WEBVTT - Flatus Ex Machina, Part 1 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:06.119 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuffworks 0:00:06.120 --> 0:00:14.120 dot com. Hey are you welcome to Stuff to Blow 0:00:14.160 --> 0:00:17.040 your Mind? My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, 0:00:17.079 --> 0:00:18.919 and today we're gonna be talking about one of my 0:00:19.000 --> 0:00:23.960 favorite comedy subjects, What's funny about the way that machines fail? 0:00:24.600 --> 0:00:26.040 And here's just a heads up. This is gonna be 0:00:26.079 --> 0:00:28.800 a two part episode because we ended up going super long. 0:00:28.920 --> 0:00:31.480 Like the machines, we can't stop. So I want to 0:00:31.520 --> 0:00:35.880 start with a particular example, probably my favorite funny thing 0:00:35.960 --> 0:00:40.919 on the Internet these days, the hilarious almost successes of 0:00:41.240 --> 0:00:47.120 artificial intelligence trying to generate examples of human language almost 0:00:47.200 --> 0:00:50.479 but not quite human. Yes, I don't know why this 0:00:50.640 --> 0:00:53.559 does it for me, but aside from Highlander to The Quickening, 0:00:53.560 --> 0:00:57.880 pretty much nothing makes me laugh harder than language generated 0:00:57.880 --> 0:01:01.280 by artificial neural networks and machine learning. And we'll explain 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:03.760 a little bit more about exactly how this works in 0:01:03.800 --> 0:01:06.200 a minute, but first I just thought we should look 0:01:06.200 --> 0:01:08.560 at a few examples of what this is like. If 0:01:08.560 --> 0:01:11.600 you're on the Internet, you've probably encountered this at some point, 0:01:12.400 --> 0:01:15.679 because it's become popular in the past few years. Especially 0:01:15.760 --> 0:01:18.280 for its comedic value. If you're not on the internet, boy, 0:01:18.280 --> 0:01:20.960 are you in for a treat um by far? I 0:01:20.959 --> 0:01:23.400 would say the best of this stuff I've come across 0:01:23.560 --> 0:01:27.120 is traceable back to the blog of a person named 0:01:27.240 --> 0:01:30.200 Janelle Shane, who I think her day job as she 0:01:30.240 --> 0:01:33.920 works in industrial researching optics, but as a hobby, she 0:01:34.040 --> 0:01:38.399 trains neural networks with text based data uh, text based 0:01:38.480 --> 0:01:43.240 data sets to spit out these amazing simulations of types 0:01:43.319 --> 0:01:46.280 of human language, and so they'll they'll be in categories 0:01:46.319 --> 0:01:50.280 like it. She gets an AI program to write recipes 0:01:50.320 --> 0:01:53.280 for foods or to come up with the names of 0:01:53.440 --> 0:01:56.080 paint colors or something. And the way, of course you 0:01:56.080 --> 0:01:58.040 would do this is, and we'll explain more of the 0:01:58.080 --> 0:02:00.800 details in a bit, but you'd train it on existing 0:02:00.960 --> 0:02:04.000 names of paint colors, or you'd train it on existing 0:02:04.040 --> 0:02:06.440 recipes of food. Right. So the end result here is 0:02:06.440 --> 0:02:10.079 you essentially have a machine trying to human but not 0:02:10.200 --> 0:02:13.840 quite pulling it off, but but but doing so in 0:02:14.000 --> 0:02:17.520 such hilarious fashion. Yeah, so you should absolutely look up 0:02:17.600 --> 0:02:21.000 Janelle Shane's blog. It's called AI Weirdness dot com. It's 0:02:21.080 --> 0:02:23.840 reliably such a source of joy. But I want to start. 0:02:23.880 --> 0:02:25.720 In fact, I will say that if you were if 0:02:25.760 --> 0:02:27.640 you're scratching your head and you're thinking, oh, didn't I 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:31.920 see something hilarious in this vein recently, there's there's a 0:02:31.919 --> 0:02:35.280 there's a high probability that it originated from AI weirdness 0:02:35.360 --> 0:02:38.600 dot com. Yes, that that blog is just awesome, but 0:02:38.639 --> 0:02:40.280 I wanted to look at a few examples of what 0:02:40.320 --> 0:02:42.440 this is like. So one thing is consider the work, 0:02:42.680 --> 0:02:45.720 uh that that Jennell Shane did training in neural network 0:02:45.800 --> 0:02:48.200 to come up with names for D and D spells. 