April 2016
A recent newpaper report on robot reporters that are supposedly able to write financial reports and TV previews, gave an example:
‘We catch up with our dastardly group along the rippling waters of the Riverlands.’
If that’s a fair example, journalists’ jobs are safe. When will human journalists stop swallowing the latest ridiculous claim for AI?
Update, April 2023
ChatGPT
Seven years later, (seems like only yesterday!) Chatbot ‘AI’ has made a significant breakthrough with ChatGPT. Although it has no real understanding, it can produce relevant, well-written text.
For instance, my post on racism, Racism explained as a redundant instinct addresses the unhelpful entrenched conflict between evolutionary psychology and cultural psychology. I asked ChatGPT about it, and it produced an excellent response.
ChatGPT is controversial – but it makes claims for AI less ridiculous.
Please feel free to comment.
soothfairy 
I think you’re onto something with the term #artificialstupidity. Spell checkers that substitute relationship-wrecking terms into personal emails, wrongly insert apostrophes into resumes, and substitute words that make no sense are just one example.
We’re lucky civilization hasn’t collapsed as a result — or have the seeds of its demise already been sown?
Yikes.
LikeLike
Thanks for your comment, Peter. Good example. Language isn’t understood well enough to be reproduced by algorithms. I think the AI hype will fade, and civilisation will be wrecked by something else!
LikeLike