What is the significance of "42"? I keep seeing it here.?

I attended a talk by Douglas Adams years ago, and someone asked if he chose '42' due to it's being the sum of the pips on a die. He was very frustrated that people tried to find meaning in the number. He worked hard to find the most ordinary number, ie it couldn't be square, or prime or even an odd number since those are, well, "odd".

Significance Of 42

The most popular reference to 42 being a special number is in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy novel series by Douglas Adams, in which 42 turns out to be the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything. The Hitchhiker's Guide series is a collection of 5 humorous science fiction novels that are well worth reading, but the ultimate answer being 42 is really just a joke.

In the popular book, the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, an answer to the question of "life, the universe and everything" was sought... and the answer was "42".

It's just a joke, based on the book.

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RE:

What is the significance of "42"? I keep seeing it here.?

I know the pagans, especially the Pythagoreans, held numbers to have sacred properties, and the christians are big on the "666" from their bible, but I had never seen this "42" thing until I got on this site and it gets thrown around a lot here.

Blame the late Douglas Adams on that one. He wrote a series of satirical quasi-science fiction novels in which the "answer" was given to a question that no one knew what it might be, but thought it was related to the meaning of the universe...

I chuckle every time I see someone (including myself) use it.

The Almighty Answer to the Meaning of Life, the Universe, and Everything. It was calculated by the computer Deep Thought for seven million years and when asked to build a better computer to discover the Question to the Life, the Universe, and Everything, it built the Earth. Before the Earth could tell the Question however, it was destroyed by the Vogons to make room for an interstellar highway bypass. For more information, see The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

The numbers 3, 6, 7 and 9 are everywhere and have a big importance i've noticed...

It's from a book.

Elvis (PBUH) was 42 when he died.

Actually, it's a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy thing.