Being able to drive a car to get to work, earn a living or go on holiday comes with rewards and risks. Dashing across a busy street without understanding what might hit us, could be deadly. So, we keep ourselves safe by learning and following a Highway Code. We stop, look, listen and make careful judgements about when to cross. Navigating a busy road requires us to be alert and patient, whether we are a driver or a pedestrian.
Now, we also have “traffic” in the form of Large Language Models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT and Chatbots. AI functions are becoming part of our lives, regardless of whether we choose to embrace them or avoid them. Slow AI: Knowing When to Use AI and When to Leave It Alone by Sam Illingworth PhD is like a highway code of valuable points to help us navigate through AI’s pros and cons.
If you disapprove of this new technology, you will certainly find facts, stats and incidents confirming your suspicions. But there’s more. And it’s worth reading, because we are all affected by this new landscape of highway-sized hazards and havens, as it charges and changes (both “it” and “us”) almost minute by minute.
Slow AI has 7 chapters:
AI is not your friend
Good AI is excellent
AI can save you time, and it can cost you time
AI is designed to hold you
AI detection does not work
The ecological cost of AI
The humanities are the moat.
It encourages us to be alert and GO SLOW. Each chapter ends with a poetic pause for thought: a sanctuary, encouraging us to “read between the lines”. That’s something that AI can’t do! It’s a quick easy read, packed with enlightening, sensible and surprising AI-related information. Primarily aimed at higher education students and faculties, it is still relevant for all and minimally priced for broad use. I particularly appreciated its wisdom as a writer and author.
Sam Illingworth explains his book is only available as an eBook because it will need to be progressively updated. I’ve been following his posts on LinkedIn and found a recent blog about an author having his trade publisher contract withdrawn due to their suspicions that his story was created by AI.
“To AI or not to AI” is no longer the question writers need to ask. Instead, it is “To PROVE or not to PROVE that AI was used … and how it was used”. Barrelling down this latest Tech Highway, it appears that we are all labelled guilty unless we can prove otherwise … at least until AI Detectors such as Turnitin are overturned and a better way of establishing how to tell the difference between human-created and AI-created prose is realised (if that’s even possible).
So, to all my writing friends, using AI tools or not, from now-on, please remember:
Treasure that first rough draft (preferably hand-written).
Keep the messy second and further versions with time-stamps.
Log any AI use along the way, showing that you are boss of your team!
Don’t give up your ideas to a Cloud without being prepared to fight.
Even if you aren’t going to be a famous author for another ten years, it is still in your best interests to cherish all your own words through to “happily ever after”.
Thank you to the poets who have kindly shared their talents for this #ScienceWeek celebration! This year’s theme, SEEDS TO SCENERY, has germinated lullabies for trees and forests; lyrics for weeds and optimism for endangered plant species. It includes gardening fauna, fabulous fragrances and essential DNA and H2O.
In Grantville Grass Tree Forest en masse bloomed hundreds of grass trees–– maybe a once-in-a-lifetime sight.
In the spring following summer bushfires the host of creamy flower spikes attracted bees, in Grantville Grass Tree Forest.
Some blackened trunks sprouted multiple spikes thick as a woman’s knees–– maybe a once-in-a-lifetime sight.
To burned remnant native bush native orchids, wildlife returned to please–– in Grantville Grass Tree Forest.
Hundreds of grass trees stand like skirted hunters, spears to tease–– maybe a once-in-a-lifetime sight.
Sand miners now expand their pit and dig up, bag grass trees, despite all pleas, in Grantville Grass Tree Forest. Indeed a once-in-a-lifetime sight?
After intense bushfires in Grantville, Victoria in early 2019, many hundreds of grass trees bloomed the following spring in the Grantville Grass Tree Forest at the Grantville Nature Conservation Reserve and sand mine on Crown Land next to it. A natural botanical phenomenon and maybe the best Grass Tree display ever seen in Australia. Much of the the ancient forest has now been dug up, bagged and translocated to allow expansion of the sand mine. Locals are fighting to ensure the rest of the forest is preserved in perpetuity.
Acacia equisetifolia is critically endangered – Northern Territory
I am a lonely little wattle shrub my family name is Fabaceae (fab-AY-see-ee) by various strange and wonderful ways, I’m related to the pea.
