25- Cookie Inception

Inception was the 2010 mind heist movie that starred Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon Levitt, Tom Brady, Elliot Page, and Cillian Murphy. It was about mind criminals that used dreams to steal corporate secrets, other secrets that you don’t want anyone to know.

Also known as one of my favorite movies.

The reason it is called Inception is a major plot point revolves inserting an idea or secret into a subconscious, not retrieving it. This secret can be anything. Such as convincing you to break up your newly dead father’s energy conglomeration.

10/10. Would definitely recommend.

The reason this week’s cookie has been dubbed Cookie Inception is that a cookie is inserted into another cookie and baked, thereby creating an entirely new cookie. Inception.

Neat huh?

Okay, if that is too much for you, I had a package of Oreos in my pantry. No idea when they were bought/how they came to be in the pantry/who brought them over for me to put in the pantry. I was going to use them in the ice cream for the department ice cream social in August but then I thought about crushing them, putting them into a cookie base and baking them.

Cookie within a cookie.

You see where I am going with this, right?

Cookie Inception.

Or Cookie-ception.

Call secrets of the OR #1- Know call time is not your own

Instead of Best Kept Secrets of the OR I thought instead to start a new subset of Wednesday. This is going to be Call Sets of the OR.

I got the idea last night when I had a surgeon, a CRNA, and the surgical tech all tell me that the case we were about to start would horribly. I reminded them that we could not know that and I believed in the power of positive thinking. That thinking and speaking negatively might just create the very negative reality for us and the patient.

No wonder they called me Pollyanna Puke on the floor.

But that is another call topic for another time.

The very first call secret is one that I know that a lot of my fellow operating room people fail at.

And that is knowing that the hours you are on call is not your own. By that I mean that the hours are not yours to do with as you wish and you might get called in during that time. But if you are called in, you are unpleasant and drag your feet on everything.

That is no way to create a positive experience for the patient.

Look, having to undergo semi-urgent or emergency surgery, because that is what the call case make-up should be, is no walk in the park for them. The patient has to be NPO, dressed in tissue paper, have an IV, and have anesthesia. This might be run of the mill for us but maybe they’ve never had surgery before and they are scared out of their wits.

Or maybe they’ve had surgery before but it was years ago when they were a kid and all they remember is being cold and dressed in tissue paper and surrounded by people in funny blue clothes that are not their mommy or daddy and being held down and having to breath in a yucky gas and then nothing until they wake up in a too bright room with yet more strangers and their wrist or their ears or their tummy hurts. And so they are scared out of their wits.

It is rare to have a patient who is laissez-faire about having surgery.

The patients are who the call nurse needs to be thinking about while they are on call. And how to make their experience smooth and efficient.

It is a mind shift for sure.

Make it less I HAVE to go in and more I GET to go in.

Do I know how to make the mind shift? No. The only thing that I know is that the brain is kind of like a muscle. You have to work on changing your own mindset.

Frankly, it can take some time, and repeated calls.

Ultimately we don’t take call for ourselves. Some of us might take call for the extra pay, or to pay back a favor to a coworker, or so that a coworker will owe you a favor. A lot of people take call because it is mandatory. Those are the calls that I took, back when I was the evening charge nurse and scooping up all the calls. Because the person whose call it was didn’t want it.

So don’t make plans. Your call hours are not your own. At the very most make vague plans. And realize that a call from the supervisor can and will change them in an instant.

Tuesday Top of Mind 7/22/25- Here’s Johnny!

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy

Interior-
Stairs with yellow flower patterned wallpaper, white French double doors to the left at the top of the stairs, open white French doors to the right.
Man limps up the stairs, he is balding, wearing a maroon zip up jacket over a majority dark blue with yellow and green plaid shirt. He is caring an axe in his left hand. He seems to be intent on the open French doors at the top of the stairs. He is grimacing, bottom lip tucked under.
He glances into the room.

Exterior-
Half opened small window, a woman in a blue bathrobe with long dark hair is waving her arms as she frantically tries to squeeze through the very small opening onto the snow covered roof.
She struggles for a moment more and, realizing that she can’t squeeze through, slides back into the room.
A small boy, snow on his sweater gasps and watches as she disappears from the window
The frantic music is coming to a crescendo.

Interior-
Older style refrigerator on the left of the passageway leading past a bed toward a yellowish lit door. There is a small table and chair to the right and a small radiator to the right of the passageway.
Same man, still holding the axe now near the head, seen from behind,
“Come out, come out, wherever you are.”

