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A Babel fish is a highly improbable biological universal translator. It appears as a "small, yellow and leechlike" fish. When a Babel fish is inserted into the ear canal it allows the 'wearer' to "instantly understand anything said... in any form of language." This was both a useful plot device for Adams, who wrote on the subject that he always found the ability of all aliens to speak English very strange; and also the starting point for a joke about the existence of God.

According to the Hitchhiker's Guide, the Babel fish was put forth as a fideist example for the non-existence of God:

"I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."

"But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves that you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. Q.E.D.For other meanings of the abbreviation "QED", see QED. is an abbreviation of the Latin phrase quod erat demonstrandum (literally, "that which was to be demonstrated"). This is a translation of the Greek oper edei deixai which was used by many early mathem"

"Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logicIn ordinary language, logic is the reasoning used to reach a conclusion from a set of assumptions. More formally, logic is the study of inference—the process whereby new assertions are produced from already established ones. As such, of particular concern.

"Oh, that was easy," says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next zebra crossingThe Beatles' album Abbey Road showing the band walking over a British Zebra crossing A zebra crossing is a type of pedestrian crossing, characterised by stripes (hence the term, named after the zebra) on the road, parallel to the flow of the traffic, alte.

The fish feeds on mental energy created while composing a sentence, and apparently 'excretes' mental energy in a form that can be understood by others.

The fish's name refers to the Tower of BabelPieter Brueghel the Elder According to the narrative in Genesis Chapter 11 of the Bible, the Tower of Babel was a tower built by a united humanity in order to reach the heavens. To prevent the project from succeeding, God confused their languages so that, a Biblical story, which describes events in ChristianChristian cross and its many variations are widely recognized as an ancient Christian symbol. Christianity is an Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as described in the New Testament. Although Christians generally chara and JewishJudaism is the religion and culture of the Jewish people and the first recorded monotheistic faith. The tenets and history of Judaism constitute the historical foundation of many other religions, including Christianity and Islam. Star of David, a common s theology which led to God introducing different languages into the world.

The Babel fish inspired the name of the Babel Fish online text translation service provided by the web portal AltaVista. It should be noted, however, that the existence of this online service "in no way proves or disproves God's existence on the Internet."

The Babel fish also inspired the name of the Babel Fish Corporation, a translation service which is not affiliated with Alta Vista's Babel Fish translation service.

See also: Tower of Babel