彷彿是在推銷某個牌子的清潔劑。
“我要告訴你的是，無論你碰到了什麼難題，我都會在這兒幫助你解決。”‘“好了，好了。”贊福德說，“是這樣的，我想我需要一張紙。”
“沒問題，”電腦說，一邊又向垃圾桶裏輸出—截記錄，“我能夠理解。如果你還需要……”
“閉嘴！”贊福德吼了—句，隨手操起一枝鉛筆坐在崔莉恩身旁的控制檯前。
“好吧，好吧。”電腦用一種受了傷害的語調說，然後關閉了通話頻道。
贊福德和崔莉恩死死地盯着面前的非概率航行軌道掃描器上靜靜閃爍着的數字。
“我們能算出來嗎？”贊福德問，“從他們的角度看他們獲救的非概率是多少？”
“可以，那是個恆量。”崔莉恩說，“2的276，709次方比1.”
“很高啊。這兩個傢伙真的是太幸運太幸運了。”
“沒錯。”