Wednesday, May 31, 2006

Sometimes I think somebody just needs to stop me

I just invited my supervisor to watch me teach on Tuesday.

Why?

I don't KNOW! It seemed like a really good idea at the time...

Monday, May 29, 2006

Bodies or minds?

I've found myself wondering what kinds of connections there might be between robots and artificial intelligence. Are the anxieties and delights of each similar? Do we worry more about AI replacing humans, or robots? Do we worry at all? How do the different performances of robots and artificial intelligence systems affect our view of their relative hostility to human beings?

I found myself thinking about these questions (when I should've been prepping for the poetry class) after I'd looked at the ten coolest robots site posted earlier.

Both artificial intelligence and robots are duplications of humans - each attempts to replicate what humans can do through available technology. Both are also decidedly non-organic, which distinguishes AI and robots from cloning or genetic engineering which uses as its base materials the same stuff human bodies are already made of. So robots and AI skirt the problem of being too much like us because they're not built out of the same materials as us.

(Though to this last point, one could argue that it isn't robots who are becoming like us, but we who are becoming like robots as we increasingly rely on the kinds of materials robots are made out of to create artificial hips, hearts, or cochlear implants)

When I read science fiction (or science fact for that matter) about artificial intelligence and robots, they are relatively indistinguishable in their ability to threaten human beings, but they way in which they do so is distinctly different. I would take The Terminator (the first one) and I, Robot as two films that are representative of the difference between robot threats and AI threats in literature, as well as in the writing of some futurists who think about what our world would like like if when science fiction becomes science fact.

In The Terminator, the AI that builds the terminator machines and threatens to wipe out humanity bases its decision on logic and enacts it through the bodies of the robots it creates. The threat of nuclear war - its primary mode of attack against the humans - is presented as a threat only through the dreams of Sarah Connor however. The storyline of the film does not take us to the place where the AI dwells, or even to the battlesites it creates except through Reese's memories (flashbacks) or in Sarah's imagination of what that world looks like. The repetition of the opening sequence, which could conceivably be argued to be a glimpse of the storyworld of the future, in a dream/memory, clearly labels it as a memory, and subject to amplification or modification as most memories and dreams are. So we never see where the AI "lives".

In Terminator we also never "see" the AI, which presumably is embodied somewhere as the defense system, and so as viewers we are never directly presented with the "enemy" and have no visual image of what it looks like. [The Terminator attraction at Orlando does however present an image of the AI, not present in any of the movies, in its 3D stage/cinema production in which the freedom fighters actually penetrate the defense system and blow up the "mind" of Skynet (which looks suspiciously like the power system inside the Deathstar)]

As viewers, we only see the threat of the robot body as it stalks, maims, and eventually kills human bodies.

In I, Robot, the intelligence behind the robot threat is also less overtly threatening than the robot bodies. We are presented with VIKI, both as the visual display at the interface with which the humans interact and also in her housing (which again, is suspended in midair... what's with this motif in film anyway?). But VIKI isn't perceived as a threat until late in the film. Because we identify with the paranoid protagonist, as viewers, our perception of the threat is kept in line with the threat Spooner perceives, which is literally embodied in the robot bodies of the new NS5 models.

These two movies pinpoint the two real differences between robots and AI that seem to underly our anxieties about the threat they pose; one is highly visible and somatic, while the other difference lies in the imitative nature of each technology.

AI is a cognitive threat - a machine that can outthink human beings - but because the threat is from the machine's ability to think, it is largely invisible, just as our mental processes are not visible to others. In some ways, this makes the threat more insidious because you can't see it coming. It also makes the threat less immediate because there's no object which fear can point to as the threat. In the Terminator movie in particular, the threat posed by AI is global - the extermination of all humans - which is hard for the audience to imagine, given that it is composed of human beings and our collective ego has a very difficult time imagining a world in which we no longer exist.

Malevolent AI systems contain the threat of an intelligent opponent, but more importantly, of an emotionless opponent. In most human conflicts, there have always been human connections that defy the logic of the opposition between two sides - think the actions of people like Oskar Schindler or Christmas Day armistices. One on one, we at least have the option of appealing to common humanity when confronting an enemy. When confronting an AI system, there is no commonality aside from the ability to use logic, but for the AI system, unlike humans, emotion or sentiment is not a part of a reasoned argument. The inhumane thoughts of AI are what is most threatening; they're also what we can't see coming.

