{"id":4548,"date":"2017-04-09T21:57:37","date_gmt":"2017-04-10T04:57:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/?p=4548"},"modified":"2017-04-09T22:28:55","modified_gmt":"2017-04-10T05:28:55","slug":"pre-programmed-at-sea-04092017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/?p=4548","title":{"rendered":"Pre-programmed \u2013 At Sea \u2013 [04\/09\/2017]"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"When I was a kid we had a dog. Sweetest dog ever. We had \u201cinherited\u201d her from a relative who had moved and we loved her dearly. But she had one upsetting quirk \u2013 upsetting not because of the quirk itself but because of what it said about how she had probably been treated \u2013 if you picked up a broom, she would scurry into a corner and just\u2026look at you. Scared. So obviously scared. We don\u2019t know what happened to make that dog scared of brooms, but something obviously did.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s odd how easy it is to develop a \u201cbroomstick complex\u201d, whether or not you happen to be a puppy. I suppose I should know, somewhere along the line of working on ships \u2013 probably in the last few years when the librarian job got hard \u2013 I developed one. I have mostly conquered it now, but even so, if someone takes a certain tone or attitude with me, my stomach will clench, my heart will race and I will start to physically shake. It\u2019s part anger I\u2019ll admit, and the desire to control that anger, but it\u2019s mostly fear\u2026the same complex that drove that dog into the corner at the sight of a broom<\/p>\n

I will say whatever you want me to say, if you will please just not hurt me, please just don\u2019t yell at me.<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not used to this surfacing in my current job. I\u2019m in an extremely positive environment, my students laugh with me, chat with me, heck they show me pictures of their pets and their kids and give me photos they took of the Neptune ceremony\u2026and so in the past year I\u2019ve come to believe that I had pretty much set my broomstick complex aside. But these things are a deep down intrinsict part of us, and that makes them hard to conquer.<\/p>\n

The student who came in to class today and touched off this circumstance did so a full half hour late, which is to say that the class was in wrap up mode anyway, as they only tend to run 45 minutes even when I\u2019ve got a packed house, and\u00a0 had only had a handful of regulars in this particular session. Normally when people come in late they do so quietly and take a seat at the back of the room, I knew something was off with this gentleman right away because he came in very loudly (the door doesn\u2019t naturally make a lot of noise when it closes unless you tug it shut with a fair amount of force, which he did) and made a big show of finding a seat at the front \u2013 which disrupted and disturbed the rest of the students, but we managed to hold the train of thought and I just kept going as if I hadn\u2019t noticed anything. Looking back, perhaps that may have been a mistake.<\/p>\n

I wrap up the section of the class I had been covering (it\u2019s an overview class, and I make a point as I go along of telling people that they can come back to the more in depth classes on the individual features if they\u2019re interesting in knowing more specifics about them, and at this point most of the students have been to those classes already so the overview classes move at a nice brisk pace), and I pause to check if there are any questions on what I\u2019ve just covered.<\/p>\n

Note: at this point,\u00a0 I have already covered the section on the operating systems digital assistant feature before the person in question arrived, that piece of the class had already been wrapped, I had mentioned it briefly again in the context of something else entirely, but the subject was known to pretty much be closed\u2026<\/p>\n

At which point the new fellow, who had been sitting there with his arms folded since he arrived, puts up his hand. As is my job, I call on him\u2026and he proceeds to ask me a very specific question regarding the digital assistant feature and \u201cher\u201d depth of knowledge, I flounder a bit as the wording of the question threw me and I wasn\u2019t quite sure what he was asking, he clarifies \u2013 in an already rather aggressive tone \u2013 with a specific example question that he wants to know whether or not the assistant in question can answer.<\/p>\n

I dutifully pose the question to the program, with the qualifier that it will probably produce a web search as a response as that is what \u201cshe\u201d will do when \u201cshe\u201d doesn\u2019t have a built in response. Much to my relief, the program actually goes one step further and in fact does produce a word for word encyclopedic answer to his query. A totally accurate one I might add. His response:<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not correct.<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019m sorry sir?<\/em><\/p>\n

That\u2019s not right. So there\u2019s no artificial intelligence here<\/em><\/p>\n

Well that\u2019s not exactly true sir, she is<\/u> A.I, but she\u2019s not that type of A.I\u2026she\u2019s intended to perform basic tasks and use the internet to answer basic questions. She doesn\u2019t have a brain of any kind..<\/em><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not about a brain, it\u2019s about consciousness<\/em><\/p>\n

