Date: Tue, 23 Mar 1999 21:15:56 +0000
From: Jim Marchand <marchand@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu>
Subject: Eliza as a bot
Thanks, Michael and Ari, for telling me about the Times article by David
Pescovitz. St. Jerome, quoting his teacher, Donatus, says in his Commentary
on Ecclesiastes (Chapter 1, verse 9 [or 10]: `pereant qui ante nos nostra
dixerunt' (cursed be they who said what we were going to say before we said
it). A good word for our plagiarizing century; it may not sound like Jerome;
I can remember being accused of making it up when once I used it. Anyway, I
was working on, to quote Michael, Eliza's rebirth as a bot (actually, she
was the original bot), but, having been previoused by Pescovitz, I shall
stand silent.
Eliza routines being so easy to write, I wonder why they are not used more
in foreign language instruction. Of course, for languages like German and
Russian, you have the case/gender/weird plurals problems, but these are not
insurmountable.
Jim Marchand.
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