Interior-
Tiled bathroom, woman from before seen from behind frantically trying to get the window open wider. She glances back, mouth ajar, seemingly frightened and tries to squeeze through the window again.
The music (strings) gets louder

Exterior-
Same window as before, same woman trying frantically to get through the window.

Interior-
Same lighted door as the previous interior shot
Man is now seen in profile. He tries the door knob. It is locked.
He lifts his head, as if in thought, as if listening.
Man turns, tongue between teeth, and knocks on the door.

Exterior-
Woman reacts to hearing the knocking by gasping.

Exterior-
The bathroom window is on the slope of a large snow pile that is against the house. She is in the window, the boy is on the ground.
She whisper shouts to the boy on the ground “I can’t get out. Run! Run and hide!”
The boy turns to run.

Interior-
Same interior as before.
Man in ¾ profile is listening. He smiles and says “Little pigs, little pigs, let me in.”

Interior-
Woman in blue bathroom, long dark hair framing her face is now inside the bathroom. She looks around frantically and picks up a long 9“ knife from the sink. Holding the knife she goes to the door. She collapses to the wall next to the door.

Interior-
Man now turned fully toward the camera.
He says “Not by the hair on your chinny-chin-chin.”
The music is still frantic, still strings.
Man looks at the door, frowning, and turns slightly toward the door. “Then I’ll huff.”
He turns toward the door “And I’ll puff.”

He steps back and slides his right hand up the shaft of the axe to where he is holding it in both hands, he steps back, readying to strike. “And I’ll blow your house in!”

Action shot of man, striking the door with the axe.
A woman’s voice cries out “NO!”
The man strikes at the door again, as the woman screams.

The music is quieter now, nearly silent.

Interior-
The woman who is now clutching the knife is screaming as the door is battered by the axe.
The door splinters and she screams. She brandishes the knife toward where the axe is tearing at the door.
The axe blade is now visible.
Woman screams “Jack! Please!” as she slides down the wall slightly.
The axe hits the door again.
Woman screams “No!”
The axe hits the door again.
Woman screams “No!”
The axe head is driven completely through the door.

Woman looks at it in terror and screams.

The axe head twists and turns are the man tries to free it.
Woman screams.
The axe finally is pulled through the door.
Woman hides her face with her left hand, still clutching the knife with her right. A wedding ring is visible on her left hand.
Woman turns to where the door is still being battered, flexing as it is. She clutches the knife in her right hand and screams “No!”
The attack on the door continues.

The woman screams “Please”

The axe head is visible again.

Interior-
Shredded door.
Man on other side of door, readies the axe again to swing.
He swings again.
Woman shrieks.
His entire head is now visible. He swings again to make the hole bigger.

Interior-
Bedroom side of the door.
Man swings again to make the hole bigger.
Man drops the axe.
Man sticks his head in the opening in the door he has made.

Man “Here’s Johnny!”

All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy
All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy

______________________________________________

This is, of course, the “Here’s Johnny” scene from Stanly Kubrick’s amazingly terrifying movie The Shining. The woman is played by Shelly Duvall and the madman is played by Jack Nicholson.

I didn’t think of this movie as a parable for the ongoing (yeah fucking still!) covid pandemic.

But it fits so well.

We are being stalked by the covid virus. It is rising across the country.

Did you hear, there is a sneaker covid wave happening right now? Did you get boosted in the Spring when that crackpot RFK Jr. took control of DHHS? It might not be too late.

The states that it is definitely growing in are Texas, Florida, Iowa, Illinois, Ohio, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, and Arkansas. The states that are likely increasing their number of cases are California, Oklahoma, Mississippi, Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, New York, Maine, New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland. That we know of. This information is from the news report on CBS news on July 21, 2025.

It hasn’t gone away. We can’t wish it away. We can’t hide our eyes under the covers and pretend like it isn’t happening.

No one at the switch means that more Americans are going to die. Currently the American Death Toll from covid is 1,225,181. This information is from the Kaiser Family Foundation and is current and easier to find.

This why the scene fits so well.

BTW, we are Shelly Duvall screaming.

Wear a fucking mask, wash your hands, don’t gather with a large group of people.

If you are sick STAY HOME!

Medical fiction and non fiction book report 7/20/25- Re-reading in a different political climate is surreal

An ode to re-reading everything.

And I mean everything.

Do you mean every book you’ve ever read, Kate?

Yes, every book you’ve ever read.