The technology of robots is embodied in a physical object, so the threat is much more immediate. The threat is also directed against human bodies. In I, Robot, Will Smith's character is physically pummeled by the robots, he chases Sonny, and the police are held hostage by the physical intervention of the robots; the human race is threatened, but the image of the threat is embodied in the robots themselves, not VIKI. In this way, robots are easier to imagine as enemies. They are physically present, but although they are strong, they are not indestructable. We can imagine ways of getting past their strengths by using even greater strength. Sarah Connor's act of crushing the Terminator brings that home in the movie.

But what is the weapon against an AI system that has decided that human beings are unnecessary (or perhaps even dangerous)? The logic that produces such a decision cannot be reversed by an appeal to sentiment or emotion. When it comes right down to it, the threat posed by malevolent AI in science fiction often emerges from the observation that logically, the human race has done nothing that automatically warrants its survival. We've messed up the planet, we mess each other up, we're thinking about going out and messing up the rest of the universe. What logical intelligence would conclude that keeping human beings around has any benefit whatsoever? Let's face it, we don't have much going for us.

So each threat - from AI or from robots gone bad - emerges from a difference between AI or robots and humans. The robot threat - strength and a hard body - can be countered by our use of other machines. The AI threat can only be countered by an appeal to sentiment, something that won't work on a machine, no matter how eloquently stated. In science fiction, the threat from AI intelligence has greater consequences for human beings, usually because the AI has been given a lot of power, but it's relatively rare that a story imagines only an AI threat. In most disaster scenarios, the AI needs robot bodies, or at least machines, to carry out its plans, returning us to materiality just as the robot body does. So it looks like bodies still win as the immediate threat that gets the most air time, but more distubing possibilities lie in the possibility that a malevolent AI could do more damage than a legion of robots could ever accomplish.

Saturday, May 27, 2006

Since I can't read poetry all day

This list of top ten robots certainly are some of the coolest robots I've ever seen.

I especially like:
The RiSE treeclimbing robot (#8)
Boston Robotics' Big Dog - The Robotic Mule (#3);
and RHex - The Robotic Pooch (#7)
and the The Robot Bartender (#10)

I might have been more amazed by the Honda Asimo (#4) and the Sony QRIO (#5) but I'd seen them before, so they lost out to the novelty items on the list.

So which one's your favorite?

Friday, May 26, 2006

Flame out

I should've known when I cheered for the Oilers three years ago in a game against Boston that I'd eventually develop a kindly streak toward the team.

Given that they're the only Alberta and now Canadian team to make it to the finals, I'll cheer for them. I did last night. I'm not the only convert. And they have some fabulous fans... just listen to them! (I especially like the fan behind I think it's Ryan Smyth... he's just belting it out!) I miss that. The stations here don't play other countries anthems unless absolutely necessary, so it's a rare occasion when I get to hear O Canada sung, let alone so enthusiastically.

Thursday, May 25, 2006

Oddities

Saw a woman wearing one of these. It looks a little creepy on the street.

Sign said "We are undergoing renovations. Sorry for the inconvenience" When I looked beyond the chain link fence, all that was left of the McDonald's was a hole in the ground. Some renovations!

The classroom just became a friendlier place

So today I figured it was make or break day - either eye roller was going to push it farther and do something that I'd have to slap her down about, or she'd get back in line. She wasn't in class right at the beginning, so I thought at first she'd decided class was useless, but then she showed up.

She didn't put her sunglasses on at any point in class - this was an improvement from Tuesday when she wore them for the remainder of class after her comment. She made friendly with others and with me during the break, then participated in discussion afterwards. I'm thinking, this is improvement and maybe we won't have problems.

Then she came up after class. And apologized for Tuesday.

It doesn't make the bad teaching day go away, but at least now I don't feel like I'm totally tanking either.

Thanks eye roller.

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

What a day

Just had one of my worst teaching days ever. I've had bad days before, but this one seems especially bad... probably because it went bad right from the beginning, and the class was 2 1/2 hours long.

