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I've heard that its intended to be the ASCII code for "*" which represents a wildcard (i.e., anything).

Is that what you had in mind or do you have different interpretations?

> The answer to this is very simple. It was a joke. It had to be a number, an ordinary, smallish number, and I chose that one. Binary representations, base thirteen, Tibetan monks are all complete nonsense. I sat at my desk, stared into the garden and thought '42 will do' I typed it out. End of story.

You obviously did not go past the literal interpretation and he was talking about the literal interpretation. What I'm referring to is his choice of a number to represent the answer to life, universe and everything. Not a magical number, but just A NUMBER. It shows how futile it is to try and answer some questions in a mechanical/mathematical way. Some questions are not computable, and there is more meaning to life beyond the rational.

I interpret it to be that the answer is whatever we make of it. Your interpretation tells me more about your mindset than about any actual truth. Taken that way, meaning is what we project on it. You project a number as futility; a numerology-leaning individual could project a different meaning.

You are both correct. It's a Rorschach test of philosophy.

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