3001: The Final Odyssey
Encyclopedia
3001: The Final Odyssey is a science fiction
novel
by Sir Arthur C. Clarke
. It is the fourth and final book in Clarke's Space Odyssey
series.
3001 follows the adventures of Frank Poole
, an astronaut who was deliberately killed by HAL 9000
in 2001: A Space Odyssey
by casting him out into space. His body is discovered in the Kuiper belt
, beyond the orbit of Neptune
, by the comet-collecting space tug Goliath, after drifting in space for a millennium, and brought back to life; the deep-freezing to near absolute zero
had preserved him sufficiently for the advanced medical technology of the time to be able to revive him. He then explores the Earth of 3001, notable features of which are the BrainCap, a brain-computer interface
technology which interfaces computers directly with the human brain, genetically engineered dinosaur servants, a space drive, and four huge towers (space elevator
s) spaced around the Earth's Equator. Humanity has also colonized Jupiter
's moons Ganymede
and Callisto
.
In the 26th century, the monolith in Olduvai Gorge
, Africa (dubbed TMA-0) that kickstarted human intellectual evolution, has been discovered. TMA-1, the monolith found on the moon, had earlier been brought to Earth in 2006 and erected in front of the United Nations Building in New York City
.
In the course of the novel, it is determined that following the events of 2010: Odyssey Two
and 2061: Odyssey Three
the Jupiter monolith sent a report back to its "superior" 450 light years away and is about to receive its orders on how to deal with humanity (since the report would take 450 years to reach the superior, and the orders 450 years to come back). Presumably, the monolith was empowered to obliterate the nascent biosphere
of Jupiter but needed a higher authority's approval to obliterate the technological civilization on Earth. There is considerable worry that the judgment, which was based on the monolith's observations of humanity up to 2061, will be negative. The entire human race, then, may be in danger of being obliterated by the aliens, just as the Jovian life-forms discovered by David Bowman were deliberately destroyed in the course of making Jupiter into a second sun so the Europa
ns could evolve. Frank manages to conscript Bowman and HAL, who had fused into a new entity — Halman — and now reside in the monolith's computational matrix, to infect the monolith with a computer virus retrieved from Pico
vault, a special containment facility on the moon used to house various chemical, biological, and cybernetic weapons in an attempt to avert a potential apocalypse.
Just as the humans feared, the Monolith does indeed receive orders to exterminate humankind, and it begins to duplicate itself many hundreds of millions of times over. These millions of monoliths assemble themselves into two separate screens in front of Sol to prevent all vital light and heat from reaching Earth and its colonies. The intent is to shut down the entire Terran biological life-cycle. However, Halman had already infected the Monolith with the virus at the time it began duplicating itself, and fifteen minutes after the screens are formed, all the Monoliths disintegrate, including TMA-0 and TMA-1.
Halman manages to upload its combined personalities into a petabyte
-capacity holographic 3D storage medium and thus survives the disintegration of the monoliths. However, that medium is infected with the virus in the process and is subsequently sealed by human scientists in Pico Vault, where it will presumably be stored until such time as humans (or others) choose to disinfect and revive it.
At the close of the story, Poole and the other humans land on Europa and attempt to start peaceful relations with the primitive native Europans.
Apparently, the creators of the Monoliths - having long since evolved into a non-corporeal and god-like state of existence - had been watching humanity. They decide to grant the human race a reprieve, and that they should not determine humanity's fate until "the Last Days".
transmission, and was generally portrayed as both less malevolent and more of a thinking entity than the one seen in this novel (in particular, Dave Bowman's transcendence as a star child is now explained as a mundane case of being uploaded onto a computer).
In 2010, an apparition of Bowman appeared before Floyd (shaping itself from dust), warning that the Leonov's crew must leave Jupiter within two days. Floyd had difficulty convincing the rest of the crew, which would have been much easier had he had the video recording of the incident shown to Poole by Dr. Allister Kim in 3001.
The very end of 2010, entitled simply "20,001", could not have happened as portrayed because of the disappearance of the monoliths at the end of 3001.
The story features a ring-shaped habitat in geostationary orbit around Earth, connected by four "towers" (space elevators) equally spaced around the equator. In the epilogue of 2061: Odyssey Three
however, the ring-shaped habitat reportedly has six "towers" instead of four.
