經典科幻文學:《生命 宇宙及一切》第7章2

And so it was only with the advent of pocket computers that the startling truth became finally apparent, and it was this:
Numbers written on restaurant bills within the confines of restaurants do not follow the same mathematical laws as numbers written on any other pieces of paper in any other parts of the Universe.
This single fact took the scientific world by storm. It completely revolutionized it. So many mathematical conferences got held in such good restaurants that many of the finest minds of a generation died of obesity and heart failure and the science of maths was put back by years.
Slowly, however, the implications of the idea began to be understood. To begin with it had been too stark, too crazy, too much what the man in the street would have said:
Oh yes, I could have told you that, about. Then some phrases like “Interactive Subjectivity Frameworks” were invented, and everybody was able to relax and get on with it.
The small groups of monks who had taken up hanging around the major research institutes singing strange chants to the effect that the Universe was only a figment of its own imagination were eventually given a street theatre grant and went away.

直到便攜式電腦的問世，這個驚人的真理才最終被揭露出來，即：
餐廳帳單上的數字所遵循的數學法則，與宇宙中任何地方任何紙張上所寫的數字都不同。
這一事實，在科學界掀起了一場風暴。它徹底引起了一場革命。在好多高級的飯館舉行了好多次數學研討會，甚至於，當其中好多當代最最聰明的人死於肥胖和心臟病時，數學學科的發展一下子倒退了好幾年。
儘管如此，漸漸地，這一理論開始被人們接受了。最初，這樣說的確很驚人、很瘋狂、很過分，特別是如果有人在大街上說着：
“哦，是的，我早該告訴你的……”云云。後來，人們發明了"交互主觀體系“這樣的說法，於是大家都習慣於此，也就放鬆下來了。
曾經有一撥僧侶，老在大型研究所附近晃悠，唱着一些奇怪的聖歌，大意是說、宇宙不過是其自身想象的產物罷了。最後他們獲得了一個街頭表演許可證，然後就離開了。