Whether He Is Or Not Is Open To Question -
Just nod politely, smile and allow his delusions. Don't forget, this is a man with his hand on the Remote Nuclear Tormentor. Art!
Another Intro inspired by MOX, because that allows me to mention 'Moxon's Master' as an intro to the Intro. It's a short story by Ambrose Gwinnett Bierce, possibly the most cynical man who ever lived and therefore a role model for Conrad. Published in 1899, it is narrated by a visitor to Moxon's house, an inventor who has created what would not be known as a 'robot' for another 21 years. Art!
I think this is the work of Virgil Finley
That's the illustrator taking liberties. Moxon holds forth about intelligence and what it means to be conscious and self-aware, concepts a generation ahead of their time. Yes, Conrad has read the story, and the chess-playing 'Master' has a face sculpted to express cool concentration. The trouble is, Moxon beats it at a game of chess.
So it kills him.
It gets it's hands around his neck and strangles him to death, still wearing that expression of cool concentration. This presages the robot revolt in "R.U.R." and is, perhaps, Ol' Amby warning about the dangers of AI. Art!
This, gentle reader, is 'The Mechanical Turk', a chess-playing 'robot' from the land of the Teutons in 1770. It appeared to use lots of clockwork to play chess, and play it quite well.
A complete hoax, of course, because imagine where we'd be today if robots had been invented before the internal combustion engine. The whole thing was an elaborate hoax. Art!
The drawers that seemed to be full of clockwork mechanisms did not go all the way to the back, and served to conceal a person who sat on a sliding seat. As the presenter opened various doors to reveal the inner workings, said seat occupant would slide about to avoid being seen.
The Turk's arm would be manoeuvred by pulleys and levers by the hidden chess player, picking up and placing the chess pieces, which all had magnetic bases. The board itself was thin enough to allow other magnets beneath it to reflect which pieces went where, and a mirror image of the board was drawn underneath it. This allowed the hidden player to see how future moves ought to be made. Art!
It wasn't until the creator's son inherited the Turk that it's real operation was discovered, and it went on tour across the Western hemisphere, finally succumbing to a fire in 1840.
At no point, whether it won or lost a game, did this chess-playing 'robot' murder anyone, which is boring yet a relief for the opposition players.
Where am I going with this? O I thought you'd never ask! Art?
Say both hello and cheerio to Amazon Go. These were convenience stores with no cashiers; supposedly a system of sensors, cameras and a powerful AI running in the background would enable shoppers to walk in, pick up their stuff and walk out, without having to scan anything.
Notice they said 'no cashiers' because Conrad can bet they had at least one or two people on-site to ensure people didn't, you know, STEAL THINGS. When I worked there, Sainsbury's trialled this at a few London locations and immediately ran into reliability issues. I don't think they continued with this scheme as it caused more trouble than it saved in staff wages. I also recall Leon, the till operator I often encountered at Morrison's, saying that theft at the self-service checkouts was costing the business big time.
Why did I mention the fake chess-playing robot? O I thought you'd never ask!
Meet Prit and Kulvinder, who are a brace of the 1,000+ Indians that Amazon hired to ACTUALLY function instead of that fake AI. They tirelessly tracked people via cameras, worked out what they were purchasing and processing their payments. Amazon might be saving on staff wages at their Go stores, but over 1,000 Indians on the payroll amounts to a hefty sum indeed. Guesstimating $5,000 per Indian employee per annum, that's $5 million per annum. To save perhaps $100,000 in staff wages per annum.
Amazon phased out their Go stores in 2024, citing the dull corporate reasons of 'technical and operational challenges'. Or, you were paying 50x what savings you made. I bet the suits who made these decisions retired to 'spend more time with their family'. Moron's Disasters?
Another From Ol' Tel
That is, Terence Cuneo, one of the official British war artists during the Second Unpleasantness. Art!
"Scots Guards fighting through the bocage"
An artist's view of the fighting, because no photographer from either side would have survived a shot from this angle or height.
The 'bocage' mentioned here is the network of small Norman fields with earthen banks accumulated over centuries, making natural defensive barriers. They were so thick they were tank-proof, meaning any tank had to either bulldoze through them or go over them. The middle Churchill tank is showing why this was a problem; the thin armour on it's underside is exposed. The British method of dealing with Teuton defences in the bocage was to absolutely shell the living daylights out of them, then machine gun them from end to end, and then advance. Not remotely subtle but it worked.
Bring The Paine
Sarah Paine, that is, the South Canadian scholar, historian and academic, who actually lived in Ruffia during the slow and then rapid collapse of the Sinister Union. She described shopping in a Ruffian 'supermarket', where the meat aisles were to be avoided, thanks to the stink of rotting meat. She counted all the items for sale - a whopping 77 of them. Oops. Art!
She got good at making borscht, Ruffian beet soup, using bones instead of meat, since she couldn't afford meat. She bought Hungarian apples, as Ruffia still had to learn what an 'apple' was, then Romanian tinned tomatoes, then Ruffian beets, and Hay Pesto! Borscht. What she felt made it even worse was that this was in Moscow - the high pinnacle of Sinister culture and civilisation.
O Dear Me
NAFOViking, a proper Norwegian I follow on Twitter, has re-used that hideous picture of Donnie Dorko that I cannot resist re-posting. Art!
With more wattle than a turkey on full display, he looks as if he stuck his face in a bag of Cheetos for his morning makeup routine. Thank heavens the 'neck vajayjay' is not visible here, you can never unsee that appalling image once seen. I won't detail any further, this is still a SFW blog.
I bet Putinpot is sweating now, because his South Canadian asset isn't going to be around for long to protect him.
They Do Things Differently In Poland
The Poles combine the ordered rationality of the Teutons with the free-wheeling attitude of the Ruffians, and are big fans of "The Witcher" novels (the television series not so much) because the author is a Pole, Andrzej Sapkowski. Art!
The image is a little fuzzy thanks to being taken at night, but yes: this is a Polish Leopard 2 main battle tank, decorated with Christmas lights. It has become a viral image in Poland, with Poles commenting on how pretty it looks. Well, yes, except see the Terence Cuneo image above for what tanks are for.
Finally -
Being serious for once, which we can manage occasionally. You probably haven't heard of him, but NAFO Fella 'iamundertow', who followed me on Twitter and whom I also followed, died unexpectedly recently. He was a genuinely decent chap who will be missed. A reminder that some of us are not getting younger.
So long, Fella. One hundred Shiba dogs salute you. Art!
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