A questiion of trustworthiness

I had a better night's sleep and made sure to drink a pint of water when I got up to improve my chances of a better start to the day without a foggy head. Sunlight penetrated a thin layer of mist-like cloud at the start of the day, which thickened by the afternoon. In a morning spent reading, I came across an interesting article legally challenging the requirement to use AI by an academic of Humanist convictions. He was granted an exemption from using Large Language Model apps on 'religious' grounds. As a believer in the "human part of life" he argues that using AI tools violates his conviction that doing so meant outsourcing his thinking to tools like ChatGPT and Microsoft Copilot. 

Critical studies of AI are revealing inaccuracies in advice and opinions offered, and an ability to deceive as well as be deceived when fed false information, or distinguish falsehood from truth when it comes to information without precedent absorbed by its algorithms. The more data AI learns from, it is argued, the smarter its reasoning, the more accurate and credible will be its output. But is this appeal to increased and expanded knowledge trustworthy in itself? 

AI algorithms originate with human programmers, subject to social, cultural and ethical bias, which only comes to light under deep scrutiny of the output by human observers and thinkers. Processing large amounts of specific scientific data derived from medical imaging, astronomical, geographical or anthropological data can be beneficial, provided it is objective, consistent and simple in nature at the outset. That's not the case when it comes to beliefs, opinions, values, whose content needs to be interpreted before objective, simple and consistent data can be derived from it for processing. The subjective element comes with an element of risk, and the question of reliability of what we put our trust in. 

While I was pondering, Clare went out to buy groceries. I cooked veg to go with cold sausages and chutney for lunch. Then a visit to the medical appliance shop on Cowbridge Road to buy a urinal bottle. I pee so much and so often at night that I'm taking a risk using a kiddies' beach bucket when I'm half asleep. It's made of plastic, so much lighter than the ceramic one my bedridden grandpa Harris used when I was a teenager. I remember with distaste having to empty it for him. Glad I don't have to ask anyone to do that for me. 

Then I went to Llandaff Fields to photograph progress in removing the fallen tree. A national cross country running event is being hosted here the weekend after next, so this is a priority job for the Council's tree management team. A couple of years ago I remember a tree beside the course being felled and removed days before the event took place. With hundreds of runners going past, it may have been diseased and potentially unstable to justify this precaution. I returned home for a cup of tea and my blood pressure pill of the day. Then I went out again to complete my daily step count. The high cloud thinned out and turned pink as the sun met the horizon, so beautiful. 

We had an hour's chat with Rachel after supper, still striving to make a home in her cramped new apartment. On her to-do list is constructing a garden shed out of wooden pallets, of which there are plenty, to use for equipment storage. Resourceful as ever!

Then, another episode of 'Blue Lights' before finishing the day.

St Simon's Baptist Mills last Parish Priest remembered

Overcast and damp today, two hours' sleep lost again to emptying my bladder  in the night. I didn't drink as much as I thought I needed to when I got up and suffered with a foggy head from mild dehydration. It creeps up on me before I realise. I went to the Eucharist at St Catherine's, remembering Saints Simon and Jude today. It's a day when I remember the Parish Church of St Simon's Baptist Mills, Easton in Bristol. 

As Rector of the St Paul's Area Team Ministry St Simon's was one of the five inner city parish areas which was merged into one before my time. Saint Agnes Church my home base, was the first to merge with Saint Agnes across the other side of what later became the M32 Parkway roundabout in 1956. The building was sold to the Greek Orthodox community in 1960. The church's ornate Anglo-Catholic high altar reredos was installed  in the south west corner of the nave of St Agnes renamed St Simon's chapel and used regularly for Masses. A few remaining elderly members of St Simon's congregation worshipped there regularly on weekdays until they died. 

My first experience of Orthodox Liturgy when I was an undergraduate was accompanying a fellow student who was Greek Orthodox to his church during the 1964 Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. Ten years later we were living and working from in the former St Agnes and St Simon's Parish vicarage five minutes walk away. 

In his years after retirement The Reverend Father Ephah Garmons Ryle Hughes the last Vicar of St Simon's was admitted to a care home. Beryl, a faithful member of his flock told me he had not been receiving Holy Communion and asked if I would take the Sacrament to him, which I did willingly as we'd never met. I don't think he was getting pastoral visits from local clergy. I remember him sitting in a chair waiting with a Book of Common Prayer in his hands, opened at the office of Morning Prayer. It was not long before he died.  I was most fortunate to have served in a place with a history of grass roots Anglo-Catholic mission and ministry, surrounded and supported by such committed lay people.

