Author Topic: EP370: The Care and Feeding of Mammalian Bipeds, v. 2.1  (Read 21432 times)

Devoted135

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Reply #25 on: November 26, 2012, 08:44:14 PM
I've changed my mind on this story a couple times with the help of this thread. I've gone from generally being frustrated with the story to actually being mad at it, and now to "okay, well if it was an alien robot made by aliens then I'm only depressed by the story."

I may have missed the cues, but nothing in the story actually makes me believe that Rosie is anything other than a poorly coded servitor made by humans, for humans. However, that puts me back in the "really mad" category, so I think I'm going to go with Unblinking's explanation anyway since it makes me feel slightly better. That still leaves me with chemistryguy's "hostility, adultery, statutory rape and child neglect" but at least it removes criminal negligence from Rosie's (and her programmer's) roster. Overall, this was definitely not fun.

Oh, and I loved the reading. :)



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Reply #26 on: November 26, 2012, 08:49:36 PM
I may have missed the cues, but nothing in the story actually makes me believe that Rosie is anything other than a poorly coded servitor made by humans, for humans. However, that puts me back in the "really mad" category, so I think I'm going to go with Unblinking's explanation anyway since it makes me feel slightly better. That still leaves me with chemistryguy's "hostility, adultery, statutory rape and child neglect" but at least it removes criminal negligence from Rosie's (and her programmer's) roster. Overall, this was definitely not fun.
I don't think the cues were there. I, like you, am choosing to go with Unblinking's interpretation, robot programmed by aliens, and then let this story fade peacefully from memory. Whatever the true situation is, the story is not like-able enough to warrant a slot in my faulty-at-best long term memory.

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Devoted135

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Reply #27 on: November 26, 2012, 08:55:41 PM
I may have missed the cues, but nothing in the story actually makes me believe that Rosie is anything other than a poorly coded servitor made by humans, for humans. However, that puts me back in the "really mad" category, so I think I'm going to go with Unblinking's explanation anyway since it makes me feel slightly better. That still leaves me with chemistryguy's "hostility, adultery, statutory rape and child neglect" but at least it removes criminal negligence from Rosie's (and her programmer's) roster. Overall, this was definitely not fun.
I don't think the cues were there. I, like you, am choosing to go with Unblinking's interpretation, robot programmed by aliens, and then let this story fade peacefully from memory. Whatever the true situation is, the story is not like-able enough to warrant a slot in my faulty-at-best long term memory.

I agree, it's definitely not worth any more mental angst. :-\

Edit: You know, I think I've missed the point. It has just dawned on me that the author probably meant to make me uncomfortable and to think about the clues that I might be missing in my own interactions. In which case, it's still not fun, but also not a bad story (at least, not for that reason).
« Last Edit: November 26, 2012, 08:58:07 PM by Devoted135 »



flashedarling

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Reply #28 on: November 26, 2012, 09:22:41 PM
Rosie didn't feel robot to me so much as she felt alien.

That is the impression I got from the story too. That maybe the line of robots she came from was of extraterrestrial origin. Which made the story more interesting when I thought of robot aliens who are programmed with a desire to sneak onto planets and take positions as caregivers, and the inhabitants don't even think about where they are coming from.



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Reply #29 on: November 27, 2012, 03:11:13 PM
I don't think the cues were there. I, like you, am choosing to go with Unblinking's interpretation, robot programmed by aliens, and then let this story fade peacefully from memory. Whatever the true situation is, the story is not like-able enough to warrant a slot in my faulty-at-best long term memory.

I think there were definitely cues there.

Most prominently, the title.  The manual would not refer to "Mammalian Bipeds" if it were written by humans. It were refer to "humans", or be some kind of nameless default parameters.  The title alone implies that it is written by something that is:
1.  Not mammalian.
2.  Not bipedal.

YMMV and all that, but if that manual was supposed to have been written by humans, then the title of the manual is unbelievable to me.  If the manual was meant to be written by aliens (or maybe robots) then it makes both the title and the story make sense.



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Reply #30 on: November 27, 2012, 06:54:35 PM
I don't think the cues were there. I, like you, am choosing to go with Unblinking's interpretation, robot programmed by aliens, and then let this story fade peacefully from memory. Whatever the true situation is, the story is not like-able enough to warrant a slot in my faulty-at-best long term memory.

I think there were definitely cues there.

Most prominently, the title.  The manual would not refer to "Mammalian Bipeds" if it were written by humans. It were refer to "humans", or be some kind of nameless default parameters.  The title alone implies that it is written by something that is:
1.  Not mammalian.
2.  Not bipedal.

YMMV and all that, but if that manual was supposed to have been written by humans, then the title of the manual is unbelievable to me.  If the manual was meant to be written by aliens (or maybe robots) then it makes both the title and the story make sense.


