Far from being “stochastic parrots,” the biggest large language models seem to learn enough skills to understand the words they’re processing. […] A trained and tested LLM, when presented with a new text prompt, will generate the most likely next word, append it to the prompt, generate another next word, and continue in this manner,…
Look what I found on my shelf in a closet. #history #archaeology #media Similar:Time Squared (ST:TNG Rewatch, Season 2, Episode 13)Rewatching Star Trek: The Next Generatio…PersonalStill More FaceTime FunI realize that video-chatting teenagers …MediaYou aren’t doing it wrong… if no one knows what you are doing.PersonalThe Most Toys (#StarTrek #TNG Rewatch, Season Three, Episode 22)…
This was before the printing press, so books were copied by hand on parchment, which made them expensive and rare. Most people didn’t read much, especially for pleasure. Instead, they listened to books at group readings for entertainment. Pero López de Ayala wrote at the end of the 14th century, “It also pleased me to…
Book historian Irene O’Daly notes that the passage crossed out in a medieval manuscript matches where the scribe accidentally turned two pages while copying out a printed book, showing that manuscript culture continued to exist even after the printing press was introduced. (It’s the third of three examples she uses.) Similar:Long Live the LARPers –…
I’m sure the good-apple cops will fairly and thoroughly investigate reports about someone stealing newspapers containing a story about alleged rapes at an underage drinking party at the police chief’s house. Nearly all the copies of a small-town Colorado newspaper were stolen from newspaper racks on the same day the Ouray County Plaindealer published a…
Ascending the path to High Hrothgar? No, just the steps from the parking lot at the appropriately named Seton Hill University. (It’s 101 steps, by the way.) Similar:First steps towards reconstructing a 30-year-old simulation. Marking the locations of the …First steps towards reconstructing a 30-…AestheticsThe Xplor Store: The Forgotten Carnegie Science Center Exhibit? (Guest Post…
This is offensive, deeply troubling, and, sadly, totally predictable. Julian Dibbell documented similar behavior 30 years ago in his article about sexual assault in the text-only virtual world LambaMOO. (Content warning… sexual assault in a multi-user virtual environment.) A woman has revealed she was ‘virtually gang raped’ by four male avatars in Meta‘s Horizon Worlds –…
Rewatching ST:DS9 The Ship On a mineral survey of a planet that just happens to look like Southern California, O’Brien trades playful barbs with crewman Muniz. Unlike most episodes where the leads have all the fun, this mission is fairly crawling with random crew we’ve never seen before. An unidentified ship appears randomly and crashes…
In general, I find Canvas a fairly decent system, but after a particularly frustrating hour wrestling with rubrics, I decided to spend two more hours blogging about my frustrations. I would expect a drop-down list to be populated with all the rubrics I’ve already created for my current class, and it would be a nice…
Rewatching ST:DS9 Worf and O’Brien want to search for overdue Sisko and Dax, but Kira invokes the Defiant’s standing orders to guard the station. When the captain’s damaged runabout turns up, we learn Starfleet wants him to prove that, per Odo’s intelligence, Gowron is a Changeling. Quark shows concern for Odo: “That’s one depressed ex-changeling.”…
I voiced Jack Rollins, writer of the popular holiday songs “Frosty the Snowman” and “Here Comes Peter Cottontail,” in another “Whispers of the Past” documentary focused on Scottdale, Pa. Similar:Original Mickey Mouse Character Enters Public Domain in 2024As a grad student in the 1990s, I chose …AcademiaHenry V Fans: Today is St Crispin's DayKing…
“Be straight like a board!” My father is pressing me flat against the ceiling from my nose to my toes, and I’m squirming with laughter. His hands are so strong. I remember him helping my little fingers spread Limburger cheese — we called it our “buddy cheese.” My father worked as a…
POV: You are coding the automatic doors on your fantasy neovictorian cruiser personal project and you notice the strikeplate in the doorframe does not line up with the door latch. #unity3d #blender3d #revision #qc Similar:Today's 10sq cm of #steampunk control panel. #blender3d #blender3dartAestheticsKeeping it classy. My 20yo son encounters the fruit-eating scene from the…
Similar:Toasty Warm Bed (designed by drunk AI neural net)AestheticsKittenwar”May the cutest kitten win…” –Kittenw…AestheticsShould you trust media bias charts? – PoynterTraditional journalism values a focus on…CultureThe Pentagon has ordered Stars and Stripes to shut down for no good reasonStunning. The Stars and Stripes is much …CultureMy understanding of biased polls is… (choose one) AmusingWhy 'Gangnam…
As a grad student in the 1990s, I chose to focus my dissertation on the years 1920-1950, on the theory that works published during that time period would fall out of copyright during the prime of my academic career. I imagined that one of my ongoing scholarly projects would be to publish free, annotated editions…
Similar:The Chronicle of Higher Education Announces Plan to Limit, Curate CommentsBy 2016, the terrain has shifted. Public…AcademiaWhen it comes to the truth, point of view really does matter.You may have seen a version of this meme…DesignWhy Love Lyrics LastI am inclined to agree with the “favorit…AcademiaIn-person classes heighten age-related hearing problems (opinion)My family tells me…
Right now I can move the player around but the NPCs either just stand there or run to a random location and stop. Similar:Short-range #neovictorian excursion craft, now with glowing power orbs! Over the past year…https://youtu.be/-cJp-kelrL8 AestheticsI am not really sure why I have kept it up this long. I have no immediate or foreseeable…
George Joseph Jerz, born on September 3rd, 1933, the son of Joseph and Clara (nee Kuta) Jerz, died peacefully in hospice care at Sunrise at Fair Oaks in Fairfax, Virginia on December 5th, 2023. He grew up in Chicago, Illinois, was interested in gymnastics and weightlifting in college, and then after serving in the military,…
Hello, I’m Dr. Jerz, I’ll be your server tonight for Christmas on the Hill. Similar:Friday night. What am I doing? #partylikeaprofAcademiaSeton Hill students Emily Vohs, Elizabeth Burns, Jake Carnahan-Curcio and Carolyn Jerz in …Seton Hill students Emily Vohs, Elizabet…AcademiaStage Right spreads the gospel of music with 'Godspell'The Tribune-Review is very dependable in…Current_EventsAfter a successful piano…
I remember these young people. Similar:Support the arts in your community! I’m here for the daughter and the rest of the cast. @j…Support the arts in your community! I’m …CultureSigma Tau Delta English Honors Society induction ceremony. Congratulations new members. #s…PersonalI'd love to do a shift at these gorgeous #neovictorian workstations, created in #Blender3D…AestheticsHappy Father’s…