Additionally, some of the dates are changed. The USSR is acknowledged as having collapsed in 1991, whereas in the earlier three books it lasts well into the 21st century. Frank Poole's birth date is set at 1996; the Discovery
mission is pushed forward to the 2030s and the Leonov mission to the 2040s, when in the earlier three books, they were in 2001 and 2010, respectively. Finally, Poole remarks that by the 2020s his world had learned to tap unlimited vacuum energy
, when the previous books had established only cold fusion as the highest source of power by 2061; vacuum energy would have made the plasma drive and fission reactor on the original Discovery obsolete a decade prior to the ship's construction (under the new 3001 dates).
However, Clarke has consistently stated that each of the Odyssey novels takes place in its own separate parallel universe
— this is demonstrated by the facts that the monoliths are still in existence at the end of 2010: Odyssey Two and that Floyd is no longer part of the trinity formed at the end of 2061: Odyssey Three
. These parallel universes are a part of Clarke's retroactive continuity.
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
by Sir Arthur C. Clarke
Arthur C. Clarke
Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, CBE, FRAS was a British science fiction author, inventor, and futurist, famous for his short stories and novels, among them 2001: A Space Odyssey, and as a host and commentator in the British television series Mysterious World. For many years, Robert A. Heinlein,...
. It is the fourth and final book in Clarke's Space Odyssey
The Space Odyssey series
The Space Odyssey series is a science fiction series of four novels and two films created from 1968 to 1997, primarily by the writer Arthur C. Clarke...
series.
Plot summary
The book begins with a brief prologue describing the aliens who created the Monoliths. They apparently evolved from "warm slime", and over the course of millions of years, turned into a space-faring species. As they explored the galaxy, they saw that few intelligent species ever successfully evolved. Therefore, they traveled the universe and catalyzed the evolution of intelligent species wherever they went, including Earth, by increasing the evolving species' odds of survival. Upon reaching Earth, they performed experiments on many species to encourage the development of intelligence. Then they left, leaving the monoliths behind. After visiting Earth, the aliens continued to evolve, to the point where they eventually found a way to integrate themselves into the fabric of space, and became non-corporeal beings. Meanwhile, back in the Solar system, the Monoliths continued to watch over humanity. However, the Monoliths were capable of degenerating and acting independently of their original programming.3001 follows the adventures of Frank Poole
Frank Poole
Frank Poole is a fictional character from Arthur C. Clarke's Space Odyssey series. In Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, Poole was portrayed by Gary Lockwood....
, an astronaut who was deliberately killed by HAL 9000
HAL 9000
HAL 9000 is the antagonist in Arthur C. Clarke's science fiction Space Odyssey saga. HAL is an artificial intelligence that interacts with the astronaut crew of the Discovery One spacecraft, usually represented as a red television-camera eye found throughout the ship...
in 2001: A Space Odyssey
2001: A Space Odyssey (novel)
2001: A Space Odyssey is a science fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke. It was developed concurrently with Stanley Kubrick's film version and published after the release of the film...
by casting him out into space. His body is discovered in the Kuiper belt
Kuiper belt
The Kuiper belt , sometimes called the Edgeworth–Kuiper belt, is a region of the Solar System beyond the planets extending from the orbit of Neptune to approximately 50 AU from the Sun. It is similar to the asteroid belt, although it is far larger—20 times as wide and 20 to 200 times as massive...
, beyond the orbit of Neptune
Neptune
Neptune is the eighth and farthest planet from the Sun in the Solar System. Named for the Roman god of the sea, it is the fourth-largest planet by diameter and the third largest by mass. Neptune is 17 times the mass of Earth and is slightly more massive than its near-twin Uranus, which is 15 times...
, by the comet-collecting space tug Goliath, after drifting in space for a millennium, and brought back to life; the deep-freezing to near absolute zero
Absolute zero
Absolute zero is the theoretical temperature at which entropy reaches its minimum value. The laws of thermodynamics state that absolute zero cannot be reached using only thermodynamic means....
had preserved him sufficiently for the advanced medical technology of the time to be able to revive him. He then explores the Earth of 3001, notable features of which are the BrainCap, a brain-computer interface
Brain-computer interface
A brain–computer interface , sometimes called a direct neural interface or a brain–machine interface , is a direct communication pathway between the brain and an external device...
technology which interfaces computers directly with the human brain, genetically engineered dinosaur servants, a space drive, and four huge towers (space elevator
Space elevator
A space elevator, also known as a geostationary orbital tether or a beanstalk, is a proposed non-rocket spacelaunch structure...
s) spaced around the Earth's Equator. Humanity has also colonized Jupiter
Jupiter
Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the largest planet within the Solar System. It is a gas giant with mass one-thousandth that of the Sun but is two and a half times the mass of all the other planets in our Solar System combined. Jupiter is classified as a gas giant along with Saturn,...
