[Chris O'Carroll]

It the sense of the meeting that I should post every New Statesman comp? I knew there would be people here who'd want to take a whack at the clerihews, of course. But this isn't a poetry comp. (Although it could be, I suppose. A computer can be programmed to produce rhyme and meter.)

No 4212 Set by Leonora Casement: As part of 2012’s celebrations to mark the life and influence of the 20th-century mathematician and code-breaker Alan Turing, Reading University is running a special one-day event, Turing100, on what would have been his 100th birthday. This will feature a display of the Turing Test, a Q&A session designed to test the ability of machines to pass as human. If a judge cannot reliably tell machine from human, the machine is said to have passed the test. We want you to think up a Q&A session with anyone (human, animal or machine) to confound the judge. Max 120 words by 26 January comp@newstatesman.co.uk

[Jayne Osborn]

Blimey, this sounds really tricky! Too clever for me, I think

(Roger/Bob? I bet you can do this!)

[John Whitworth]

I shall wait for some long-headed Jeeves to explain.

Bertie

[Roger Slater]

I'm confused. How can we fool the judge into thinking the conversation was created by a human when the conversation will, indeed, be created by a human? (This isn't my comment. I'm just quoting what Siri said).

[Chris O'Carroll]

Computer science isn't my long suit, but I think a Turing test works like this: The human judge sits at a keyboard typing questions which are answered either by a real human being or by a computer pretending to be human. (The answers are appearing on screen, so there's no voice to hear.) It's up to the judge to phrase the questions and analyze the answers so as to figure out what's software and what's synapse.

One way to play it for this comp (120 words doesn't give you a lot of room to move) would be to write an exchange with some recognizable human figure who has a notoriously robotic affect.

[basil ransome-davies]

Romney, for example?

Originally Posted by Chris O'Carroll

One way to play it for this comp (120 words doesn't give you a lot of room to move) would be to write an exchange with some recognizable human figure who has a notoriously robotic affect.

[W.F. Lantry]

Originally Posted by John Whitworth

I shall wait for some long-headed Jeeves to explain.

Bertie,

Imagine Eliza, on steroids. Eliza was a therapist, back in the 60's. If you were lying on the couch, and you said to her, "I feel a great sense of ennui," she would say "Why do you feel that way?"

If you said "You always answer my anguish with questions," she would say "How does that make you feel?"

Eliza was very popular, but not very smart. Her whole brain fit on just a few screens. It turned out, to everyone's dismay, that coding a smarter therapist quickly got immensely complicated.

Twenty years before she was born, Alan Turing challenged everyone to conceive her. Turing, you'll remember, was your countryman, who helped crack the German war codes. Back then, everyone figured it wouldn't take very long, what with the pace of advances. After all, the cell phone in your pocket has more computing power than a computer that took up a whole floor then...

But even now, no-one has written an Eliza that would fool even the most self-involved patient, lying on a couch and staring at the ceiling while he unburdened himself. This is your big chance. You can easily out-do George Bernard Shaw!

Thanks,

Jeeves

[Allen Tice]

Eliza was a standard issue Rogerian therapist funneled through a thing that made her seem like a computer.

Rogerian therapy is one of the more effective approaches. Why?

Aha!
Largely, it is theorized, because it makes you actually listen to what you say and mull it over a few times. As a part of that, the nonverbalizing parts of your various hemispheres (wherever they are - right or left, up or down) are exposed to you as as outsider blabbering your highly sincere rubbish.

Then these nonverbal wigadoons of yours start firing their messages through your nervous wires to modify (maybe) that sincere blather and sincere behavior.

That's also why talking aloud to yourself isn't crazy. Unless, of course, there's a wire or a bug around.

Go, Turing, talk to Carl Rogers!

[John Whitworth]

Turing Test

Can you do Q & A in rhyme?
I can. I do it all the time.

Tell me all about your life.
Trouble and strife, man. Trouble and strife.

Are you married? Yes I am.
Marriage isn't worth a damn.

Have you had sex with penguins? No.
It might be good to try it though.

Can Ed Miliband succeed
In leading Labour? Yes indeed.

He's the man I love to like.
You can't be serious. On yer bike.

Gotcha! You are a machine.
So are you. Know what I mean?

[ChrisGeorge]

Originally Posted by Chris O'Carroll

It the sense of the meeting that I should post every New Statesman comp? I knew there would be people here who'd want to take a whack at the clerihews, of course. But this isn't a poetry comp. (Although it could be, I suppose. A computer can be programmed to produce rhyme and meter.)

No 4212 Set by Leonora Casement: As part of 2012’s celebrations to mark the life and influence of the 20th-century mathematician and code-breaker Alan Turing, Reading University is running a special one-day event, Turing100, on what would have been his 100th birthday. This will feature a display of the Turing Test, a Q&A session designed to test the ability of machines to pass as human. If a judge cannot reliably tell machine from human, the machine is said to have passed the test. We want you to think up a Q&A session with anyone (human, animal or machine) to confound the judge. Max 120 words by 26 January comp@newstatesman.co.uk

Aye, Chris, this may be beyond us mere poets.

Thanks though for bringing it to our attention. The best of luck to anyone who gives it a try.

For my own part, I think I would prefer to go Touring than Turing.

Cheers

Chris