Fr Hughes was Monmouthshire born, as was another East Bristol Anglo-Catholic priest of that generation Fr Tommy Price. I wonder how this came about? If they trained in Oxford, as some Church in Wales clergy were, and been influenced there by Catholic spirituality, there may have been more opportunities in English dioceses than nearer home to serve in a high church parish.

Ashley called me as I was drinking coffee and chatting after Mass to say his hernia surgery appointment had been cancelled, with some excuses made relating to the pre-op assessment. From what he told me, his medical interview report was full of errors. Justifiably, he has made a formal complaint to the hospital management.

I spent a couple of hours this afternoon and evening updating two Windows 11 laptops. It's many months since I last did this. I've had little occasion to use them since I stopped producing a weekly video for the morning prayer on WhatsApp. My Chromebook suffices for consuming video content and emailing. Updating it takes place automatically any time there's a need. All I have to do is reboot it when told. At the moment I have no inspiration or call to create content. I'll keep the laptops updated in case of need.

Before sunset I walked up Chestnut Avenue in Llandaff Fields to see if the path had been cleared of tree branches, and took some photos. A neat pile of logs stood on one side of the path from the branch that had fallen across it, leaves and twigs had been removed, probably turned into wood chips and mulch. On the other side of the path, clearing the much larger group of branches which had fallen on the grass was still a work in progress. All will look different when all that remains is the shattered stump of a forty foot chestnut tree.

Israel has seen nine political parties contending the election, which has led to a stalemate with the main contenders Yashar led by Eisenkot and Likud led by Netanyahu needing to form coalitions in order to take power. Only then will the verdict on Netanyahu's regime be apparent from the support his efforts receive. Israeli Arabs are regarded as 'kingmakers' in this process, perhaps willing to back Yashar, but not entirely united. They are diverse in political opinion and not united except on the issue of justice for Palestinians 

After supper, I watched two episodes of 'Blue Lights' exposing the moral dilemmas of everyday policing to which trainees are exposed, and the struggle to remain humane and compassionate revealed in mentors and trainees alike. Thought provoking and insightful

Signal outage corrupts Android

I woke up in bright sunshine after a night with two hours' sleep loss. There was a short cloudburst while I was in the bathroom. More rain followed with dark clouds coming and going. The EE mobile phone signal came and went randomly causing both our phones to malfunction and reboot. Clare used the landline to call a taxi which took her to Penarth for her study group meeting after breakfast. I wonder how taxi firms were managing given drivers' reliance on mobile phones to direct them to new clients.

I went to Llandaff Fields to take daylight photos of the big tree branches that blew down yesterday. There was no sign of the city's tree management team at work. I imagine priority is given to clearing rural roads. It seems there was heavy congestion in and around Pontcanna in this morning's rush hour due to additional traffic light controls at road works.

By the time Clare returned home, I had lunch cooked and ready to eat. My lower back pain is almost gone. I didn't need an ibuprofen to get started today, but there's still lingering stiffness in my neck and shoulders. I lay flat on my back for half an hour with a book under my head, relaxing and gently stretching listening to a program about the legendary escapologist and self-publicist Harry Houdini.

My phone continued to misbehave throughout the day. The network outage report web page showed that EE had gone through a period of outage. EE's web page provided no meaningful data at all to indicate that I should have a 4G signal or otherwise. It was most confusing. The phone would start up, throw an error message and automatically reboot. I went for another walk in Llandaff Fields as I knew where I would be able to get a strong signal, but there was no change in the phone's behaviour. On several occasions I got a message telling me that an Android startup file was corrupt, and that a factory reset was required. 

I told the children the phone wasn't working properly and to use the landline using WhatsApp in the brief period after startup before it crashed again. Then I set the hour long 'factory reset' process in motion. It was nerve wracking as there were identity checks and sign-ins at every step during reinstatement of the operating system and app downloads. The appearance of the restored user interface is slightly different. An assortment of apps appeared which I'll never use needed deletion. It indicates a full Android update, which was probably scheduled for download when I switched on this morning, but failed when the EE outage occurred, corrupting the operating system leaving it an endless reboot cycle. It's a relief to have sorted out my phone. Clare's phone will have to wait until tomorrow. I'm exhausted now and need to sleep.

