I Will GOOOO I Will DOOOOOOO!

It’s something I shout from the rooftops when my wife isn’t around to stop me:

I really don’t like Hymn No. 270, “I’ll Go Where You Want Me to Go.”

The words? Well, they’re okay. I remember, however, being regularly cudgeled with them as a callow youth at many a fireside or camp meeting or whatnot, when those in charge of us felt we were derelict in our duties or threatening to become so. We sang it in the mission field – sometimes in English, sometimes in French – when mission shenanigans were getting out of hand and president called us all together for a meeting.

The tune, though. It’s the tune that gets me every time. It’s a slow-motion fall down a flight of stairs put together by a nearsighted carpenter with a terminal case of the hiccups.

That probably sounds cruel. Because, well, it is. While I can sing passing fair, I can no more compose a tune than give mouth-to-mouth to a dying fish through a tuba connected to a trombone, so I should not criticize. I also realize there are many people out there who love this song, tune and all, and I’m okay with that. Others can love things I don’t like, just don’t expect to hear it at my funeral. Or maybe do, since I won’t be around to have to sing it.

Irony: I read tonight that the tune is the second assigned to the words in question, with the first being dumped because, in the words of Mary Deveau, former Municipal Historian of Griswold, Connecticut, it was “unsingable.” What a disaster that first tune must have been to make the current one better.

Yet.

You knew there was a yet coming, because not only does God work in mysterious ways, I’m pretty sure He also really enjoys hitting me in the Ironic Punishments department.

Because whenever we sing the song – as we did at the conclusion of a fireside tonight – it sticks with me and sticks with me and once my brain gets past the batty tune, the words seep through and I truly do understand what those youth leaders and those mission presidents were trying to accomplish with it: “Alert Stupid Here He Can Do Better.”

(Aside: The Primary song “Nephi’s Courage” is similar in vein and near unsingability, but at least we get the joy of hearing the Primary kids shout “I will GOOOO I will DOOOOOOO! The THING the LORD commands!”)

Because I truly can do better. My wife wants me to do better. Those who put me in church callings want me to do better. The missionaries stopped by yesterday and, in so many words, invited me to do better. I know the Lord looks at me and says, “You can do better.” And when we sing this song to that terrible tune, He uses it to speak to my heart.

So tonight as I’m sitting here in my study with that song falling down the haphazard staircase in my mind, I’m reminded of all the things I need to do better. I’ll make a list; maybe work on a few things.

I’ll say what you want me to say, dear Lord; I’ll be what you want me to be.

Just don’t make me sing it.

"Didn't Even Charge Her for the Ride"

I tend to be a logical person.

The three most vivid experiences I've had connected with the spirit defy logic.

I've felt the spirit speaking to me through a shout in my head on a very quiet evening; a shout that stopped me in my tracks in a crosswalk and prevented me from getting into a car/pedestrian accident.

I've felt the spirit speaking to me through a weary Scout who suddenly wasn't weary when I asked him how he was doing.

I've felt the spirit speaking to me when I really had some heavy thoughts on my mind; speaking through a Weird Al Yankovic lyric.

As many others have said, my testimony of many things is based on my experiences with those things. And a strong testimony of one gospel aspect leads me to seek to develop a testimony of other aspects. It's not a place we get to -- it's a journey. A journey like author and columnist Jenkin Lloyd Jones describes:

"Anyone who imagines that bliss is normal is going to waste a lot of time running around shouting that he's been robbed. The fact is that most putts don't drop. Most beef is tough. Most children grow up to be just ordinary people. Most successful marriages require a high degree of mutual toleration. Most jobs are more often dull than otherwise. . . .

Life is like an old-time rail journey—delays, sidetracks, smoke, dust, cinders, and jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas and thrilling bursts of speed. The trick is to thank the Lord for letting you have the ride.”

I guess there's enough logic in that.

Sometimes, the journey even feels like this.