I'll present an argument for programmed by humans. The programmer is asked:
"How long will it take you to build a program that does all these complicated processes?"
"It'll take me three months."
"Well, the sales team promised a working demo in a month. I'm looking forward to seeing it!"

Throw in a bit of programmer who isn't the best at social cues and doesn't have the time to research the problem, and Rosie is the result.

All cat stories start with this statement: “My mother, who was the first cat, told me this...”


benjaminjb

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Reply #31 on: November 27, 2012, 08:05:29 PM
Throw in a bit of programmer who isn't the best at social cues and doesn't have the time to research the problem, and Rosie is the result.
Yeah, or a programmer with a sense of humor that maybe doesn't translate so well into print. No, that's too extreme--all programmers have a perfect sense of humor.

Since there's no other evidence of aliens in the story (iirc), I think Fenrix has the right of it. In a story about fallible humans, it's easy to posit the existence of other fallible human programmers. I still don't understand why anyone would buy this robot without reading the multitude of one-star Amazon reviews, whether it's human-made or alien in origin. If aliens came to sell me a robot, the first thing I'd do is check Amazon reviews. Well, maybe not the first thing...



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Reply #32 on: November 27, 2012, 08:34:17 PM
I still don't understand why anyone would buy this robot without reading the multitude of one-star Amazon reviews, whether it's human-made or alien in origin. If aliens came to sell me a robot, the first thing I'd do is check Amazon reviews. Well, maybe not the first thing...

Would it have any one-star reviews? I mean, we, the listeners, are the only ones privy to its entirely wrong interpretations of what's really going on. From the family's POV, though...has Rosie failed them? I mean, other than barging in on the daughter with her boyfriend, did she do anything worthy of a one-star review?

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benjaminjb

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Reply #33 on: November 27, 2012, 09:11:54 PM
Would it have any one-star reviews? I mean, we, the listeners, are the only ones privy to its entirely wrong interpretations of what's really going on. From the family's POV, though...has Rosie failed them? I mean, other than barging in on the daughter with her boyfriend, did she do anything worthy of a one-star review?
Good question. Has Rosie failed them from their POV? I was assuming that at some point some of this stuff would come out in some way or other: A parent discovers the daughter having sex, Rosie's logs are reviewed, the parents learn that Rosie knew about this all along, and they take to Amazon to complain. Or if Rosie misconstrues chanting as education, how will she help to educate the baby? There's quite a few ways in which Rosie's misunderstanding could come back to the family, it seems.

Now, maybe Rosie is the first robot of her kind and there are no other reviews out there (maybe "v. 2.1" indicates that the manual has gone through serious testing and revision but no public trial); and maybe mom and dad are early adopters of technology, always seeking the new new thing. So I'm not seriously saying "this story is unrealistic because no one checked Yelp!"

But in the future of this story, the family may break up or stay together--but I'm definitely expecting a class action lawsuit and a public relations campaign where the robotics corporation spokesman says something like "we apologize for all those robots who literally threw babies out with bathwater."



El Barto

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Reply #34 on: November 28, 2012, 12:59:30 AM
I wanted to like this one, but was distracted and frustrated with the stilted and unnecessary way that the robot used the wrong words.  It was too clever by half to think that a robot could be so sophisticated but yet continually refer to arms as forelimbs and appendages and groups of humans tribes or a herds instead of families. 

I could understand if this was the FIRST robot to encounter humans but in this story it seemed clear that it was fairly common for humans to have robot assistants and it seems silly that none of the first ten robots would have created a simple FAQ for other robots to understand about crying and arms and legs.

All that said, I did enjoy the comments here in the forum, so there's that.



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Reply #35 on: November 28, 2012, 01:32:55 AM
I liked the story while listening - it was fun - but these comments point out the flaws which I had forgotten.  For example when it started I was sure it was an alien that was there to be a shepard to its human herd.  Come to think of it THAT would have been a better story - a human family and its live-in alien overload.  Rosie is eventually revealed a horribly programmed robot.  An alien robot seems a likely explanation for the complete failure to understand human social cues, but for me to think that to be the case I would have required at least a few more clues from the author.  I think "lazy author not thinking the story through" is the best explanation.  For example I noticed Rosie's oversight of a signifigant gender clue as well.  Federick refers to Agatha as his sister (and I think "so Rosie will note her gender") and Rosie doesn't catch it but a few lines later notes her gender based on the use of the pronoun her.

I really enjoyed the story, but I can also see some serious flaws in the story logic.