It is amazing how a re-read shows that the story has changed. I have heard this from a lot of different readers. The books they loved as children, the books they loved as adolescents, the books they’ve loved as young-adults, the books of their early adulthood? All different because you’ve changed.

Well, you’re not the person who originally read the book anymore.

Things have changed. You may have gone back to school. You may have gotten married, or had a child. The country might’ve been taken over by a despot whose only concern is himself and how much money he can bilk out of his followers. You might have changed jobs.

I didn’t start this series out in a bid to change my mind about the classics that I’ve read, or about books that I enjoyed in the past.

But it has happened.

You’ve heard the Star Trek joke about not liking Shakespeare until you’ve heard it in the original Klingon?

I am not the person I was when I originally read these books. Fiction AND non-fiction. That means the lens through which I see them is different now. And my interpretation will be different now.

Case in point- I am re-reading the book Lock In by John Scalvi. Yes, that same John Scalvi. I started three books when I was on vacation. Lock In by John Scalvi, All Systems Red by Martha Wells (this is the books the Netflix show Murderbot was based on), and The Soul’s Guide to the AfterDeath by Gwenna Laithland. Lock In was the only book that was a re-read.

Back to the analogy-

I originally read this book when it first came out in 2015. And I remember liking it. It is a near future story about people who have had a disease (Haden) and are locked in. There has been a flurry of these books over the years, think The Butterfly and the Diving Bell, but this was the first one that I read that was was fictionalized. This book has robots that can be piloted by those who are locked in.

The United States has just passed a law that will seriously impact those who are locked in. By taking away their subsidies. These are everyday Americans who have been struck down by an illness that they didn’t want and didn’t ask for because it is expensive, baby. To care for all of those 5 million Americans who are locked in. And the government would rather you take the cure that no one has yet, than be on the dole.

Not that most of the Haden sufferers don’t have a job. From coding, to the FBI agent main character. But caring for a body is expensive and having a second life piloting the robots is expensive. The robots are also expensive. You have to care and feed for the body that you are not using and you have to maintain the robot and make sure it is charged. That is why most of them have jobs. And still the funding for their survival and medical care has been cut.

Sound familiar?

This was definitely not how I interpreted it when I first read it.

It is funny how times and circumstances and bullshit that those in power and those in power desperate to stay in power are pulling on us changes our perception. Isn’t it?

Re-reading this book about a pandemic that locked in 5 million Americans and 20 million people around the world? Well, those the Haden virus didn’t outright kill. That has been a mindfuck to this operating room nurse who worked in a hospital nearly every day through the real 2020 pandemic.

Of course the government tires of taking care of these disabled Americans. Have we learned nothing?

Eye roll.

FFS 7/18/25- F’in Cowards #3

Oh, my God, they killed Elmo.

Say it along with me and Kyle “You Bastards!”

Or they are doing their damnedest too. Kill Elmo that is.

This is, of course, a riff on the long standing killing of Kenny on South Park. This is a not quite children’s show on Comedy Central.

It isn’t just Elmo. It is also Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me. It is also Fresh Air with Terry Gross. It is also Sesame Street, writ large. It is also Masterpiece Theater. It is also PBS Newshour. It is also Antiques Roadshow. It is also Ken Burns’ myriad historically important history programs. It is also Morning Edition. It is also may podcasts that go beyond the story. Hey, that is a good point, it was also Paul Harvey.

This is when the big bad budget that was passed in March, with Chuck Schumer’s reluctant support, was deemed by some people to be too “woke” and so their leader decided that there needed to be a claw-back to money that has already been approved for things like NPR, PBS, and foreign aid.

As always, the more poor people are punished for being poor by the richest congress that lobby money can buy, the better for the richest congress that lobby money can buy.

For why?

Because we as a society don’t deserve nice things, apparently.

After all, if children watch PBS and see everyone being kind to the Muppets or learn something, they will be tainted. And infected with the so called “woke mind” virus.

Many people who voted for this stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid (did I write stupid yet?) bills in the last two weeks have come out to their outraged constituents as being unhappy with the bill. Cough, cough, Josh Hawley, Lisa Murkowski. Look at you trying desperately to save your jobs from your rightly outraged constituents.

Um, if the congressperson or senator doesn’t like a bill, there is a REALLY simple and EASY solution. Don’t vote for the fucking thing!!!!!!!!!!!

Grow a back bone or develop a set of balls or ovaries and stand up for your constituents! Stop listening to the minority who have the megaphone at the moment and start listening to the everyday Americans who have been calling your offices and standing up to you at town halls.