0:02:48.960 --> 0:02:51.560 So you take the Dungeons and Dragons manual and you'd 0:02:51.600 --> 0:02:54.359 feed in all the actual names of spells to the 0:02:54.480 --> 0:02:56.400 neural network, so it gets a sense of what these 0:02:56.400 --> 0:02:58.760 things are like, and then it tries to come up 0:02:58.840 --> 0:03:01.440 with similar types of names on its own. Now, to 0:03:01.520 --> 0:03:03.760 give everybody just a quick idea first of what actual 0:03:03.840 --> 0:03:08.280 Dungeons and Dragon spells are named. You have everything from 0:03:08.480 --> 0:03:13.919 Magic Missile or Crown of Madness to Evard's Black Tentacles 0:03:14.080 --> 0:03:16.320 or anytime there's a wizard name in there, you know 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:19.320 you're in for some good stuff. Um, well, there's you know, 0:03:19.320 --> 0:03:22.799 stuff like Glyph of Warding or what's the what's the 0:03:22.840 --> 0:03:25.440 one I'm trying to think of? Oh, stuff like Leo 0:03:25.520 --> 0:03:31.119 Moon's Secret Chest or Leoman's Tiny Hut. That's another great one. Well, 0:03:31.200 --> 0:03:33.280 so here are the ones that it came up with. 0:03:33.560 --> 0:03:37.920 How about selections like Mister of Light, Confusing, Storm of 0:03:37.960 --> 0:03:44.520 the Giffling, Song of Goom, song of the Darn, Ward 0:03:44.640 --> 0:03:49.000 of Snay to the pooda Beast, primal rear. You've got 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:51.840 to watch out for primal rear. Someone's storm Bear. Now 0:03:51.880 --> 0:03:54.760 that one sounds legitimate, because that's one of the beauties 0:03:54.840 --> 0:03:58.400 of these exercises is is when there's one that either 0:03:58.640 --> 0:04:02.080 almost works or actually does work. Because I think some 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:04.800 in storm Bear, I can I can easily imagine I 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:09.080 can describe the storm Bear blasting out of the portal 0:04:09.480 --> 0:04:12.280 and rushing into combat on behalf of your you know, 0:04:12.320 --> 0:04:16.360 your your storm mage. Yeah, it's almost kind of effortlessly evocative. 0:04:17.240 --> 0:04:19.880 A divine boom. How about that? That one sounds pretty 0:04:19.880 --> 0:04:23.239 good too. Soul of the Bill. Now now we're flying 0:04:23.279 --> 0:04:27.760 back down the hill. Farc mate about Charm of the CODs, 0:04:30.279 --> 0:04:33.520 Death of the Sun. Okay, that that's that would have 0:04:33.560 --> 0:04:35.720 to be a high level spell. But okay, okay, three 0:04:35.720 --> 0:04:39.880 more greater flick. Okay, that's that's just a can trip there, 0:04:39.960 --> 0:04:42.760 that's just a flick, a magical flick of the ear 0:04:43.400 --> 0:04:48.920 curse clam. I like it. Daving Fire's confusing. Now. While 0:04:49.000 --> 0:04:52.359 these phrases I think are mostly funny on their own, 0:04:52.440 --> 0:04:55.039 I think they're probably even funnier if you're an actual 0:04:55.120 --> 0:04:57.440 D and D player, because you not only get the 0:04:57.440 --> 0:05:00.480 pleasure of the nonsense words and the you know, the 0:05:01.240 --> 0:05:04.360 syllables that seem out of place in their context, like 0:05:04.880 --> 0:05:07.120 Dave does not really seem to go very well with 0:05:07.200 --> 0:05:10.320 some kind of magical fire spell, But if you actually 0:05:10.360 --> 0:05:12.599 play D and D you probably also get some humor 0:05:12.680 --> 0:05:17.040 from just like seeing the little resonances that these spells 0:05:17.080 --> 0:05:20.560 have with actual spells that you would recognize. I now 0:05:20.680 --> 0:05:23.360 want to run a gaming session where there's some sort 0:05:23.400 --> 0:05:27.080 of warp effect in place where suddenly all the magic 0:05:27.200 --> 0:05:31.520 users are forced to use of spells from this list, 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:33.960 and they don't know what they're going to exactly do 0:05:34.080 --> 0:05:37.200 until they cast them. Even better, what if they had 0:05:37.240 --> 0:05:40.520 to What if your character suddenly had amnesia and then 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:43.480 had to act as if they had bios that were 0:05:43.520 --> 0:05:46.480 also generated by an artificial neural network. That's right, because 0:05:46.480 --> 0:05:49.480 AI weirdness dot Com also has a wonderful piece titled 0:05:49.520 --> 0:05:52.880 D and D Character bios now making slightly more sense. 