''MS Fnd in a Lbry'' (probably intended to be understood as "Manuscript Found in a Library") is a

satirical Satire is a genre of the visual arts, visual, literature, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently Nonfiction, non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ...

science fiction Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...

short story A short story is a piece of prose fiction. It can typically be read in a single sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the old ...

about the disastrous effects of the exponential growth of information. The story was written by

Hal Draper Hal Draper (born Harold Dubinsky; September 19, 1914 – January 26, 1990) was an American socialist activist and author who played a significant role in the Berkeley, California, Free Speech Movement. He is known for his extensive scholarship on ...

in 1961. Its title is a play on the

Edgar Allan Poe Edgar Allan Poe (; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic who is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly his tales involving mystery and the macabre. He is widely re ...

story " MS. Found in a Bottle".

Plot

The story is in the form of a report written by Yrlh Vvg, an

anthropologist An anthropologist is a scientist engaged in the practice of anthropology. Anthropologists study aspects of humans within past and present societies. Social anthropology, cultural anthropology and philosophical anthropology study the norms, values ...

from an alien civilization who investigates the remains of human

civilization A civilization (also spelled civilisation in British English) is any complex society characterized by the development of state (polity), the state, social stratification, urban area, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyon ...

approximately 175,000 yukals into the future. It turns out that humankind's fall was brought about by

information overload Information overload (also known as infobesity, infoxication, or information anxiety) is the difficulty in understanding an issue and Decision making, effectively making decisions when one has too much information (TMI) about that issue, and is ...

and the inability to catalog and retrieve that information properly. The title of the short story comes from the fact that all redundancy - and vowels - had been removed from our language in order for the information volume to shrink. Finally the sum of all human knowledge was compressed by means of subatomic processes and stored away in a drawer-sized box. However the access to that information required complicated indices,

bibliographies Bibliography (from and ), as a discipline, is traditionally the academic study of books as physical, cultural objects; in this sense, it is also known as bibliology (from ). English author and bibliographer John Carter describes ''bibliograph ...

etc., which soon outgrew the size of all knowledge. The use of indices grew exponentially, comprising a pseudo-city, pseudo-planet and eventually a pseudo-galaxy devoted to information storage. At this point, a case of

circular reference A circular reference (or reference cycle) is a series of references where the last object references the first, resulting in a closed loop. Simple example A newcomer asks a local where the town library is. "Just in front of the post office," s ...

was encountered, and the civilization needed to refer to the first drawer-sized box to find the error. However, this drawer had been lost in the pseudo-galaxy, and soon the civilization fell apart while trying to locate the first drawer. It turns out that the anthropologist's civilization is actually heading down the same path.

History

In a December 12, 1960 article in ''Time'' magazine,

Richard Feynman Richard Phillips Feynman (; May 11, 1918 – February 15, 1988) was an American theoretical physicist. He is best known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, the physics of t ...

predicted that the explosion of information and storage made possible by the computer revolution would necessitate shrinking the size of information. Feynman offered a prize for anyone who could shrink a page of information down 1/25,000 size that could still be read by an

electron microscope An electron microscope is a microscope that uses a beam of electrons as a source of illumination. It uses electron optics that are analogous to the glass lenses of an optical light microscope to control the electron beam, for instance focusing it ...

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of modern technology and sc ...

librarian Malcolm Ferguson wrote that Feynman's idea "may provoke discussion and perplexity" in an article for ''

Library Journal ''Library Journal'' is an American trade publication for librarians. It was founded in 1876 by Melvil Dewey. It reports news about the library world, emphasizing public libraries, and offers feature articles about aspects of professional prac ...

'' in November 1961. Draper's satirical story "MS Fnd in a Lbry" envisaged a world where information was reduced to a microscopic scale and required indices of indices to retrieve the data. The short story first appeared in the December 1961 issue of ''

The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction ''The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction'' (usually referred to as ''F&SF'') is a U.S. fantasy and science-fiction magazine, first published in 1949 by Mystery House, a subsidiary of Lawrence Spivak's Mercury Press. Editors Anthony Bouche ...

''. It was anthologized in the collections '' 17 X Infinity'' (1963) edited by

Groff Conklin Edward Groff Conklin (September 6, 1904 – July 19, 1968) was an American science fiction anthologist. He edited 40 anthologies of science fiction, one of mystery stories (co-edited with physician Noah Fabricant), wrote books on home improvement ...

and ''Laughing Space'' (1982), edited by

Isaac Isaac ( ; ; ; ; ; ) is one of the three patriarchs (Bible), patriarchs of the Israelites and an important figure in the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and the Baháʼí Faith. Isaac first appears in the Torah, in wh ...

and Janet Asimov. It was also published as "Ms Fnd in a Lbry: or, the Day Civilization Collapsed". The story inspired a discussion on adopting computers in libraries at a symposium on technological advances in medical librarianship in 1963.

References

External links

* {{isfdb title, id=93729, title=MS Fnd in a Lbry
"Ms Fnd in a Lbry"
at folk.universitetetioslo.no 1961 short stories Science fiction short stories Post-apocalyptic short stories Works by Hal Draper

Plot

History

See also

References

External links