Today is Thursday, January 21, 2016. How much sarcasm is on Twitter? We also hear from Stephen Hawking regarding aliens. Don’t forget frozen pants.
#Sarcasm
How much sarcasm is on Twitter? Two professors, David Bamman from UC Berkeley and Noah A. Smith from the University of Washington, are working on an algorithm to find sarcastic tweets.
The algorithm trains itself to recognize sarcastic posts by scanning tweets with a “#sarcasm” hashtag. Over time, the algorithm gets better at finding the sarcasm. When tested, the algorithm recognized sarcasm 85 percent of the time.
The author of the tweet is important. When incorporating author information into the algorithm, accuracy rose.
Stephen Hawking and Aliens
Stephen Hawking thinks we’re playing a dangerous game by trying to contact aliens. The physicist believes that if aliens discovered Earth, they are likely to want to conquer and colonize our planet.
‘If aliens visit us, the outcome could be much like when Columbus landed in America, which didn’t turn out well for the Native Americans,’ he said in a recent interview.
Not everybody agrees.
Jill Tarter, co-founder and former director of the Seti Institute, says that any aliens who have managed to travel across the universe will be sophisticated enough to be friendly and peaceful.
So, there’s that.
Frozen Pants
What do you do when it is super cold? Freeze your pants?
Tom Grotting is becoming a bit of a celebrity in Minneapolis for his frozen pants. See them here.
