Open thread. Looks like we need one!
Threat alert: Spy balloons and ignorant buffoons. pic.twitter.com/APOkTjYe9H
— Jack E. Smith ⚖️ (@7Veritas4) February 8, 2023
And a rebuttal from Jamie Raskin.
Republicans tried to give themselves a platform to whine about Twitter and instead gave @RepRaskin a platform to smack them down. https://t.co/J6Yai10Kdg
— Brian Tyler Cohen (@briantylercohen) February 8, 2023
And a short ass-kicking from AOC about Twitter changing their policy so that Trump wouldn’t be in violation of it.
— Colleen Bartlett (@CBartlett1963) February 8, 2023
Talk about whatever you want.
Baud
This Up remake looks awful.
Ken
@Baud: You’d think the CGI would have gotten better, but it’s pushed even further into the uncanny valley.
Math Guy
Fixing Asian style ribs over steamed rice for dinner. Needed to get rid of some leftover odds and ends in the fridge and this is what happened.
Barbara
I’ve been obsessively following the seditious conspiracy trial and there are some darkly comedic moments, like the following Telegram chat recovered by the FBI:
“I’ve got civil war planning penciled in for Monday. Does that work for you?” Almost as good as making the members of your coup planning group sign a nondisclosure agreement.
patrick II
AOC speaks her mind:
AOC at today’s Hunter Biden hearings
MTG speaks hers:
MTG yesterday at SOTU
Baud
@Ken:
That photo is the new American Gothic (Horror).
Ten Bears
Out of idle curiosity, did the hit counts balloon during the balloon incident … ?
scav
All the same, it’s somehow so nice to see when two lonely gas bags finally find each other.
(actually, a bit of a relief as it might get them off the general market.)
WaterGirl
@patrick II: That link didn’t work for me. But it worked for Baud???
WaterGirl
@Ten Bears: Might there be a word missing or an autocorrect in your sentence? Because I don’t understand it. :-)
Baud
@WaterGirl:
First works. Second doesn’t.
Ken
Fascinating twitter thread (found via Derek Lowe’s blog) on how ChatGPT makes up fake academic papers — not the content, the citation.
I am particularly impressed by the step where, having decided on the fake title of the paper and chosen an author, it decides a second author is needed, because most papers have more than one.
lgerard
Raskin needs to consider a fez. It would look great on him.
zhena gogolia
@patrick II: good for AOC.
WaterGirl
@Baud: Ah, maybe we dodged a bullet by not getting to see another picture of Marge?
Maybe I should have seeded this post with a pet picture!
Baud
When will Balloon Juice incorporate AI?
WaterGirl
@zhena gogolia: Did you see the one up top, too? Where she asks questions in sequence that showed that twitter literally changed their policy document so Trump wouldn’t be in violate of it?
She definitely does her homework.
Ken
@Baud: Don’t you think we should get some of the regular stuff first?
WaterGirl
@Baud: Hopefully never!
Qrop Non Sequitur
First we have to attract some organic intelligence, then whatever entity provides this can program the AI.
David 🎈🕵️The Establishment 📸🛩 Koch
If you can’t stand the lettuce stay out of the kitchen: England’s PM blames demise on cutting liberal humor (photo)
Long live Larry the Cat (photo)
Baud
@WaterGirl:
That stinks. Content creation is a lot of hard work.
zhena gogolia
@WaterGirl: Oh, when I first looked at this post, I only saw MTG with a balloon. I didn’t see the other videos. But I did watch that one at the link patrick gave.
Anoniminous
@Ken:
ChatGPT successfully automates Dunning-Kruger.
Sister Golden Bear
@Ken: Saw that earlier. It’s great article not just about academic papers, but also why ChatGPT can be confidently wrong in other ways.
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
Post automatically updated by AI.
Gin & Tonic
Has anybody (in the USA) noticed that there’s no variety anymore in supermarket oranges? They seem to be sweet, sweeter, sweetest. Mandarins, “cara cara,” navels, perhaps blood oranges, that’s it. Used to be you could get bags of not very attractive juice oranges, valencias, that sort of thing. Now they are all cosmetically enhanced and loaded with sugar.
Is it just me?
Sister Golden Bear
@lgerard: Fezes are cool!
So sayth The Doctor.
twbrandt (formerly tom)
Meanwhile, over at the Muskified twitter, users are unable to post more than one tweet per day. Anymore than that and they get a message saying they “are over the daily limit for sending tweets.”
Things are going great over there.
Ohio Mom
@lgerard: I think Raskin’s bandanna brings to mind pirates. Looks like he took off the big gold hoop earring, gave a shipmate the parrot to watch, and threw on a suit.
I hope his treatment continues to allow him to work and is successful.
Baud
@David 🎈🕵️The Establishment 📸🛩 Koch:
I’d like to buy the left wing economic establishment a pint.
