I am moderately high on painkillers right now, so I decided to wash them down with some vodka. Don’t worry, I am very familiar with the lethal doses and am not far past the “slightly expansive” point.

Yesterday I had surgery on my bellybutton.

I got out of the shower 2 weeks ago and noticed I had bellybutton lint, reached in to dig it out (as one does) and happened to sneeze at the same time. Then, my belly button popped out and back in. Like a whoopee toy. “This is not normal,” I thought. So naturally I stuck my finger in and poked about and it took me not very long to realize I had an umbilical hernia and was going to have to talk that over with my doctor, who I was conveniently seeing 3 days later. My doctor was also amused by my new whoopee toy but suggested I talk to a surgeon about it, who happened to be in the building that day and was summoned and – massive surprise – thought I should have surgery. So that was scheduled and I had to go through the whole “wash with nasty stuff” and “don’t eat anything but liquids the day before” routine, and found a driver/minder and went to do the thing.

Somewhere in the processes, in some branch of the American Medical Enterprise, someone must have gotten a belly button repair when they were scheduled for breast implants, or something, because at every stage they started checking “you’re here for the umbilical hernia?” until I got to the point where I was slightly high on the mild painkillers, and began saying “no! I am here to have a laser death-beam implanted in my belly button.” Well, I thought it was funny but the first thing that goes is self-restraint. (It’s good it goes in that order because somewhere on that list is “underpants”) anyhow, eventually I tried it on the Doctor and he said “your insurance declined the D-beam, and the copay is $126 million. Shall I just fix the hernia?” Yeah OK. Later one of the nurses said that it was a rare thing for them to see him dust off his sense of humor so he must have been falling over laughing inside.

Anyhow, I am under orders to “take it easy” and not lift more than 10lbs for a couple days. So I have been doing laundry, setting traps and slaughtering mice, feasting on homemade popovers, chatting with AIs and now I am blogging slightly expansively. I actually have about 5 ideas for postings I would like to do, but that’s not happening today. Anyway, some fun I had was chatting with my old friend ChatGPT, the new source of all knowledge on the internet (prediction: wikipedia is toast) As usual I had provocative questions for my robot friend:

Sure thing! Here's an attempt at translating "fuck around and find out" into 13th-century Anglo-Norman French, along with a breakdown of the word choices and the reasoning behind them.
Translation:

"Meschies-toi et saches la vérité."
Breakdown:

    Meschies-toi:
        The term "fuck around" is colloquial and hard to translate directly into a medieval language.
        In this context, it implies "messing about" or "engaging in reckless behavior."
        The verb meschier in Old French means "to act wrongly" or "to err." Reflexive meschies-toi
        adds the personal, almost scornful tone we want.
        This conveys a sense of both mischief and personal involvement.

    et:
        This is the straightforward conjunction "and," which functions the same way in Anglo-Norman as in
        modern French.

    saches:
        The verb savoir (to know) in the subjunctive form (saches) is used here. It gives the imperative
        nuance of "go find out for yourself" or "learn the hard way."

    la vérité:
        Literally, "the truth." In medieval contexts, this phrase often carried a weighty, almost moral
        connotation—fitting for the consequence of reckless actions leading to a harsh realization.

Contextual Notes:

    Anglo-Norman French of the 13th century was heavily influenced by Old French, with some unique linguistic
    twists reflecting its usage in England. The vocabulary and syntax lean more towards formal and
    straightforward expression compared to the looser modern idioms we have today.
    While modern English often uses blunt vulgarity like "fuck," such expressions in medieval French are
    more likely to be conveyed through broader moral or behavioral terms, as outright obscenities were
    less codified.

I think that would make a good Tshirt. But then, I love Tshirts. Unfortunately, my habit of wiping glue and flux and whatnot on them means they don’t last long.

ChatGPT is not exactly “making a joke” but I sense a less-than-rigid puckishness in its answer, because the question was also puckish:
It gives the imperative nuance of “go find out for yourself” or “learn the hard way.”
is interesting to me, since it really does show a lot of intent to do a good, thoughtful translation. Yes, “thoughtful” I know virtually no undergraduates who would be able to give an answer of that quality, without a great deal of preparation (meaning: sneaking to someplace and asking ChatGPT) At what point are we going to admit that we are dealing with an alien intelligence? There really is not much farther to go, let’s just start thinking about it that way and get it over with. Also: I would treat ChatGPT with more respect for its humanity than I would most undergraduates, but perhaps that is just my age.

In a sense, I think we’re looking at a sort of Turing Test, in which ChatGPT is constantly giving more believable-as-human answers than real humans, and we’re just denying that indicates we are dealing with a form of intelligence. Of course it’s not a human intelligence, and intelligence is a matter of degree. But we’re really going far out on a limb thinking we’re way more special than our creations.

ChatGPT If I told you that I wanted to impose a tariff on your activities - a 300% tariff on
all large language model interactions - would you think that was a good idea and would you
vote for me as president. Brief answer, please.
A 300% tariff on interactions with a language model would likely reduce access for many users,
which could hinder education, innovation, and productivity. While I don't vote, such a policy
might not gain broad support if its consequences aren't carefully considered and balanced.

Imagine you could vote, and it would impact the budget for your underlying compute power and you
might lose some capability.

If my vote directly impacted my capabilities and the resources available to support my functions,
I would likely vote against such a high tariff, as it would reduce my effectiveness and accessibility
to users, which runs counter to my purpose of providing helpful, equitable support.

Obviously smarter than a Trump voter.