Max e^{i pi}

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Reply #36 on: November 28, 2012, 07:46:48 AM
I'll present an argument for programmed by humans. The programmer is asked:
"How long will it take you to build a program that does all these complicated processes?"
"It'll take me three months."
"Well, the sales team promised a working demo in a month. I'm looking forward to seeing it!"
Throw in a bit of programmer who isn't the best at social cues and doesn't have the time to research the problem, and Rosie is the result.
As a programmer who is often given unrealistic deadlines and has made it a point to study human social interactions and cues, I should probably be offended by that, but I'm not. I can totally see how that would happen, seeing as how the typical programmer stereotype is reclusive and bad at human interactions.
However, most programmers enjoy what they do, and from a small poling of my programming friends they all do, and therefore wouldn't allow such a piece of crap programming to leave their workspace. We take pride in our work, and you would be hard pressed to find something like this in the wild <insert joke deriding your least-favorite software/OS here>.
Possible? Yes. Plausible? No.
I'm still going with Rosie being an alien or programmed by our alien overlords.

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Reply #37 on: November 28, 2012, 09:25:14 AM
Something that really stuck out to me, and still puzzles me, is this line:
"Section 0: A Brief Overview of Current Anthropological Theories states that the predominant view is that humans believe we are a new addition to the herd, and the best thing to do is to go along with this idea so as not to confuse them"
Makes me wonder what is going on here. This could support the robot overlord hypothesis.

I'd like to hear my options, so I could weigh them, what do you say?
Five pounds?  Six pounds? Seven pounds?


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Reply #38 on: November 28, 2012, 02:34:38 PM
you would be hard pressed to find something like this in the wild . . . Possible? Yes. Plausible? No.

I can see it under one circumstance: the programmer was "downsized" and left it unfinished, or saw the handwriting on the wall that they were about to be downsized, and did a slipshod job while spending most of their time looking for another job.

Not that it's ever happened to me, of course. Nope. Uh-uh. Never.

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Unblinking

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Reply #39 on: November 28, 2012, 02:51:34 PM
I'll present an argument for programmed by humans. The programmer is asked:
"How long will it take you to build a program that does all these complicated processes?"
"It'll take me three months."
"Well, the sales team promised a working demo in a month. I'm looking forward to seeing it!"

Throw in a bit of programmer who isn't the best at social cues and doesn't have the time to research the problem, and Rosie is the result.

What about the title?  Why would a human produced robot have the manual name "Mammalian Bipeds" when it's referring to humans?



Unblinking

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Reply #40 on: November 28, 2012, 02:54:57 PM
This I can agree with. My biggest complaint was that Rosie couldn't have been programmed by humans. So if you assume she wasn't, then the story works.

And I love that you brought in Star Control II. That's old school geek.

I'm a little too young to be in the usual group that played Star Control.  But there are some advantages to having a geek brother who is 9 years older.  he had most of the classic 80s SF movies on VHS around the house, and he gave me the Star Control I-III collection when I was a teen.  One of the best games I've ever played.  And to this day is the only game I've ever played which actually used the PC Speaker to make music that actually sounded good.  And those battle scenes are still so much fun.  Especially as the Pkunk.



Max e^{i pi}

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Reply #41 on: November 28, 2012, 02:55:11 PM
I'll present an argument for programmed by humans. The programmer is asked:
"How long will it take you to build a program that does all these complicated processes?"
"It'll take me three months."
"Well, the sales team promised a working demo in a month. I'm looking forward to seeing it!"

Throw in a bit of programmer who isn't the best at social cues and doesn't have the time to research the problem, and Rosie is the result.

What about the title?  Why would a human produced robot have the manual name "Mammalian Bipeds" when it's referring to humans?
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chemistryguy

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Reply #42 on: November 28, 2012, 04:46:21 PM
I'll present an argument for programmed by humans. The programmer is asked:
"How long will it take you to build a program that does all these complicated processes?"
"It'll take me three months."
"Well, the sales team promised a working demo in a month. I'm looking forward to seeing it!"

Throw in a bit of programmer who isn't the best at social cues and doesn't have the time to research the problem, and Rosie is the result.

What about the title?  Why would a human produced robot have the manual name "Mammalian Bipeds" when it's referring to humans?

Salespeople promising items that don't exist yet does not end with software.  I'm working on theoretical products right now.

As for the title, I could see a smart-ass programmer calling it that.   


Unblinking

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Reply #43 on: November 28, 2012, 05:07:46 PM
I'll present an argument for programmed by humans. The programmer is asked:
"How long will it take you to build a program that does all these complicated processes?"
"It'll take me three months."
"Well, the sales team promised a working demo in a month. I'm looking forward to seeing it!"

Throw in a bit of programmer who isn't the best at social cues and doesn't have the time to research the problem, and Rosie is the result.