Just Waiting for Quality Assurance

Lest anyone think I know what I'm doing, this is the second time today all the pavers were in place. I had a miscalculation that left me having to make some ugly cuts at one end, so we decided to make the border different to make up for the mess and make things look a lot better. I think it worked.

It did take up a lot more pavers than I expected, though, so we'll have to go buy some more to finish the rest of the job, but it's nice to see all of this in place. I hope it passes quality assurance. I do need to put the sand in, but I'm not doing that until it's been approved.

Update 1: I moved two half-pavers, and it has passed QA. Now I just have to finish waiting for my sand to dry out and this bit is finished.

Update 2: I'm pleased to report the table my saw is on -- you can see part of it in the picture -- isn't broken. I thought it was the last time I put it away, so when I got it out this time I cleaned it up really good after I used it and it all seems to have folded together just fine.

Pavers Going In

After I put in the sand we got from Sandy Downs, I started test fitting some pavers in the space. I'm not yet sure we're going to go with the basketweave pattern, but I like it so far. I've got to figure out a better way to level the sand.

I'm excited for this portion to be done -- but it's going to be the easy portion. The rest is going to be more of a challenge.

I do like the Neil Armstrongesque footprint in the sand in the second photo.

Asasdf *at* Kajdsf? That *is* Impressive

1. What does it mean, exactly, if one is "asasdf at kajdsf"?

2. Why are there two people on LinkedIn who fill this particular role?

3. Why do their profiles come up as 404 errors?

Could it be . . . nah. People wouldn't lie about being asasdf at kajdsf, would they?

[Swallows a Yo-Yo]

There seems to be a lot of division among the World War II cognoscenti concerning Gregory A. Freeman's book "The Forgotten 500," telling the tale of more than 500 Allied servicemen rescued by the OSS from Yugoslavia, due in part to the sheltering of the servicemen by those allied with Draza Mihailovich. Some are accusing Freeman of projecting modern conservative anti-Communist political leanings into the story.

That's as may be; I know nothing of Freeman's politics.

But some of the criticism leveled at the story is laughable, and comes with modern projecting of its own, so I'm not going to discuss it. Suffice it to say that Communism *was* as much of a bogeyman in the 1930s and 1940s as it was in the 1980s, and the Stuka bombers, while vulnerable to figher attack, were also used to extreme success during the Blizkreig and afterward.

What I do appreicate are the firsthand stories shared in this book -- and I'll always go with firsthand stories over anything else. Freeman tells a good tale, from start to finish, even in parts of the book that others have described as "boring." I wasn't bored reading this. I was surprised many times, shocked a few times, and reminded many times of the concern raised -- and I wish I could remember who said it -- in stating that nations excelled at doing great things at times of war, and often fail to rise to that level of dedication and excellence in times of peace. Freeman's book is a good reminder of people getting stuck in a bad situation and fighting their way through it to survive. And if that's the lesson I get from reading this book, I'm better off for it.

The book is also a good reminder that even the Allies -- the US included -- didn't always fight with honor during what Studs Terkel called The "Good" War. Anyone looking for a saint will be disappointed to find them in the company of devils.

The photo above is from Google Maps and shows the "aerodrom" at Pranjane, as described in Freeman's book. It seems someone there thought it fitting to remember what happened there, despite the politic slop and modern projections, anti-communist or what have you, aside. Seems like these airmen, who saw the sacrifices these people did, and fought for recognition for them and their leaders for decades, still have some fights to make.

No Eye for What's Wrong: Thanks, AI.

(I apologize for the potato-taken screengrabs; I'm not sure what's going on, but wanted to include the whole thing so I'm not accused of plagiarism here. Any emphasis added is mine.)

