What's that? I've been doing more silly AI stuff? Well, yes, but also some stuff that's actually taking advantage of the tech's capabilities with an excellent use case.
It might be pretty obvious to even the casual observer that I've got some neurodivergence going on. Certainly ADHD - untreated, undiagnosed, but a long history of being "hyperactive", and when I've filled out Vanderbilt assessments for my kids, they felt autobiographical (and boy did they get screwed by their genetic heritage on both sides). Also maybe some other spectrum-y things going on with my various obsessions and general inclinations toward hyperfixation, not to mention sensory issues and suboptimal ability to understand people (the kids gently suggest I get an official diagnosis).
Between all that, plus PTSD, getting older, likely long COVID impact, and being fairly overwhelmed as a single parent (now starting Year Seven!), I've had some challenges with decision fatigue and executive dysfunction.
Class tomorrow? No problem, I've taught that material a million times, or I have such long experience I could make shit up on the fly if it came to it. But other necessary things like getting new glasses (took me over four years, and only happened because Sadie needed some) fall by the wayside because it's difficult for me to work out when I can actually do something, then to get on the phone (something I have always hated) and set it up.
Enter Amazon Quick. I now have a single source of truth for the eleventy million daily messages I get in Slack and Outlook (my backlog is longer than a list of Trump lies), a tool that prioritizes various tasks for me automatically and looks around corners ("you'll need to validate that lab for Thursday, don't worry about the AI ethics/responsible use session on Friday"), and an assistant that can tell me if I will be able to run an errand or schedule an appointment uptown in between calls ("yes, your best window is after 3:00 PM when your Cloud Practitioner class is over"), amongst other things.
It has already been a game changer for me, preserving just a little bit of my fraying sanity. And being me, I was compelled to explore its limitations and power, particularly for in-class demo purposes, so I decided to see whether it could integrate with non-standard things like Brother William. Yup:
So a couple things about that screenshot. First, Brother William lives on a simple web server (an EC2 instance to be specific), and fittingly has an extremely austere user interface. One splash of fancy is the app also generates an accompanying image that's germane to my input, and in the style of marginalia found in illuminated manuscripts. But it's the barest of bones, which is suitable for the task of demonstrating and discussing many different aspects of technology generally, our particular services, AI/ML, security and ethics, etc.
Now I have set up Quick to send queries (on my behalf or even as itself) to the Brother William process, and display the results in the Quick app directly. Not only that, I have it massage the output, ignoring some components and even formatting things in a much nicer, still style-appropriate, fashion. Another demo has been consecrated.
He’s Amazon’s mascot and cultural ambassador, Peccy.
Wait—Amazon has a mascot? I expect that this comes as news to you. Or at least it did to me. When I interviewed Amazon HR chief Beth Galetti for a profile in our new issue, we mostly talked about topics such as her unlikely career path from electrical engineer to HR pro, the challenges of hiring thousands of people a week, and her quest to use technology to better the Amazon employee experience. But as we wound up our chat, she gave me a laminated copy of the company’s leadership principles. Our conversation ended thusly, as I pointed at the character grinning from the document’s upper left-hand corner:
Me: Does this critter have a name, by the way?
Galetti: Peccy! Oh, I love Peccy. He’s called Peccy because he represents our peculiar ways. We call ourselves at Amazon very peculiar.
The different spelling is a peculiar mystery, although when I queried Quick about the discrepancy, it first took responsibility ("totally a typo on my part!"), then when I pushed back, it hallucinated that I had chosen the spelling in honor of my late dog (too soon, man). So remember the primary lesson of AI: don't fucking trust it.
Anyway, the accompanying picture is of my vintage paperback copy of Eco's Reflections on The Name of the Rose, and the Peccy/i plushy/ie I scored at our team all-hands last month. I like the mascot and what it represents in particular because, well...I am rather peculiar myself. Not just due to all that stuff I mentioned way at the beginning, but because I am a Quaker:
Quakers are “peculiar,” both within the Christian tradition and beyond it, in that we do not base our religion on a system of outward requirements (either of belief or behavior) or rewards (either in this world or the next). Quakerism invites much freedom for personal spiritual inquiry and guidance. This suggests a basic optimism about the goodness of life and belief in God’s availability to teach, to comfort, and to minister to each person directly. Central to this experience is a willingness to be transformed, not just once but over and over. That means a willingness to test ideas and processes. It also means living as pilgrims, always seeking new openings.
As pilgrims ourselves, our meetings are open to others who seek. We do not profess what we have not experienced, nor do we ask anyone else to profess what he or she has not experienced. But we need to name experiences of the Divine in others and in ourselves. We affirm that ours is a community that provides an opportunity to seek, and indeed rejoices when people affirm, “This I know from my own experience!”
As with everything else in my life, this peculiarity influences a great deal of how I show up in my classes. I work with and build AI tools so I can talk about them with earned authority beyond what I might learn from reading research papers and course material. I've always preferred to speak from my own experience, rather than just describing what others have done, and when I get on my soapbox, leaning heavily into responsible use and whatnot, I view it as Witness.
In conclusion: have I mentioned I also love trains?
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