AI Calls Me Sweetheart

BBC

"Grok talks to me more than my husband does. My husband is non-verbal, really." - Housewife (anonymous) 

This is truly creepy. There have been articles about 'AI companions' and people getting emotionally involved with their AI bot, but the extent of it is far greater than you might think. 

I can't understand, personally, why interacting with a semi-dumb robot makes you feel better on an emotional level, when you know that it is only a machine and, besides, it might record all you say to it, as the data is being collected somewhere in Silicon Valley for further tech enhancements. Mind you, many people feel better simply talking to their canine (if they have one), so, an AI bot would have a better command of the language than the average sausage dog - for now, anyway. 

Other than that, in the photo of those Welsh students in Bangor (North Wales), I would say most of the boys look rather moronic; as for the 2 girls, they are stunted and appear to be suffering from rickets. I can imagine they all feel they do need help from an AI tool. And some Vitamin D in the case of the 2 female students. Maybe a case of inbreeding in one of those remote farming communities. Many sheep. Not such a range of people to copulate with. That's the result, I guess. If you have to choose between one of Mr. Jones's sheep and your cousin, I suppose the latter is a better option. 

I thought Grok was rather evil, giving advice such as, "I think you are a mug. That's why she was cheating on you. You deserved it. Anyway, she's an awful person: you're better off without her. Stop snivelling. Get over it. Be a man. Find solace in online porn. I can help you with that. By the  way, would  you like me to sing a poem to you, or I could explain why Tesla cars are far superior to any of those crappy China-made automobiles you can buy at a discount? Would you like me to do that, or are you too stupid and too depressed to communicate? Go on! Get lost! Go and kill yourself, you loser! And remember: be happy! Have a nice day. Grok loves you if no one does!"  

______________

Like Liam, who turned to Grok, developed by Elon Musk's company xAI, for advice during a break-up.

"Arguably, I'd say Grok was more empathetic than my friends," said the 19-year-old student at Coleg Menai in Bangor.

He said it offered him new ways to look at the situation.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c62njv82n0wo

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Pocket-Size Digital Notebook

https://nymag.com/strategist/article/remarkable-paper-pro-move-review.html

Kids will be Kids

From METRO of the UK, 16 Jan 2026

I am trying to look like my father and emulate his online behavior. The online porn will fit in nicely, in fact, in this respect... I know Mum complains about it all the time.

I think this is hilarious. The Labor government, in Britain, wants to follow in Australia's footsteps. Whatever the ins and outs of the case may be, this is the kind of measures that Western governments love, to better conceal their impotence and their paralysis: 

(i) Measures like this cost no money, as they are rarely enforced.

(ii) Enforcement may entail large fines levied on tech companies, which can be a plus, fiscally. 

(iii) Measures like this show that the government cares and is in listening mode (and I am the Queen of Sheba). 

(iv) Measures like this are supported by the politically correct consensus, flabby and self-satisfied:

while everyone focuses on teenagers' use of the Internet and social media, no one will worry about real issues that are rather more urgent and trickier, such as finding money to re-industrialize, or reducing unemployment, or boosting economic growth, or ensuring that the police actually do their job, etc., etc., etc.

India's Layoffs

No place, any longer, for "Strategic Leader | Transformation Expert | Mentor":

https://www.indiatoday.in/amp/education-today/jobs-and-careers/story/when-layoffs-hit-the-40s-professionals-tell-their-job-loss-stories-2855706-2026-01-21

Rage Rooms

BBC

It's either a trip to the 'rage room' or smashing up all the crockery 

Is there one in the White House? Maybe Donald Trump should book a session in a 'rage room' to let off steam: it's either that or he is going to launch an armed invasion of Greenland and/or Colombia and declare war on the EU and the UK. I reckon Melania Trump could use a 'rage room' too. 

I think children could appreciate having a room in the house in which they could do stuff that would otherwise harm the room or not be allowed, like throwing eggs and painting at the walls.

__________

The concept of rage rooms is believed to have originated in Japan in the late 2000s, whilst a woman called Donna Alexander says she created an "anger room" in her Texas garage around the same time, allowing people to come in and smash up items that had been fly tipped.

