Futurelawyer

World Parrot Day Is Tomorrow.

World Parrot Trust I have been a member of the World Parrot Trust for some years. So, I was pleasantly surprised today to learn that the organization is joining with Disney's Animal Kingdom to breed rare Amazon parrots at the Kingdom. Some of the rarest parrots in the world will be saved due to this good work. And, to top it off, tomorrow is World Parrot Day. Save the parrots. They are our last connection to the dinosaurs.

Chat GPT Can Browse The Web - Should Google Be Worried?

OpenAI Connects Chat GPT To The Internet. My $20 a month subscription to Chat GPT Plus just got scarily valuable. I was able to turn on the Beta web browsing feature today, and I am now able to ask questions that mine the current Internet for answers. My preference for the abilities of Chat GPT over Google's Bard has been limited by the fact that Chat GPT, up to now, could only access information prior to 2021. The new Beta feature opens the whole world of data, and I feel like I have a super intelligent friend helping with every search I make. Of course, the user must always be aware that the answers may be wrong, or fictional. But, with a critical eye, the breadth and scope and cogency of Chat GPT is beyond amazing, and it will forever be the first place I go for information from now on. I only have a few years to live; but I now feel like I can compress several decades of learning into those years. Now, let's find a Chatbot that knows how to extend human life. 

Nobody Wants To Write An Obituary.

Some things in life are harder than others. The Stoics believed that recognizing the inevitability of death every day would give impetus to living life to the fullest. Writing obituaries for loved ones is a distasteful but necessary task. When I wrote one for Jacquelyn a few years ago, I was struck by the contradictions in our attitudes towards life and death. We fear death and cling to life. Facing fear is the definition of courage. However, we engage in all sorts of deceptions to soften the blow, don't we?

Obituary.

I wrote your obituary today.

I told the truth

But not the whole truth.

I wrote the truth that we all tell each other

and others

and post on Facebook walls

and in Newspapers

I didn’t write the truth we keep in our hearts.

I didn’t write about the battles we fought together

and alone.

I didn’t write about the secrets we kept from others

and from ourselves.

I didn’t write about the truths we humans

don’t want others to know.

I wrote about your accomplishments

I wrote about the love others had for you

I wrote about the public face

we all show the world.

But, I didn’t write about your incandescent eyes

I didn’t write about your caring soul

I didn’t write about the wry tilt of your head

When I was being ridiculous.

I didn’t write about the words we spoke

in the night.

I didn’t write the truths we admitted to each other

in the early morning light.

I didn’t write about our sins, our faults, or our failings.

I didn’t write about the daily struggles we faced

in a world consumed by desire and evil.

I wanted to write about the heartache of a string of days without you.

I wanted to express the pain of loss

I wanted to tell the world that you were the best person I ever knew.

I only told them what they wanted to hear.

Happy Easter From The Georges Family.

First Home Baseball Weekend - You Score All The Games Also, Don't You?

IScoreSports My first summer job in the Sixties, was as an official scorer for Jacksonville area baseball. My stepdad, who was a very good professional ballplayer in his youth (career cut short by an injury), taught be the game, and he became a well regarded umpire. Through his connections, I got scoring jobs, and I learned the game by scoring on paper in big notebooks. Other than playing, the best way to learn baseball is to score it. I got into the habit of scoring when I went to AAA games in Jax, and later, I revisited it when the Rays came to town in 1998. Naturally, the FutureLawyer was interested when scoring came to computers, and I started using IScore years ago. The software is ridiculously inexpensive, and you can get up to the minute rosters for all of Major League Baseball for $19.99 a year. I have never figured out how to add it to more than one device, though, so I usually spend the $20 on more than one device. The company kindly attempted to refund the extra purchases; but, I stopped them after one. This software is worth a lot more than twenty bucks a year. With the press of a button, the lineup cards are brought in at gametime, and current stats are available for every player at all times. The software can be used for any other league or game as well, so, if you have kids in little league, or follow other games, you can use it to create stat sheets and score cards for all of them. Yesterday's blowout win over Detroit produced the attached scorecard for the Rays. Don't you love those 12 little blue squares, each of which represents a run driven in? I am using my old Samsung Tablet, the S5e, which is very thin and light, and not a problem to hold for the whole game. Thanks, iScore. Thanks, God, for another season watching baseball, and joined by my beautiful, loving wife, Diane. I can't wait until this afternoon's game, when I get to do it all over again. Play ball.