I wasn't really enthusiastic about the material, but I found an interesting angle for approaching it and was trying to connect it to the writing that we've already studied. I figured out it was going to go bad about twenty minutes in, when after the announcements, my bio blurb about the poet and the first read through of the poem, the first comment was so off base that it was almost ridiculous.

Even though I indicated the poem was more complex than the comment allowed, several other students jumped at the interpretation and insisted upon it, no matter how many times I pointed out that there wasn't anything in the poem to support such an interpretation. No matter how many times I'd ask a student to point out the line in the poem that clearly states their claim that the poem was about a single subject, not the plural subject that it is about, they insisted upon reading it as a poem about how every reader has their own unique interpretation of the poem.

NO! It's not about the reader! I wanted to scream. But I kept calm. I finally got them to understand that the poem meant something else than what they were obsessed with, and we moved to the next poem. They were still having difficulty, but I was starting to get through to them. I announced we'd turn to the third poem, which should have nailed it for them and put everything back on track, when a student - one who I wouldn't have imagined would be worried about it - asked about the midterm.

In the course of answering questions and indicating that the exam would cover all the assigned material, not just what we specifically went over in class, eye-roller asked "then what's the point of coming to class?" to which I answered that the midterm was only worth 10% of her mark and she might want to learn something in order to fulfill the other assignments in the course. (I knew better than to appeal to her desire to be better educated or just learn something for the joy of learning itself- she's actively counting the minutes till the course is over)

Another student, sensing the inanity of the questions, asked whether the staples would be straight up and down or at an angle on the exam, which of course lightened things up, but by then I was so annoyed, I was having a real difficulty getting back on track.

We took a break, and when we returned I mostly had it together, but I ended up just lecturing at them mostly because I just didn't have the energy or desire to let them talk.

I think students learn best when they talk - when they're challenged with questions and have to find the answers themselves instead of just having it handed to them, but it's harder as a teacher to do so because so often they end up with some really weird stuff that you have to respectfully debunk while pointing them in the right direction.

But maybe I need to lecture more and guide less.

It's not my style, but I can certainly give it a try.

I hope I feel better about it in the morning.

Friday, May 19, 2006

It IS a small world

The far North and deep South have more in common than I ever thought possible.

Wednesday, May 17, 2006

CONGRATULATIONS!

So I heard a certain somebody give his valedictorian speech this last week - how cool is that!? - and he absolutely rocked the house! I thought the speech was fabulous, but his classmates loved it even more. I knew this guy was great ever since I met him, but it's also nice to know that other people also think so!

Then I watched him at commencement, also cool, which was also on Mother's Day, so we had plenty to celebrate that day... the only damper on the day was the pouring rain/leaky basement. But other than that it was fabulous!

I'm so proud of you babe!

Q: why do we call it convocation in Canada and they call it commencement here?

In which I wax poetic

You may remember how I was worrying about how to fill 210 minutes of class twice a week. Looks like that's less of a worry than I at first thought.

Having never taught for such a long time period before, I worried about how to fill such a large time slot. I also worried about the stamina of the students and whether they'd be able to keep up.

They're able to keep up (mostly) and they even seem eager to talk, which makes classtime so much easier to manage. They did get a little wearied by the scansion exercise yesterday. And I was very confused about how difficult a time some of them had grasping the concept. I had one student who swears she cannot tell which syllable the emphasis is on for any given word. I've never met anyone who couldn't figure that out.

I also thought that kids do this in school... don't they? She recalled a clapping exercise, but still claims she cannot tell which syllable to emphasize, even though she is clearly able to because her speech isn't full of weird emphases. She's also the student who rolled her eyes when I said the exam was cumulative, so I'm chalking it up to obstinacy, and just a piss poor attitude about the course.

note to self in ideal world: ask her why the hell she chose the course if she hates it so much or if she's always just this negative and whether she has many friends
I realized that most of my posting has been about this poetry class, which is not only boring for you, dear reader, but also indicates a relative lack of imagination or variety in my blog life. That's mostly because this course is eating up every spare minute that I have. I'm sure my head will be able to emerge out of my ass sometime soon... at least I hope so!

Saturday, May 13, 2006

Teaching modern poetry

Teaching an elective is SO different from teaching required courses!