's moons Ganymede
Ganymede (moon)
Ganymede is a satellite of Jupiter and the largest moon in the Solar System. It is the seventh moon and third Galilean satellite outward from Jupiter. Completing an orbit in roughly seven days, Ganymede participates in a 1:2:4 orbital resonance with the moons Europa and Io, respectively...
and Callisto
Callisto (moon)
Callisto named after the Greek mythological figure of Callisto) is a moon of the planet Jupiter. It was discovered in 1610 by Galileo Galilei. It is the third-largest moon in the Solar System and the second largest in the Jovian system, after Ganymede. Callisto has about 99% the diameter of the...
.
In the 26th century, the monolith in Olduvai Gorge
Olduvai Gorge
The Olduvai Gorge is a steep-sided ravine in the Great Rift Valley that stretches through eastern Africa. It is in the eastern Serengeti Plains in northern Tanzania and is about long. It is located 45 km from the Laetoli archaeological site...
, Africa (dubbed TMA-0) that kickstarted human intellectual evolution, has been discovered. TMA-1, the monolith found on the moon, had earlier been brought to Earth in 2006 and erected in front of the United Nations Building in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
.
In the course of the novel, it is determined that following the events of 2010: Odyssey Two
2010: Odyssey Two
2010: Odyssey Two is a 1982 best-selling science fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke. It is the sequel to the 1968 novel 2001: A Space Odyssey, but continues the story of Stanley Kubrick's film adaptation with the same title and not Clarke's original novel. The book is a part of Clarke's...
and 2061: Odyssey Three
2061: Odyssey Three
2061: Odyssey Three is a science fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke that was published in 1987. It is the third book in Clarke's Space Odyssey series...
the Jupiter monolith sent a report back to its "superior" 450 light years away and is about to receive its orders on how to deal with humanity (since the report would take 450 years to reach the superior, and the orders 450 years to come back). Presumably, the monolith was empowered to obliterate the nascent biosphere
Biosphere
The biosphere is the global sum of all ecosystems. It can also be called the zone of life on Earth, a closed and self-regulating system...
of Jupiter but needed a higher authority's approval to obliterate the technological civilization on Earth. There is considerable worry that the judgment, which was based on the monolith's observations of humanity up to 2061, will be negative. The entire human race, then, may be in danger of being obliterated by the aliens, just as the Jovian life-forms discovered by David Bowman were deliberately destroyed in the course of making Jupiter into a second sun so the Europa
Europa (moon)
Europa Slightly smaller than Earth's Moon, Europa is primarily made of silicate rock and probably has an iron core. It has a tenuous atmosphere composed primarily of oxygen. Its surface is composed of ice and is one of the smoothest in the Solar System. This surface is striated by cracks and...
ns could evolve. Frank manages to conscript Bowman and HAL, who had fused into a new entity — Halman — and now reside in the monolith's computational matrix, to infect the monolith with a computer virus retrieved from Pico
Mons Pico
Mons Pico is a solitary lunar mountain that lies in the northern part of the Mare Imbrium basin, and to the south of the dark-floored crater Plato. This peak forms part of the surviving inner ring of the Imbrium basin. This ring continues to the northwest and with the Montes Teneriffe and Montes...
vault, a special containment facility on the moon used to house various chemical, biological, and cybernetic weapons in an attempt to avert a potential apocalypse.
Just as the humans feared, the Monolith does indeed receive orders to exterminate humankind, and it begins to duplicate itself many hundreds of millions of times over. These millions of monoliths assemble themselves into two separate screens in front of Sol to prevent all vital light and heat from reaching Earth and its colonies. The intent is to shut down the entire Terran biological life-cycle. However, Halman had already infected the Monolith with the virus at the time it began duplicating itself, and fifteen minutes after the screens are formed, all the Monoliths disintegrate, including TMA-0 and TMA-1.
Halman manages to upload its combined personalities into a petabyte
Petabyte
A petabyte is a unit of information equal to one quadrillion bytes, or 1000 terabytes. The unit symbol for the petabyte is PB...
