The ?word daemon?, Leonard ventures, ?however spelled, uncovers a provocative and useful dualism. An intermediary with another world doesn’t have to be beneficient. Yet neither is it compelled to be nefarious. It can be both, flip-flopping between positive and negative states?depending on context or perception, on the vagaries of polities, or the whims of the fickle masses. —Bots, Demons & Dolls (WRT: Writer Response Theory)

A great post on the history of simulations of conversation, sparked by Andrew Leonard’s book Bots: The Origin of New Species.