Several days later, Mr Blottisham entered the Senior Common Room looking unusually melancholy.
Professor Quillibrace immediately noticed.
Miss Stray did as well.
Neither commented.
Blottisham sat down heavily.
The silence persisted.
Eventually Quillibrace spoke.
"You appear troubled."
"I am."
"How unfortunate."
Blottisham sighed.
"I have been reflecting on our recent discussions."
"My sympathies."
"They seem rather bleak."
The professor looked surprised.
"Do they?"
"Certainly."
"You have removed every exciting possibility."
"Have I?"
"One by one."
The room became quiet.
Blottisham counted on his fingers.
"Intelligence does not guarantee wisdom."
"No."
"It does not guarantee values."
"No."
"It does not eliminate politics."
"No."
"It does not eliminate uncertainty."
"No."
"It does not provide history with a destination."
"No."
Blottisham spread his hands.
"What remains?"
The room fell silent.
Quillibrace looked thoughtful.
After a moment he asked:
"Do you believe spectacles are valuable?"
Blottisham blinked.
"What?"
"Spectacles."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"They help one see."
"Excellent."
The professor nodded.
"Do they provide a destination?"
"No."
"A moral system?"
"No."
"A purpose?"
"No."
"A theory of history?"
"Certainly not."
"Yet they remain useful."
The room relaxed.
Miss Stray smiled.
Blottisham looked unconvinced.
"That seems an absurd comparison."
"Possibly."
The professor folded his hands.
"What has concerned me throughout these discussions is not that people value intelligence."
"No?"
"No."
"What then?"
"That they ask intelligence to perform tasks that do not belong to it."
The room became quiet.
Blottisham considered this.
Miss Stray nodded.
"A tool becomes disappointing when required to become a religion."
The silence deepened.
Quillibrace smiled.
"An excellent formulation."
Blottisham frowned.
"Surely intelligence is more than a tool."
"Perhaps."
"Much more."
"Possibly."
The professor considered.
"But whatever else it may be, it remains extraordinarily useful."
The room settled.
After a while Miss Stray spoke.
"I wonder whether intelligence is most valuable when it increases possibility."
The others turned toward her.
She continued.
"It allows us to understand more."
"Yes."
"Imagine more."
"Yes."
"Anticipate consequences."
"Yes."
"Discover relationships."
"Yes."
"Generate alternatives."
"Yes."
She smiled.
"None of those things tells us what must be done."
The room became still.
"But all of them enlarge what can be done."
Quillibrace nodded approvingly.
Blottisham looked thoughtful.
This time the thoughtfulness seemed less defensive.
More curious.
After a moment he asked:
"Then intelligence does not answer the questions."
"No," said Quillibrace.
"What does it do?"
The professor reflected.
Then replied:
"It improves the quality of the questions."
The room became very quiet.
Outside, evening sunlight crossed the college lawns.
Inside, nobody spoke for a while.
Eventually Blottisham said:
"I think I had hoped intelligence would save us."
The confession hung briefly in the air.
Miss Stray looked down at her notebook.
Quillibrace regarded him kindly.
"Many people do."
"Why?"
The professor smiled faintly.
"Because responsibility is tiring."
The room laughed softly.
Even Blottisham.
After the laughter subsided, silence returned.
A comfortable silence this time.
Not an uncertain one.
At length Miss Stray spoke.
"Perhaps that is why these stories are so attractive."
"What stories?" asked Blottisham.
"The stories in which intelligence eventually becomes so great that the difficult questions disappear."
The room remained quiet.
Blottisham nodded slowly.
"And they do not?"
"No."
"Never?"
Quillibrace considered.
Then smiled.
"I rather hope not."
The room became still.
"Why?" asked Blottisham.
The professor looked toward the window.
For several moments he said nothing.
Then he replied:
"Because a world in which all worthwhile questions had been answered..."
A pause.
"...would be a surprisingly impoverished place."
The silence lingered.
Outside, students crossed the quadrangle.
Inside, evening settled over the room.
At length Blottisham spoke.
"So intelligence is not the destination."
"No."
"Nor the salvation."
"No."
"Nor the final answer."
"No."
The professor reopened his book.
"What is it then?"
Quillibrace turned a page.
A faint smile appeared.
"Mr Blottisham..."
A pause.
"...it is one of the ways the universe becomes curious about itself."
For once, nobody replied.
And for several minutes, the Senior Common Room remained entirely silent.
A rare achievement.
Even by academic standards.
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