Allison Parrish[my impression of the state of AI in pop culture, snarky, sorry]
RESEARCHER: I have made yet another somewhat interesting way to transform one spreadsheet into another spreadsheet
JOURNALISTS: we're all doomed by robots lol
[fin]
...which isn't to say that transforming one spreadsheet doesn't affect the world because obviously it does (that's the history of computation essentially, going back to punched cards). it's just the "we're all doomed by robots lol" narrative acts like a weird sink for actual critical thinking about what these procedures are doing
Ꮢ๐ϲoᴄo Ⅿoԁｅm Ᏼaｓіliｓk@aparrish
(This isn't a criticism because I think the era of spreadsheets being super important is over, but I find it interesting that spreadsheets used to be super important.)
It's not just that computation starts with spreadsheets. Instead, written language begins with spreadsheets, as does commerce. And, ideas like zero, negative numbers, hedging, insurance, & futures are basically the result of spreadsheet innovation rather than the other way around.
@aparrish
Spreadsheets and gambling, when combined, form a really outsized impact on the world compared to what one would expect. And, so much of modern society is basically defined by people using spreadsheets to gamble (i.e., "modern finance").
Spreadsheets and gambling, when combined, form a really outsized impact on the world compared to what one would expect. And, so much of modern society is basically defined by people using spreadsheets to gamble (i.e., "modern finance").
@enkiv2 these are all good points! I was sort of just using "spreadsheet" as shorthand for "sequence of numbers/matrix/tensor/whatever"
@aparrish
Yup! I'm just using your toot as an excuse to gush about spreadsheets; I hope you don't mind 😉
Yup! I'm just using your toot as an excuse to gush about spreadsheets; I hope you don't mind 😉
@aparrish
Unrelated to spreadsheets: do you know anything about the historical association between magic and gambling?
This is implicit in names like Faust, & there's definitely a set of folk-magic traditions around gambling charms, but I've seen a handful of *hints* about gambling being implicated in the western occult tradition outside of divination & I haven't been able to find anything substantial.
@enkiv2 quinn's "early mormonism and the magic world view" talks about early american scrying/treasure hunting in some detail, which I think is related! but largely no, this hasn't been a focus on my research, though a google scholar search is hell of evocative (incl. this paper http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/0361368277900319 not explicitly *about* gambling but written by someone *named* gambling which seems magically serendipitous to me)
@aparrish This is wonderful and I hope in no way a pseudonym!