0:05:53.000 --> 0:05:55.560 In fact, I would say this post from I think 0:05:55.560 --> 0:05:57.440 this was last week or something we were looking at. 0:05:57.480 --> 0:06:00.000 I think this inspired me to want to do this episode. 0:06:00.160 --> 0:06:03.200 We should read a couple of these. I'll read the 0:06:03.200 --> 0:06:08.480 first one here. Quote. Frick found his old family's fortune 0:06:08.760 --> 0:06:12.119 and his curiosity, and he went to a small city 0:06:12.200 --> 0:06:15.680 to see if he could find a work in the goldfish. 0:06:15.760 --> 0:06:19.520 He heard stories of a goldfish, a goldfish, a sea monster, 0:06:19.640 --> 0:06:22.280 and a silver fish, a sea monster, and a ship 0:06:22.360 --> 0:06:25.520 that was a ship of exploration. The ship was full 0:06:25.600 --> 0:06:30.320 of fish and evil some treasure, but it was not 0:06:30.440 --> 0:06:33.360 to be When Frick found the ship. He rushed back 0:06:33.960 --> 0:06:38.080 and found the ship full of treasure and full of fish. 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:41.800 He wanted to be a pirate and fight it. Now. 0:06:41.800 --> 0:06:43.719 I like that because there's a there's a lot of 0:06:43.760 --> 0:06:47.440 silliness in there, but it does have the basic shape 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:50.040 of a bio and and and and and it's weirdness, 0:06:50.040 --> 0:06:54.360 and it's the stuff that is more nonsensical actually feels 0:06:54.400 --> 0:06:58.480 suitably magical and fantastic. You know that there's this this 0:06:58.640 --> 0:07:00.880 fish that's not a fish, that's also a ship that's 0:07:00.880 --> 0:07:03.640 full of treasure and fish, and he's going to become 0:07:03.640 --> 0:07:06.479 a pirate and fighted, and so I think you could 0:07:06.560 --> 0:07:08.960 run with that. This is one of the fascinating things 0:07:08.960 --> 0:07:12.520 about neural net generated text is that it often has 0:07:12.680 --> 0:07:16.560 the format of what you're going for correct, It just 0:07:16.640 --> 0:07:20.800 doesn't have the sense of it correct like it will 0:07:20.960 --> 0:07:24.200 esthetically and in shape be very much like what you're 0:07:24.200 --> 0:07:28.000 looking for, but keywords do not make any sense at all. 0:07:28.520 --> 0:07:30.800 Then again, another one that I thought was kind of 0:07:30.840 --> 0:07:34.240 interesting in what it showed about common themes in in 0:07:34.320 --> 0:07:36.720 D and D character bios, or I guess maybe fantasy 0:07:36.760 --> 0:07:41.000 more generally, was one bio that included the lines um 0:07:41.040 --> 0:07:43.559 the orc Warlock was captured and killed by a group 0:07:43.600 --> 0:07:46.120 of Orcs. He was imprisoned and forced to work for 0:07:46.160 --> 0:07:48.960 a giant tome. He was imprisoned and imprisoned for a 0:07:48.960 --> 0:07:51.480 while until he was rescued by a group of adventurers. 0:07:51.720 --> 0:07:53.880 He was imprisoned and imprisoned for a while until he 0:07:53.920 --> 0:07:56.080 was rescued by a group of adventurers who were looking 0:07:56.120 --> 0:07:59.800 for a group of adventurers to help eradicate the orchest ferocity. See, 0:07:59.800 --> 0:08:02.040 now that's wonderful. I actually really like that when it's 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:05.080 a little you know, nonsensical. But uh, first of all, 0:08:05.160 --> 0:08:08.440 you know, being an orc is hard. It's it's it's 0:08:08.440 --> 0:08:13.080 a warlike world for the orc. But but then the 0:08:13.120 --> 0:08:15.559 idea that he's working for a giant tone, the idea 0:08:15.600 --> 0:08:18.600 that there's like a magical book employing him, and the 0:08:19.200 --> 0:08:23.120 repetitive imprisonment. Yeah, it's a hard knock life. You're always 0:08:23.160 --> 0:08:27.480 getting imprisoned and then escaping and encountering a band of