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Speed, oversimplification, and delusion
Artificial intelligence seems to be mostly about speed. Instead of days, weeks, or months working on your software, book, or other project, it can be done in hours or even minutes! Well…okay…but so what? There are certainly cases where speed is an important component of an outcome. Dousing a fire. Removing a steak from the… Continue reading
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Unincorporating
My most recent employer recently decided the jobs I and many of my colleagues were doing no longer needed to be done. We had, of course, been doing exactly the work that same employer specified. We were doing it pretty well, too, judging by the performance reviews, bonus payments, and acclaim we were receiving. But… Continue reading
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The intelligence is the words
Kevin Kelly asks If programmers did not program ChatGPT with logical deduction skills, where does the intelligence in its models come from? He hypothesizes that It is the architecture of language that conveys the intelligence. I have another idea: our intelligence is the language, and that’s been hidden in plain sight for centuries or more.… Continue reading
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Growling about cars
by Chocolate My friends woof to me about rides in a car.They like them. They’re great, like a super-speed run.I disagree; I don’t think cars are fun.I already can run super fast, super far. The thing about running is I am the boss;I choose where to go, which direction to head.If I change my mind… Continue reading
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The local and the flood
The local was washed away in the spew. You know the spew. It’s the relentless flood of information overwhelming us online. So much email the majority is automatically deleted. Same situation with text messages. Social media is even worse — there’s so much nobody can keep up with it, even though thanks to the automatic… Continue reading
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Juneteenth
Today is Juneteenth. Not everybody knows that the official title is Juneteenth National Independence Day. It’s the holiday that commemorates the end of slavery in the US. Slavery was declared over by Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, but it took another two and a half years for the traitorous slavers to be defeated. That… Continue reading
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Writing, Generative and Symbolic
Writer has been my self-description for my whole adult life. Not the only one, but probably the one with the longest standing. I’ve had a daily writing practice for longer than I remember. As I’ve occasionally mentioned, a writing practice, at least for me, is not necessarily aimed at producing anything to be read, even… Continue reading
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Commode-Door
Back in the day — way way back in the day — personal computers were diverse and came with communities of fellow users of whatever brand you had. And of course you would tease those other folks by making fun of their brand. If you had a TRS-80, you’d call Commodore systems “commode-doors.” Commodore users… Continue reading
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Design as divisive; design as inclusive
Among other pursuits, I’ve been a software interaction designer. That’s basically a user interface designer without doing the graphics. When I was doing interaction design, I always started from user research. In order to design something that works for users who are not like you, it’s critically important to learn about them. You start by… Continue reading
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Hare is Live
You can find quite a few Tales from the Forest stories here, all tagged “tales from the forest.” Now you can find a few of them here as well, on paper or a Kindle ebook. Have a look! Hare, Dog, Magpie, Ferret, and the rest of the forest gang are waiting. Continue reading
About Me
I’m Pete Harbeson, a writer (among other things) located near Boston, Massachusetts. In addition to writing my own content, I’ve learned to translate for my loquacious and opinionated pup Chocolate Bossypaws. No surprise, she mostly speaks in doggerel. You can find her contributions tagged with Chocolatiana.
Check out my newsletter, Artisanal Scribbles, where I’m grappling with writing, authentic human authorship, integrity, and the craft of beauty in the AI age. You can also find some of my old software projects at GitHub. Nothing very impressive. I mostly wrote tiny utilities in Python and shell scripts. I’m mostly retired from coding nowadays.
I find myself suddenly de-corporatized (their choice, not mine). To help keep the lights on, buy me a coffee!
Recent Posts
- Can any good come of any of it?
- What is it about Florida?
- Why does anybody listen to this grifter?
- Fashionable or able to fashion
- The corporate overlords and the long despair
Categories
Artificial Intelligence
Chocolatiana
Essays
History, sort of
Immorality
Incompetence
Quotations
Resistance
Stories
Tales from the Forest
Technicalities
Tragedy
Unanticipated Consequences
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Contact
peterharbeson@me.com