Express & Star

Peter Rhodes on a pig race that wasn't, a march for the forgetful and a question - why no hosepipe ban?

It's like the savannah out there.

Published
Whose values?

SAD to see so many sufferers attending the National Amnesia Day march in London at the weekend. There were about 100,000 of them, all calling for a "People's Vote," having entirely forgotten we had it two years ago. Poor devils.

"TWENTY-seven headless chickens all pulling in opposite directions." Description of the EU after Brexit from an online debate.

HACKS are at their most sharp-toothed and snidey when pouncing on one of their own who seems to be blowing his own trumpet a little too loudly. A local newspaper in Wiltshire ran a story about how one of its reporters missed the recent Japanese earthquake, having passed through Osaka station "some hours earlier." Cue a barrage of derision on the journalists' website, Hold The Front Page. One hack reported how he escaped death in the Hawaii lava eruption, thanks to being in England at the time. But I particularly enjoyed this: "What a lucky escape! It reminds me of the first time I drove over the Humber Bridge in June 1981. Had I attempted the same a year earlier I would have undoubtedly drowned as the bridge wasn’t complete then."

THERE is one tiny problem with artificial intelligence (AI), the super-computer-powered next generation of robots. It is that they, in their infinite artificial wisdom, might decide the biggest problem on the planet is humans and set about eliminating us. This is why some pessimists grimly describe AI as "mankind's last invention." One of the weekend glossies focused on the views of an AI expert who says the best strategy is to create super-intelligent machines "that share our values." Now, what values would those be? Two thousand years of civilisation has failed to produce any consensus on what is good or bad. It is a Western liberal delusion that all people share a common outlook. This planet is home to many people who believe the best way to make everything better is to kill other people. They hold those views perfectly sincerely. What's to stop them programming AI machines with their values?

WHEN a pub in Dorset advertised a race for pigs and lambs, an animal-rights group was straight on the case. It launched an online petition against such "exploitative" cruelty. It thundered that a beer festival was not a suitable environment for the animals. It raged: "There will also be a BBQ where the animals will be able to smell the cooking flesh of their fellow creatures." Er, not exactly. As a phone call to the The Swan Inn at Stalbridge would have confirmed, the pub was actually planning a race for humans dressed as pigs and lambs. According to an ancient saying, a lie can be half-way around the world before truth has got its boots on. The internet supercharges this process, especially if you add a dash of hysteria and remove all common sense.

I CANNOT be the only one genuinely surprised that, at the time of writing, there is not a nationwide hosepipe ban. It's like the savannah out there.