adventurers. Yeah, 0:08:27.640 --> 0:08:30.160 and working for weird magic books. So that one, that 0:08:30.200 --> 0:08:32.320 one works, I think. Of course. Another great one on 0:08:32.360 --> 0:08:35.199 this page is an injury that just seems to devolve 0:08:35.320 --> 0:08:39.200 into endless like dozens of repetitions of variations of the 0:08:39.240 --> 0:08:43.080 phrase big cat. Yes, little did he know. During the 0:08:43.080 --> 0:08:47.080 monastery's course of time, when the monastery's training and growth 0:08:47.160 --> 0:08:50.200 was complete, his mother told big cat, big cat and 0:08:50.280 --> 0:08:52.640 big cat to drive their own path and test big 0:08:52.679 --> 0:08:55.560 cat with big cats, Army of big cats, Army of 0:08:55.600 --> 0:08:58.760 big cats and big cats and big cats. Big get 0:08:58.880 --> 0:09:01.480 is big cat, big cat and goes on, yes something 0:09:01.679 --> 0:09:06.480 for for many many lines. I'm trying to picture big cat. Uh, 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:09.480 though I can't. I don't actually go to like tiger 0:09:09.600 --> 0:09:12.680 or lie in there. I think more of a kind 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:16.640 of mental power great basilisk type of fat house cat. 0:09:16.920 --> 0:09:18.800 I think that would work. I also can't help but 0:09:18.880 --> 0:09:22.160 think of cheshire cats, and of course cat Bus from 0:09:22.160 --> 0:09:25.360 Totoro is being sort of in the vein of big Cat, 0:09:25.400 --> 0:09:30.240 Big Cat, big Cat. Um. How about a neural networks 0:09:30.280 --> 0:09:33.079 trained on a corpus of more than forty three thousand 0:09:33.200 --> 0:09:37.600 questions and answer style jokes. I'll just read one of them. 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:39.880 Why do you call a pastor a cross the road? 0:09:40.600 --> 0:09:47.880 He take the chicken? Yeah. Another great one from AI 0:09:47.920 --> 0:09:52.480 Weirdness dot Com was a neural network designs Halloween costumes. Okay, 0:09:52.480 --> 0:09:54.840 so you just feeded a bunch of Halloween costume names. Yeah, 0:09:54.880 --> 0:09:57.079 and this one, this one was tremendous fun. I remember 0:09:57.080 --> 0:09:59.000 when it first came. I just made me laugh so hard. 0:09:59.600 --> 0:10:07.199 Highlight It's include uh, Saxy Pumpkins, Um, Disco Monster, Spartan Gandalf. 0:10:07.200 --> 0:10:10.480 I really like that one. Starfleet Shark. Yeah, that's good. Um, 0:10:11.120 --> 0:10:15.120 let's see Martian Devil. That was too believable. Panda clam though, 0:10:15.880 --> 0:10:20.760 that's that's pretty good shark cow. That's very interesting given 0:10:21.240 --> 0:10:24.120 some of our past discussions on was it a shark 0:10:24.120 --> 0:10:25.960 cow that we were discussing. I believe it was. Oh, 0:10:26.080 --> 0:10:29.640 that was That's Daniel Dennett's thought experiment exposing what he 0:10:29.679 --> 0:10:34.439 believes to be flaws in Donald David's Donald Davidson's Swampman 0:10:34.920 --> 0:10:37.880 thought experiment. It was the cow shark where he says, 0:10:38.520 --> 0:10:41.240 is it actually meaningful if you posit a cow shark 0:10:41.360 --> 0:10:43.520 to ask whether it's a cow or a shark? A 0:10:43.640 --> 0:10:48.480 little accidental thought experiment here from this list. Uh, you'll 0:10:48.520 --> 0:10:52.000 find less thought experimentation in such entries though, as Snape 0:10:52.080 --> 0:11:02.840 scarce snape scarecrow, or or how about Lee garbage Lady garbage. 0:11:02.960 --> 0:11:05.000 Lady garbage is good. So yeah, there's there are a 0:11:05.040 --> 0:11:09.600 lot of great, great entries on that list. Okay, one 0:11:09.679 --> 0:11:12.280 last thing from General Shane's work, I just must mention 0:11:12.440 --> 0:11:15.520 some some titles for recipes that she wrote a script 0:11:15.520 --> 0:11:19.760 to come up with. Um. These include chocolate pickle sauce, 0:11:19.920 --> 0:11:28.600 whole chicken cookies, salmon beef style chicken bottom, artichoke, gelatin dogs, 0:11:28.640 --> 0:11:34.560 and crock pot cold water. Where any of these attempted 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:38.080 these recipes well, actually at one point she so those 0:11:38.080 --> 0:11:41.240 were just names at some point. I don't have these selected, 0:11:41.240 --> 0:11:43.920 but she did have it based on a corpus of 0:11:44.040 --> 0:11:48.280 recipes generate new recipes which are just nightmares, you know, 0:11:48.400 --> 0:11:51.640 like huge lists of ingredients that would be like, you know, 0:11:52.320 --> 0:11:58.480 a third cup s'more goals, you know, a cup of Horseradishuh. 