MaeLyn's Musings

Like the morning sun Gently rising, gaining strength: AI overlords! An AI generated image of itself influencing the world It seems like every time I go online or use my cellphone these days, there are invitations to use AI to help me in my tasks. If I do a search on Google, I get an AI overview of whatever topic I looked up. When I open my email, I get summaries of my emails, reminders to pay bills, estimates of package delivery times,  spam emails helpfully filtered out,  even  offers to write my emails for me, all compliments of AI.  Realizing that it has been way too long since my last blog post, I tried an experiment. I asked ChatGPT to write a blog in the style of MaeLyn's Musings on the influence that AI has on our lives today. Here is what it came up with: The Quiet Role AI Plays in Everyday Life Artificial intelligence sounds like a big, complicated idea, but most days it shows up in very small ways. It’s there when a reminder pops up at just the right t...

Since discovering Doctor Who about a year and a half ago, I watched all the new episodes, as well as several of the classic episodes, and now I see references to it everywhere. I hadn't realized how very popular it really is! It wasn't just seeing people dressed as the doctor/tardis/weeping angels/whatever at the ComicCon in Salt Lake City. I've seen people wearing Doctor Who T-shirts at Sam's Club. Our local library had a Doctor Who event. Pictures and references to Doctor Who are all over the internet. Here are some fun Doctor Who images I've come across recently. (Please note, these are not my images. I don't own them. I'm including the links to where I found them to give credit where credit is due.) http://minionfactory.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-doctor-is-afoot.html https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=609320269122668&set=a.414413855279978.99986.276710412383657&type=1&theater http://blog.riptapparel.com/blog/fun-holiday-p...

One of my favorite aliens from Doctor Who are the weeping angels. If you don't know what the weeping angels are, watch the video below, where the doctor explains... you can fast forward to about 2:15 if you don't want to watch the beginning. Anyway, yesterday while browsing we came across this tutorial that explained how to make our very own weeping angels, and Hannah decided she wanted to do it. So we did. We made six of them, and I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out. Now Hannah wants to leave some on the window sills of her Doctor Who fan friends, looking in.

In the Doctor Who TV series, there is an alien race called the silence. According to the show, they have lived here on earth since the dawn of time. However, the silence have a strange defense mechanism - as soon as a person looks away from them, he forgets the silent's very existence. The silence use post-hypnotic suggestion to manipulate people to do what they want them to do. A few minutes ago, the boys climbed into a car and drove away to spend the rest of the afternoon playing at a friend's house. Hannah was in her room, and the house was silent. For a moment, it reminded me of what it was like when school was in session, when all the kids were at school and I had several hours of silence during which I could think, and blog about what I was thinking of. It reminded me of someone seeing one of the Doctor Who Silents for the second time and saying, "Oh yeah! I remember you! How on earth could I have forgotten you?" Except that my re-encounter with peaceful sil...

I mentioned a while back that I started watching Doctor Who after Halloween last year. Since then, I've watched seven seasons of the show in a little over three months. The kids have been watching the episodes at a slower pace, but they are enjoying them too. Josh has made his own sonic screwdriver out of paper, and occasionally he talks about what his tardis would be like if he built one. Peter is scared of the weeping angels, and insists that when we talk about one, we call it a  "W. A." or "WAs" if there are more than one. He also is not a big fan of the "GMK"s (Gas Mask Kids) or the question, "Are you my mummy?" On the other hand, he does enjoy going around yelling "Exterminate" (Daleks) or "Delete" (Cybermen) at random times. It is interesting how some random things can really scare us and others we can pass off without a worry. Of the seven seasons I watched, I liked the 9th doctor the best, I think because of h...