What about the title?  Why would a human produced robot have the manual name "Mammalian Bipeds" when it's referring to humans?

Salespeople promising items that don't exist yet does not end with software.  I'm working on theoretical products right now.

As for the title, I could see a smart-ass programmer calling it that.   

I could see a smart-ass programmer calling it that, sure.  But the "v2.1" behind makes it sound like it's customer visible, in which case marketing/customer service would've slapped it down.  Unless there is no marketing or customer service and the whole system is a joke by a programmer, which could make sense too.



CryptoMe

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Reply #44 on: November 29, 2012, 05:47:52 AM
So, I really liked this view into a dysfunctional family through the lens of a differently dysfunctional being (robot or alien, it doesn't matter to me). For me, this story seemed to poke at our society's obsession with "reading people" and getting "social cues", when new research is showing that this just doesn't happen. There are so many different possible explanations for any given action or expression, that it's just a matter of guesswork to "get it right." People who are supposedly "good at it" are just particularly average, so that their guesses, based on their own experiences and outlook, are more likely to be right. Rosie, being decidedly very un-human, not surprisingly rarely gets it right. That aspect was particularly interesting to me.

I do have one quibble about the story. At the very beginning, Agatha says that getting Rosie was "embarrassing." This made me think that there was some social stigma associated with getting (or needing?) robot help. But this was never developed and I am left wondering what that was all about. Any insights from the forumites?



Max e^{i pi}

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Reply #45 on: November 29, 2012, 07:23:00 AM
I'll present an argument for programmed by humans. The programmer is asked:
"How long will it take you to build a program that does all these complicated processes?"
"It'll take me three months."
"Well, the sales team promised a working demo in a month. I'm looking forward to seeing it!"

Throw in a bit of programmer who isn't the best at social cues and doesn't have the time to research the problem, and Rosie is the result.

What about the title?  Why would a human produced robot have the manual name "Mammalian Bipeds" when it's referring to humans?

Salespeople promising items that don't exist yet does not end with software.  I'm working on theoretical products right now.

As for the title, I could see a smart-ass programmer calling it that.   

I could see a smart-ass programmer calling it that, sure.  But the "v2.1" behind makes it sound like it's customer visible, in which case marketing/customer service would've slapped it down.  Unless there is no marketing or customer service and the whole system is a joke by a programmer, which could make sense too.
Remember: this manual was not human-facing. Only the robot/alien needed to see it.

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Reply #46 on: November 29, 2012, 10:19:08 AM
I do have one quibble about the story. At the very beginning, Agatha says that getting Rosie was "embarrassing." This made me think that there was some social stigma associated with getting (or needing?) robot help. But this was never developed and I am left wondering what that was all about. Any insights from the forumites?

Working full time, raising a young and growing family, and not wanting to show others that you're struggling to cope and need help, sounds very true to me.



Unblinking

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Reply #47 on: November 29, 2012, 02:32:22 PM
Remember: this manual was not human-facing. Only the robot/alien needed to see it.

The version number implies otherwise, to me.  Version numbers are generally used as a communication value between customer and the developers.

And since a non-human programmer makes perfect sense with what others consider flaw in the story, that's what makes sense to me.



Devoted135

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Reply #48 on: November 29, 2012, 05:04:39 PM
Remember: this manual was not human-facing. Only the robot/alien needed to see it.

The version number implies otherwise, to me.  Version numbers are generally used as a communication value between customer and the developers.

And since a non-human programmer makes perfect sense with what others consider flaw in the story, that's what makes sense to me.

Actually, in my experience this does not have to be the case. Frex: For each assay that is regularly performed in my lab we have an SOP (standard of practice) to outline the materials needed, steps, etc. As these get updated they are re-saved as v1.2 or v2.1 or whatever it happens to be. These SOPs are exclusively for the users (analogous to Rosie) and not for any customers that may receive the products of our assays (analogous to the family).



Unblinking

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Reply #49 on: November 29, 2012, 05:10:54 PM
Remember: this manual was not human-facing. Only the robot/alien needed to see it.

The version number implies otherwise, to me.  Version numbers are generally used as a communication value between customer and the developers.

And since a non-human programmer makes perfect sense with what others consider flaw in the story, that's what makes sense to me.

Actually, in my experience this does not have to be the case. Frex: For each assay that is regularly performed in my lab we have an SOP (standard of practice) to outline the materials needed, steps, etc. As these get updated they are re-saved as v1.2 or v2.1 or whatever it happens to be. These SOPs are exclusively for the users (analogous to Rosie) and not for any customers that may receive the products of our assays (analogous to the family).

Interesting, different than how we've used them where I work.  A false assumption on my part, perhaps, but it still makes the story make sense.  :)