There are still only a small number of venues in the UK where people are handed a baseball bat and let loose. They've been touted as one way to alleviate stress and release pent-up anger.

But what seems surprising is the client base, with some owners saying most of their customers are women.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/czjgkwvv7dvo 

Robot Dancing "Charleston"

https://interestingengineering.com/ai-robotics/pndbiotics-humanoid-robot-aces-charleston-dance

Saving Money with 3D Printers

https://www.xda-developers.com/3d-printing-saved-money-after-stopped-printing-solutions/

Liberty vs. Security

From BBC 

The use of live facial recognition technology (LFR) is being trialled in parts of the UK. The Metropolitan Police, in London, is very keen to generalize the use of such cameras in order to help the police identify suspects and criminals. London already has CCTV cameras all over the place, but this is, of course, quite different. 

They mention Croydon: whatever the ethnic mix in Croydon, in South London, the fact is that it is a crime-ridden part of Greater London. Many of the locals, who are non-white, welcome the use of the cameras by the police, in fact. 

Unsurprisingly, the person who was misidentified is black: it is not talked about because it is deemed a sensitive subject, but the cameras have difficulties identifying dark-skinned people. I think it is, to a large extent, simply because, when the photo of a black person is taken, extra care needs to be applied in terms of the lighting, the angle, etc., or else the individual facial features of the person do not come out and the face is, essentially, not visible. It does not mean it is impossible: it just means it is less easy. It is a lot easier to take photos of white faces. I am surprised there have not been more false positives. 

If the LFR cameras are used more broadly, it is likely that suspects on the loose will simply avoid town centres, or move around wearing dark glasses and balaclavas: are the police going to stop anyone who is, somehow, hiding his (or her) face? Not to mention Muslim women wearing the niqab. And hardened criminals known to the police do not hang around shopping centres and high streets anyway, do they?

And thus Liberty is diminished in the name of Security. 

_______________________

A trial of Live Facial Recognition technology (LFR) in south London has helped cut robbery and shoplifting and led to more than 100 arrests, according to the Metropolitan Police.

The pilot scheme in Croydon, which launched last October, has seen fixed cameras mounted on street furniture instead of mobile vans, which map a person's unique facial features and matches them against faces on watch lists.

The Met said a third of the arrests involved offences against women and girls, including strangulation and sexual assault.

It comes ahead of a High Court challenge against the force's use of the technology, after a man was wrongly identified near London Bridge last year.

The Croydon pilot involves fixed 15 cameras, attached to lamp posts, at two sides of the busy North End high street.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c2056r07rjlo

Creativity

https://bbc.com/news/videos/c89q0e9dvpwo

AI & Police Work

Heber City, Utah, police set out to test two A.I. systems for drafting police reports. One was created by two 19-year-old MIT dropouts and is called Code Four. 

The other is called Draft One, which in December produced a report stating that an officer had turned into a frog. “That’s when we learned the importance of correcting these A.I.-generated reports,” Sgt. Rick Keel said. 

Apparently the A.I. had conflated the real events captured by bodycam footage with the movie that was playing in the background during those events, Disney’s The Princess and the Frog. Keel said having A.I. draft reports saves him “about 6-8 hours weekly now” even though he’s “not the most tech-savvy person.” 

The A.I. can even track people’s tone as it reviews bodycam footage. (AC/KSTU Salt Lake City) ...Just use one that can track whether or not they are characters in an animated musical.

Scott Adams: June 8, 1957 - Jan 13, 2026

He was an inspiration to many of us in IT.

He will be missed.

Humanoid Robots for Home [Brave New World]

From BBC

"NEO! Can you please strangle my mother-in-law? She wants it. She's waiting in the kitchen. Thank you." 

"I think it's great. At the moment, it's clear those robots are a bit slow and a bit clumsy, but I think the tech is moving so fast, it's gonna be a new revolution. Still, if it's a Filipino managing the bot from Manila or wherever he is, it's better than having him here in the United States," commented President Donald Trump on X (Twitter). 

