2001: A Space Odyssey questions and answers

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2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) - 4 questions

Directed by Stanley Kubrick, starring Gary Lockwood

The "questions" section is for any random questions that occurred to you while watching this film, or anything you didn't entirely understand, and which Google or the IMDb can't help with. Submit them as a question, and hopefully someone will answer (the bold comments in brackets) - check back regularly. If the answer is wrong, or missing information, please use the "clarify answer" option. Don't feel limited - want to know what music played in a certain scene? Whether this was the first film to use a certain effect? Here's the place to ask!

Can anybody make out the instructions on the zero gravity toilet on the space craft? [The wording was spelled out in the "making of" book. Someone took the time to reproduce it here: http://www.ee.ryerson.ca/~elf/aso/zeroGtoilet.html.]

I don't understand the significance of the monolith or the starbaby. Can someone explain it to me? [The monolith is a monitor placed by the aliens to track the progress of developing civilizations. When humanity found the monolith on the Moon, that signaled a certain level of technological advancement. The starbaby is the evolution of the astronaut, as the symbol of humanity, from "Earth-bound" to a true child of the universe, turning his back on the Earth and looking toward the stars.]

What was the ultimate destination of the Jupiter mission? The giant planet is made of gas, it has no solid surface to land on. Theoretically a spacecraft could land on one of Jupiter's moons, but they lie within the lethal radiation belt. [The ultimate goal was to orbit Jupiter to study the Monolith also in orbit around it.] Answered by Grumpy Scot

Maybe I need to read the book, but can someone explain the whole ending sequence to me. Why all the flashy over dramatized pictures? It's artistic but is there some other meaning to it? [All the flashing images are supposed to represent Bowman travelling past far and distant galaxies, this is what happens in the book, where he travels to that white house place.]