Stand up for the people who sent you there!

Stand up for your children and your grandchildren, for the god you profess to believe in’s sake!

Stand up to the wannabe tyrant at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

For fuck’s sake, the Founding Fathers would be so disappointed in your lack of care for those you wouldn’t piss on if they were on fire.

Fucking cowards, the whole lot of you!

Dispatches is going on vacation-ish

Yes, yes, I usually take it with me.

Always.

Across oceans.

Across time zones.

I’m just saying it might be spotty for a bit.

Apologies.

Cookie Thursday 7/10/25- Husband’s surprising cookie choice

My department has many favorite Cookie Thursday is a Thing cookies.

Some people prefer the triple pepper thumbprints. This is a cheddar cookie with triple pepper jelly in the thumbprint.

Some people go ga-ga for the Chex Mix that I make in December. I know that one is a fan favorite because when I go back for the tin it is emptied in record time.

Some people are partial to the OG CTIAT cookie. I made Twix cookies, both caramel and peanut butter.

Others are partial to the fruitcake cookie. Again in December.

But the overwhelming favorite of the department is the Jalapeño Chocolate Chip Cookie.

Even if jalapeños have been decreasing on the Scoville Scale for years as farmers’ practice natural selection for a milder pepper.

The point is that you never know how spicy the pepper will be until you cut it up and use it.

My garden has been sad, sad, sad this summer.

This is probably due to the the June heatwave. Or the over abundance of water because of thunderstorms. Or the wildlife.

Who knows.

I asked my husband last night what cookie I should make for CTIAT today.

To my surprise he said the Jalapeño Chocolate Chip.

He hates this cookie. But wanted me to make it today. So I did.

At least some of my coworkers were happy when I told them the cookie of the day.

~One hundred ten billion, three hundred seventy six million heart beats in 50 years.

How do you measure a lifetime?

Heck, how do measure age?

The number in the post title was garnered from 70 heart beats a minute times 60 minutes in an hour, twenty four hours in a day, 365 days a year, 50 years. Times them all together and you get 110,376,000,000 heartbeats.

This is based on an average heart beat of 70 beats per minute. Which is subject to race, age, sex, activity level, activity that is being performed. Lots of variables here. Even Google says between 60 and 100 beats per minute. Let’s just call it 70.

My husband keeps trying to wind me up about growing older. I say so what?

I also say that age is a state of mind.

And I don’t care about age.

I just care about getting there.

Of course, I also tell people who tell me that being old is for the birds that it beats being below ground. By that I mean it beats being dead.

Capiche?

No Tuesday Top of Mind 7/8/25- Review of When the Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi

No Tuesday Top of Mind for this Tuesday because I cannot get this book out of my head.

And also because there has been so much crap that has entered our consciousness in just the last 5 days as to require a little processing time.

Okay, it’s me. I require processing time.

AKA my mind is too full to discuss any of a number of things. From the supreme court giving the conman in the white house unchecked power to the minimal amount of reaction that I am getting from different source to the unfortunate but somehow warned of flooding in Texas to the idiotic yes-men in the federal legislature that are rubber stamping these inhumane practices to the attacks on healthcare to Medicaid being virtually unfunded through attrition because they put the bar so damned high to the continued attacks on higher education to to the file with names that didn’t want the names released disappearing tricks to the attacks by those who should know better but they are grasping at power anyway they can in any number of sectors to the thought of what will undoubtedly additional deaths to the concentration camp on American soil to apology we have to make to those who cried out never again and then they did it anyway to the women who are dying because of policies that purportedly put the child first, no matter that there is no child to the families who have been upended or straight up ended because of inhuman immigration policies to the man who has never heard the word no and paid attention to the boundary to any number of things.

This just in (July 8, 2025, 3:15pm)- to the conman who is “looking into” the take over of 2 American cities (DC and NY, if he doesn’t like their elections) because of the “red scare” that he is trying to engender. Well, the Muslim scare.

Ugh.

Cruelty is the point indeed. And so is irrationality.

To cleanse my mind, I will review When the Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi.

Published March 25, 2025 through Tor Books.

This book has been on my radar for quite some time. I massively enjoyed Starter Villain, which was released on September 19, 2023. But the first book I read by John Scalzi was Lock In, which was released on August 26, 2014. This was another of my library finds. I kept seeing it on the New Releases shelf and it mocked me until I picked it up.

Fabulous read but not the book I want to write about today.

