There must be some mistake, he said, are you not a greatest computer than the Milliard Gargantubrain which can count all the atoms in a star in a millisecond?
The Milliard Gargantubrain? said Deep Thought with unconcealed contempt. A mere abacusmention it not.
And are you not, said Fook leaning anxiously forward, a greater analyst than the Googleplex Star Thinker in the Seventh Galaxy of Light and Ingenuity which can calculate the trajectory of every single dust particle throughout a five-week Dangrabad Beta sand blizzard?
A five-week sand blizzard? said Deep Thought haughtily. You ask this of me who have contemplated the very vectors of the atoms in the Big Bang itself? Molest me not with this pocket calculator stuff.
The two programmers sat in uncomfortable silence for a moment. Then Lunkwill leaned forward again.
But are you not, he said, a more fiendish disputant than the Great Hyperlobic Omni-Cognate Neutron Wrangler of Ciceronicus 12, the Magic and Indefatigable?
The Great Hyperlobic Omni-Cognate Neutron Wrangler, said Deep Thought thoroughly rolling the rs, could talk all four legs off an Arcturan MegaDonkeybut only I could persuade it to go for a walk afterwards.
Then what, asked Fook, is the problem?
There is no problem, said Deep Thought with magnificent ringing tones. I am simply the second greatest computer in the Universe of Space and Time.
But the second? insisted Lunkwill. Why do you keep saying the second? Youre surely not thinking of the Multicorticoid Perspicutron
Titan Muller are you? Or the Pondermatic? Or the
Contemptuous lights flashed across the computers console.
I spare not a single unit of thought on these cybernetic simpletons! he boomed. I speak of none but the computer that is to come after me!
Fook was losing patience. He pushed his notebook aside and muttered, I think this is getting needlessly messianic.
You know nothing of future time, pronounced Deep Thought, and yet in my teeming circuitry I can navigate the infinite delta streams of future probability and see that there must one day come a computer whose merest operational parameters I am not worthy to calculate, but which it will be my fate eventually to design.
Fook sighed heavily and glanced across to Lunkwill.
Can we get on and ask the question? he said.
Lunkwill motioned him to wait.
What computer is this of which you speak? he asked.
I will speak of it no further in this present time, said Deep Thought. Now. Ask what else of me you will that I may function. Speak.
They shrugged at each other. Fook composed himself.
O Deep Thought Computer, he said, the task we have designed you to perform is this. We want you to tell us he paused, the Answer!
The answer? said Deep Thought. The answer to what?
Life! urged Fook.
The Universe! said Lunkwill.
Everything! they said in chorus.
Deep Thought paused for a moments reflection.
Tricky, he said finally.
But can you do it?
Again, a significant pause.
Yes, said Deep Thought, I can do it.
There is an answer? said Fook with breathless excitement.
A simple answer? added Lunkwill.
Yes, said Deep Thought. Life, the Universe, and Everything. There is an answer. But, he added, Ill have to think about it.
A sudden commotion destroyed the moment: the door flew open and two angry men wearing the coarse faded-blue robes and belts of the Cruxwan University burst into the room, thrusting aside the ineffectual flunkies who tried to bar their way.
We demand admission! shouted the younger of the two men elbowing a pretty young secretary in the throat.
Come on, shouted the older one, you cant keep us out! He pushed a junior programmer back through the door.
We demand that you cant keep us out! bawled the younger one, though he was now firmly inside the room and no further attempts were being made to stop him.
Who are you? said Lunkwill, rising angrily from his seat. What do you want?
I am Majikthise! announced the older one.
And I demand that I am Vroomfondel! shouted the younger one.
Majikthise turned on Vroomfondel. Its alright, he explained angrily, you dont need to demand that.
Alright! bawled Vroomfondel banging on an nearby desk. I am Vroomfondel, and that is not a demand, that is a solid fact! What we demand is solid facts!
No we dont! exclaimed Majikthise in irritation. That is precisely what we dont demand!
Scarcely pausing for breath, Vroomfondel shouted, We dont demand solid facts! What we demand is a total absence of solid facts. I demand that I may or may not be Vroomfondel!
But who the devil are you? exclaimed an outraged Fook.
We, said Majikthise, are Philosophers.
Though we may not be, said Vroomfondel waving a warning finger at the programmers.
Yes we are, insisted Majikthise. We are quite definitely here as representatives of the Amalgamated Union of Philosophers, Sages, Luminaries and Other Thinking Persons, and we want this machine off, and we want it off now!
Whats the problem? said Lunkwill.
Ill tell you what the problem is mate, said Majikthise, demarcation, thats the problem!