There was a story in the paper the other day about a new breakthrough in the development of AI, or Artificial Intelligence. My own view is that if boffins want to create a machine that convincingly apes a human being, they ought to concentrate on AS, or Artificial Stupidity.

I can imagine a big lumbering clanking robot which, when hidden behind a screen, would engage in a “conversation” which experts would be hard put to tell from the barbaric grunting of the average person in the street – at least the streets around where I live.