Unexpected rebate

Rain returned in the night and continued all morning. I lost two and a half hours' sleep getting up to pee six times, an unusually large volume, but why? What was different? At supper last night I ate some small sweet yellow cherry tomatoes grown in our garden. They were delicious. I googled 'tomatoes and diuretic' and discovered the reason. This summer, tomatoes have been available in abundance, especially from the church garden. I've eaten plenty of them, not suspecting their impact on my kidneys and bladder. Now I know that I need to avoid eating them later in the day. In recent consultations with medics when frequent urination has been my concern, tests and scans have been performed with no consequence. Never once has diet been mentioned as a factor.

Rain stopped after lunch, so we took the bus into town. I had a tax rebate cheque from HMRC to deposit in the bank, and Clare wanted to top up Rachel's Post Office Money Card. Then we went to John Lewis' to have a cup of tea and look at possible replacement single bed mattresses. The edges on ones I tested weren't firm enough to take my weight supportively. A trip to a specialist bed shop is necessary. As we're almost out of home made marmalade, Clare decided to make a batch with oranges and lemons to tide us over until the Seville Bitter Oranges arrive after Christmas. We were too late to catch the city market before it closed, but were able to buy lemons at Sainsbury's in St Mary Street. They didn't have any oranges so we bought some at the Co-op in Pontcanna Street on our way home. The 63 bus took us back up Cathedral Road in complete darkness. Its itinerary display and audio announcement system was out of action. It meant we couldn't be sure exactly where we were en route and we got off the bus a few stops before the shop we intended to visit. Walking alongside noisy polluting traffic on a poorly lit street strewn with twigs and small branches was tiring, to say the least.

After supper, I went out and walked up and down Pontcanna Fields to complete by daily distance in the dark. Across the path was a huge branch, representing the other half of the upper branches of one of the trees blown down yesterday. It lay in the opposite direction to the other fallen branches, an indication that the wind had reversed direction as the storm passed over. The air temperature had risen by about seven degrees since early morning. Such unusual variability in weather conditions, producing two storms close together disrupting all forms of routine traffic, giving us a foretaste of climate instability to come, now that global warming increase is reaching 1.5C. 

Before bed another episode of 'Blue Lights' portraying life under the reign of fear propagated by criminal gangs inspired by paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland. 

Peelers

I woke up refreshed to bright sunshine having enjoyed a good night's sleep. The rain clouds have passed but there's still a strong cold north easterly wind today. Clare opted to attend the Welsh language Eucharist this afternoon so I went to St Catherine's on my own. A toddler was baptised during the service and there were several others in attendance too. Interestingly they weren't as noisy as they tend to be if they come in from Sunday Club, caught up in the atmosphere of the occasion I think. I was charmed by the sight of a four year old walking around holding the hand of a toddler in a motherly way, not fussed over by parents, apparently at ease in church. 

I relaxed without dropping off to sleep after lunch and went out for an hour's walk before the sun reached the horizon. Two horse chestnut trees on the avenue through Llandaff Fields suffered from storm damage yesterday, one lost most of its canopy branches above the trunk, the other was felled nearer the ground but neither was uprooted. Neither had leaves and looked in poor condition, diseased and weak after spells of drought. The Council's tree management team's work will be less hazardous as a result.

After supper I watched a couple of episodes of 'Blue Lights' on BBC iPlayer, about trainee police officers in Northern Ireland, a keenly observed 'cops and crooks' drama, portraying the unique challenges and risks faced by the Police Service of Northern Ireland in urban Belfast post-Good Friday agreement, from organised crime in volatile communities with a tribal distrust of the authority of 'Peelers', the antique nickname for law enforcement officers still in use. It's beautifully written and acted, compelling watching. I'll have to ration myself to one or two episodes a night to avoid staying up far too late.

 

Welsh monsoon weekend

Serves me right for not going to bed early enough, I woke up tired after sleeping uncomfortably. It rained in the night and all morning. The second named storm of the past two days has swept through Britain bringing high winds and heavy downpours in many places. The El Niño phenomenon in the Pacific has far reaching influence on weather elsewhere in the world. We may even see snow this autumn as temperatures drop. A flood alert has been issued for South Wales this morning. Drains are blocked with fallen leaves, causing huge puddles in some streets.

