It
was a long time before anyone spoke.
Out
of the corner of his eye Boris could see the sea of tense expectant
faces down in the square outside.
"We're
going to get lynched aren't we?" he whispered.
"It
was a tough assignment," said Big Red Bus mildly.
"Brexit!"
yelled Nigel. "Is that all you've got to show for seven and a
half million years' work?"
"I
checked it very thoroughly," said the computer, "and that
quite definitely is the answer. I think the problem, to be quite
honest with you, is that you've never actually known what the
question is."
"But
it was the Great Question! The Ultimate Question of Immigration, the
NHS and Everything!" howled Nigel.
"Yes,"
said Big Red Bus with the air of one who suffers fools gladly, "but
what actually is it?"
A
slow stupefied silence crept over the men as they stared at the
computer and then at each other.
"Well,
you know, it's just Everything... Everything..." offered Boris
weakly.
"Exactly!"
said Big Red Bus. "So once you do know what the question
actually is, you'll know what the answer means."
"Oh
terrific," muttered Boris flinging aside his notebook and wiping
away a tiny tear.
"Look,
alright, alright," said Nigel, "can you just please tell us
the Question?"
"The
Ultimate Question?" "Yes!" "Of Immigration, the
NHS, and Everything?" "Yes!" Big Red Bus pondered this
for a moment.
"Tricky,"
he said.
"But
can you do it?" cried Nigel.
Big
Red Bus pondered this for another long moment.
Finally:
"No," he said firmly.
Both
men collapsed on to their chairs in despair.
"But
I'll tell you who can," said Big Red Bus.
They
both looked up sharply.
"I
speak of none other than the computer that is to come after me,"
intoned Big Red Bus, his voice regaining its accustomed declamatory
tones. "A computer whose merest operational parameters I am not
worthy to calculate - and yet I will design it for you. A computer
which can calculate the Question to the Ultimate Answer, a computer
of such infinite and subtle complexity that organic life itself shall
form part of its operational matrix. And you yourselves shall take on
new forms and go down into the computer to navigate its ten
million-year program! Yes!
“Yes,” declaimed Deep Thought, “I said I’d have to think about it, didn’t I? And it occurs to me that running a programme like this is bound to create an enormous amount of popular publicity for the whole area of politics in general. Everyone’s going to have their own theories about what I’m eventually going to come up with, and who better to capitalize on that media market than you yourself? So long as you can keep disagreeing with each other violently enough and slagging each other off in the popular press, you can keep yourself on the gravy train for life. How does that sound?”
With limitless thanks to and for Douglas Adams.