Sister Golden Bear
@WaterGirl: Not a pet, but I vote for Jorts the Cat!
Jeffro
I’m trying to think of the last time that
Nope, nothing, still thinkin’…
Sister Golden Bear
@Anoniminous:
And it’s Mansplaining As A Service:
Seriously ChatGPT is an impressive achievement and is good for some uses — I’ve heard of fiction writers using it as inspiration to get out writers block (obviously they don’t use it verbatim, it’s more about the idea generation), as well as using it to create plausible descriptions of background details, like the contents of a shop, or descriptions for minor characters. But factual accuracy is definitely hit and miss, and more often miss. The problem is that one needs to know the topic well enough to know when ChatGPT is just making shit up.
Gin & Tonic
To those who might be regulars in the nighttime Ukraine thread – a russian dude named Igor Mangushev, who a few months back appeared on stage somewhere holding a human skull, which he said belonged to a Ukrainian soldier, was himself shot in the back of the head the other day, as was mentioned by Adam. While he did not expire immediately and was taken to hospital, the expected conclusion arrived today.
I will refrain from further comment.
Baud
@Sister Golden Bear:
Soon, women won’t need men for anything anymore.
patrick II
@WaterGirl:
Sorry I messed up that link. I normally test them.
Anhow:
MTG at SOTY
You’re probably sorry I fixed it.
danielx
@Barbara:
Is you taking notes…?
The depths of their stupidity have yet to be plumbed….
Baud
@patrick II:
State of the Yeti?
Sister Golden Bear
@Baud: Between ChatGPT and the Hitachi Magic Wand, you men are obsolete. /s
Gin & Tonic
So Sy Hersh, who used to be somebody back in the day, has Substacked an extremely thinly-sourced piece laying the Nordstream explosions plainly at the US’s feet. So far, so normal for Hersh and Substack. Now comes reputed US Senator Mike Lee retweeting that trash. No, I won’t link. But boy, is Lee a loose cannon or what?
Ken
@twbrandt (formerly tom): That explains the shape of the outage graph at https://downdetector.com/status/twitter/, which I might have otherwise mistaken for a raised middle finger.
danielx
Worst earworm I’ve had in quite some time.
Gin & Tonic
@Sister Golden Bear: I’m so old I can remember “a woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle.”
Baud
@Sister Golden Bear:
Wait until they combine the two.
kindness
We can all be proud that our side’s Representatives are kicking butt. Unfortunately, none of these things will be shown on Fox News, and very little of it will be shown on any of the network news shows. Fox will only show Republicans questions/accusations and the network news shows will both sides the whole thing. It’s going to end up like tik-tack-toe with no winners at all.
Suzanne
@Sister Golden Bear: There’s still objects on high shelves. Rest assured, men!
I’m such a shameless flirt.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Sister Golden Bear: think of all the man-hours it will save. [term used advisedly]
Ken
Not even opening the pickle jar?EDIT: Dang, Suzanne got there first, and with a better one. I’ll just note that we haven’t quite worked out parthenogenesis in humans yet.
Baud
@kindness:
I’m not sure why you discount clips on our social media. That’s how our side tends to get news nowadays.
And MSNBC talking heads are still occasionally good for something.
I can’t speak to podcasts.
Leslie
@Gin & Tonic: That is just sad. Sy Hersh used to be a real journo and now he’s his own self-parody. I hate to see it.
LivinginExile
@Gin & Tonic: I also saw a post that c!aimed he was shot by Wagner.
Sister Golden Bear
@Baud: Only if they train ChadGPT to talk dirty.
Baud
@Leslie:
We should have a thread listing once respected figures who have lost the plot.
Baud
@Sister Golden Bear:
Oh, ChadGPT is a much better name.
Suzanne
@Ken: Now I feel like making Mr. Suzanne a Valentine that reads “You’re my favorite person to get stuff down from that weird cabinet over the fridge”.
ETA: He knows who he married.
E once again TA: He married an asshole. It’s his own damn fault.
SiubhanDuinne
@Suzanne:
And jars to be opened!
trollhattan
@Ken: {rimshot} Hey-oooh!
scav
@Suzanne: It would be both fun and classically inspired to use men — the former masters of the universe — as stepstools. Flirtatious is a new one for me though. It’s good for me to keep up: Thanks!
Leslie
@Sister Golden Bear:
Yes, I know a lot of authors who are using it in these ways. They’re finding it very helpful for getting unstuck. It’s like having a never-fatigued friend to bounce ideas off of.
However, the (extremely low-paid) people in other countries who are keeping Chat GPT “appropriate” have already killed a lot of its creativity, basically because of those people, who want to have it riff on the kinds of things people should get arrested for, versus what happens between consenting adults.
Leslie
@Baud: That would be a really depressing thread.
SiubhanDuinne
@Suzanne:
Roses are red.