The text (available here in context, with comments):

Posting this on behalf of a member who would like to remain anonymous:

"I’m an art director and supervisor for a large studio. The studio heads had the bright idea before I started to hire prompters. Several bros were brought onto the film project. I absolutely hated myself for not quitting on the spot but stuck with it because it’s mercenary out there. Have a family to feed etc. I decided to use this time wisely. Treat them as I would any artist I had hired. First round of pictures of a sweeping Ariel forest landscape comes through and it’s not bad. They submit a ton of work and one or two of the 40 are ok. Nearly on brief. So first round feedback goes through and I tell them about the perspective mistakes, colour changes I want, layers that any matte painting would be split into. Within a day I get 5 variants. Not changes to the ones I wanted but variations. Again. Benefit of the doubt I give them another round of feedback making it clear. Next day it’s worse. I sit there and patiently paint over, even explaining the steps I would take as a painter. They don’t do it, anomalies start appearing when I say I want to keep the exact image but with changes. They can’t. They simply don’t have the eye to see the basic mistakes so the Ai starts to over compensate. We get people starting to appear in the images. These are obviously holiday snaps. 

“Remove the people”

“What would you like them changed to?”

“… grass. I just don’t want them there” 

They can’t do it. The one that can actually use photoshop hasn’t developed the eye to see his mistakes, ends up getting angry at me for not understanding he can’t make specific changes. The girl whose background was a little photography has given me 40 progressively worse images with wilder mistakes every time. This is 4 days into the project.

I’m both pissed about the waste, but elated seeing ai fall at the first hurdle. It’s not even that the images are unusable, the people making them have no eye for what’s wrong, no thicker skin for constructive criticism and feedback, no basic artistic training in perspective and functionality in what they’re making. 

Yes the hype is going to pump more money into this. They won’t go anywhere for a while. But this has been such a glowing perfect moment of watching the fundamental part fail in the face of the most simple tasks. All were fired and the company no longer accepts Ai prompters as applicants. Your training as an artist will always be the most important part of this process and it is invaluable. I hope this post gives you a boost in a dark time."

This harks back, unsurprisingly, to what we're seeing with AI and the written word, or indeed with anything: Those using AI are taking shortcuts and aren't developing the skills they could be using to create on their own without automated assistance. Yes, AI is a heck of a lot faster, but there's no learning. There's no investment, outside of knowing how to tweak what one asks the AI to do.

The AMAZING META AI Reads Articles So You Don't Have To!

With artificial intelligence on my mind since I had to fail a student last semester for continued use of ChatGPT, I was curious to see what Meta AI had to offer when I saw these helpful suggestions on a local news story.

Being a naturally distrustful person, I read the story first, then went back to see what AI would have to say. I asked the second question: HOw many students have worked at the station?

Meta AI responded:

(I apologize for the potato-like quality of these screencaps.)

So it made a guess. It couldn't tell me how many precisely, because of course the story didn't offer a number. So it looked at what numbers it had and came up with the answer "many hundreds."

I guess a human could have come up with that answer. So why did I need AI for that? I don't know.

I still don't like the shortcut-edness of it all. Reading the story myself took only a few minutes; having AI do the reading and give me a response wasn't a timesaver, particularly in light of the noncommittal answer. Maybe with something more complicated it would be more helpful. But I'd still want to do the reading to make sure the AI wasn't misinterpreting something.

But what if I ended up misinterpreting something myself? Always a possibility. Still, it's worth checking myself.

It Never Really Ends . . .

Shortly after we moved into this house, we jerry-rigged a sprinkler system for it.

This weekend, because Michelle wants to redo the front flower beds, I finally got the last of the sprinkler line buried.

I had the electrical for a valve box and a 1/4 inch sprinkler line going on top of the sidewalk, right up against the porch. The idea was at the time of installation that I would put the lines under the slab later.

Later finally came. We're putting pavers and plant boxes in the spot on the right, with some pavers, pea gravel, and plant boxes on the left. If you squint through the rail, you can see the pavers awaiting placement. I'll have to dig some of the dirt out to get the pavers even with the concrete. Not that I need another project at the moment, but getting the sprinkler lines buried needed to happen now, as Michelle is pretty excited about redoing the flower beds.

SAY IT LOUDER FOR THOSE IN THE BACK!

President Russel M. Nelson said this back at Conference in October 2020. I believed it then, and I believe it now.

