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I’m not sure who’s idea it was, though certainly not mine. I was staying at a friend’s, Andy, and Stu and another Andy (Joyce) were on the way over with their bikes, decided destination: The Welsh Border (and back). Since my bike was at home, and to be fair, not a road-bike, I agreed to use Andy’s dad’s bike.
Occasional Top Gear challenges involve driving from one side of a country to another, the presenters will argue about who’s car is best for the challenge, while in the background a totally inappropriate car is waiting by, this is the forfeit car which they must drive if their own car breaks down beyond repair. For this ride to Wales, I was that vehicle. The first thing I noticed was the huge saddle, it had a slight wobble about it, but still looked extremely comfortable. I’d always wondered why bike saddles are so thin and hard, and I soon learnt why. The chain was a little rusty, but the main problem was it was so slack. A tyre split at the valve as we were pumping topping it up, and the outers had very little tread left. The worst bit by far though, was the gearing, it was like nothing I’d ever seen before. Wikipedia tells me they’re called “down-tube shifters“, pulling the lever changes gear as you’d expect, quite instantaneously too, but to which one you just don’t know, as there is no clicking or grooving into place (though they did make a tremendous coughing sound), you just sort of guess. Keeping my eyes on the road, actually finding the gear levers meant slapping around on the frame, by the time I found them, it was time to switch back to the gear I’d just come from. This was providing the loose chain didn’t slip off in the first place.
Besides the coughing, the rear wheel made a tapping sound every turn, and the breaks laughed at me every time I tried to use them, on top of that I developed a grunt on every stroke. NOW I know why saddles are so thin and hard. The width of it meant it rubbed against both thighs, occasionally trapping more than just fabric, and I’m not just on about the occasional nerve (sending sharp, shooting pains to unnecessary and unfair places) either.
My hands also suffered from the ride. The handlebars had nothing more than black tape for grip, and in some areas, were bare metal, leaving no shock absorption for the hands which were having to hold on tighter just to be able to grip the bars, so now as I type I have a nice red callus stripe across each palm.
So now I’ve come to appreciate cycle design, mysteries I’ve always wondered about have been solved in a single ride, though there’s still one thing left. Why do road cyclists still insist on not using suspension? Sure it adds weight, but there is nothing fun about travelling 30-40mph down a hill, and feeling every single tiny bump, especially when the tyres are made to be rock solid, and thin enough to actually drop into every possible gap (drainage covers) at the same time.
The truth is I’m still going through 8GB of photos and 880 video clips, and I’ve started writing up the journal but it’s taken me 2000 words just to get off the plane and onto the train, so I’m having to rethink how best to present the events of the trip. I’ve also been busy trying to sort out my trip to Germany in 2 weeks time…
In the meantime stand by for my thoughts on the new Need For Speed three-way and yesterday’s ride which gave me a whole new perspective on cycling.
Before getting started, I’ll let you watch the video, and then discuss it afterwards:
My first reaction to this was to wonder how much of the scene was scripted. Even the most developed interactive bots still struggle to put a comprehensive sentence together, let alone with the addition of emotion and gesture. Though MicroSoft must be taking this seriously or else the whole project is a waste of time. So my conclusion is that yes, we are looking at real A.I. when we look at Milo, but chances are, the A.I. created so far has been specialised - and is probably only adequate enough - for the purposes of the demo we’ve just watched. Ask him to comment on the weather or your make-up, and well, dare I say a BSoD probably couldn’t be more wished for as a convenient way of ending the awkward silence.
But let’s look at the bigger picture. When I say this, I think, how BIG is this bigger picture? This could end up in numerous places. Imagine a PC game based in a medieval of fantasy setting, similar to Oblivion. You’re about to enter a forest on a mission to rescue some damsel in distress, but you know the forest is teeming with dangerous wildlife, and bandits. At your side, you have not just one squire, but a small band of brothers. Being able to give orders verbally without having to click generic, limited options is one thing, but having to use emotion and gesture to give a pre-battle motivational speech which could entirely sway the mood of the battle, or even convince nearby eavesdroppers to join in (or if done badly, scare them off), that would bring gaming to an whole new level never even imagined.
But where next, outside of the gaming world? A boy that could actually genuinely tell you that your dress looks good and recommends what colour shoes to go with it? A virtual teacher to take over the job of substitute teacher in nursery? A.I. of this level may also have its therapeutic qualities, I’m sure there’s an opportunity for helping autistic children somewhere here.
But I’d say if there was a line, this would be it. The social consequences of anything further could be disastrous. An A.I. bot capable of doing all of the above, would be very human indeed, I can imagine youngsters in a few generations time being brought up unable to distinguish humans in the real world from characters on their TV screen. Loners would become more lonely, as they no longer need friends at all, when they can just load one up from their hard drive.
If your onscreen friend insulted you, you could just delete him, or if you’re tech enough, could reconfigure or script him (or perhaps if the AI’s sophisticated enough, just tell him, and he’d never even accidentally do it again). If you’d like a new friend with a specific personality, you could make one on the spot, and then when you want him to go away, he would do so without asking “why, what’s up?”.
Now imagine the frustration of not being able to do this with real-world friends. I’m starting to think perhaps this could backfire and turn non-autistic people autistic. It seems that with mankind’s ongoing quest for perfection, we’ve given up altogether and moved on to create a super-species which could, in generations to come, ruin everything it is to be human.