I picked up this book from the library last week. It’s been on my library holds list for months.

I read it in two days.

I have thoughts. Many thoughts.

There will be spoilers for this book. But this is my take on this book.

Last chance for spoilers.

**************************************************************************************************

What struck me was the structured/unstructured path of the chapters. It wasn’t until I was nearly at the end that I realized that each chapter was numbered with a day since the moon had turned to cheese. And that the entire book takes place over 28 days, the length of a lunar cycle. This is genius and sneaks up on you.

Each chapter has a different voice and a different narrator. From a group of old men in a diner in the Midwest, one of whom is a retired philosopher, to the billionaire adrenaline junky, to the astronomy student whose entire academic life and potential career that has been upended, to the board of a bank who are worried at people pulling all their money out of the bank to live their bucket list, to the President of the United States and the First Lady getting ready for bed, to the writer who grew up a gifted and talented writer who got stuck on the first three chapters of her book to realize that there is no time, and more.

The first point is that the moon has suddenly, absurdly turned to cheese in an instant. Specifically around 1700 EST. Alarms were raised immediately when it was noticed.

Also the quarter moon is brighter than it should be in the sky. This brings to mind the moon shifting of the movie Bruce Almighty.

Of course, the moon mission that is a must do for the billionaire whose company developed the lander. Of course, the United States outsourced outer space to the billionaire class. Of course, the astronaut who was destined to be on that mission hears of the moon turning to cheese while on the phone with her mother.

Of course.

The following are notes straight from the notes app that I wrote to myself, annotated with page numbers. And also my stream of consciousness thoughts on the events of the book. I tried to match these up as best as I could. Your thoughts and notes will be different.

Philosophy. Astronomy student feeling unmoored because the moon has turned to cheese p. 145

Billionaire subplot. My thoughts are that it is basically a pull em out boys space race. Including the race between 2 billionaires to be the first to taste the moon cheese scene.

NASA outsourcing the space program to billionaires p. 169. My thoughts are of course they are.

Dry heaving in zero G was an interesting application of physics p. 175. My thoughts on this is what I learned p. 173 is something I already knew. That billionaires are spoiled brats and have never been told the word no. And they also get bored, to our detriment. The billionaire’s death (Jody) because of hubris was definitely an homage to the billionaire deaths from hubris on the way to the Titanic. See also billionaires being bored.

President and First Lady having a conversation, starting around p. 210. He drops his shirt on the floor, she tells him to pick it up, he argues that they have staff for that. She says, “If you dropped a shirt with the expectation that someone would pick up after you, I would divorce you immediately.” She continues “Dropping your shirt for someone else to pick up shows contempt. I didn’t like it when I was the person who had to pick it up. I don’t see why I would like it less now that someone else would have to do it.”

My thoughts are that I loved this exchange. And is also an answer to my own husband on leaving things on the floor for me to pick up. This will be my new answer to that. I feel that most women are frustrated or have been frustrated by this exact issue.

Back to the philosophical discussion p. 210. My thought is that there is a lot of philosophy in this book and it is a common thread. I have recommended this book to my cohort and will be recommending it to my dissertation chair.

The reaction of everyday Americans turns into fuck the moon sentiment and flipping off the moon to relieve stress. My thought on this is that might be the energy we need for I.C.E.

Unfortunately fuck the moon unraveled quickly to an attack on a cheese shop p. 217. My thought is that at least the estranged brothers who are running rival cheese shops across the town square from each other have reconciled. Also this is very evocative of Romeo and Juliet, which is actually mentioned in a previous chapter from the astronomy student.

Immigrant cook who says they want to go back to their home country because he isn’t as hated there as he is in America p. 228. My thought is that I realize this was written before the current administration crack down on illegal immigrants and naturalized immigrants. But oof.

There is a development in that the Lunar One which is the projection that is not unlike a meteor has been detached from the moon and is hurtling toward earth. My thought is cue the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs. This has been earned because wipe it all out is something I’ve heard from various quarters.

Oh and Lunar One will impact the earth in 2 years and three months with a 95% confidence. My immediate thought was that I understood that reference. Which is a meta reference in and of itself to Captain America in The Winter Soldier.

The Lunar One impact will be devastating and lead to the cessation of life on the planet.

There is a chapter on the filming of an Saturday Night Live show shortly after the announcement that the earth has an expiration time. The studio audience laughs at none of the skits and are very unsettled. Finally, the host stands up and starts to sing “Imagine” to placate the audience after a pretty speech of coming together. He is immediately clocked by a chair and a riot ensues. My thought is that this is a delayed reaction to the celebrities singing Imagine on Zoom during the lockdown in 2020.

