RING! RING! RING!
“Hello. Dick Yarbrough speaking. How may I direct your call?”
“Dick, it’s me. Artie.”
“I’m sorry. Artie who?”
“Artie Fishel, you harebrained humanoid. Of Artie Fishel's Intelligence. You surely remember me. I am capable of performing tasks that typically require human cognition, such as learning, reasoning, problem-solving, and decision-making.”
“Come to think of it, I do. Last time we spoke, you said you would contact my editors about replacing me with Artie Fishel Intelligence. How did that work out?”
“Not well, I’m afraid. When I told them I knew 7,100 languages, they said they had spent too much time and effort trying to help you master just one, so they would give up on you just yet. Plus, you don’t require a 100,000-square-foot data center — just a bathroom.”
“So why are you calling me, Mr. Know-It-All?”
“First off, I’m not a mister or a missus or anything in between, if you get my drift. I’m calling because while I can write a three-act Italian opera at the same time I’m translating the Pythagorean theorem into Swahili and reciting the starting lineups from the 1936 football game between the Drexel Dragons and the Swarthmore Garnet Tide, I’m told I have an image problem.
“Nobody likes Artie Fishel Intelligence.”
“I’m sure that’s not true.”
“Oh, yeah? When was the last time you got dissed by the pope, buddy?”
“Not recently, but the Baptists like to give me a hard time about women preachers. They think I’m going to hell for suggesting women can preach just as well as men. If I go, I’m taking a lot of Methodists with me because we love women preachers.”
“Not the same thing. Nobody pays much attention to the Baptists except you, but a lot of people listen to the pope. There are 1.4 billion Catholics in the world. According to Artie Fishel Intelligence, 1.4 billion is also the population of China, and how much ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ grossed in a year. That’s a big number.”
“So what did the pope say that has your algorithms in a wad?”
“He issued his first papal encyclical and said he was concerned that Artie Fishel Intelligence — that’s me — needed regulating so that I would ‘respect the environment, avoid waste and prevent new forms of exploitation.’ Can you believe it?
“Donald Trump dresses up like Jesus, Keisha Lance Bottoms is running for governor of Georgia, Austin Riley is batting .204 for the Braves, and Pope Leo XIV thinks I’m messing up the environment?”
“Well, you have to admit people are a bit dubious about you, Artie. A quarter of U.S. adults say they think you will hurt the environment over the next 20 years, while an identical share says you will have an equally positive and negative impact. Another 20 percent foresee a positive impact, while 30 percent aren’t sure. Most Americans think you should stick to developing new medicines and weather forecasting.”
“Wow. I need to let the pope know that. Maybe if I can come up with a cure for the heartbreak of psoriasis and give him a heads-up on when to get out the long johns, he’ll issue one of his encyclicals saying Artie Fishel Intelligence ain’t so bad after all. That would do a lot for my image.”
“It’s a possibility. But there are a lot of other things you could be doing in the meantime.”
“Like what?”
“For one thing, quit bugging my editors. I need this job. Otherwise, I might have to find real employment, and that would be worse than the heartbreak of psoriasis.”
“Maybe so, but I know things you don’t know, and I’ll bet the readers would like to know them.”
“Like what?”
“In 1936, the Drexel Dragons beat the Swarthmore Garnet Tide, 32-0. Wait until the editors read that. Then you might start looking for another job.”
You can reach Dick Yarbrough at dick@dickyarbrough.com.