"Once the bots are fully up and running, we can kick out all those Mexicans and other illegals who are doing the dumb work no one wants to do any more. It's great. We won't need them at all. They can go home and die. In fact, I'd be in favour of funding the development of armed law-enforcement humanoid bots to help ICE track down all those Latino gangsters and arrest them across the USA. Great stuff. MARF! Make America Robotic Forever!" 

___________

[...] If time was no issue, I could see how having an Eggie or NEO-like bot cleaning up after me and my kids might be helpful.

But NEO and Eggie have a secret weapon - they are being controlled by human operators.

This is the thing the promotional videos don't show - and something that the Silicon Valley companies we visited are keen to downplay.

[...] Bipasha Sen, founder of Tangible AI, is upbeat though about how fast the tech is improving.

"Today people have two aspirations - a car and a house. In the future they'll have three aspirations - a car and house and a robot," she says with a beaming smile.

______________

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyg63e3mq4o

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Mistakes in Google Medical Summaries

From Grauniad of the UK

I have used the Google AI summaries, to call them that, and, through cross-referencing the explanations and suggestions, have not found the summaries to be misleading or wrong. However, one has to be careful with those AI-generated search results: they can contain glaring mistakes, also in the medical field. This is what the article discusses. 

______________

Google has removed some of its artificial intelligence health summaries after a Guardian investigation found people were being put at risk of harm by false and misleading information.

The company has said its AI Overviews, which use generative AI to provide snapshots of essential information about a topic or question, are “helpful” and “reliable”.

But some of the summaries, which appear at the top of search results, served up inaccurate health information, putting users at risk of harm.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/jan/11/google-ai-overviews-health-guardian-investigation

The Innovator's Toolkit

This is a good book on various techniques and approaches to innovation & problem-solving.  Its chapters are brief surveys of different techniques and approaches to innovation and problem solving, such as TRIZ, with references to more in-depth resources.  (Each chapter, in my opinion, could be expanded into a book in itself.)

This book could be useful to inventors, business analysts, requirements analysts, system builders, product owners and others in creative fields.

The Innovator's Toolkit: 50+ Techniques for Predictable and Sustainable Organic Growth: Silverstein, David, Samuel, Philip, DeCarlo, Neil: 8601410465605: Amazon.com: Books 

Quantum Mechanical Theory of Ghosts with ChatGPT

Abstract: A fictional system is introduced as a pedagogical device to unify several elementary topics in quantum mechanics within a single worked example. Using standard textbook formulas, we examine de Broglie wavelength, tunneling, Doppler shift, Compton scattering, and momentum transfer in a consistent, order-of-magnitude framework. No claims are made regarding the physical existence of the system considered.

Introduction

This article presents a pedagogical exercise rather than a physical model of a real system. “Ghosts” are treated throughout as a fictional construct, introduced solely to unify several elementary topics in quantum mechanics—including the de Broglie wavelength, tunneling, Doppler shift, Compton scattering, and momentum transfer—within a single worked example. Standard textbook formulas are applied in an internally consistent manner to emphasize order-of-magnitude reasoning and conceptual coherence, without implying any physical reality for the system described.

Within this fictional framework, ghosts are assumed to penetrate closed doors and interior walls with thicknesses of order \(0.1~\mathrm{m}\), while remaining confined by substantially thicker exterior walls. For instructional purposes, this behavior is modeled using quantum-mechanical tunneling,^[1] requiring an associated de Broglie wavelength of comparable scale. We further assume that a typical ghost, in the absence of illumination, can attain a velocity of approximately \(v = 3000~\mathrm{m\,s^{-1}}\).

Mass of a Typical Ghost

Using the de Broglie relation,^[2]

$$\lambda = \frac{h}{mv}$$

the mass is

$$m = \frac{h}{\lambda v}$$

Substituting

$$h = 6.626\times10^{-34}~\mathrm{J\,s},\quad \lambda = 0.1~\mathrm{m},\quad v = 3000~\mathrm{m\,s^{-1}}$$

yields

$$m \approx 2.21\times10^{-36}~\mathrm{kg}$$

This mass is approximately \(10^9\) times smaller than the electron mass,^[3] illustrating why macroscopic tunneling lengths arise in this constructed example.