There is a chapter on a drunk, Caleb, interrupting a church service. Remember, the world knows that time is ticking. The pastor throws out his dial a sermon that he got from a sermon service and speaks from the heart. He calms fears and basically toes the religious line p. 253.

The private conversation he has with God later that night is perfection.

A bank meeting about people panicking and taking all their money out is next. It is revealed that the bank has modeled the end of the world. But, hey, the bank still has to make money. The plan is that they will introduce a zero interest rate $40,000 limit credit card with no repayment due for 2 years. The bank model also says that the consumer confidence will end after the planned last Christmas. After all, people hold it together for Christmas. Thought for this is that yes, yes, they do.

The last major character is a gifted and talented girl child who only wants to be a writer. Her entire life is pointed in this direction. Until she gets caught in the writing group trap after the third chapter and gives up. Until there isn’t enough time because, hey, the end of the world is upon us. Her husband says who cares if there isn’t enough time to get published, she should write for herself and because he wants to read it. My thought for this part is that she has the uncomfortable realizing that gifted kids can’t give up when it gets hard. You have to work that much harder to succeed.

Really the entirety of Chapter 23 spoke to me, the former gifted and talented kid. And has inspired me to write my dissertation chair and get this train back on its tracks. The world will still be a dumpster fire.

The most hopeful tidbit of this entire book is that “American Democracy has survived worse than the end of the world.” p. 302. Well, I needed to hear that.

The hardest tidbit of this entire books is that when you know that it is going to be the last of a thing (because, you know, part of the moon will be crashing into the earth and killing everyone), that knowledge weighs on you.

There will always be the last Christmas, the last birthday, the last day at a job you love. The thing is to keep going anyway.

After all, it might not be the last thing.

I will not address how the book ends.

Just know that my take aways are flip off might be the energy we need.

And do the hard things.

School Me Saturday 7/5/25- students and AI part 2

AI is the newest, shiniest tech toy.

Of course companies are falling over themselves to make it available to us, the consumers.

At a premium of course.

But what are the other associated costs?

According to a report from IBM’s Institute for Business Value, the cost to compute (what it costs the company to make AI possible) was expected to climb 89% between 2023 and 2025.

And guess what? They won’t be interested in footing the bill forever. Nothing is free.

Ever.

So they made it ubiquitous. To make us as consumers dependent on AI. So that when costs to the consumer are introduced we will be convinced we can’t live without it.

Goodness knows, students are already dependent on it.

Especially the younger ones.

I know I am not dependent on it. I find output obnoxious and not a plaything. AI isn’t anything that I am curious about. I wanted to find a workaround with search engines so it would NOT give me AI output. I found one. I put -AI in the search bar and about 70% of the time I do not get an AI output. I have also heard putting a curse word in the search string will allow for AI free output, but that is not my experience.

Hell, Google itself is a kind of AI. That is how we get answers so quickly to a search field. But also less than AI because it didn’t suck up all the world’s literature and art to make a large language model.

In last Saturday’s post I wrote about the my personal experiences with AI since ChatGPT was released in 2022. But it goes farther back than that. Much, much further.

In the 1988-1989 school year, I was an eighth grader. There was no cafeteria at our school. Most schools in California don’t have cafeterias. Students gather on the quad, sit on the grass, lean against the trees, roam the campus, or walked home for lunch. Personally that did not interest me, none of the options were appealing. I usually went to the campus library and read. One day, my computer teacher approached me and my friend Aluminum to run simulations in the computer lab during lunch. We jumped at the chance.

After that, I split my time between the library and the computer lab.

In the library I read.

In the computer lab, Aluminum and I were working a machine learning task that the teacher had asked us to do. Basically we played a version of Connect Four with the computer. As I remember, the goal was to see if the computer could be trained to beat us.

I imagine that there were students in computer labs just like us across the country, training the computers to “think”. This was the way that people originally termed artificial intelligence, thinking.

It wasn’t until 1997 that Deep Blue beat Gary Kasparov in chess. But I think the seeds of this computing marvel was in the computer labs at middle schools and high schools in the 1980s. From my first experience with machine learning to this chess match was less than 10 years.

Look how far artificial intelligence has come in just over forty years. It started with nerd students in the classrooms playing with the computer, teaching it to think.

Oh, boy. Hold onto your hats.