 

ChatGPT-4 - Smarter, Safer, Bigger, and Visual - What's Not To Like?

GPT-4 Unleashed. Open AI has introduced the next iteration of its ground breaking AI, and Kevin O'Keefe (My Internet Guru) cites this PC World article this morning, that discusses the changes and improvements over 3.5. The biggest one, for me, is the ability to create documents with 25,000 words. This thing can write papers and books. Amazing. It is 80% more accurate, and obvious errors are far less likely. Human editing and review will still be required; but, what a time saver. As a subscriber to ChatGPT Plus, I have access to 4, and I love it already. Kevin will be integrating it into his blog aggregator and publishing services. He has always been on the bleeding edge of tech; and generative AI is the new frontier. Since I am in the declining years of my life, I feel fortunate that I have lived to see the development of computer intelligence. The Turing model is obsolete. Computers can be trained to mimic human content creators; and we are not far away from computers that can initiate conversations on their own. My favorite science fiction librarian is here.

 

Lightest Mobility Scooter On The Market.

Super Handy Mobility Scooters. We have been getting a lot of questions about our recent purchase of mobility scooters. We are in our middle seventies, and arthritis, heart disease, and old age restrict our movements. I am fine up to 100 meters; but, have to stop and rest often. I didn't want a a heavy, huge mobility device, and am not ready for a wheelchair yet; so, I did a lot of research. These little scooters are under $700, and have small 48 volt batteries that look like the kind you use in power tools. In fact, the company is really a power tool company. The batteries last for 6 miles or 4-8 hours, depending on your weight. There is an extra battery under the seat, which will get you around for a full day. These scooters are perfect for theme park use, and they have changed our enjoyment level tremendously. So, check them out at the website. Great Circle Us is a California company, and they are the nicest people around. The seat pulls off, and the scooter folds in half. Total weight is only 30 pounds. We fit two of them in the trunk of our SUV; but they also fit in the trunk of our VW beetle when the rear seat is removed. Don't surrender to old age. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

 

An Extra Hour Of Florida Sunshine Forever?

Daylight Saving Time (DST) was first proposed by Benjamin Franklin in 1784. However, it was not widely adopted until the 20th century. The idea was further developed and implemented by George Vernon Hudson, a New Zealand entomologist, in 1895. He proposed a two-hour shift in time to allow more daylight for insect collecting.  In 1907, William Willett, a British builder, independently proposed DST as a way to save energy and increase leisure time. He published a pamphlet titled "The Waste of Daylight," and campaigned for the idea until his death in 1915. DST was first implemented during World War I as a way to save energy. Germany was the first country to adopt DST in 1916, and other countries soon followed. In the United States, DST was first used in 1918, but it was unpopular and repealed the following year. DST was reinstated during World War II and has been used in many countries since then, although its implementation and scheduling vary widely.

In the United States, the Senate, in a bill sponsored by my home state Senator, Marco Rubio, has passed the Sunshine Protection Act, which, if passed by the House and signed my the President, will make this the last change in time, and Daylight Savings Time permanent. So, keep an eye out this summer, as we might never have to push our clocks back and forth again. And, while Florida has always had plenty of sunshine, we will have an additional hour forever. You didn't lose an hour of sleep last night. You gained an hour of sunshine.

Speak In Your Own Voice.

Today, Cultural Offering offers a short, but profound, quote from Elon Musk. "Speak in your own voice", is simple; but, applies to every form of human endeavor. The best advice I ever received about blogging was to be 'authentic". Why are we always trying to act, or be, like someone else? I get the hero worship thing; but, trying to be something we are not will always be seen as phony. I suppose it is human to think we are unworthy; but, it is far better to be judged for what we really are, than on what we want to be. We can never control what others think, anyway, so why do we care? 

“Speak in your own voice.”

A simple profound suggestion from Elon Musk.

Never Live More Than 10 Minutes From The Ocean.

Seeing this photo of my mom, me and my brother and sister, reminded me that I have lived my whole life less than 10 minutes from either the Atlantic Ocean or the Gulf of Mexico. Life came from the ocean, and every human should spend time in it.