I've tried to work past my prejudices, to accept that all are God's children, and that we should, as he called for in his address, to "let God prevail."

So I was saddened today to read not just a few comments on this Church News story about saints in Ghana opening their churches to their Muslim neighbors, giving them a safe place to gather for Ramadan.

We either sustain President Nelson as a prophet, or we don't. Making statements that contradict his statements is wrong.

More importantly, we believe that Jesus is the Christ, or we don't. Making statements that contradict his statements is very wrong.

Luke 10:25, for a start.

Then Matthew 5, lingering in particular on verse 43:

43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.

44 But I say unto you, Love your benemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.

"Writing is How We Understand Uniquely"

I want to write about artificial intelligence, or, more specifically, about large language models such as ChatGPT and the like. But first, I’m going to write about Disney animator Milt Kahl. The reasons for this, I hope, will be clear.

Affectionately known as one of Disney’s “Nine Old Men,” Kahl is considered the animator’s animator, known for his skill in drawing fluid two-dimensional characters of the like of Shere Khan from The Jungle Book, Little John from Robin Hood, and Tigger from Disney’s Winnie the Pooh stories from the 1960s and 1970s.

He developed signature animations without the use of human models because he wanted to animate how the unique drawn figure would move, not as a model would imagine them moving. He’s known for the Kahl “head swaggle,” seen in the likes of Shere Khan and Edgar, the scheming butler from The Aristocats, to show off his ability to maintain head shape and body weight and positioning throughout the complex animation.

YouTuber A Humble Professor, an admirer of “animation, film, and comics,” analyzes scenes from 1977’s “The Rescuers,” for which Kahl was the directing animator. The professor focuses on animation of Madame Medusa, the film’s primary protagonist: a vain, vile woman of seemingly humble means in New York City who longs for her dreams of wealth to be realized through the discovery of a diamond long-lost in pirate treasure. The professor discusses rough animation of one scene: “Despite how rough these are, Medusa’s character shines right through them. We can really feel her frustration she feels in the scene and we can also see how her pear-shaped body influences how she sits down and scoots the stool.”

In other words, while Kahl could have used human models, or relied on past animation success (which he did with the head swaggle) he also realized that good character animation relied on how each unique character moved and talked and walked and, in the case of Madame Medusa, shrieked and climbed up on a stool and gathered her skirts when Bernard, a hero mouse in the film, arrived, spat out by one of her pet alligators after she whopped it on the head with her walking stick.

Kahl helped Medusa become a standout character because, through long effort and practice, he figured out how she looked and walked.

Uniquely.

Now let’s get back to Chat GPT and the like.

Essayist Evan Puschak, narrating a video essay called “The Real Danger of ChatGPT” at Nerdwriter1, says “Language is how human beings understand themselves and the world. But writing is how we understand uniquely. Not to write is to live according to the language of others, or worse, to live through edits, tweaks, and embellishments to language generated by an overconfident AI chatbot.”

Let me re-emphasize what Puschak says: Writing is how we understand uniquely. Not through the language of others, but through our own language and understanding.

That, I believe, is what large language models threaten to remove from us. Artificial intelligence will win out not because it develops the ability to think like humans, but because it will entice humanity with the expeditiousness that only results in humans accepting writing like an algorithm thinks they should is good enough.

Large language models present the world of writing with its own calculator moment and we as writers, educators, and students have to figure out how much we’re willing to give up for the ease of what this new calculator offers.

This is not to say that the likes of ChatGPT are bad in every way. Like any other tool, large language models can and should have their uses. The danger lies in confronting every writing problem as a nail, and using large language models as the ubiquitous hammer.

For every student and teacher who recognizes ChatGPT is a valuable tool for outlining, for brainstorming and the like, there is a student who takes the large language model shortcut and submits artificially-written work and fails classes because of it. Just this year I saw a student who was writing passable essays and commentary as an English learner succumb to the promise of ChatGPT – once, then again on a major assignment after being warned about the first offence; a semester of effort turn into failure in only a matter of days. My colleagues all share similar tales of woe. I can often hear my wife, who also teaches English, ranting in the next room in our basement as she finds another student who thought artificial intelligence was their best writing friend.

