blasto, meet official opinions on self-replicating minions

[peterxy]

The PRT catches wind of a strange increase in disappeared domestic animals in the downtown area. Given that the people who live there are the rich and powerful, this is clearly a problem that needs to be investigated and solved immediately. The PRT, of course, agrees that this is of utmost importance, and not just because of precedent about mass abductions of pets, of course not, why would you think that, they are so very worried about Fido, even Scion recognizes the merits of rescuing lost pets.

(Lorica's asked to maybe keep a few more eyes there than she has been.)

Comments

[mxglam]

"I'm sure they'll appreciate the idea."

[thinkering]

"Bot's gonna suggest it. It's got lots of spare processor time when it's not operating a trebled flock in an emergency."

[mxglam]

"I wish I had that kind of multitasking to apply to my power," they say wistfully.

[thinkering]

"Hey, if you think of a way to run your power on software lemme know..."

[mxglam]

They snort. "My power seems to be wholly immune to attempts at using anything other than myself as its lens."

[thinkering]

"Yep. At least you can offload some of the fine control to the bot even if you have to do all the conjuration."

[mxglam]

"You know, I wonder if a simulated brain that was like mine, corona pollentia and all, would be able to use my powers."

[thinkering]

"I don't think I can biotinker enough to simulate a meat brain."

[mxglam]

"Yeah, I wouldn't expect you to, this was merely academic interest. I probably can't conjure anything that'd count, either."

[thinkering]

Nod.

[mxglam]

"Anyway, your bot challenged me to another round of the Turing Test."

[thinkering]

"Yes, it mentioned. Do you want to do that right now?"

[mxglam]

Shrug. "Not necessarily. I do want to do it a few more times and see if we can reach a large enough sample size. It could have been luck, after all."

[thinkering]

"Fifty-fifty, yep."

[mxglam]

"It wasn't, though."

[thinkering]

"I am aware that you think so."

[mxglam]

"I'm gonna prove it, too, p less than .05 and all!"

[thinkering]

"That's going to take a lot of time investment and you do know I update the software sometimes, right?"

[mxglam]

"Right, but you also said you have no idea what you would even need to update to cover for whatever flaw it was that I found." Pause. "Which is I suppose evidence that it was just luck."

[thinkering]

"I mean, my best guess is that the bot should act less conservatively in general but that's only a guess."

[mxglam]

"What exactly do you mean by conservatively, here?"

[thinkering]

"When it's not quite sure if I would, say, swear, or gesture, or suggest an idea, it defaults to not doing so unless there's some other reason it should. So overall it does those things a little less. It's also not quite as creative as I am so it does come up with fewer novel ideas in the first place."

[mxglam]

"Hmm. Well, the first thing's fixable but I'm not sure about the second."

[thinkering]

"Yeah. But this doesn't come up in most casual conversation in a statistically interesting way."

[mxglam]

"Well, doesn't it? Perhaps there are very subtle ways in which you creatively choose what to say?"