Um, no sir I\u2019m afraid she can\u2019t provide consciousness in that sense\u2026that\u2019s not what she\u2019s designed to\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

And he interrupts me<\/p>\n

So there\u2019s a limitation<\/em><\/p>\n

I need to make it very clear that he made that statement. That the rest of the class heard him say it. Because what happened next was that he denied having said any such thing, denied having ever said anything to do with \u201climited\u201d, he proceeded to double talk back to me, and change the question he was asking every time he asked it and I attempted to answer. I will admit that never once did he raise his voice, but the underlying aggression in his tone was enough to kick me into being severely shaken up. A little too late I realized that this fellow had likely come in seeking some kind of a confrontation, although for what reason I have no idea. In trying to probe for what he was actually asking, and get some sense of what on earth he was actually talking about, I even went so far as to ask the rest of the class if they had heard what I had, but they were all as shocked as I was, and he wouldn\u2019t let go, he wouldn\u2019t stop. In a somewhat desperate attempt to at least shut down the conversation and move on, I even went so far as to go with the following<\/p>\n

I\u2019m sorry sir, no we\u2019re not to the level you seem to be asking for, I mean she\u2019s not the holodeck<\/em><\/p>\n

The holodeck didn\u2019t have it either..<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2026am exaggerating for the point of a story sir..<\/em><\/p>\n

That was the only thing I could think of to say, because at this point this is bordering on the bizarre. Not to mention the fact that he\u2019s wrong: mess with me on many things, but not on all things geek. I may not be a pure blood Trekkie, my knowledge of the series is limited, but even I can name you a few episodes where the AI involved in the holodeck got out of control, not to mention that in Next Gen the Doctor is programmed with the same type of technology that the Holodeck has and I dare anyone to say that he doesn\u2019t have a consciousness. But I didn\u2019t\u2019 say any of that the alarms bells blaring in my head were too loud. What I did say was this<\/p>\n

I\u2019m really sorry sir, but I\u2019m afraid I just don\u2019t understand your question, exactly what is<\/u> it you\u2019re trying to ask?<\/em><\/p>\n

Thank you! You don\u2019t know. You just don\u2019t know. <\/em><\/p>\n

I would very much like to help you though sir, if you could just clarify what it is you\u2019re trying to ask<\/em><\/p>\n

No, you just don\u2019t know.<\/em><\/p>\n

And the tone in which he said it *very* clearly said \u201cwhy didn\u2019t you just say you didn\u2019t know in the first place, you\u2019re obviously incompetent\u201d\u2026and it didn\u2019t take a genius to read that tone. The whole class could read that tone.<\/p>\n

Thoroughly shaken up, and upset with myself for being so, I managed to close that conversation and ask if there were any other questions. There weren\u2019t. So I began my wrap up, and a few minutes into that, he gets up and stalks out, having not uttered another word, but with total distain written in every muscle in his body. I waited for the door to close, took a very deep breath, looked at the rest of the class, who looked back at me<\/p>\n

I\u2026am really not sure what just happened there. I am sorry about that.<\/em><\/p>\n

You have nothing to be sorry for! You handled that much better than I would have! Etc etc\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

They all looked just as completely baffled by the situation as I had been. But I was shaken enough that my train of thought wouldn\u2019t re-center, I had to cut my wrap up short, leaving out much of what I would normally say (grateful for the fact that they had heard the whole thing before), before giving them their paperwork and stepping aside to make the phone call to my boss to explain what had happened, because I know the attitude of people like this, he will probably complain and my words will be twisted so that it sounds like I truly was rude and incompetent. A few of my other students stayed behind to vouch for me\u2026which is always nice..<\/p>\n

But I find myself surprised that things like this still shake me as much as they do\u2026and I wish I knew why, because I am so confident and difficult to shake in other areas. It was just something about the tone of his voice\u2026and the way he looked at me\u2026<\/p>\n

If you need me, I\u2019ll be in my cave\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I was a kid we had a dog. Sweetest dog ever. We had \u201cinherited\u201d her from a relative who had moved and we loved her dearly. But she had one upsetting quirk \u2013 upsetting not because of the quirk … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,17,93],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4548","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-below-the-waterline","category-reflections-below-the-waterline","category-south-of-the-border-2017"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3GtNE-1bm","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4548","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4548"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4548\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4551,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4548\/revisions\/4551"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4548"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4548"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4548"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}