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Article 3925 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: zeleny@boucher.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: Robotic Follies
Message-ID: <1992Feb21.192207.9035@husc3.harvard.edu>
Date: 22 Feb 92 00:22:04 GMT
Article-I.D.: husc3.1992Feb21.192207.9035
References: <1992Feb20.140749.9003@husc3.harvard.edu> <1992Feb21.131053.100@cs.ucf.edu>
Organization: Dept. of Math, Harvard Univ.
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In article <1992Feb21.131053.100@cs.ucf.edu> 
clarke@acme.ucf.edu (Thomas Clarke) writes:

>In article <1992Feb20.140749.9003@husc3.harvard.edu> 
>zeleny@zariski.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:

MZ:
>| The instructive story of Nasruddin, the great
>| Shah, and the aforementioned pet animal will be supplied on request. 

TC:
>Please, by all means.

There once was a Shah who developed a special fondness for his ass, and
expressed a desire that the animal be taught human speech.  Nasruddin came
forth, declaring that he could do the job in twenty-five years, for 25
thousand gold pieces.  The shah agreed, and Nasruddin led away the ass
loaded with a fortune in gold.  Upon hearing about the bargain, Nasruddin's
friends came to his house, expressing great concern.  "Surely, -- they
said, -- you will fail to teach the ass to speak, and spend the gold, and
then the Shah will order his royal executioner to cut off your head."
"Don't worry, -- replied Nasruddin, -- in twenty-five years the Shah will
die, or the ass will die, or I myself will die."

The parallel between the natural language parsers and other miraculous
goodies the first generation of artificial intelligentsia promised to the
rich and gullible well over twenty-five years ago, around the same time
Khruschev was promising the Soviet people Communism in their lifetime, is
left as an exercise for the reader.  (Hint: one point of difference is that
Minsky's ass is long dead, but he still keeps asking the NSF for more money.)

MZ:
>| having read "The
>| Society of Mind" in the smallest room in my house, I was quite happy to put
>| it behind me.  

TC:
>A little outhouse humor?

Honi soit qui mal y pense.

`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'`'
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: Connais pas! Connais pas!                                 think    :
:                                                             so     :
: Mikhail Zeleny                                                     :
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