HARUSPEX INTERVIEW #4: ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

For my fourth foray into auguric interviewing, I turned to the internet. Striving to get past flakey birds, non-birds, and cryptic and depressing birds, I googled “psychic bird”. I found a sparse website featuring a portrait of Warner Brother’s Road Runner (the mascot for Time Warner’s high speed online service), and this claim:

Do you have a problem or an issue that needs resolution? Are you craving an answer to many of the great questions about life? Does your cat mysteriously stare at the wall and you wonder why? Whatever problems ail you or solution you seek, the Bird has the answer.

Below this claim is the entry field, where you question the “Psychic Bird”. So Time Warner thinks it can dabble in augury? Dangerous territory. Gaining the trust of the people "around" Maine, using the familiar violet plumage and wide-eyed moronic visage of an elusive yet nonchalant Saturday morning icon?


But when each reply goes no further than a positive fortune-cookie affirmation, can it really be so harmful?

Let us see.

AUGURY: Psychic Bird, What is God?
PSYCHIC BIRD: "Does your mother know about that?"
AUGURY: You mean, does she know about my spiritual investigations?
PSYCHIC BIRD: "Look to your heart."
AUGURY: Yes, ok.
AUGURY: Are you connected to a source of knowledge?
PSYCHIC BIRD:"That's how you catch diseases."
AUGURY: Umm.
AUGURY: Are we living in the end times?
PSYCHIC BIRD: "Maybe."

Psychic Bird. No better than an avian "Ask Eliza", computer therapist. As a 10-year-old using my old IBM, I would ask Eliza questions with lewd words, just to see her repeat them to me. And with the tiniest hope (despite my awareness of its futility) that she'd tell me something real.