The evening sun cast long shadows across the lawns of St Anselm's. The Senior Common Room was unusually quiet.
Professor Quillibrace was arranging a small collection of old college photographs upon the table.
Mr Blottisham wandered in carrying a membership application form.
"Professor."
"Good evening, Blottisham."
"I have a procedural question."
"I feared as much."
Blottisham unfolded the form.
"Who exactly is allowed to become a member of the Senior Common Room?"
Quillibrace looked mildly puzzled.
"The regulations are reasonably straightforward."
"Excellent."
Blottisham adjusted his spectacles.
"Suppose someone is exceptionally intelligent."
"Yes?"
"They solve every crossword."
"Remarkable."
"They speak fourteen languages."
"Commendable."
"They never lose an argument."
"A less attractive quality."
"They quote Aristotle before breakfast."
"One hopes only occasionally."
Blottisham nodded.
"So..."
A pause.
"...are they automatically a person?"
Miss Stray looked up from her knitting.
"I believe they already were."
Blottisham frowned.
"That's not what I mean."
"We suspected as much."
"I mean..."
He searched for the words.
"...what actually makes someone..."
Another pause.
"...someone?"
Quillibrace folded the application form.
"My dear Blottisham..."
"Yes?"
"You have asked a question considerably larger than the paperwork."
The three sat quietly for a moment.
Eventually Miss Stray asked,
"When did you become yourself?"
Blottisham smiled confidently.
"On the seventeenth of April."
"I was thinking less legally."
He considered.
"When I learned to speak?"
"What about before that?"
"I was still me."
"When you learned to walk?"
"I was still me."
"When you first recognised yourself in a mirror?"
"I imagine so."
"When you first fell in love?"
Blottisham became unexpectedly thoughtful.
"I was..."
He paused.
"...rather more myself afterwards."
Quillibrace nodded gently.
"Interesting."
Blottisham frowned.
"So there isn't a single moment."
"Perhaps not."
Miss Stray smiled.
"We're very fond of single moments."
"We are?"
"They make examinations easier."
Quillibrace laughed softly.
"We often search for one decisive test."
"Exactly!"
said Blottisham.
"The Intelligence Test."
"The Consciousness Test."
"The Person Test."
"There must be one."
Quillibrace reached for an old college photograph.
It showed a group of students from decades earlier.
"Tell me, Blottisham."
"Yes?"
"Which one of these young people became a person first?"
Blottisham looked horrified.
"That's impossible."
"Why?"
"They're all becoming."
Nobody spoke.
Miss Stray quietly resumed her knitting.
"What a beautiful word."
Blottisham looked again at the photograph.
"I've always imagined personhood as a finish line."
"And now?"
"It feels more like..."
He searched for the phrase.
"...a life gradually gathering itself together."
Quillibrace smiled.
"A promising beginning."
After several minutes Blottisham spoke again.
"I've been thinking about intelligence."
"We noticed."
"It doesn't seem enough."
"No."
"Nor language."
"No."
"Nor memory."
"No."
"Nor reasoning."
"No."
"Nor passing examinations."
"Especially not."
Blottisham sighed.
"So what are we left with?"
Miss Stray looked towards the college gardens.
"Histories."
"Relationships."
"Promises."
"Responsibilities."
"Hopes."
"Regrets."
"Things that matter."
Blottisham nodded slowly.
"So personhood isn't one achievement."
"No."
"It's lots of different things..."
He paused.
"...holding one another together."
Outside, students were crossing the quadrangle.
Some hurried to lectures.
Others lingered in conversation.
One stopped to help another gather books scattered across the path.
The three watched without speaking.
Eventually Blottisham asked,
"Professor?"
"Yes?"
"If someone understands every word about friendship..."
"Yes?"
"...have they therefore had a friend?"
Quillibrace looked thoughtfully towards the students outside.
"I should think not."
"If someone understands every description of courage..."
"They need not yet have been brave."
"If someone explains grief better than I can..."
"They may still never have lost."
Blottisham sat quietly.
"So understanding meaning..."
Another pause.
"...isn't obviously the same thing as living from somewhere."
Miss Stray smiled.
"What a lovely way of putting it."
The fire crackled gently.
After a long silence Blottisham looked around the familiar room.
"You know..."
"What?"
"We've spent weeks talking about artificial intelligence."
"Indeed."
"But I don't think that's what we were really discussing."
Quillibrace raised an eyebrow.
"What were we discussing?"
Blottisham looked around the old room.
The books.
The photographs.
The teacups.
His friends.
Finally he smiled.
"I think we were trying to understand..."
He paused.
"...what sort of creatures we already are."
Neither Quillibrace nor Miss Stray spoke.
There seemed very little to add.
At length Quillibrace rose and walked towards the window.
The evening light lay softly across the college lawns.
"My dear Blottisham..."
"Yes?"
"When this conversation began..."
"It did?"
"We imagined ourselves asking whether machines might one day become persons."
"Quite."
"And now?"
Blottisham smiled.
"Now I think we've spent the whole time discovering how astonishingly difficult it is to explain why we already are."
Miss Stray closed her knitting.
"Perhaps that is what philosophy does."
"What?"
"It begins by asking questions about unfamiliar things."
"And ends?"
"...by helping us notice the familiar ones."
The college bell sounded across the evening air.
Students drifted towards Hall for dinner.
Someone laughed in the distance.
Someone called a friend's name.
Someone held a door open for someone else.
The three remained where they were.
After a while Blottisham spoke once more.
"Professor?"
"Yes?"
"If one day there were beings unlike birds..."
"Yes?"
"...and unlike humans..."
"Yes?"
"...but for whom a world genuinely mattered..."
Quillibrace waited.
"...I rather hope we'd recognise them."
Quillibrace smiled.
"So do I."
They stood together for another minute, looking out over the college.
Finally Blottisham said,
"I think we've reached the end."
Quillibrace shook his head almost imperceptibly.
"My dear Blottisham..."
"Yes?"
"I rather believe..."
He glanced back at the old photographs on the table.
"...we have finally reached the beginning."
The three left for dinner together.
The conversation, however, remained behind in the Common Room.
Waiting patiently for whoever might next wander in and ask a deceptively simple question.
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