And who knows, but why not, while on the topic of humanity… a character capable of performing virtual sexual favours. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the aim of the project after-all; seriously, who could possibly work at MS, on a project such as this in particular AND have a girlfriend? Think about it. If such A.I. ever went commercial, there is no doubt in my mind that there will be a whole load of characters to chose from, as-well as functionality to design your own.
Well, I probably shouldn’t say such things about the team behind this project, and probably speak out of jealousy, as I honestly wish I was there working on this project with them. When I complete my masters in artificial inteligence, I think I found the place where I want to go. This is the current apex of AI technology, without going as far as to rely on robotics.
This entry is part of a series, Planning Japan» Finally, I have before me, some physical evidence of this summer’s adventure. On my desk is an exchange order for a 21-day rail pass, which allows free travel and seat reservation on any Japanese train, including the Shinkansen (bullet trains), apart from the Nozomi; These are the trains which directly connect the major cities, Fukuoka, Hiroshima, Kyoto, Osaka and Tokyo. They don’t travel much faster than the other Shinkansen, but the fact you don’t have to switch trains speeds up the journey times. I get the feeling this is because the Japanese want to reserve the high-speed intercity trains for businessmen. When we land as Kansai airport, the first thing we have to do is find the ticket office and collect the pass, using the exchange order. Luckily enough, the pass comes with maps of every station and where to find said offices.
The Japan Railways Group quotes the pass at ¥57,700 (Yen), which at time of writing, equates to £377, but adding VAT and the fact it’s actually flown in from an office in Australia, hence two currency conversions, brings this to £441 including P&P, meaning I’ve now spent slightly more than £900 on this trip and I’ve not even arrived yet. This may sound a lot, but the Japanese trains are notoriously expensive. For example, an average journey, such as Kyoto to Hiroshima would cost ¥11,290, or £74. Now considering we’ll be travelling almost every other day for three weeks, and some days may involve more than one journey, it suddenly becomes clear how much this is actually saving.
There are some journeys which will go on through the night. I learnt the benefits of this from travelling around Europe. Travelling through the night costs are as much as an expensive youth hostel, with the benefit of waking up in the morning where you want to be, rather than having to wake up, pay and book out of the youth hostel, and then waste the morning travelling to where you want to go. This means a careful selection (with much research) of the trains and timetables. A night train may arrive at your location at 5am, or take eight hours when a bullet train could make the journey in two. There’s also a big variance in prices and sleeping arrangements. Some trains offer a matted floor to sleep on, which are free with the pass, or beds, typically at ¥9500 with the pass (more than double without).
No, in response to people such as Anna and Sandi; I haven’t read the book. I didn’t even know there was one, in-fact I hadn’t even heard of the film and had no idea what I was going in to watch, and I prefer it like this, I always find trailers give too much of the film away, let alone books.
I didn’t even know that the term “Angels and Demons” was meant to be metaphorical. I was half expecting the opening scene at CERN to show the opening of some portal that brings Hades himself to single handedly slaughter the world.
What actually happens is this: Some dirty scouser from the Illuminati manages to steal some explosive anti-matter and uses it as a bomb against the Vatican. In the meantime, the four favourite cardinals to become the next pope are taken hostage. Tom Hanks is called in to solve century old riddles to rescue the cardinals and retrieve the explosive.
It did seem a little unnecessary for him to point out Christianity’s flaws at every opportunity, and then go on to explain them. Everyone knows why Christmas is celebrated on December 25th, I don’t need to be reminded. This is a film, not a history lesson. The film did however, always manage to justify these flaws, not just for Christianity but religion in general. This leaves just two beefs:
- Why not just use a normal bomb? Why did they have to bring the element of sci-fi in with this explosive created from an experiment at CERN? I’m quite sure A-Level physics taught me that anti-matter bomb just wouldn’t work, the amount of energy radiated by annihilation (collision between matter and anti matter) is no where near as much as the energy required to make anti-matter in the first place. I’m always the last person to point out scientific flaws in films, and I never dis-recommend a film because of it, it just bugs me that they brought this in when a stick of dynamite would have fitted just as well in the storyline, making the climate of the discussion of science vs religion totally plausible.
- So it turns out the goodest of good guys (I’m really sorry to spoil this for whoever hasn’t seen the film yet, but it seems an old cliche which I personally always anticipate in every film I see anyway, and it always annoys me when I’m right) is actually the villain, and he planned the whole thing for his own glory. Sorry, there are so many elements that could not be planned. The main thing being the timing. With the bombs timer being so ambiguous, as it used a battery with an “approximate” lifetime and was affected by the temperature of its surroundings, he still managed to time the conclusion of his master-plan so perfectly by heroically taking the device in a helicopter and letting it detonate high up away from everyone. Again, they could have done away with this whole conspiracy, the film would have still achieved its same goals, while making more sense at the same time.
Overall I’d still recommend it. As an action film, the perfect balance is achieved, where there’s not so much going on that your eyes dart around the screen struggling to take it all in, and at the same time, there’s enough to keep the film moving at a good pace. As a philosophical film, it does well to openly study the debate between science and religion. As a romance film, there’s nothing tongue-in-cheek about it… See what I did there?
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