Peas are plentiful but my fellow family members dwindle by the day. Acacia equisetifolia is critically endangered so the scientists say.
I’d really love to have a chat calling out across the sandy ground, “Is anybody there?” then hoping for an answer to float on through the humid air.
If anyone in the big wide world would like to visit me this is where I’ll be: Graveside Gorge Kakadu National Park in the Northern Territory.
I’ll put my yellow pom-pom blooms on show, they’re a little like dandelion clocks you know.
You’ll find me in a woodland glade of woollybutt and bloodwood trees; they’re shady, kind and friendly but far too big to be my family.
My seed pods need a fire to burst them into life, a little one will do. It rained a lot last night and I am so surprised to see, where last season I popped a pod or two a teeny tiny green shoot – a sprouting Mini-me.
When introduced plants come to our land they invade, take hold and expand
Our desert sands are chock-a-block with bright red, English Rosy Dock
Other plants, same old story like the purple Morning Glory
Tumbleweed, oh tumbleweed You roll so far and spread with speed
Lantana: though pretty you are invade weed-like so wide and far
English Ivy, sturdy and green grows like Jack’s fabled bean
Blackberry, you taste divine but oh, you’re hard to confine!
Gamba Grass and Prickly Pear change ecosystems everywhere
So, let’s clean up! Give native plants a really good fighting chance!
When Australia was colonised, many plants were brought from England and beyond to remind the new settlers of home. These plants frequently spread far and wide, irrevocably altering Australian ecosystems. These introduced plants had no natural predators or competition, so they regularly outcompeted (and sometimes pushed to and even beyond the brink of extinction) our own native vegetation. Many scientists and environmental groups are still fighting tirelessly to eradicate these plants from our wilderness areas.
I’m a very small seed and hidden in me is the plan that I need to grow a great tree.
I don’t need to see the whole of me, just read DNA like a book about me!
Page one says, “please start”. That gives me my height. Page two: “grow this fast” for slope – that’s my rate. Page three: “start to bend”, my curves will begin. You see, all instructions are hidden within.
Height, slope and bend are just the beginning of functions, instructions that keep our tree growing.
In Maths, this is called a Taylor Expansion – growing the shapes for seed-to-tree action.
Call me a choko or a chayote, Or a vegetable pear. I’m nicely green and spiky, You can grow me anywhere. On backyard fences or on sheds, My vines just love to climb. Plant me when I sprout, I’ll grow for you in no time. Cut me in half, remove my seed, And boil or steam or roast me. Serve me up for dinner, With melted butter mostly.
Every Tree in the Parkby Jeanette Swan
I love to stare through leaves under old wide trees, beneath canopies of glittery sunshine rustled by breaths of some invisible breeze: each tree is a parasol – a living design.
I love seed-codes, sudden sprouts, giants’ ages; bud-burst, summer stretch, autumn, winter stages.
When bowed in purple storms, when wild branches thrash, lightning strikes – cracks… trees, still magnificent – crash!
In the Shade of Treesby Jeanette Swan
Softly, one grey spider weaves underneath the heart-shaped leaves.
Upside-down, cicadas cling. All the day they loudly sing.
I stand still beneath them all. They are little. I am small.
Shimmer by Stefan Nicholson
Touched by the breath of a silent breeze, the shimmering Derwent comes alive, dancing to flashes, a field of golden light, like ripples of honey from a busy hive, lighting the distance to frame a wondrous sight, where, wild birds take rest – and float and dive.
Then, as the blustering North-Wester arrives, with heavy clouds, the shimmer is transformed, into a grey and solemn phase, mist and drizzle, soften the wildlife sounds. It surely will last for several days, with howling wind ensuring no wild birds are found, even amid the swaying trees. They left early. No more for us to gaze.
For Autumn is upon us . . . only stragglers remain. And in haste they now prepare, for cold grey days ahead, or rest quietly, for ever, in an icy, wintery bed.
Large and colourful, with a casque on their heads; Glossy black feathers with three toes to tread, Cassowaries are known as the rainforest gardeners. They swallow fruit whole then become seed dispersers.
A favourite food is the Davidson Plum; Those seeds germinate when excreted in dung! This marvellous system of nature’s creation Ensures northern rainforest’s regeneration.