-capacity holographic 3D storage medium and thus survives the disintegration of the monoliths. However, that medium is infected with the virus in the process and is subsequently sealed by human scientists in Pico Vault, where it will presumably be stored until such time as humans (or others) choose to disinfect and revive it.
At the close of the story, Poole and the other humans land on Europa and attempt to start peaceful relations with the primitive native Europans.
Apparently, the creators of the Monoliths - having long since evolved into a non-corporeal and god-like state of existence - had been watching humanity. They decide to grant the human race a reprieve, and that they should not determine humanity's fate until "the Last Days".
Differences between 3001: The Final Odyssey and earlier books
This portrayal of the monoliths is different from that in the earlier novels. In particular, the 2001 monolith was capable of faster-than-lightFaster-than-light
Faster-than-light communications and travel refer to the propagation of information or matter faster than the speed of light....
transmission, and was generally portrayed as both less malevolent and more of a thinking entity than the one seen in this novel (in particular, Dave Bowman's transcendence as a star child is now explained as a mundane case of being uploaded onto a computer).
In 2010, an apparition of Bowman appeared before Floyd (shaping itself from dust), warning that the Leonov's crew must leave Jupiter within two days. Floyd had difficulty convincing the rest of the crew, which would have been much easier had he had the video recording of the incident shown to Poole by Dr. Allister Kim in 3001.
The very end of 2010, entitled simply "20,001", could not have happened as portrayed because of the disappearance of the monoliths at the end of 3001.
The story features a ring-shaped habitat in geostationary orbit around Earth, connected by four "towers" (space elevators) equally spaced around the equator. In the epilogue of 2061: Odyssey Three
2061: Odyssey Three
2061: Odyssey Three is a science fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke that was published in 1987. It is the third book in Clarke's Space Odyssey series...
however, the ring-shaped habitat reportedly has six "towers" instead of four.
Additionally, some of the dates are changed. The USSR is acknowledged as having collapsed in 1991, whereas in the earlier three books it lasts well into the 21st century. Frank Poole's birth date is set at 1996; the Discovery
Discovery One
United States Spacecraft Discovery One is a fictional spacecraft appearing in The Space Odyssey series, including the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. Discovery One is a large, nuclear-powered interplanetary spaceship.-History:...
mission is pushed forward to the 2030s and the Leonov mission to the 2040s, when in the earlier three books, they were in 2001 and 2010, respectively. Finally, Poole remarks that by the 2020s his world had learned to tap unlimited vacuum energy
Vacuum energy
Vacuum energy is an underlying background energy that exists in space even when the space is devoid of matter . The concept of vacuum energy has been deduced from the concept of virtual particles, which is itself derived from the energy-time uncertainty principle...
, when the previous books had established only cold fusion as the highest source of power by 2061; vacuum energy would have made the plasma drive and fission reactor on the original Discovery obsolete a decade prior to the ship's construction (under the new 3001 dates).
However, Clarke has consistently stated that each of the Odyssey novels takes place in its own separate parallel universe
Parallel universe (fiction)
A parallel universe or alternative reality is a hypothetical self-contained separate reality coexisting with one's own. A specific group of parallel universes is called a "multiverse", although this term can also be used to describe the possible parallel universes that constitute reality...
— this is demonstrated by the facts that the monoliths are still in existence at the end of 2010: Odyssey Two and that Floyd is no longer part of the trinity formed at the end of 2061: Odyssey Three
2061: Odyssey Three
2061: Odyssey Three is a science fiction novel by Arthur C. Clarke that was published in 1987. It is the third book in Clarke's Space Odyssey series...
. These parallel universes are a part of Clarke's retroactive continuity.
Film, TV or theatrical adaptations
It was reported on Yahoo Entertainment in 2000 that MGM was in discussions regarding turning 3001 The Final Odyssey into a movie. An update in 2001 stated that there was no further development on the project.Similarities with other works of Clarke
- The featured ring-shaped habitat in geostationary orbit around Earth first appeared in Clarke's work at the end of The Fountains of ParadiseThe Fountains of ParadiseThe Fountains of Paradise is a Hugo and Nebula Award–winning 1979 novel by Arthur C. Clarke. Set in the 22nd century, it describes the construction of a space elevator. This "orbital tower" is a giant structure rising from the ground and linking with a satellite in geostationary orbit at the...
.