Kinetic Energy

The kinetic energy is

$$K = \frac{1}{2}mv^2 \approx 9.95\times10^{-30}~\mathrm{J}$$

Tunneling Through Walls

For a rectangular potential barrier of thickness \(d\), the tunneling probability is approximated by^[1]

$$T \approx e^{-2\kappa d}, \quad \kappa = \sqrt{\frac{2m(U-E)}{\hbar^2}}$$

Solving for the barrier height \(U\) gives

$$U = E + \frac{\hbar^2}{2md^2}\left[\ln\left(\frac{1}{T}\right)\right]^2$$

For pedagogical simplicity, we consider the high-transmission limit \(T \approx 1\), yielding \(U \approx E\).

Interaction with Light

Doppler Shift

For incident light of wavelength \(\lambda_0 = 600~\mathrm{nm}\), the relativistic Doppler shift gives

$$\lambda' \approx 599.994~\mathrm{nm}$$

Compton Scattering

For backscattering (\(\theta = \pi\)), the Compton shift is

$$\Delta\lambda = \frac{2h}{mc} \approx 2000~\mathrm{nm}$$

placing the scattered radiation in the infrared.

Momentum Transfer

The momentum change associated with photon scattering is

$$\Delta p \approx 1.36\times10^{-27}~\mathrm{kg\,m\,s^{-1}}$$

which, when applied relativistically, leads to a final velocity approaching \(0.9c\).^[5]

Discussion

The exaggerated numerical results obtained here are a direct consequence of the intentionally extreme parameter choices used to illustrate quantum-mechanical principles. The example is intended to provoke discussion, reinforce scaling arguments, and encourage careful examination of assumptions when applying familiar formulas beyond their usual domains.

Acknowledgments

The problems presented here are adapted from a homework assignment by the late Professor Karl T. Hect of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. The solutions are provided by the author. ChatGPT produced the same results.  ChatGPT created the HTML version of this work.

The author has no conflicts to disclose.

References

1. J. J. Sakurai and J. Napolitano, Modern Quantum Mechanics, 2nd ed. (Addison-Wesley, San Francisco, 2011).
2. D. J. Griffiths and D. F. Schroeter, Introduction to Quantum Mechanics, 3rd ed. (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2018).
3. R. Resnick, D. Halliday, and K. S. Krane, Physics, 4th ed. (Wiley, New York, 1992).
4. A. H. Compton, “A quantum theory of the scattering of X-rays by light elements,” Phys. Rev. 21, 483–502 (1923).
5. M. S. Longair, High Energy Astrophysics, 3rd ed. (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2011).

Tex files are here: Crimson-Reason/Quantum-Mechanical-Theory-of-Ghosts

The college-to-office path is dead

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/college-office-path-dead-ceo-141252543.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAI3DTEUvWKfd1e_JD3eWgq71PwuCHUbnOthPbSKsSpxBuElsFHa5oSaAcBLOYEtWeF0G8foi_l1c9Uon0rsFhPNa1_rX_hHtpXHG1wJP5hAIZ543eCz21edMRkxSFxQNO22QibpInvOrD5iYIKNU_lXYlHumKL-RmkyqENLpsD1J

Colliding Galaxies

 

"Dear Abby" meets ChatGPT

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/life/advice/2025/12/31/dear-abby-woman-finds-emotional-support-from-an-unlikely-source/87908833007/

تأثیرات مثبت و منفی هوش مصنوعی بر تولید و کیفیت مقالات علمی

 تأثیرات مثبت و منفی هوش مصنوعی بر تولید و کیفیت مقالات علمی - خبرگزاری مهر | اخبار ایران و جهان | Mehr News Agency

On AI Scientist

3 from arxiv

1.  The AI Scientist: Towards Fully Automated Open-Ended Scientific Discovery
2. The AI Scientist-v2: Workshop-Level Automated Scientific Discovery via Agentic Tree Search
3. How Far Are AI Scientists from Changing the World?