Sure, there are students in the class only because it fulfills a requirement. And some of those students have put it off long enough that this is the only class that they can take to fulfill that requirement before they graduate, so they're not excited about this particular course.

But most of them CHOSE this class.

Deliberately.

That's so refreshing! First day when I walked in, I was met by people who smiled and I could tell they were excited about the material. Yes, I did have a lot of "is this going to be on the exam?" kind of questions... and one eye roller when I said the final was cumulative, but c'mon people! the term's only seven weeks long! If you can't remember what you did seven weeks earlier, you should be getting a CAT scan... or staying awake in class at least.

Comparing notes with the other TA teaching a lit course this term, we were really surprised to find that her general Brit Lit course had half the students enrolled in it as mine. We couldn't figure it out, since her course is required, covers a broader range of material, and isn't poetry (which isn't always popular with undergrads... I know I wouldn't have elected to take it if it wasn't required a U of C).

I finally figured it out after I looked at the course catalog and quizzed my students about why they were in the course. My course fulfills a general "social sciences and humanities" core requirement that ALL students in Arts and Sciences have to fulfill, and the number of seniors in my class tells me that many of them have put it off till now - I have polisci majors, chem majors, graphic design, philosophy, business, you name it, and I've probably got it!

I've always found such mixes successful for discussions because students have so many different perspectives that they bring to the table that you don't end up with parroting and groupthink that sometimes happens when you're only teaching one major. But it's also made me realize that I will have to spend more time than I expected on some basics like how to scan poetry, rhyme schemes, poetic devices and effects, and sound effects.

The trick will be to teach the students who don't know this stuff, without boring the hell out of the English majors that are in the class - they make up roughly a third of the students. I'm figuring on trying to get them working in groups where there's at least one English major per group. That way the major gets to 'teach' and not get bored, while the non-majors learn what they need to know.

Regardless of the challenges that I'll still run into teaching this course, so far it's been a fabulous experience, and I'm really looking forward to the rest of the term!

Wednesday, May 10, 2006

ummm...I don't get the connection...


According to CTV, the Senate proposed a levy on alcoholic drinks to pay for mental health programs.

Why beer and mental health?

Okay, aside from the 'some of it makes you feel good while too much is pathological' connection, why target beer taxation to fund mental health programs? They need to be funded, sure, definitely in fact, but I don't get the connection.

What's next?
New gas tax to fund childcare subsidies?
New cigarette tax to fund post office expansion?

I'm all for increased mental health funding, but I find it puzzling that revenues for the project are being generated specifically through increased alcohol taxation.

Monday, May 08, 2006

Talking and Listening

So I was telling a colleague over the weekend how many students I have in this summer poetry class - 28 - and she said, "Oh, so it's a lecture class then"

I really hope not! I don't think I can talk about modern poetry for seven hours a week. I can talk a lot when I need to, but seven hours? that's pushing it!

I'm actually hoping to have a discussion component in the class - I've built in a participation mark to encourage people to talk - and I'd like ideally for the class as a group to discuss the poetry. I think it would be far more pedantic to have to format discussion as small groups, because then you have to use discussion questions, which frankly get a bit annoying and students feel like it's just make-work.

At the same time, I know with 28 students, it's going to be real hard to get all of them talking. I know there will be some students who will talk all the time, while others will try to say nothing at all. But I'm going to try it anyway.... 'cause if I have to lecture for seven hours a week, my head will pop right off!

Friday, May 05, 2006

Scheduling

So I'm prepping for the summer course I'm teaching - Modern Poetry - which is pretty exciting because it's a lit course which I've never gotten to teach before. Closest I'd come is a guest lecture on Gawain in my supervisor's Medieval Lit during my MA.

I'm feeling pretty good about the material. I know which artists, poems, movements I want to talk about, but the schedule is what's giving me trouble.

I'm teaching twice a week, 210 minutes per class. Yes, 210 minutes - that's three and a half hours twice a week that we meet. Yikes! I know I've done classes that long, but they're hard! The only time I did that as an undergrad was a block week course in Canadian art. We met twice a day for two and a half hours for a full week. But in that class, half the day was spent on lit, and the other half on visual art, so it was really only like sitting through two different - albeit still long - lectures.