Violets are blue.
When I’m looking for my favorite person to get stuff down from that weird cabinet over the fridge,
That would be you.
Math Guy
Clearly, I am not able to read this room.
Suzanne
@scav:
I wish this was my kink.
Actually, I wish “financial domination” was my kink. Lord. What an opportunity I missed.
Anyway
@Gin & Tonic:
I look for Meyer Lemon in January. While not an orange it gives me that sour citrus hit. I made an upside-down citrus cake last week with blood oranges, navel and Meyer lemon and it was a welcome bitter note to balance the sweetness of the other oranges.
Suzanne
@SiubhanDuinne: That’s perfect.
I can write it in Spencerian script so it looks really good, too.
Ken
That’s for storing things you never have to get down, like the pasta-maker your sister-in-law gave you for Christmas twelve years ago.
WaterGirl
@Gin & Tonic: I’m trying to decide between “he got what he deserved” and “he got better than he deserved.”
lowtechcyclist
@twbrandt (formerly tom):
Earlier, today it wouldn’t even let me post one tweet today, saying I was over my daily limit. I can’t remember what limit it said when I clicked on “Learn More” but it was in the hundreds.
I complained, and I can tweet now. But yeah, their systems are slowly breaking down.
Anoniminous
@Sister Golden Bear: Don’t need to define “mansplaining”. I have Ilona Baliūnaitė’s flowchart.
ChatGPT managed to get Gary Marcus and Yann LeCun to agree on something for the first time ever. To wit: if AI is the goal chatbots are a dead end. The tl;dr explanation: Generative chatbots are based on (1) meaning is not an engineering concern and (2) the informal logical fallacy ‘The Territory is the Map.” In the ‘Chat-verse’ words are ONLY a sequence of ASCII bit strings separated by the ‘space’ character with their arrangement based on: Given these three words what is the most likely – by Occurrence Count – next word. The “meaning” (sic) of the text output is constructed by the reader via anthropomorphism.
Suzanne
@Ken: I have this tiny kitchen (house built approx. 1920). Every cabinet is in use. At some point, I’m going to redo the kitchen, and I’m gonna get the oversized upper cabinets and take them up to the ceiling. Get rid of that dumbshit soffit.
KenK
@Gin & Tonic: Alas, poor
YorickIgor.tokyokie
@twbrandt (formerly tom):
lowtechcyclist
@Jeffro:
If you include the RW SCOTUS majority as part of the GOP, they’re still landing some serious punches, unfortunately.
WaterGirl
@Math Guy: ??
WaterGirl
@tokyokie: That’s totally nuts!
WaterGirl
Sent to me just now by commenter Leslie:
Perfect. Except, of course, that she is smart in some ways, but she is an awful person to be mocked mercilessly.
Splitting Image
@Anoniminous:
Give it the vote and you would make conservatives obsolete.
lowtechcyclist
@Suzanne:
Our kitchen isn’t tiny, but it isn’t particularly big either, and we’ve got more stuff that needs to be on low shelves that my wife can reach than we’ve got low shelves to put the stuff on. So I still have my uses, apparently.
Kay
Imagine – at least 20 people were paid to come up with this insane plan. They sat around a table and designed it.
“Let’s make it so they won’t know whether they get Social Security payments and retirement healthcare and then do that to them over and over, every 5 years”
Sickos.
Baud
@Kay:
Please proceed, Senator.
sab
@Gin & Tonic: On the other hand, I was just able to buy a bag of key limes, and another bag of meyer lemons in a medium sized city in Ohio.
buggrit
@Baud: Nonsense. Y’all make fine companion animals.
Kay
@Baud:
The whole plan is insane.
I take it back too- it’s only 31 pages with a ton of graphics filler and 50% of the (few) words in are their bullshit trigger words, “woke”, etc. so it took almost no work at all.
Baud
@buggrit:
The next Balloon Juice pet calendar will be different.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Baud: AI can generate images too.
Anoniminous
When I remodeled our kitchen I installed stainless steel Rev-a-Shelf and boy are those things nice. They are pricey but double the effective under-the-counter storage and you don’t have to get down on your knees and conduct an archeological dig to find stuff.
Van Buren
@Gin & Tonic: “chemically enhanced and loaded with sugar” sounds like a coed at a southern party school.
EarthWindFire
@Kay: Not only that, what happens to FICA in the meantime? Did the brain trust even cover that part? Can’t pull down the great work so my guess is no.
Sister Golden Bear
@scav:
Reminds me of the meme with a dominatrix sitting on a man on his hands and knees being used as a chair. The caption read: “He wanted a sandwich — so I made him a sub.”
Timill
@Anoniminous: There’s also these pull-outs for upper cabinets.
Manyakitty
@Gin & Tonic: and the wheel of fortune spins
Paul in KY
@Gin & Tonic: Fuck him.