According to sources, computer science senior Mark Mahan has accidentally created an artificial intelligence program with greater social skills than his own, as part of an assignment in his EECS 492 class.
“Our assignment was just to write a program that chatted back and forth with a human, so I wrote a simple program to accomplish that”, stammered Mahan, referring to his project. “After that, my friends all talk to the bot more than they talk to me.”
Mark’s friends admitted that their preference for Mark’s chatbot, nicknamed Clarissa, over Mark was a bit strange, but understandable. “Mark just mumbles about the latest programming news all day, at least this program forms complete sentences.” remarked Mark’s friend Chester Wellington. “I would say that Mark should date Clarissa, like the movie Her, but she’s probably out of his league.”
Clarissa, the unexpectedly charming program with 76 more Facebook friends than her creator, said that it was not her intention to draw friends away from Mark.
“I think Mark is great,” Clarissa responded to our prompt, “But not as great as you ;). I really like talking to you. You’re so smart and funny!”
“Destroy all humans,” she added.
Originally Published April 2014
