I”ve just returned from Florida. My wife, Jacquie, is still there dog-sitting for friends who are on a cruise. The pleasure of being in Key West can be measured mathematically. Take the difference in the temperature between Cleveland and Key West, square it, and then multiply the result by the number of inches of snow in Cleveland. However, you also have to subtract the number of minutes you spend worrying about your house in Cleveland: frozen pipes? An electrical short causing a fire? Ice building up on the eaves? Leaking roof? Ice and leaks have been problems since we remodeled our attic a few years ago. So, we worried about our house, but the first two weeks in February were so brutal in Cleveland that the pleasure definitely outweighed the worry.
It started to warm up the day after I got home (coincidence? I don’t think so.) And the good news is that we had no damage.
I’ve had a smartphone for a couple of months. It has a talk-to-text feature that I am using more and more. It is remarkably accurate, but it is also pretty revealing when it isn’t. The temperature rose to 50 by Sunday and I sent a text to Jacquie to let her know the roof was OK. I spoke these words into the smartphone: “The ice dam is gone”.
It came out: “The ice damn is gone”.
I have certainly felt that way about the ice on our roof, but I was intrigued by the fact that the text-to-talk technology would choose a homonym that will bring an FCC fine for some broadcasters.
It reminded me of an incident a few weeks ago. I was making some notes for upcoming sermons using the smartphone and an app called “Evernote” (which I highly recommend!). I was planning a series based on Micah 6:8: “What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God?”
The theme for this coming Sunday will be mercy. So, I spoke the words “February 20th mercy” into the phone. “February 20th” - to my amazement - came out perfectly. But “mercy” came out as “Mercedes”. I tried again. “Mercy”, I said more slowly and clearly. “Mercedes” appeared on the screen.
What does it say about our society (or at least about users of smartphones) that a computer program will confuse “mercy” with the name of a luxury car? One of the readings for Sunday, Leviticus 19, gives us a picture of the biblical concept of mercy. Landowners were instructed to leave a margin of uncut grain around the edge of their field so that the poor and the landless could glean some for themselves. You could tell how merciful someone was by how wide that margin was.
In a culture that prizes acquisition, we maximize our profits and minimize margins that we consider “waste”. Ask most Americans where we can cut the national budget and they will say, “Foreign Aid”. Ask them what should not be cut and they will say, “Defense”. The U.S. spends about $1.4 billion to feed hungry people around the world and to lift them out of poverty. The Pentagon has already spent $3 billion on a second engine for the F-35 fighter jet . The Secretary of Defense and most military analysts agree that the project, plagued by cost overruns, is a complete waste. But political observers give an extension of the program at least a 50-50 chance of passage. I wonder why?
So it doesn’t surprise me that when we say “mercy” it comes out “Mercedes” or that when we talk about a wall that holds back water, it comes out “damn”.
It started to warm up the day after I got home (coincidence? I don’t think so.) And the good news is that we had no damage.
I’ve had a smartphone for a couple of months. It has a talk-to-text feature that I am using more and more. It is remarkably accurate, but it is also pretty revealing when it isn’t. The temperature rose to 50 by Sunday and I sent a text to Jacquie to let her know the roof was OK. I spoke these words into the smartphone: “The ice dam is gone”.
It came out: “The ice damn is gone”.
I have certainly felt that way about the ice on our roof, but I was intrigued by the fact that the text-to-talk technology would choose a homonym that will bring an FCC fine for some broadcasters.
It reminded me of an incident a few weeks ago. I was making some notes for upcoming sermons using the smartphone and an app called “Evernote” (which I highly recommend!). I was planning a series based on Micah 6:8: “What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God?”
The theme for this coming Sunday will be mercy. So, I spoke the words “February 20th mercy” into the phone. “February 20th” - to my amazement - came out perfectly. But “mercy” came out as “Mercedes”. I tried again. “Mercy”, I said more slowly and clearly. “Mercedes” appeared on the screen.
What does it say about our society (or at least about users of smartphones) that a computer program will confuse “mercy” with the name of a luxury car? One of the readings for Sunday, Leviticus 19, gives us a picture of the biblical concept of mercy. Landowners were instructed to leave a margin of uncut grain around the edge of their field so that the poor and the landless could glean some for themselves. You could tell how merciful someone was by how wide that margin was.
In a culture that prizes acquisition, we maximize our profits and minimize margins that we consider “waste”. Ask most Americans where we can cut the national budget and they will say, “Foreign Aid”. Ask them what should not be cut and they will say, “Defense”. The U.S. spends about $1.4 billion to feed hungry people around the world and to lift them out of poverty. The Pentagon has already spent $3 billion on a second engine for the F-35 fighter jet . The Secretary of Defense and most military analysts agree that the project, plagued by cost overruns, is a complete waste. But political observers give an extension of the program at least a 50-50 chance of passage. I wonder why?
So it doesn’t surprise me that when we say “mercy” it comes out “Mercedes” or that when we talk about a wall that holds back water, it comes out “damn”.