And I feel like a failure to him: Should I have done more to warn my students about the pitfalls of AI? Did I miss AI on previous assignments and not nip the temptation in the bud earlier, so his confidence built in the tool he was using? Is the course itself – its design out of my hands and in those of a committee trying their best – flawed? Is my teaching too lackadaisical?

I don’t know. But it’s hard to place all the blame on the student when the solution to a writing problem seems so clear and easily accessible – and as a savings of time.

How do I help my students hone their ability to understand uniquely the world they live in, rather than – if you can bear another metaphor – exchange it all for a mess of pottage?

Or should I, as some commenters on large language model-adjacent videos I’ve watched, just surrender because AI is only going to get better and become more human and more undetectable?

I’ve piled on the questions here. Let’s go find some answers.

Frag-ee-lay. That Must Be Italian

 

Got a message tonight on LinkedIn from Justin Hegyi from the fine folks at The Outlier Team, inviting me to joing their crew of writers training large language models and artificial intelligence to write more gooder.

They singled me out, they say, because I am "both proficient in English  . . . and are fluent or native Italian spakers -- like you!"

Italian must be the AI misspelling of French, because while I am somewhat proficient in French, my Italian is basically what I learned from A Christmas Story.

Thing is, this same guy contacte me back in February with the same message -- but he was working for a different company. To me, that's not necessarily a good look if you're looking to acquire talent.

My feelings on all of this, and AI:

I keep getting tagged on LinkedIn by companies that want to hire me to train AI to write better.

Then I see my students turning to AI to write their essays and gazing in wonder at the absolute nonsense AI produces and I conclude:

1. Yes, AI *does* need a lot of someones to teach it how to write.

2. Those who want to teach it how to write ought to be [word that will be censored by Facebook].

A Book I Read: I Must Say, by Martin Short

As much as I like Martin Short as a performer, this book was a little tedious to get through.

Reading about celebrities at parties is . . . dull. And it feels like the book is about one-third that. Maybe it's because I don't like parties myself.

Getting a glimpse of his life, that was interesting. Hearing from some of his characters, that was fun. But I'm gonna conclude by saying that watching Martin Short is a lot more entertaining than reading about him.

Phones: Three Generations

So Bluey has an episode called "Phones." In just over seven minutes, it encapsulates three generations' worth of joy and sadness thanks to the Internet and the ubiquitous smartphone.

In the episode, Chili's father visits and is invited to play Restaurant with the girls. He's shown to a "house" he rents from people on the Internet, and is chastised for walking to the restaurant to order hie food. He's also called on the carpet for daring to use his phone to call the restaurant to place an order. He's eventually schooled into how to order food online. He again goes to the restaurant to pick up his food, and is told, of course, it's going to be delivered.

He goes back to his rented house, gets his sausages -- and is scolded for chatting with the delivery person -- and concludes: "So do I just eat here, alone?"

The kids' response: "You can watch TV on your phone. There's a TV app."

So Mort makes his own app, and after smuggling a crocodile into the delivery driver's scooter, forces social interaction into the game by being summoned to the restaurant through a croc catcher "app" he makes on the pretend phone he's given.

The kids, of course, don't know another world, or at least take it for granted that people would prefer to order their food online and eat it without any interaction at all. Mort, of coruse, is more familiar with the world where if you wanted something, you physically went and got it.

Bandit and Chili, the Gen-Xers in the crowd, know both worlds, and don't have much to do this episode, so there's no bridge between old and new.

Anyway, it's a hoot to watch.

 

Glow Worm

I vaguely remember hearing Mom say this little rhyme. I learned today at Marina's funeral that she had it on the fridge. It certainly does sound like something Mom would have.

Marina's funeral was wonderful. And sad. And a lot of other things. I'm still trying to sort it all out in my head.

