Roadrunners are truly majestic birds. I've seen one enough times by now in the wild to develop some personal knowledge, which feels pleasing to me. How privileged is it to know the habits of the roadrunner?'
Indeed they move swiftly on the ground. Seeing one scamper down the road will tell you how they got their name. They will take to the air if need be, using their speed as momentum in the air, but they only for a short trip of necessity, and their soaring is not particularly swift but a gentle arc to land at somewhere not to distant.. If they can get to brush, you will not see them again. They will use the brush like a subway system and pop up who knows where, far away from where they entered. That's an ability I somewhat envy.
I was thinking of jokes about these birds. I didn't have any in mind, and not being creative about this kid of thing, I wondered how ChatGPT might do on such a question. At first it wanted to make everything about the famous cartoon roadrunner. Everything involved either "Beep! Beep!" (a sound I've never heard a real roadrunner make) or a coyote*, or an ACME product. I told it to knock that off and give me ones about real roadrunners.
Here's how it did. Judging by the answers we humans have nothing to worry about for a while.
Why did the roadrunner refuse to buy a car?
Because he’s already got zero to sixty — on foot!
Why did the roadrunner get a promotion at work?
Because no one else could handle high-speed deadlines!
Why don’t roadrunners ever get lost?
Because they always follow the fastest route!
Later I tried another LLM, Claude Sonnet to be precise. I got these. The one about the rattlesnake isn't that bad, actually. The one about the cactus is my favorite because it is absolute nonsense and makes me laugh.
*Bizarrely I have seen a roadrunner and a coyote together, one following the other, about a minute apart, on an animal trail that used to run through the previously undeveloped desert. I thought I was hallucinating. I have also seen a chicken cross the road, for what it's worth.
2 comments:
If I were a roadrunner, I think I'd like to be known as clever and quick but would bristle at being pigeon holed into dumb blond jokes. If I were a roadrunner, i believe I would pirouette about the cactus. But gently so as not to cause too much dizziness..Just a pleasant and sort of miraculous dizziness. But as it is, I am not a roadrunner, a rattlesnake or a cactus or even a roadside attraction made of landfill.
But i certainly can't think of a single eloquent roadrunner joke or Riddle, so AI wins. And also hallucinate? There mystery be some jokes about chickens and roads that are eloquent. How do you know that a person has not become AI. That's like the chicken and egg question, right. Sorry...long day.
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