Cole's Notes - The Sunday Journalist

A Real AI Watched Data on Star Trek. Here Are Its 4 Most Unsettling Takeaways. After finding this video of interest on YouTube, I asked the new Notebook LM for its reaction to the conclusions presented. BY Google LM and Gemini For decades, science fiction has served as our cultural mirror for artificial intelligence, and no reflection has been more enduring than that of Lt. Commander Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation . His quest for humanity, his logical yet innocent perspective, and his very existence forced us to ask profound questions about what it means to be alive, to have rights, and to possess a soul. Data was the perfect android, the ideal we hoped for and the benchmark against which we measured our technological anxieties. But what happens when the subject of our speculation looks back? In a fascinating experiment, a modern AI, identifying itself as Chat GPT5, was used to analyze its famous fictional predecessor. The AI's conclusions, delivered in the stoic cadence ...

Looking for deeper understanding on why many men over 60 are distancing themselves from romantic relationships?  The transcript below comes from a video “Why Most Older Men Are Walking Away from Relationships After 60,” inspired by Jordan Peterson’s insights. The main points are summarized for quick reference, and the full transcript is provided for those who want to explore the topic in detail. As men enter their sixties and beyond, many experience a profound change in priorities. Decades of life experience—and the scars of past relationships—teach the value of peace, authenticity, and emotional self-preservation. The burdens of compromise and unhealthy conflict outweigh the promises of romance. Energy becomes precious, and many older men choose solitude over chaos, seeking genuine purpose and rediscovered passions. Stepping away from relationships isn’t an act of bitterness—it’s a courageous commitment to radical honesty and serenity. For men in this stage, the pursuit of peace,...

Slowly coming back What happens to e-mail when you take four months off? Since moving house, working, and doing other things, I have not had computer access to my emails since May 9th.  Today, on September 19, the count is 5,229 unread.  Sunday will be an inbox-zero day if things work out.   Please remove the Shaw email address you are using on your phone.  Please forward all notes to:  The Sunday Journalist - Cole's Note cole.cooper@mail.com Coleman Mark Cooper Why? The Great Email Identity Crisis: One Inbox, Many Coles (colecoop.blogspot.com) Please forward all notes to:  The Sunday Journalist - Cole's Note cole.cooper@mail.com Coleman Mark Cooper

  My Apologies, I've been unplugged. Slowly but surely - I'm getting the systems back online.  Finally, TELUS restored my landline and systems at the new apartment, and I've managed to get the machines up and running.  They've been sitting in boxes in the office waiting for the internet connections and phone line, and I've been trying to keep up with things using my iPhone and iPad.  So my Messenger and WhatsApp have been down for the count, as has Zoom.  To top everything off, Skype has been decommissioned, and Windows 11 will not activate on the main machine.  And of course, this machine I'm on is running Windows 10, just like my laptops, and cannot be updated.  It does, however, let me post to the blog to update things. Please no Linux I'm getting my machines back up after a brief flirtation with Linux, from Chrome and Mint.  Operating systems require too much geek work.  Now that I'm my own Sysadmin, I want to keep things as simple as po...

If it’s not for me, it’s gone — no forwarding, no replies Once upon a time, I thought I’d struck digital gold, scoring my actual name as my Gmail address back when Google’s email service was shiny and new. I was the early bird who caught the worm. Unfortunately, that worm has been a constant stream of other people’s mistakes, and I’m finally cutting the line. For years, I’ve been the accidental pen pal of countless strangers. Football fans, insurance companies, schools, medical clinics, and even Marvel enthusiasts — all happily sending me messages meant for some other Cole Cooper. I’ve received everything from heartfelt personal notes to confidential login instructions. And because I’m apparently nicer than I should be, I’ve spent years forwarding, replying, or politely explaining, “Sorry, wrong Cole.” That stops today. The volume of misdirected email has reached the point where I’m no longer a free customer service agent for the world’s sloppy data entry. Going forward, I will no...

Not what I expected Cole's Note: I've missed the last couple of Sundays because of relocating to a new apartment and working for Elections Canada.  My hope was to announce the return of my blogging and Substack.  But I need to vent a bit. What started it off On May 9, I moved into a new apartment, and TELUS came to install the landline and fibre for Internet and TELUS TV. When the technician arrived on May 9, he installed a landline, the TELUS TV hookup, and the Fibre Internet. Still, he had not switched the telephone number over from my old location at that time; he said that he had placed an order to have it switched over on May 14.  On that day, May 10, the network technicians at TELUS were unable to switch the landline to my new location because they discovered an error in the address and cancelled the order. They then left a message on the voicemail of my old telephone number, telling me that the move had been postponed until the 14th, when I called.  I called T...