Tag Archives: AI

A.I. Needs My Help

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I must admit to having lost my focus a couple of times early on in Miron Bialoszewski’s Memoir of the Warsaw Uprising. As I mentioned in my previous post, it’s a dense and repetitive narrative, and it can seem like nothing new is happening when of course the opposite is true. I had to go back and re-read to orient myself a couple of time, but one thing I couldn’t figure out was the meaning of the term “wardrobes”. Bialoszewski mentioned the it a couple of times, and I’d skimmed past it until I realized that I didn’t get it.

I looked back for the first mentions of “wardrobes” and couldn’t find them. I resisted doing a Google search but finally conceded: What do “wardrobes” mean in Miron Bialoszewki’s A Memoir of the Warsaw Uprising? The search results offered nothing accurate, I grudgingly resorted to an AI tool, which offered two options: First that wardrobes – the literal ones – were piled on the barricades and, second, that the term was used to describe people so badly burned as to be the color of a wardrobe. Neither was answer was relevant. This was his slang for being under attack. I looked back again and just couldn’t find it, until I carried on with my reading and finally found a reference that made it quite clear: At night, a breath of air. The moon. Shrapnel. “Wardrobes”. Exactly. Bomb-hurling wardrobes. (121)

In Bialszewski’s mind, the image of wardrobes perhaps softened the blow of what was happening or it was simply how he saw it. Indeed, what an image! Germans dropping furniture in a siege! Nevertheless, Google and AI didn’t understand it becasue the data was insuffcient.

And so now I’m just feeding the machine.

AI Gets Angry

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AI has become a go-to for tedious documents and letters, but who knew that it could be told to get angry? I asked it to, and it delivered.

Your email is absolutely infuriating! How dare you try to twist my feelings and words to suit your narrative. It is crystal clear that you have no regard for my boundaries or emotions, despite my repeated attempts to communicate them to you. Your gaslighting and attempts to downplay my feelings are despicable. You have the audacity to shift blame onto me for being angry about topics that you continuously bring up. It is not my responsibility to manage your inappropriate behavior.

Love Portal at 14th Street, Manhattan

Stop trying to manipulate the situation and take accountability for your actions. My feelings are valid, and your attempts to dismiss them only solidify my decision to cut off contact with you. I have no interest in engaging with someone who consistently disregards my feelings and boundaries. Your manipulative and disrespectful behavior has left me with no desire to continue any form of communication. Do not contact me again. Sincerely infuriated, The Anger in the Machine

Rags the guard dog from Woody Allen’s Sleeper

The problem is the lack of tone, the same words repeated in a predicable pattern, no typos, no tangents. It’s like Rags in Sleeper, too cute to take seriously. We’ll have to give it time.

Sexy Robots from Outer Space

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I’ve given up on Battlestar Galactica. I lasted through six episodes and lost interest. Not only did the story get boring – how many hyper-jumps can you make in one episode? – but the characters were just wooden and silly…which of course leads to the disappointment of the highly touted sexy Cylon, Number Six:The red dress is something, but she isn’t. The truth is that she is exhausting in her incessant nymphomaniac demands and in the end makes sex seem dull. There is no subtlety, no mystery. Number Six offers no more than a Westworld Medieval robotor the amusingly named Gigolo Jane from A.I.The problem is that Number Six doesn’t have the substance of a major character; there’s only the one look and the one demand. While she might look great in her red dress, she remains light years behind her predecessors, Maria from MetropolisTerminatrix from Terminator 3or Pris from Blade Runner.Being a sexy robot isn’t easy. You can’t just stroke and pose like Galaxina. You have to come through with something else, an out-of-this-galaxy sort of appeal. A name would be good too.