borges & infinite monkeys

there's an interesting possibility in the field of literature that can be approached through at least two different philosophical lenses. first, let me explain the possibility, then i'll talk about two immediate problems that arise from it.

the problem i'm going to talk about is the problem of the infinite monkeys. if a group of an infinite amount of monkeys sit on typewriters randomly smacking the keyboards, eventually, all known literary works (and all future ones too) will be produced.

the same intuition is elucidated in a story by borges about an infinite library that has every combination of characters and punctuation marks possible.

from these speculations i see two philosophically interesting questions arising. the first is mostly metaphysical: what ontological status, if any, should we give to stories when, if we take this possibility seriously, all coherent works in the literature already exist in some sense or another?

the second question that arises immediately is one from authorial intent and meaning, thus becoming a question in the philosophy of language. does the intent of the author really add anything to the work produced, given that an unintelligent mechanisms could produce the same works?

these two questions require a lot of thought, but my very preliminary answers depend heavily on the plausibility of the hypothetical. obviously infinite monkeys wouldn't do the trick, but even a computer that does this task forever wouldn't have the time to contain ALL possible works of literature, considering that the human mind's language abilities are infinitely generative. take, for example, simon roberts's book titled knickers, which was unique in that chapter fourteen only says the word "thanks". chapter fourteen, btw, is from page 52 to page 2069. would a computer do that? i don't know.

if my intuition is correct, the role of authorial intent becomes of hightened importance. however, i don't think it has any effect on the ontological question.