The Plane Treeby Toni Newell
The Plane Tree isn’t plain It’s beautiful to see A canopy that reaches far A woody perennial tree. Their seeds are housed inside Hairy round seed pods That dangle from its branches Raspatory system it’s at odds. Bare branches spread in winter For it is deciduous Can grow to fifty meters tall In tree world it’s prestigious. The plane tree wasn’t born here Some came from London town They’re now in many cities And for me they wear the crown.
Artwork by Andrea Lew
H2O by Andrea Lew
Did you know that H2O is the chemical symbol for water?
Hydrogen, Hydrogen Oxygen. Drink several glasses every day to keep the doctor away.
Did you know that H2O is good for health and hydration?
It regulates body temperature and is part of respiration.
Did you know that H2O exists as liquid, solid and gas?
On Earth we have all three Elsewhere it’s mostly found as ice.
Vital for health and hydration, this refreshing liquid drink, for humans, plants and animals deserves our celebration!
campfire scones the fragrance of lemon myrtle sparks a memory
Sturdy Mulga Treesby Celia Berrell
Stretching up towards the skies or weeping boughs drawn by their sides, iconic mulga, drab and droll, still represent Australia’s soul.
In sunburnt soils on arid lands, with long strong roots, the mulga stands. High heat; cold nights are mulga’s fate. In drought these trees can hibernate.
Their rugged bark with groovy tracks can channel drips down trunks of black. Instead of leaves, they’ve phyllodes. Flattened stems that clatter breeze.
Mulga blossoms, tassled gold, are quick to let sweet-scents unfold. Flowering not for Spring, but rain. Should water kiss their harsh terrain.
When it comes to relationships with poetry, at school, I had a preference for the sassy bravado of Tam O’Shanter, courtesy of Robert Burns, rather than English words worth of wooing and woe-ing. Later, I discovered the deceptively simple enchantments of Poet Laureat Norman MacCaig, yet another Scottish poet.
Having one of my own poems held within The Scottish Poetry Library (alongside these masters), is an uncanny honour, and celebration is appropriately timed for World Poetry Day!
Norazha’s “We Only See the Dead” makes my head spin, every time I read it. The complexities of time and space are given to us full blast (a bit like a rollicking adventure with Tam O’Shanter). Courtney’s “Northern Lights” is contrastingly peaceful and a little bewitching (which is more of a Norman MacCaig craft). I simply planted some “Sturdy Mulga Trees” in The Scottish Library. I wonder if anyone will notice them or appreciate their amazing Australian significance?
We Only See the DeadbyNorazha Paiman
Andromeda’s light takes 2.537 million years to reach us, which means the photons hitting your retina tonight left when Australopithecus was learning to walk upright. You’re not seeing Andromeda. You’re seeing its ghost from the Pliocene, and it’s probably already collided with us by now, in real-time, in the present we’ll never know.
Betelgeuse sits 548 light-years away in Orion’s shoulder, already exploded maybe, already supernova, the shockwave expanding while we’re still looking at a star from 1476—before Columbus, before the printing press—when the light from its death finally arrives we’ll call it “breaking news” like we witnessed it.
Even Proxima Centauri is 4.24 light-years off. Obama’s first term is just arriving there now, and if they’re looking back they’re seeing us in 2016, still innocent, still thinking certain things won’t happen, and neither of us can warn the other because causality moves at the speed limit and we’re all shouting into the past.
We won’t see it. We won’t witness it. Everything you see is obituary, every star a time capsule you can’t open until it’s irrelevant, and the farther you look the deeper into graveyard you go.
Look up: that’s not the sky. That’s a time-lapse of extinction we call beautiful because we don’t know what we’re really seeing.
We only see the dead. We see only the dead. The dead, only the dead.
Northern LightsbyCourtney Williams
An Icelandic car park, 1 AM. Shaking screens capture particles as they sweep across the sky. Spellbound by solar ghosts. All too soon it ends, leaving us cold, weary, but starry eyed.
These Sturdy Mulga Trees will feature as part of this year’s Science Rhymes / National Science Week call for poems on the theme SEEDS TO SCENERY.
Wishing you an enchanting WORLD POETRY DAY on 21st March!
