I keep wondering if the AI written posts will work out in the long run. Cheaper than paying people to write but lacking any real experience with the topics they write.

They used to say "Don't do this at home, kids" when something was possibly dangerous/ risky. I think that will be a problem with AI generated posts. A computer can put together an article but is it giving people information they can count on?

My Mother isn't sure about AI/ computer driven cars. I thought it was a good idea, safer for drivers who may be distracted, intoxicated, tired, nervous, or just don't drive. All the AI needs to do is follow the line of the roads, know traffic signals, etc. After all, people drive themselves places half in a trance and are surprised when they get there. If all vehicles were AI driven there would be very few unexpected incidents, they would all be driving the same way. No second guessing, no human errors.

But, this relies on everything being predictable for the AI. An AI only knows as much as it knows, no more. What if the road hasn't been maintained to the standard the AI needs, for instance? People who drive know it isn't easy to see the white lines in the road when the paint is worn away or during a storm. Can the AI deal with that, or will that be a time when the AI needs to shut down and the vehicle is driven manually, by a human.

What about AIs writing articles online, giving people information, advice? People stuff information into the computer and leave the AI to spit it out as an article. So the AI gives advice to people about assorted topics: fast food restaurants, fashion choices, and cancer medications. Is the AI a trusted source? No. The AI is not an expert, does not have any experience or training. The AI only has information given to it and information it scrapes from other sites/ sources online.

Who will be responsible if the AI gives people the wrong advice, bad information? I don't think its just a small chance that this will happen. Fact checking has gone out of style, like proofreading and I don't see much editing either. Yes, the AI can edit itself for punctuation and grammar. Pretty limited with fact checking. By the time the article is written the AI considers it to be fact checked based on whatever information it had or came across. But, its just software. An influencer, not an authority.

The authorities will be at home, washing their dishes, cleaning the garage, all those dirty, messy, tedious jobs we thought robots would do for us. What comes next? What else will AIs do "for" us?

"Don't try this at home, humans, I'm just an AI and don't know any better." Will that be the new warning when something could be dangerous or risky? Probably more legalese than that.

I strongly disagree with cancel culture, book burning, etc. History doesn't go away just because people don't like it. Young people won't know Nancy Green because she was removed from the syrup bottles. So they won't see her and think to find out who she was. She becomes lost to history, because she was black, not because she wasn't worth remembering.

Posted by Terry Quinn on Facebook:

The branding of the syrup was a tribute to this woman’s gifts and talents. The world knew her as “Aunt Jemima”, but her given name was Nancy Green and she was a true American success story. She was born a slave in 1834 Montgomery County, Kentucky. and became a wealthy superstar in the advertising world, as its first living trademark. Green was 56-yrs old when she was selected as spokesperson for a new ready-mixed, self-rising pancake flour and made her debut in 1893 at a fair and exposition in Chicago. She demonstrated the pancake mix and served thousands of pancakes, and became an immediate star.

She was a good storyteller, her personality was warm and appealing, and her showmanship was exceptional. Her exhibition booth drew so many people that special security personnel were assigned to keep the crowds moving. Nancy Green was signed to a lifetime contract, traveled on promotional tours all over the country, and was extremely well paid. Her financial freedom and stature as a national spokesperson enabled her to become a leading advocate against poverty and in favor of equal rights for all Americans. She maintained her job until her death in 1923, at age 89. This was a remarkable woman, and sadly she has been ERASED by politics. I wanted you to know and remind you in this cancel culture time period.

Listening to people, family, and the media go on about your life and health as you get older, some days it feels like living with a jack-in-the-box. Any time it could pop up and that's it your time is up. I'm going to be 60 at the end of this year. I do wonder how many days I still have. I don't feel stressed about it but, I don't like it.

I wonder if there have been people who also didn't like the unknown date lurking in their future. Has anyone ever decided they didn't like the suspense and chosen their own expiry date? Not due to despair, or ill health. Just because you don't want to leave it random and unknown.

I don't think its suicide. It's not a decision made due to sadness, or ill health. I don't think its morbid either. Younger people may see it that way. Your experience is different. But, unless immortality becomes an option, I think its entirely reasonable.

Compare it to doctors deciding a birth date for babies by scheduling a caesarian for women. They don't know what the real birth date would have been, if the baby had been left in the womb until it made its own way, in its own time. I think choosing your own death date would be the same really.

You could have all your affairs in order, make sure your will is done right, write instructions for your funeral, burial, or whatever you want done with your leftover body. Decide where your possessions go, are distributed, knowing there isn't much of anything you can take with you. Spend that extra time with family and friends you've kept meaning to visit but didn't make time for. If you are a bucket list person, finish your list. Find a good spot and plant a tree! Otherwise, do those things you'd like to have done, travel to those places you would have liked to see, knowing your plan for how many days you've decided you have left.

In the end, you might choose to extend the date. There would be not reason you couldn't. That alone would be a good reason not to tell anyone else about what you're doing and the cut off date. Who wants someone reminding you about it. You might change your mind entirely. But, if you wanted to stick to your date and not keep waiting for it to come along and happen to you - why shouldn't a person take their own fate in their own hands and choose their last day for themselves?

I understand the idea about pulling down statues, burning books, and trying to change how history is viewed, but I am concerned about censorship.

Changing a point of view can be done without destruction, like burning books, toppling statues, defacing graves, and so on. People don't need to destroy things in order to change perspective.

The people in history had a different perspective, a different lifestyle. They lived in the times as they were. Their choices were based on what life was like, what they knew and understood about the world. In their world, at that time, they believed in what they were doing.

Times change, attitudes and ideals develop and evolve. That doesn't mean everything about the past is terrible or wrong, or should be destroyed. One negative should not cause the destruction of everything else that was positive and important and good.

A new, different perspective can bring fresh understanding of history, without attempting to vilify people or erase them from history. Talk about people in history, but without censorship or bias. Give people the facts, about the accomplishments and failures of people in history and see them as human beings, as people like ourselves but different.

In time, future people will look back on us, our deeds, ideas, and very likely have a different perspective than we do now. I hope they will also choose to have understanding and view us in perspective. I would not like us to be censored or erased from history because future people don't agree with our ideas or actions.

My Mother likes to watch game shows: The Price is Right, Let's Make a Deal, Family Feud, Wheel of Fortune, and the odd other. Wheel of Fortune is the only game show I haven't seen anyone jump on the host. But they do scream, sometimes. I don't think it is especially encouraged there. But, all the others seem to work people up into a frenzy.

I'm sure its a marketing thing. Getting people to show all that excitement helps promote the products, whatever they are. A game show can have people jumping all over the place and screeching over winning a pen and paper. Then they drop a car into the mix to keep everyone on their toes and crazy excited.

I can see how it works for the shows and the marketing which is what the shows are really about. Selling stuff to the public.

But, all this rabid excitement, the screaming and jumping, isn't good for people. That level of excitement, in our past, would have been over seeing a large predator about to kill and eat us.

Have you noticed TV shows and movies and even commercials are all about excitement. They are louder, more colourful, bigger reactions (over reactions), far more emotions and being very emotional and sensitive. Its all gone over the top.

What kind of people are they turning us into?

Of course, its great for marketing. The goal of marketing is to make people feel they need more stuff. Marketing preys on people, as I have written before. Not just to sell us stuff but to make us feel we really need all that stuff. What would we be without blinding white teeth?

But, the funny thing, watching these game shows, we look more and more like prey. But, there are no big predators, no monsters, right?