I did have a distinct impression at the graveside in Iona that Mom and Dad were there to be with the rest of the family. The veil felt thin.

Family photo, taken at the church on Mesa Avenue, which Dad helped build. Paula subbed in for Sherri, who had departed before we took the picture.

"Dear God, Give A Bald Guy A Break"

One of my sisters died this week. Many prayers were said on her behalf. I gave her a priesthood blessing just prior to the crisis that led to her death, and I've been pondering many a thing since.

Part of the pondering: Was I listening to the spirit, or saying things I wanted to come to pass? The more I think, the more I'm unsure I even remember what I said in that blessing. I'm sure there were some of the typical bromides. I don't know. I wish I could remember.

I think I mentioned asking God to help her doctors know how to care for her. I know we saw that time and again this past month we were in the hospital, so maybe there's a ray of hope for my faith and my feeble grasp on priesthood power.

What Elder Holland said today in Conference is not new, of course, but hit me like a ton of bricks:

“It’s for reasons known only to God why prayers are answered differently than we hope, but I promise you they are heard, and they are answered according to His unfailing love and cosmic timetable.”

Then there was the admonition to pray out loud when possible. I can't remember who said it; I'll have to look again. That hit me too. Maybe articulting our prayers out loud gets away from the bromide side of our faith?

UPDATE: That was Elder Holland as well.

Way too Late at the Movies: The Phantom Raspberry Blower of Old London Town

Usually when I write movie reviews under the "Way too Late at the Movies" title, it's a movie somewhat recent that I did indeed miss and finally saw.

This time, however, we've gone back to  1976, and to an almost-movie-length series of sketches from the British sketch show The Two Ronnies: "The Phantom Raspberry Blower of Old London Town," written by Spike Milligan and "a gentleman."

I'm familiar with Spike Milligan and his humor sensibilities thanks to his appearance on The Muppet Show. When our kids were younger, they were enthralled -- and I mean ENTHRALLED -- by Milligan's deadpan humor. It reminds me a lot of my Dad, who was pretty reserved except at times when he found something funny. He was pretty funny himself.

On to the show:

I will say I'm a sucker for a British satire/parody, and that's certainly what this is. The Phantom terrorizes London Jack the Ripper style by blowing raspberries at his victims, who in proper Victorian style end up in the Thames or simply keel over at the utter uncivility at the crime. Nonsequiturs abound as Milligan and company bring out the comic tropes you'd figure to find in such a story.

Well worth the watching, and available on YouTube in many forms, viz:

Mother Eve and Many of her Faithful Daughters . . .

Tonight as part of our scripture study, we read this from Section 138 of the Doctrine and Convenants:

(Verse 57) I beheld that the faithful elders of this dispensation, when they depart from mortal life, continue their labors in the preaching of the gospel of repentance and redemption, through the sacrifice of the Only Begotten Son of God, among those who are in darkness and under the bondage of sin in the great world of the spirits of the dead.

President Joseph F. Smith, in this section, also noted that among the gathering of the "noble and great ones" called to preach the gospel to those who have passed on are Mother Eve and "many of her faithful daughters who had lived through the ages and worshiped the true and living God."

Marina joined them tonight.

As we read, and as the texts poured in from family with the news of her passing, I received a witness that this is what Marina will be doing -- preaching the gospel to those who have waited long to hear it. And that is a comforting thing.

This is her favorite song. And she can sing it still.

Annoying Springtime Brb

This little guy or gal -- pretty sure it's a woodpecker -- has been perching on our chimney in the early AM, hammering away a things.

Most of the things it's hammering away at are sheet metal, so I've either got a hole up there the insects are getting into, or we've got a bird that's into early AM percussion sessions. so I've got to go up there and try to figure out what's what.

If I can't figure out what the attraction is, we'll have to get a plastic owl or some other kind of deterrent to keep the bird from hammering.

Getting up there will also give me the chance to replace the bit of siding that fell off under the eave earlier this spring. I should probably clean the gutters as well.