Here, we're talking about poetry the whole time. I want to keep their attention for both halves of the course, and don't want students deciding to ditch the second half at the break - which I know will be a temptation 'cause I've fallen victim to it myself before.

I've decided to treat each day as if they were two different classes, with two different topics, two different lectures, and possibly even two different poets to focus on. I think that will be the way to combat the weariness that I'm sure we'll all feel by the end of 210 minutes. Let's hope that does the trick.

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Bloodsuckers


Dracula Blogged begins again today. If you've ever had the urge to read the original vampire story (no, not the first, but the one that has the most cachet in pop culture) you can read it day by day over at Dracula Blogged.

The novel is written as a compilation of documents, all dated, and they're posted according to those dates. If you've read the novel, the blog gives you a very different sense of the story, as it unfolds in chronological order, not page by page, which lends it a sense of veracity you can't get from the book or even from film adaptations. Check it out.

Game 7

So, yes, it is only the quarterfinals, but game 7 between the Ducks and Flames goes on tonight, and I really wouldn't mind seeing the Flames win it. Then they'd advance to play the Oilers, which would be an interesting series to watch... provided there's any coverage of it here - one would hope the semifinals would be.

In honor, I give you

25 Signs Showing You Might be Canadian:

1. You're not offended by the term "HOMO MILK".
2. You understand the phrase "Could you pass me a serviette, I just dropped my poutine on the chesterfield" not that I'd ever say something like this
3. You eat chocolate bars, not candy bars.
4. You drink Pop, not Soda.
5. You know what 'Mickey' and '2-4' mean - I used the term "mickey" here once and was greeted by a lot of confusion... who knew it was a Canadian thing?
6. You don't care about the fuss with Cuba. It's a cheap place to go for your holidays, with good cigars, lots of rum, and no Americans.
7. You know that a pike is a type of fish, not part of a highway.
8. You drive on a highway, not a freeway... and they're often not free
9. You have Canadian Tire money in your kitchen drawers.
10. You know that Casey and Finnegan were not part of a Celtic musical group...though it would be a good name for one, eh?
11. You get excited whenever an American television show mentions Canada.
12. You brag to Americans that: Shania Twain, Jim Carrey, Celine Dion & many more, are Canadians.
13. You know that the C.E.O. of American Airlines is a Canadian!
14. You know what a touque is...and own one.
15. You design your Halloween costumes to fit over snowsuits.
16. You know that the last letter of the English alphabet is always pronounced "Zed" not "Zee"
17. Your local newspaper covers the national news on 2 pages, but requires 6 pages for hockey.
18. You know that the four seasons mean: almost winter, winter, still winter, and road construction. so true! especially in Saskatchewan!
19. You know that when it's 25 degrees outside, it's a warm day!
20. You understand the Labatt Blue commercials.
21. You know how to pronounce and spell "Saskatchewan". (Sas-Kat-chew-an)
22. You perk up when you hear the theme song from 'Hockey Night in Canada'...ah...memories
23. You were in grade 12, not the 12th grade.
24. "Eh?" is a very important part of your vocabulary, and is more polite than,"Huh?"
25. You actually understand these jokes, and forward them to all of your Canadian friends (and then you send them to your American friends just to confuse them...)

Tuesday, May 02, 2006

Desperation has an ugly smell

So I could tell the university had posted marks for the term by the small flurry of emails I received this morning from students who thought they'd been gypped in the marks they got. Several of them conveniently "forgot" the attendance policy even though it is clearly outlined on the syllabus, I go over it on the first day and remind them of it on a regular basis throughout the term.

I don't know what it is, but this term was worse than usual...all through the term actually. Lots of whiny, grade-grubbing students who spent a lot of time and energy trying to convince me they should get higher grades than they did. I wish they'd spent that much time and energy on just doing the work - then it wouldn't have been a problem! Sheesh!

Monday, May 01, 2006

Benefits of a cultural studies dissertation #31

I spent my weekend watching music videos


Shock To The System
By Billy Idol
BestVideoCodes.com



reading comic books







watching movies





All in the name of research! At least the book review is finally finished (it took much longer than I expected it to).