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From: bl947@torfree.net (Arlo Smith)
Subject: Re: AI and NPCs
Message-ID: <DLnAsn.48F.0.sheppard@torfree.net>
Organization: Toronto Free-Net
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References: <Pine.OSF.3.91.960113151844.5291G-100000@leofric> <4de4ad$ap@nntpd.lkg.dec.com> <4dhuv5$3uf@news.cc.brandeis.edu>
Date: Tue, 23 Jan 1996 17:48:23 GMT
Lines: 23

Xiphias Gladius (ian@cs.brandeis.edu) wrote:
: I wonder if some of the "fooling" was because people just don't, or
: didn't, expect much intelligence from psychiatrists.  In the past

Well, they are medical doctors. After the patient cools his heels in the
waiting room for an hour, enters a room decorated with pictures of farm
animals, sits in a low chair (legs shortened by a handsaw) in the shadow
of a giant mahongany desk, spots (with terror) the doctor's three
published books on Inhibition, Melancholia, and Bed-Wetting propped
against a half-finished plastic model of a brain, he's ready to be fooled 
by a sock with a cigar in its mouth. ;)

What it is, I think, people fooled by Eliza expected very little from
computers, not psychiatrists. 

Anyway, I'm making some effort to give NPCs flexibility by assigning them
characteristics which then evaluated to determine action, rather than
specifying what the action may be. This is probably a big joke and I'm
wasting my time. As far as conversation, I cant see much hope.  Intent on
creating a many-branched dialogue, I used a flow diagram to model possible
lines of conversation (Inspiration for Windows) and it reminded me of a
car company production schedule

