Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts
Showing posts with label internet. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Brr dyslexic

I have to say that being dyslexic is a drag sometimes. I don't know how to sell "brr" and had to stop writing a post in order to look it up on the internet. But, the good news is WE HAVE THE INTERNET and I can spend the couple of seconds it takes to look up anything that I need to spell. The drag part is that it's all the time.

What I started to write about was LA in winter. It can be 55 degrees and feel warm on one day and 55 degrees and be chilly on another. Today it's chilly. I even came back from walking my dog to change my jacket to a coat. I'm not complaining about a cold 55 degrees because it feels wonderful as long as you're wearing the proper clothes.

Monday, October 8, 2007

Chatterbot

I’m listening to Professor Dumb-Ass on the normally excellent podcast of Scientific American, “Science Talk.” This smart scientist spent four months corresponding on-line with a computer program. He thought it was a hot Russian babe but it was a computer program called a chatterbot. A chatterbot is a conversation agent. That sounds Russian. The scientist admitted to being fooled because he's a “predator looking for a mate.” In other words (and his words), if he didn’t think there was the possibility of sex at the other end of the “conversation,” he would have picked up the vague answers months before and known it was a chatterbot.

What future was this guy going to have with this Russian babe? 1) if she was real, which she was not, she would only be looking for a way to get out of Russia; and 2) once she was out of Russia, she’d dump this nerd for a hunky Cowboy.

You don’t hear women scientists saying, I need to enhance my breasts because I’m so thin, there isn’t enough fat in my body to make desirable breast to attract a mate. We don’t use the prime directive to excuse bad behavior. In fact, there’s no evolutionary excuse for smart women making dumb choices.

That brings me to evolution. Homo sapiens that we are, we have not adapted to our environment to survive. That’s what Darwinian theory is about. Species find a niche, adapt, and thrive, or they don’t adapt quick enough and die out. Unlike other species, homo sapiens have made our environment adapt to us, and we won’t necessarily survive. So, what we know about how the world works is limited.

The fact that most men—in white America anyway—are attracted to skinny women instead of the best breeders, i.e., women with large hips and big breasts, makes the entire “I’m looking for a mate to procreate because that is the prime directive of all species,” bull. If that were true, the system would be foolproof. And what I see is proof of fools.

http://www.sciam.com/