42 - Douglas

I mean it may be cliche, but there was really only one choice for the subject of the 42nd post on this blog... Douglas Adams.

He was definitely a man ahead of his time; if you look at some of the things he foresaw you'd recognise them in today's technology. His most famous creation, The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, was essentially an iPad (or iPhone) ahead of its time in terms of its physical nature, with the premise being more or less a version of Wikipedia. 

The sad thing is, the bugger went and died not long before these things became reality You can imagine him loving IPhones and IPads and embracing their possibilities. Let's not forget, Douglas loved Apple's products. It's said he was one of the first two people to get an Apple Mac when they were launched (the other being Stephen Fry). 

I'd also like to have thought that he might have written another Hitch Hiker's book; I'd imagine he'd have staretd it in the early 2000s, and he'd just about be finishing it now. Similarly, I can  imagine Russell T Davies comissioning him to do a Doctor Who script, which might just about have seen the screen by the time Steven Moffat took over, just about making it in to Matt Smith's final season. I'd imagine we'd still be waiting for his follow up...

But I think of all his work, the most important is the book he co-wrote with the zoologist Mark Carwardine, where they visit various locations around the world where there are specific species very close to extinction (sadly since then at least two of them have gone extinct). One of the moments I recall is when he's in Australia and a person Douglas and Mark are visiting says to make sure they don't get bitten by a particular snake, as its venom is fatal. Douglas asks what happens if they do get bit, and the chap deadpans back "You die. That's what fatal means." 

I'd like to think the book made a difference. But sadly, I don't think it did. The world's climate continues to deteriorate, and make further extinctions of species not just a possibility, but a continuing reality.