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no warnings, no errors, just a straight build all the way down.

Dartmouth College’s Neukom Institute for Computational Science is sponsoring a competition for the best computer-generated sonnets.  

The rules:

A contemporary computer should be able to run the code and generate a sonnet within 24 hours using less than 8G of RAM.

The algorithm/software should respond to a noun or noun phrase “prompt” (e.g., “hat”, “car keys”, “wedding”, “sorrow”, “violin case”) and be capable of producing an effectively unlimited number of original sonnets.

Submissions must include source code, and programs must be capable of generating distinct sonnets with high probability.

I seriously cannot WAIT to see what the machines come up with! Here’s an example from a couple of years ago – programmer Charles Dawson wrote a Shakespearean sonnet generator in Java that produced gems like this:

Sonnet The First

With mine only care Then hate after new faith in a very part was thy looks with me, tired with me, that writes of a tomb the wide as thus; That for what he shows you to his sweet fingers. Walk with winter hath motion, and lovely knights, when sometime lofty towers I then give thee partake? And with what old words new, and therein showest, and will pluck the prey of thine eyes but weep afresh love’s veins thou wilt; if never can forbid? From their pride I not think me thus: mine eye hath in me. Yet thou wert thou being made from woe to write the earth removed that to

Our own 13.7 blog just had an interview with Neukom’s director Dan Rockmore – check that out here.

Cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of, um … processing power?

– Petra

Look more closely at these photographs, Your Honor.

Notice anything strange about the bread?

I didn’t either. That’s because…

…no cuts were made there in the first place!

The witness forged the photographs to make it look like they had an actual bread knife, when they actually did not!

How, you ask? Look to the second photo.

While it is quite obvious that the knife is penetrating the top half of the breadstick, I’m not sure about the bottom half.

Looks pretty flat, doesn’t it?

The angle of the photo makes it look like the knife is in the witness’s breadstick, whilst it is actually behind it. In addition, the cut was actually made after the first photograph and before the second. Continue to the third photograph.

It is also taken from a flat angle, as was the second photograph. I’m sure you’re finding something missing in this photograph as well, Your Honor. Where is the index finger’s fingertip?

This illustration explains it all.

While I am… ahem, not the best artist…

(Didn’t I go to art school?)

The index finger is hidden behind the loaf of bread. It is not wrapping around the loaf of bread. This is because…

Are you really that dull, Wright? For a man who majored in art you should be able to recognize a sculpture when you see one.

as we can see from the photos provided, this is quite obviously plastic.

if you look at any photo of real bread it can’t attain that level of shininess, and even if it could.

If you’ll notice in this picture, the bread on the inside is quite shiny, as well.

Tell me, Wright, have you ever seen real bread gleam that much? Don’t answer that, I will.

Even in this high-resolution photograph with bread that thick, it obviously wouldn’t shine on the inside when it isn’t buttered.

And it isn’t too hard to find the item in question with a quick google search.

Oh, and if you will notice, their hand was covering the seam where the bread was taken apart in the first photo with a simple comparison of the pattern on the bread.

You should be asking “can there be bread like that?”

Sweet bread can be infused with sugar or a syrup, making the outsides shinier- and the insides sweeter. Take a look.

Furthermore. there are parts of the witness’s bread knife that don’t just match up with the novelty bread knives you have presented. Take another look.

Let me point out two things about the novelty knives: one, their markings, and two, the placement of the knife itself.

In the novelty knives, the marks are artificial-looking and repeated. That is because they are manufactured. In the witness’s photo, the marks are more natural and realistic- because they are, well, real!

Furthermore, the blades on the novelty knives are in the middle of the handle.

But… look back at the witness’s photo. The knife is to the left? Where is the problem, you ask? Look at this illustration.

Here we have the knife, a piece of bread, and a table. Let’s have a go.

I’m sure you see it now, Your Honor.

The bread knife cannot actually be used to cut bread efficiently! Even if it was tilted, it would be uncomfortable and unbalanced!

The defense has an explanation for this positioning.

Nicholas Was…