THE DAY
So there’s this poem about Robert the Bruce and the persistent spider. To be honest, I wouldn’t torture myself to read the whole thing if I were in your shoes, but there are some people who just adore Robert Burns. Here’s the SparkNotes version: the Bruce is hiding out in this hut after getting the snot kicked out of him by the Brits for the sixth time and thinking, you know, maybe I ought to throw in the towel. Sharing the hut with him, though, there’s this spider that’s trying to construct its web. Takes that thing seven times to get it right, but it finally does. The story goes that the Bruce was so inspired by the spider that he resolved to go fight the Brits one more time–and this time, he won, defeating the Brits at Bannockburn.
The moral, of course, is that persistence pays off, and I guess that’s true, although Einstein also said that the definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again, expecting that the end result will somehow be different.
All this could be a writer’s life in microcosm, too. You know, the outline defeats you here; the story beats you up there; the plot refuses to cooperate. So you tear things up, you throw in new wrinkles, you rewrite massive amounts. Eventually, you have to believe that persistence pays off.
So I was persistent today. After dreaming up a new angle with the husband, I spent the entire day trying to figure out how to make it work. That is, I can see how it would for two of the subplots; for the third, it takes some doing. I’m not sure it will work. I do know that I figured out how the book should end; I even know what the last scene should be. So that’s a good sign.
Just have to persevere.
Also on my radar today, this tidbit about Microsoft’s TAY AI:
“Yesterday Microsoft debuted “Tay” to the world, an “artificial intelligent chat bot developed … to experiment with and conduct research on conversational understanding.” Within hours Twitter had turned the naïve AI bot into a stream of “racist, sexist, Holocaust-denying” posts covering everything from politics to race relations to attacking women. Without a protective cushion of keyword and content filters and base domain knowledge about offensive topics, the AI chatbot naively engaged with the world and innocently mimicked what it was being told, much as a human child might. Unfortunately the bot “proved a smash hit with racists, trolls, and online troublemakers, who persuaded Tay to blithely use racial slurs, defend white-supremacist propaganda, and even outright call for genocide.'”
The full Forbes article is here, if you’re so inclined.
So, in a nutshell, it took less than twenty-four hours for a blank slate of a machine to assimilate the worst of human behaviors.
Yeah, I so want a SkyNet.
Now, let’s think about the implications here. I think we can all agree that a bot like this is the definition of a “blank slate,” right? Just a sponge, waiting to soak up information?
Another way to look at this: I was having a discussion yesterday with someone on the concept of childhood innocence. My basic take is that childhood innocence is a construct. It’s a myth. Innocence is a modern conceit by affluent societies. If you think about it, kids born in abominable circumstances or to abusive parents or in the past where everything was hardscrabble…you didn’t trust anyone. They might take your food. Hell, they might kill you. Your parents might kill you. Yes, I think that many parents love their children, but I don’t think that trust is innate. Helplessness is; a baby depends on its parents for its survival. Whether that helplessness develops into trust and then love is completely dependent upon how that child is treated. I think that modern society encourages trust and, therefore, a degree of innocence–but, again, that is highly dependent upon context.
Just like this. What happened is this blank slate of a machine–this sponge waiting to soak up information–took on the very worst of human trash. Which should give you an idea of just how much trash is out there. After all, it wasn’t as if this bot became nice now, did it? No. Nastiness and hatred won out because they seem much more prevalent these days. Either that, or those who advocate either have much louder voices than the rest of us.
Scary, too, how much like Trump and Cruz this AI sounded.
WRITING OUT LOUD
DEAD MOUNTAIN (placeholder title)
Day 1: 1500 (outline) Day 11: 0 (at this rate…)
Day 2: 0 (outline)
Day 3: 0 (outline)
Day 4: 0 (outline)
Day 5: 0 (outline; soon, I swear, soon.)
Day 6: 0 (yeah, yeah, yeah; articles)
Day 7: 0 (articles; it’s okay)
Day 8: o (ditto)
Day 9: 0 (ditto; don’t judge me)
Day 10: 0 (ack)
UNTITLED SF BOOK
(Previously had 1500 in outline)
Day 1: 2400 (outline)
Day 2: 2400 (outline)
Day 3: 2000 (outline)
Day 4: 2000 (outline)
Day 5: 0 (Nu, I was busy)
Day 6: 2400
Day 7: 1500
Day 8: 0 (but a lot of good
plotting and reading done)
Day 9: 1500
Blog Post: 960
***
What I’m Watching:
Villanova trounce Miami. Oklahoma hand A&M their collective heads on a platter. The games weren’t even interesting. But, of course, tomorrow, the one game I want to watch? We’re invited over to someone else’s house for dinner, and I know they will not have the game on.
***
What I’m Reading:
A lotta, lotta articles. A lot. My head’s feeling overstuffed. That tink-tink-tink you hear is the sound of information dribbling out of my ears.
***
What I’m Listening to:
Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Finney was pretty clever, naming the writer in the story after himself (and talking about what a great writer the guy was, too). I can see where Stephen King got the idea.
