Category Archives: computers

Autonomous Cars VS Autonomous Drivers

The problem with human intelligence is that its normal range is too broad. The difference between the lower limit of normal compared to the upper point of the normal range is so wide that the average comes in at such a low number that the ordinary performance of typical human functions is beyond the capacity…


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A Few Thoughts about Artificial Intelligence

AI is on the lips of just about everyone, including those who don’t know what the two letters stand for. Many seem to share the concern of the philosopher Nick Bostrom that we may create AI systems that will be so powerful and so much smarter than we are that they will take over the…


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Another Failure of AI – Man Beats Best Computer Go Program

This is a flow up to the article I wrote here five days ago in which I described the failure of Open AI’s ChatGPT to handle medical material. Obviously, the AI program has not had much exposure to medicine accounting for its poor performance in that field. Specialized AI programs have done as well or…


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The Perils of AI

I’ve recently read several articles describing the incredible output of openai. Samples of its work were presented as equivalent to the columns of newswriters or the advice emails by writers with large numbers of readers. So I decided to try it out. I asked for the biographies of a number of well known and important…


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California Bans High End Computers

California is not only our most populous state, it’s also our goofiest. As a consequence of an energy bill passed in 2017, the state has banned the sale of high end gaming computers. Not to be outdone Colorado, Hawaii, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington have issued the same ukase. “The state had recently published a paper looking into…


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Lead Browser

Like much of humanity, I use Chrome as my internet browser. I started out using Netscape as did almost everybody in the 90s. Microsoft bullied Netscape out of existence by bundling its late to the game browser Internet Explorer with its operating systems which were included on OEMs. In a few years Netscape was fit…


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Bring Back The Abacus

The complete ingestion of the modern world by the computer has putatively made life easier and allegedly added to the variety and plenty of life’s pleasant experiences. Except when it hasn’t. Yesterday Walgreens informed me that I had a prescription ready for pickup. To make life easier for me they gave me a link to…


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Robot Reaches Milestone, Passes Medical Licensing Exam

The following is from Becker’s Hospital Review – November 21, 201. It was bound to happen. Draw your own conclusions. An artificial intelligence-powered robot in China took the country’s medical licensing examinations and passed, becoming the first robot to do so, Futurism reports. The robot, Xiaoyi, not only passed the tests, but it did so with flying colors —…


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CCleaner Trojan

Even looking at a computer from a distance no longer seems safe. The popular utility CCleaner distributed an update (Version 5.33) that contained a piece of malware – trojan.floxif. Ironically the company that makes CCleaner was recently bought by Avast the antivirus company. They distributed a post that describes their response to the problem. It…


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The Medical Record – Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose

The medical record has been a problem ever since Hippocrates, in a moment of spite, invented it. Until the advent of the electronic record it had existed on paper and was stored in a variety of inaccessible locations by the Department of Medical Records, or by a similarly named entity. Once entombed in the medical…


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