0:11:58.600 --> 0:12:01.360 Then there was one website I don't remember who actually 0:12:01.360 --> 0:12:03.880 did it, might have been Super Deluxe. Somebody made a 0:12:03.960 --> 0:12:07.479 video where they took one of these AI generated recipes 0:12:07.520 --> 0:12:10.440 and just literally made it. Now, they had some trouble 0:12:10.520 --> 0:12:13.160 because some of the ingredients were not real words. They're 0:12:13.160 --> 0:12:16.200 just you know, like so they had to I guess 0:12:16.200 --> 0:12:19.319 substitute something or they put in instead of smart goals 0:12:19.360 --> 0:12:21.679 it was coco powder or something. But they ended up 0:12:21.679 --> 0:12:25.760 with these like, uh, pasta shells. I think that had 0:12:25.800 --> 0:12:28.679 like chocolate and stuff all over them. But anyway, so 0:12:29.080 --> 0:12:31.560 that I think that's currently one of the best websites 0:12:31.559 --> 0:12:33.920 on the internet. Go to AI weirdness dot com if 0:12:33.920 --> 0:12:36.959 you want more joy and humor. But um, but I 0:12:37.320 --> 0:12:41.080 was wondering, why is this the funniest thing out there 0:12:41.160 --> 0:12:44.080 for me right now? What? What is so inherently funny 0:12:44.120 --> 0:12:49.520 about the ways machines create things that are sort of 0:12:49.679 --> 0:12:52.920 like real language, just close enough to be in the 0:12:53.000 --> 0:12:55.160 zone where they are funny, but at the same time 0:12:55.240 --> 0:12:58.240 far enough off that they're they're totally hilarious. And I 0:12:58.280 --> 0:13:01.240 think that they're at least two parts it's uh that 0:13:01.360 --> 0:13:04.400 make this this stuff so golden. One is that there's 0:13:04.440 --> 0:13:08.840 something inherently funny about machines trying to behave like humans 0:13:08.840 --> 0:13:12.040 and failing. Specifically, it's the ways that they fail, and 0:13:12.040 --> 0:13:15.480 we'll we'll definitely explore this more throughout the episode. But 0:13:16.080 --> 0:13:19.559 the way that they failed demonstrates a kind of pristine, 0:13:19.840 --> 0:13:25.000 oblivious quality of stupidity. It's like a kind of platonic stupidity, 0:13:25.040 --> 0:13:29.600 isolated from the ability to appreciate itself. It's like the 0:13:29.640 --> 0:13:33.240 funniness of, you know, watching automatic doors repeatedly trying to 0:13:33.280 --> 0:13:36.200 close on something that's blocking them like that that's not 0:13:36.320 --> 0:13:39.120 itself so funny, but you see an inkling of the 0:13:39.160 --> 0:13:42.920 same thing there that comes through in these AI generated texts. 0:13:43.440 --> 0:13:45.800 But then we sort of mentioned this earlier. It's also 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:49.960 funny because it tends to reveal something interesting about the 0:13:50.040 --> 0:13:53.040 human culture game that it's trying to play like it 0:13:53.120 --> 0:13:56.640 brings this sort of cold objectivity to phenomenon that we 0:13:56.679 --> 0:14:00.560 don't necessarily always bring, and it can identify a quardly 0:14:00.600 --> 0:14:03.800 replicate trends and behaviors that we might fail to notice 0:14:03.840 --> 0:14:06.400 in the same way that like you might notice funny 0:14:06.480 --> 0:14:10.000 things that are actually present in the names of D 0:14:10.120 --> 0:14:14.920 and D spells by watching a computer try and replicate them. Yeah, yeah, 0:14:14.920 --> 0:14:17.520 I think these are these are these are two strong reasons. Okay, 0:14:17.559 --> 0:14:19.400 we're going to take a quick break. We'll be right 0:14:19.440 --> 0:14:24.600 back with more than thank Alright, we're back now with 0:14:24.680 --> 0:14:26.360 all things humor, And of course we'll get into this 0:14:26.400 --> 0:14:29.320 in this episode as we continue to discuss what humor 0:14:29.520 --> 0:14:33.000 is and then why machines in some cases achieve it, 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:39.840 Like the absurd is is funny, Like the absurdity is hilarious, 0:14:39.960 --> 0:14:43.040 And it seems it seems like we're in a situation 0:14:43.080 --> 0:14:45.040 where a lot of times, some of these, especially these 0:14:45.120 --> 0:14:50.840 neural net situations, were we were accidentally creating absurdity engines. 