Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

The arc of the moral universe does not bend itself. it is up to us to bend it.

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

Petty moves from a petty man.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

People are complicated. Love is not.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

“Alexa, change the president.”

Peak wingnut was a lie.

The real work of an opposition party is to oppose.

When you’re a Republican, they let you do it.

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

American history and black history cannot be separated.

You know he’s going to shit a cat.

I really should read my own blog.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

We need to vote them all out and restore sane Democratic government.

Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

These are not very smart people, and things got out of hand.

There are times when telling just part of the truth is effectively a lie.

Republicans in disarray!

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Something Fun

Fun Facts That the Rest of Us May Not Know

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As I was reading the discussion this morning about jars that are hard to open, I thought it could be fun to have a thread where we share some of the tricks that make life easier.  And then I got email this morning telling me that xylitol is now being marketed as “birch sugar”.

I’m sure you guys all know that Xylitol is extremely dangerous, and even life-threatening, to dogs.  It’s in peanut butter and some ice cream and other things one might be tempted to give a dog.

Xylitol is extremely toxic to dogs. Even small amounts of xylitol can cause hypoglycemia (low blood sugar), seizures, liver failure, or even death. Cats, ferrets, and horses do not appear to be at risk from ingestion of xylitol.

So then I thought, hey, let’s combine tricks of the trade and some fun (and possibly not so fun) facts that all of us may not know.

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I Finally Found A Use For Chat GPT…

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In the morning thread, Jackal Tobie pointed out that Google does not offer an AI answer for a search asking if Trump has dementia, while generating a reply if one asks about, say Bruce Willis.*

So…what should one do?

Well, if you have my somewhat unfortunate turn of mind, you might ask Chat GPT to generate an internal monologue for a Trump posited to be in the grips of cognitive decline. To its credit, I’d say, that generator of frequency distributions of strings of words declined to do so, explaining that would be too close to offering a diagnosis of a living person.

Being a helpful sack of words+algorithms, however, the LLM offered to write up what a fictional  politician in such straits might be thinking. My first try was a bust–I fed back the word “politician” in the prompt and got a notional senator’s musings.  I tried again with a cleaned up ask, and this is what I got:

Prompt: Write an internal monologue of a fictional American president who is confused, grandiose, or erratic.

I Finally Found A Use For Chat GPT...

Here’s an internal monologue of a completely fictional American president—President Alderidge “A.J.” Mapleson—who is confused, grandiose, and erratic. No real person is being portrayed.

Internal Monologue of President Alderidge “A.J.” Mapleson

Where’s my nuclear football? They told me it’s always nearby, but I don’t see anything shaped like a football. Maybe it’s an actual football. Maybe they’ve been hiding it from me because they’re worried I’ll try to punt it down the hallway again. That only happened twice. People overreact.

Focus, A.J., focus. You’re the president. The President of the United States—the biggest job in the world. Or is it the second biggest? I think the CEO of MegaMart technically has more employees. I should call him. Maybe he can give me leadership tips. Or coupons.

What’s on the schedule? Something about a security briefing? Or a briefing about the briefing? Why do they brief me so much? I already know everything. I’ve read so many files, some of them twice. I could brief them if I wanted. But I won’t. Wouldn’t want to make them insecure.

Is that the Secretary of Defense coming toward me? I hope he doesn’t want an update on the “Mapleson Doctrine.” I don’t remember inventing it, but everyone keeps referencing it like I wrote it in stone tablets. Should I ask him what it is? No—no, play it cool. I’ll nod sagely. Nodding solves many problems.

I need a strong line for the speech today. Something presidential. “My fellow Americans…” Yes, good start. Then something inspiring. Maybe trees? Americans like trees. Or space. Space trees? I’ll circle back to that.

Wait—am I supposed to be in the Oval Office right now? This hallway doesn’t look oval. It looks rectangle. That’s troubling. Maybe they moved the office again. They keep rearranging things. I know they do it to keep me sharp. Or to keep me confused. Hard to tell these days.

I should announce a new initiative. Presidents announce things. “Operation… something.” Operation Lighthouse, maybe? Or Operation Lightning Shark. Yes. That sounds powerful. Dramatic. Cinematic. I’ll figure out what it actually does later, once the polls come in.

Smile, A.J. Smile with gravitas. Think majestic thoughts. Think commander-in-chief energy. Think… wait… where was I going?

Ah yes.

To lead the nation. Boldly. Confidently. And with absolutely no idea what meeting I’m walking into right now.

I don’t know about y’all, but I’m feeling that the veil of fiction is pretty damn thin.

Have fun in the comments, jackatariat; this thread is as open as the presidential mind is welded shut.

PS: I am not an AI-involved guy, at least not yet. As you might expect, the question of how the ready availability of LLMs affects higher ed is a pretty constant topic at my workplace. But I’ve been too much involved in immediate crises to get much of a handle on what actual use such models might be, and how (if at all) to keep their use from wrecking humanistic education. I suspect I will not be permitted such blissful ignorances for much longer.

*To be fair: Google also declines to provide an AI summary for the same search asked of other politicians. I tried it on Joe Biden and Mike Johnson and each time it went “nope.”

Image: Hans Memling, X-radiograph of the painting, Portrait of an Old Man,  c. 1475

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Cats Apparently Not About To Be Outdone by Dogs

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Thursday Night Open Thread 12
This is my Miss Willow!

Commenter BethanyAnne sent me this awhile ago.   (I am playing catch-up on my email.)

In her own words.

I have something that might make a fun distraction or off-topic post.

You know those buttons that dogs can be trained to press? They play an English word, and that way the dog can “speak” to their human.

Author Mary Robinette Kowal has taught her cat, Elsie, to use those buttons. Elsie is up to a 120 word vocabulary. And she rearranges the words and such in a way that indicates she knows what she’s saying.

The podcast “The Allusionist” did 2 episodes about this:

https://www.theallusionist.org/lexicat1

https://www.theallusionist.org/allusionist/lexicat2

I also found that Mary Robinette posts videos of Elsie using the buttons on YouTube.

 

I’ve watched about half of the videos, and this was the absolute bestest of them all:

 

This whole thing sounded like a topic the Balloon Juice crew would love. If you make a thread, I hope Werebear notices it.

Watch some of the videos.  This is wild!

Mostly open thread.

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