Arthur C. Clarke, devoto de la tecnología avanzada

Precisamente por el respeto debido al difunto Arthur C. Clarke, no está de más recordar que personalmente -sin confundir del todo con sus libros de ciencia-ficción- profesaba una extraña fe.

Arthur C. Clarke fue un genuino visionario cosmopolita, aunque pensaba que los seres humanos deberíamos reconocer que las religiones organizadas son los peores virus que pueden afectar nuestras mentes. De ahí que dejara escrito: ''absolutely no religious rites of any kind, relating to any religious faith, should be associated with my funeral.''

Así, como el genuino devoto de la tecnología avanzada, lo presenta Reihan Salam en A World Made by HAL:

(...) So what would come after the end of religion? Clarke suggested that humans might join together to form some kind of "supermind," and venture forth into the galaxy.

But to what end? Clarke only rarely considered the justification for humanity's deep yearning to learn and explore. What if it was, like religion, yet another "mind virus," one that makes us restless and miserable?

Clarke never took this notion seriously, perhaps because he was proffering his own faith. His novels were endlessly inventive and often very fun, but they were, with their wooden characters and simple moral parables, hardly meant to be great literature. They were, in a sense, devotionals.

Clarke all but worshipped advanced technology, and his novels were a mash note to heroic humans who transformed the world in a spirit of fellowship and boundless curiosity. (...)

Descanse en paz. Ahora que habrá visto que lo que sirve de fundamento para poder pensar aquel supercomputador HAL, tan dramático en manos de Stanley Kubrik (2001), es precisamente la dignidad humana, algo que de suyo trasciende lo que hacemos.

Decía el personaje de Clarke, David Bowman, en la última línea de la novelización de "2001: A Space Odyssey": "oh my God! — it’s full of stars!". Clarke quizá ha enmudecido tras decir, simplemente, "oh my God!"...