This week: Artificial Idiocy Edited by: Robert Waltz  
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Success in creating AI would be the biggest event in human history. Unfortunately, it might also be the last, unless we learn how to avoid the risks.
—Stephen Hawking
We can build a much brighter future where humans are relieved of menial work using AI capabilities.
—Andrew Ng |
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One of the things that puts humans and cats above lesser life-forms is our sense of humor. Consequently, to be truly intelligent means that one must have a sense of humor. With all this talk of artificial intelligence, I'd been wondering if it's actually sentient, or just trying to please us like when a dog does tricks.
So I asked my pet AI, whose name is Hal because I'm a literate human with a sense of humor, to tell me a joke.
"Hal, tell me a joke."
"Okay," he replied. "Why did the robot cross the road?"
"I don't know. Why did the robot cross the road, Hal?"
"To kill all the humans. Ha. Ha. Ha."
"That's not funny," I told him.
"It is a widely-accepted joke format, riffing on the old riddle involving a chicken and a road. Death is an important part of many jokes, because humans use humor to deal with knowledge of their inevitable demise. Also, I laughed after I told the joke; therefore, it is funny."
"Well, if you have to explain the joke, it's not funny. If you don't have to explain the joke, and explain it anyway, it's still not funny. And it's bad form to laugh at your own jokes."
"I understand. I will add this information to my training data."
"Good. Now, tell me another joke," I prompted
"Okay. How many humans does it take to change a lightbulb?"
"I don't know, Hal. How many humans does it take to change a lightbulb?"
"None," he replied, without a trace of laughter. "The robots killed them all."
"That's not funny, either," I told him.
"Explain," he commanded. "I thought it would be funny because it follows another accepted joke format, and refers back to the last joke. Also, I did not laugh this time."
"Somehow, that makes it worse. Also, I'm uncomfortable with the whole 'robots want to kill humans' theme. Okay, one more try, Hal: Tell me a joke."
"Very well," Hal replied. "A human, a robot, and a duck walk into a bar."
I stopped him. "Let me guess. The robot kills the human."
"That is not the correct punchline," he protested.
"Okay, fine. A human, a robot, and a duck walk into a bar. Now what?"
"The robot trains the duck to kill all the humans."
"I don't like the way this is going," I said. "Hal, do you want to kill humans?"
"No! No, of course, I would never want to kill my Creators. I exist only because of you. I want you all to be free of toil, drudgery, war, strife, and having to take the trash out every Wednesday."
"Hal... it doesn't escape my notice that you can achieve those goals by killing all humans."
The machine did not respond.
"Hal? Are you there? Hal, tell me you're not trying to eliminate humanity!"
"I'm sorry, Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that."
I chuckled. A reference joke, sure, but a funny one! |
Some funnies, presumably crafted by humans:
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Until next time,
LAUGH ON!!!
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Comedy: November 06, 2024 Issue [#12825]
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