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Tuesday, February 06, 2024

Old school AI

 


Sometimes I think we take for granted the things we used to rely on to do the things AI does for us now. There was always something magic or mystical about consulting a OUIJA board or shaking the Magic 8 Ball and asking a question. 

Truth be told, the answers we'd get were sometimes just as reliable and useful as the ones we get from ChatGPT, Alexa or Siri. Though the OUIJA board could lead you down some dark paths.


Let's face it. AI is kind of like magic to those of us who don't understand the algorithms or whatever coding they use to make them work. 

I remember this early program you could get when PCs first came out. It was a therapy program. You could type in your program and pretty much everything the program would respond would be a variation of, "How do you feel about that?" Or, "What makes to feel that way about ____?"

It was uncanny how much it was like real therapy and it didn't cost you $150 per hour. 

I imagine some day soon Alexa will actually carry on a conversation with you instead of telling you it is time to reorder ink for your Canon InkJet printer.  I'd like her to ask me how my day is going or tell me I'm looking nice. Though I don't think AI characters can see you yet. And at my age, I pretty much never look nice. 

But it would be nice to be lied to the way real people do.  Though no real people tell me I look nice anymore, lie or not. It is one of those things that HR has convinced you is inappropriate. You can't ask someone at work how they are feeling either. 

AI can get away with that because they pretty much don't need the job. 

Sometimes I'd be happy to give them mine, though.

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