This weekend I spent a few moments playing with some of the new generative ai engines that have recently been in the news so much lately. It’s interesting, and of course there is a ton of power there, much of it yet to be unlocked. For someone like me who’s been a big fan of procedurally generated content, from nethack to some approaches I’ve taken in testing and “dummy” data creation, its neat to see new developments in these (related) spaces.

As Arthur C. Clarke wrote so long ago, any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. As we develop more and more complex systems, especially those that make other systems, this is more true than ever.

This felt a little like magic.

Magic comes in many forms though. Sometimes it terrifies, sometimes it delights, and often the only difference in those reactions are the feelings and state of the person observing.

I like to try my best to delight.

In not much more time than it took me to finish a cup of coffee I was able to prompt the system to create a children’s story based on an offhand comment that my alliteration loving spouse made on our drive home. Respectfully submitting here, my first attempt at an AI parlor trick, “Aardvarks in the Attic”.