0:14:50.880 --> 0:14:56.800 We're creating machines that that produce absurdity, and uh, you know, 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:00.040 you know, what can you say, like why is I 0:15:00.240 --> 0:15:04.080 is something that is absurd funny? You know? Because we'll 0:15:04.120 --> 0:15:05.800 get into all that in a bit. But but sometimes 0:15:05.840 --> 0:15:08.440 I feel like the answer might be it's funny because 0:15:08.440 --> 0:15:11.640 it's funny. Well, yeah, I mean, there's definitely an ineffable 0:15:11.720 --> 0:15:15.080 quality of of of humor. That is one of the 0:15:15.120 --> 0:15:18.040 reasons there's so many different theories of humor. Then, as 0:15:18.080 --> 0:15:20.160 I said, we'll explore them more as the episode goes on. 0:15:20.240 --> 0:15:24.280 But um, yeah, it's obviously something that's really hard to 0:15:24.280 --> 0:15:26.560 to narrow down and put your finger on. It's that 0:15:26.640 --> 0:15:29.920 there seemed to be all these strange, conflicting, overlapping reasons 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:33.040 we find things funny. But I do feel like this 0:15:33.160 --> 0:15:38.360 strain of machine humor machine failure humor being one of 0:15:38.360 --> 0:15:42.440 the funniest types of humor UH is bigger than just 0:15:42.600 --> 0:15:46.320 the AI text. Because it got me I started thinking 0:15:46.360 --> 0:15:49.480 about what are some of the funniest scenes in movies 0:15:49.560 --> 0:15:51.760 I can think of? And when I tried to think 0:15:51.800 --> 0:15:53.920 about that, I can't help but think of the dark 0:15:54.000 --> 0:15:58.880 humor of the hyper violent board room scene in Robo Cop. 0:15:59.040 --> 0:16:02.200 With ed to own mind, I would argue one of 0:16:02.240 --> 0:16:04.200 the I mean, it's not for children, this is like 0:16:04.240 --> 0:16:08.000 a hyper violent, horrible UH scene, but it's also in 0:16:08.000 --> 0:16:10.240 in a in a morbid way. One of the funniest 0:16:10.280 --> 0:16:13.560 scenes I think in film history, Like and so, why 0:16:13.640 --> 0:16:16.440 is it so funny? I think it hinges on parallels 0:16:16.840 --> 0:16:19.960 between humans and machines and the scene and the similarities 0:16:20.000 --> 0:16:23.160 in the ways they fail. So brief recap of the 0:16:23.200 --> 0:16:26.760 scene is, uh, you know, Ronnie Cox plays this you 0:16:26.800 --> 0:16:31.040 know self, serious bloviating businessman who's proudly proclaiming, you know, 0:16:31.080 --> 0:16:34.480 I've got the technology that's the future of policing. And 0:16:34.520 --> 0:16:36.720 he brings out this robot called ED two oh nine 0:16:36.800 --> 0:16:39.040 that's got these big guns on it, and they're saying 0:16:39.040 --> 0:16:41.320 that it's going to take over the police force and 0:16:41.320 --> 0:16:44.520 it's this great new technology. And then they demonstrate it 0:16:44.600 --> 0:16:47.920 on a guy and it malfunctions, and uh, it tells 0:16:48.000 --> 0:16:50.680 him to drop his weapon in the demonstration, and he does, 0:16:50.760 --> 0:16:52.680 and it doesn't seem to notice he has and then 0:16:52.720 --> 0:16:55.640 it shoots him like a hundred times, just a ridiculous 0:16:55.680 --> 0:16:59.359 amount of times. And but it's something about the way 0:16:59.600 --> 0:17:02.360 that the the people in the room fail in the 0:17:02.400 --> 0:17:04.920 same way the machine does. Like he just plows through 0:17:05.000 --> 0:17:08.639 this this horrible, violent encounter, and then afterwards somebody in 0:17:08.680 --> 0:17:11.520 the background is like, can we get a paramedic after 0:17:11.640 --> 0:17:15.240 this guy has been shot like a hundred times, as if, 0:17:15.359 --> 0:17:17.959 like the machine, they're just sort of like carrying on 0:17:18.160 --> 0:17:22.280 their like route behaviors without understanding what they're doing or 0:17:22.320 --> 0:17:26.000 thinking about them. Yeah. The edd to oh nine is 0:17:26.040 --> 0:17:31.320 such a great design in the original RoboCop because it 0:17:31.320 --> 0:17:34.760 it resembles it has animal qualities to it. It looks 0:17:34.880 --> 0:17:39.400 kind of like a bipedal dinosaur. Uh, and yet it's 0:17:39.400 --> 0:17:42.680 also smooth and abstract in so many ways that it 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:45.800 looks like either a highly designed piece of technology, which 0:17:45.800 --> 0:17:47.359 of course it is. It has you know, it looks 0:17:47.400 --> 0:17:50.840 like it's a nice piece of stereo equipment, but but 0:17:50.920 --> 0:17:54.719 then it also lacks any additional details, like it's almost 0:17:54.760 --> 0:17:58.440 a silhouette of a lie of an animal. Yes, um, 0:17:59.119 --> 0:18:01.760 and the growls and it growls as well. But then 0:18:01.840 --> 0:18:04.119 also later a really funny scene in the movie is 0:18:04.160 --> 0:18:08.680 the discovery that this horrible violent killer robot is can 0:18:08.720 --> 0:18:11.600 be defeated by stairs. Like it can't use stairs. It 0:18:11.600 --> 0:18:15.399 has these wonderful like all terrain looking um legs that 0:18:15.480 --> 0:18:18.760 it walks on, and that it can't manipulate stairs. It 0:18:18.800 --> 0:18:21.560 falls down them, and then it's it's like a you know, 0:18:21.600 --> 0:18:25.239 a ridiculous upside down duckling. I mean it's so hilarious too, 0:18:25.280 --> 0:18:27.119 because I mean it dad to a nine is highly 0:18:27.119 --> 0:18:31.320 effective in other situations if it's just filling a guy 0:18:31.359 --> 0:18:37.000 with bullets, highly effective. Um, just battling RoboCop also highly 0:18:37.000 --> 0:18:40.280 effective for the most part um. And this falls in 0:18:40.359 --> 0:18:43.440 line I think pretty well with our experiences of machines 0:18:43.840 --> 0:18:47.240 and of AI, we can create highly effective specialist in 0:18:47.280 --> 0:18:50.879 many areas of AI and robotics. So you create a 0:18:50.920 --> 0:18:53.800 machine that just puts bullets into this guy, uh, you know, 0:18:53.800 --> 0:18:55.879 it does a great job. But when it comes to 0:18:55.960 --> 0:19:00.000 creating a general AI or a machine that can navigate 0:19:00.080 --> 0:19:03.240 the complex natural or even or the human created world 0:19:03.520 --> 0:19:07.639 such as the stairs, Uh, there's continual challenge there. Like 0:19:07.720 --> 0:19:09.800 that's kind of that's that's what a lot of of 0:19:09.840 --> 0:19:12.600 what's going on in robotics and AI is about. Yeah, 0:19:12.720 --> 0:19:15.600 or the just recognizing that it's not actually supposed to 0:19:15.600 --> 0:19:19.359 shoot the board executive during the demonstration exactly. Yeah. But 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:23.280 then also just the idea that it's it's wonderful, it's 0:19:23.320 --> 0:19:26.920 something and terrible at another thing. That imbalance is often 0:19:26.920 --> 0:19:28.840 where we find a lot a lot of hilarity in 0:19:28.960 --> 0:19:33.159 other um, you know, another comedic stories and bits of 0:19:33.160 --> 0:19:37.119 fiction or just situations like one of my favorite cut 0:19:37.160 --> 0:19:40.600 scenes of all times from Conan the Barbarian. So there's 0:19:40.600 --> 0:19:43.159 a scene in it where this is the Arnold Schwarzenegger original. 