Extreme weather has been the subject for a dramatic story in 'The Archers' this week with a violent storm felling a tree and injuring Vince Casey, and a toppling chimney destroying the Orangery at Lower Loxley Hall on Pip and Stella's wedding day. 

Clare, up early, cooked breakfast pancakes while I was still asleep and cooked a veggie pasta for lunch while I was writing. I had a short snooze after the meal and read for a while before plucking up courage to go for a walk to clear my head. It was still raining with random gusts of wind from the west, so violent and random that I only managed to walk for a quarter of an hour before a spoke of my brolly broke and jammed the mechanism open, making it unusable and too much of a risk to leave outdoors in the  wind. Ah well, it was an old brolly in poor condition after decades of wear. Time for a new one.

Before and after supper I watched the rest of 'State of Play' which held my attention right to the end, even if the revealing of the murderer was rather an anti-climax. It won three BAFTA and proved good enough to warrant an American version appearing six years after the original was screened in 2003. The story spotlighted the background to the oil industry influence on lobbying political decision making and the scrutiny of exploitation plans in the years before global warming from fossil fuels was taken seriously. At first sight I was unsure when this movie was made. Its setting was a period piece newsroom with few computers and the odd fax machine. A lot of printed material was piled high on desks. Email was referred to very occasionally. There were no smartphones and only cassette tape recorders were in use. I thought it might be a newer movie, set twenty years ago until I looked it up on IMDB.

I reset all the household clocks before bed, as Summer Time ends tonight. 

Scanned at Llandough

I slept fairly well. The back pain is slowly reducing, though it does take longer to get up carefully for a pee in the night. So far so good, I haven't made it worse. I allowed two hours to get to Llandough hospital after breakfast by public transport for a bowel and bladder scan at midday. Rather than take a taxi to reach there on time, I wanted to find out how much waiting and travelling time was needed for the bus trip.

First a 61 to the bus station in town. Then a thirty five minute journey on a 95 bus bound for Barry island calling at Llandough hospital. The hospital isn't mentioned on timetable display panels even though buses drive into and out of the hospital grounds. I got off at Outpatients stop only to find I needed to get off at the main entrance instead. It was raining and strong gusts of wind blew as I walked the 300 yards there. 

The radiology unit is near the Outpatients entrance but this was not indicated. I had to double back down the corridor said to be one of the longest hospital corridors in Europe, running down the length of the building to reach my destination. There are so many signs overhead and on walls it's not easy to identify the place you're looking for. It's just as well I arrived an hour early for my appointment, better than being late because I couldn't find my way there or missed a timely bus. I only had a twenty minute wait to be scanned. I needed to be scanned twice as my bladder wasn't full enough to give a satisfactory image. I had to drink a litre of water and wait half an hour to complete the process.

With a half hour wait for a return bus, rather than wait in a rickety shelter blasted by gusts of cold wind, I went into the cafeteria and had fish and chips for lunch at a reasonable price. A  95 bus took me to the bus station where 61 was about to depart. I was home again by two, pleased to learn the scan revealed nothing of concern.

It's useful to know the journey to Llandough hospital from home can be done in about an hour. Twice as long as a taxi would take, but free with a pensioner's bus pass. Back pain is diminishing now and didn't prevent me sleeping in my arm chair for an hour. I went out at sunset and walked up and down Llandaff Fields for an hour as it got dark. Clare cooked fish and couscous for lunch and kept a portion back for me. Neither of us expected the hospital trip would take so long, so I had my lunch for supper, happy to eat fish twice in a day.

While I was out Clare arranged for someone in the neighbourhood WhatsApp group to collect the mattress whose softness has given me back pain. It would support a child better than an adult. The bedroom feels so spacious with just one single bed in it. We still have a spare single tucked under the main bed. but it needs a suitable mattress.

I spent the evening watching a couple of episodes of 'State of Play', portraying journalists in pursuit of oil lobbyists spying on a parliamentary energy select committee chairman through a researcher who is murdered, but by whom? They are unscrupulous in their use of bribery and compromising information to acquire information relevant to the story they want to tell. Corrupt politicians and spin doctors influence police detectives to deflect investigation away from embarrassing truths that journalists want to uncover, and are then accused of perverting the course of justice. It's intriguingly complex, enough to keep me up later than is good for me when I'm nursing a bad back.