The philosopher paces. Wooden planks creak but never crack, fixated facts of flooring. An answer to a strange question is somewhere between these half-steps some fragmented word or deeper meaning to trip upon. But each step forward takes him back, until he paces no more.
"Gah!"
He's been at this for hours, this project of his. The understanding lays somewhere beyond this confused haze over his view, hanging for hours.
As if his ambient thoughts are enough to shake the science loose, he checks his telescope again. Brass and gold blend in shattered fragmenting to a brushed texture. Each gemstone lining the band in the middle shines in a line as stars from the nightsky shine through the open window.
This is where he does his best thinking. Sitting on the old wooden stool, he peers through the scope once more.
"Nothing! I don't understand it!"
Blue and black smear. The sky- he consults the gems to be sure- still bears its pinprick lights. The firmament evermoving, infinite possibility and wonder and answers. Yet he cannot see any one answer any further than a passing idea, lost in a fade of new stars. The tool is proving useless.
"How... this doesn't make any sense..."
Footsteps jump the philosopher in his chair. Hailing up the stairs is his roommate, hardly one for all this 'meaning', rather making his own means.
"Got a problem?" The man grumbles. "Heard the pacing."
"I've nearly got this theory solved. It almost coheres, yet..." Angry gesturing shifts the philosopher's sleeves. "...all these things I do to relax, to find ideas... are failing me!"
The man cocks an eyebrow.
"Failing... you? I didn't think you held some glass and metal to such esteem."
A philosophically-ringed hand waves the man off. Instead, the roommate takes to striding across a rug tossed-not-thrown, up to the little window and the esoteric scope. Hovering over the man, the roommate reaches out, brushing the metal. And removes the cap from the lens.
The philosopher blinks. Twice, to be sure- then gazing through the scope to an infinite body of lights.
"How did you..."
"Well, I'm not as wise as you, to be sure..." The man smirks. "...but I wasn't looking for the obtuse. I was looking for the obvious."