0:19:43.240 --> 0:19:45.439 There's it's like a blooper out take. That's a blooper 0:19:45.440 --> 0:19:46.840 Outare you find it? I don't think most of the 0:19:46.880 --> 0:19:50.879 special DVDs. It's available on YouTube as well, but basically 0:19:50.960 --> 0:19:55.800 Conan has just escaped or been released from servitude and 0:19:55.840 --> 0:19:59.320 he's running across the you know, the waste land essentially, 0:19:59.600 --> 0:20:02.679 while dogs are chasing him in order to to to 0:20:02.800 --> 0:20:05.480 eat his flesh. He manages in the finished film to 0:20:05.520 --> 0:20:08.440 scramble up some rocks and that begins this new story 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:11.359 arc him discovering this great old sword. But this is 0:20:11.440 --> 0:20:15.240 like young corporal beef body giant Arnold Schwartz, and this 0:20:15.320 --> 0:20:17.520 is the this is the Arnold Schwarzenegger that was so 0:20:17.640 --> 0:20:20.520 ripped he had to like lose muscle so that he 0:20:20.520 --> 0:20:24.359 could actually hold the sword correctly. Uh So there's this 0:20:24.680 --> 0:20:28.400 out take though, where he's running in chains, the dogs 0:20:28.400 --> 0:20:31.320 are chasing him in the movie Dogs, and then he's 0:20:31.359 --> 0:20:34.399 scrambling up the stones and the dogs catch him and 0:20:34.480 --> 0:20:38.120 drag him back down, and he's just screamed a and 0:20:38.119 --> 0:20:41.240 and cursing the whole time. Yeah, it's I watched it 0:20:41.480 --> 0:20:43.920 after you linked it very very funny, and you see 0:20:43.960 --> 0:20:45.920 the p as come in to get the dogs off 0:20:45.960 --> 0:20:50.440 the dog, and he's like, yeah, it's it's funny because 0:20:50.480 --> 0:20:53.760 the idea of Conan the barbarian, or even just Prime 0:20:53.920 --> 0:20:58.240 Arnold failing like this, it's just start contrast to actual 0:20:58.359 --> 0:21:02.560 or perceived strength of a character and or individual. And 0:21:02.560 --> 0:21:05.600 it's also funny because he wasn't actually mauled to death 0:21:05.720 --> 0:21:08.560 by movie dogs, right, of course, he wasn't actually seriously 0:21:08.560 --> 0:21:12.960 harmed in this incident, but he was apparently inconvenienced and 0:21:13.000 --> 0:21:15.080 had his pride wounded. Right, And it will come back 0:21:15.119 --> 0:21:18.879 to that idea to the degree to which you know, 0:21:18.920 --> 0:21:23.120 the severity the outcome um comes into play and determining 0:21:23.160 --> 0:21:25.399 if something is funny or not. Yeah, I think I 0:21:25.440 --> 0:21:28.040 can definitely see what you're talking about that the failures 0:21:28.040 --> 0:21:32.119 of technology are especially funny when there are other ways 0:21:32.240 --> 0:21:37.000 that the technology is highly advanced or presented as highly advanced, 0:21:37.359 --> 0:21:41.000 and as long as like nobody of course dies, you know, um, 0:21:41.560 --> 0:21:43.320 but but I do wonder too if there's a darker 0:21:43.320 --> 0:21:45.520 streak and all of this too, you know, something that 0:21:45.640 --> 0:21:49.680 ties into a deeply rooted human disdain for the other, 0:21:49.960 --> 0:21:53.840 especially for others of species. There is a quote from C. S. 0:21:53.920 --> 0:21:56.879 Lewis's The Lion, The Which, the Wardrobe and the Four Children. 0:21:56.960 --> 0:22:00.080 That's my son suggested alternate title for it. He's okay, like, 0:22:00.080 --> 0:22:02.640 why don't they call it the Land the Witch Wardrobe 0:22:02.720 --> 0:22:05.359 the Four Children? Like they're in it too, and they're 0:22:05.400 --> 0:22:08.159 not in the title. Seems like a missed opportunity. But anyway, 0:22:08.280 --> 0:22:10.439 there's this wonderful quote from it that I find I 0:22:10.440 --> 0:22:15.240 found kind of creepy on a recent reread of the book. Quote, 0:22:15.560 --> 0:22:18.440 but in general, take my advice when you meet anything 0:22:18.760 --> 0:22:21.520 that is going to be human and isn't yet or 0:22:21.720 --> 0:22:24.600 used to be human once and isn't now or ought 0:22:24.640 --> 0:22:27.600 to be human, and isn't you keep your eyes on 0:22:27.640 --> 0:22:32.160 it and feel for your hatchet. Well, that is very creepy. Now, 0:22:32.200 --> 0:22:34.040 I think in the context of the book, this is 0:22:34.040 --> 0:22:37.960 going to be referring to, like, you know, possessed objects 0:22:37.960 --> 0:22:40.879 and stuff like creepy and magical. Basically, yeah, basically, the 0:22:40.880 --> 0:22:44.359 message here was talking. Animals are cool, you know, you 0:22:44.359 --> 0:22:46.920 can hang out with them in Narnia, But there are 0:22:46.920 --> 0:22:49.440 other things in Narnia that are dangerous, and you can 0:22:49.440 --> 0:22:52.440 tell if they're dangerous based on how human they seem, 0:22:52.600 --> 0:22:54.720