Ponder Stibbons
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In the fictional universe of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series of books, Ponder Stibbons is a wizard in Unseen University. He is the Head of Inadvisably Applied Magic, Praelector and Reader in Invisible Writings and works in the High Energy Magic building. His first appearance is as a student wizard in Moving Pictures (1990). His roommate was Victor Tugelbend, who gained a large inheritance by always getting an exam score of 84% (four percentage points shy of passing). The senior wizards decided to trap Victor and gave him an exam paper with only one question: "what is your name?" Victor, however, missed that particular exam and Ponder, having accidentally destroyed his own exam paper, used Victor's instead. He was surprised to find only one question and tried to take as long as possible answering it: "The answer to question One is: Ponder Stibbons. Which is what my name is."
His entry in The New Discworld Companion states: 'originally rather lazy by nature, he seems to have blossomed to become the youngest and most depressingly keen member of the UU faculty... as one of the few wizards at the University with his head screwed on in any fashion, he appears, quite against his will, to be in the front line'.
Stibbons' most successful creation is Hex, a magical computer composed of glass tubes full of ants, and other assorted complex systems, such as mice. Hex is initially capable only of simple arithmetic; however as the series continues, and more complex additions are made to Hex, it develops the semi-sapience of a child, the ability to add to and redesign itself, and the ability to do complex spells much, much more rapidly than a team of wizards could (For example, when they were searching for Rincewind in Interesting Times, Hex did in a day what would have taken the UU Faculty several years).
In The Science of Discworld, a book which interleaved a story set on the Discworld and real world science, Stibbons creates a device for splitting the thaum, once believed to be the smallest unit of magical radiation particles. The creation of this device borrows heavily from the real world splitting of the atom.
In The Last Continent he is offered the job as assistant to the god of evolution, but quits after only a few hours when he realizes that the god's big project is, in fact, a cockroach.
It is possible that Ponder Stibbons is named after a 'Mr Stibbons' who taught at Terry Pratchett's secondary school. Ponder Stibbons and another young wizard seem to look not unalike, but it should be noted that Ponder's presence and looks were published before Harry Potter's.
