October CURRENTS 2024

CURRENTS is the official newsletter of the Credit River PROBUS Club. It is published monthly and emailed to members to keep them abreast of club activities and to promote the club’s central objectives. Submissions are welcome as are new ideas and should be emailed to Lydia Koop, lydia04@rogers.com.

President’s Message

This is my last “editorial” before passing the Presidential reins to Bob Warren. I step down with mixed emotions. There is, I admit, a certain amount of relief. Perhaps my email inbox will not be quite so full. But I also leave with a certain amount of apprehension – not for myself, but for the future of our club. We have had exceptional speakers this year – more on that below – and events both educational (for example the IESO visit) and just fun (the Grand River Cruise). Rick Palmer and Tour Design have provided international travel opportunities. Much is going well.

However, I am concerned about the challenges Past President John Burrows faced trying to cajole members to stand for the vacant positions on the Management Committee. Many thanks to John for persevering so that we now do now have a full slate of candidates to be presented at the AGM in October. Also, many thanks to those who volunteered or “were volunteered”. However, it should not have been such an arduous task. Allan Evans, our regional representative to Probus Central has told us that the main reason Probus clubs falter and fail is when no one will accept responsibility for their club’s operation. That is sad.

To return to our speakers, Dr. Christopher Di Carlo gave an outstanding talk on “Artificial Intelligence” (AI)
explaining not only its strengths but also its dangers, so, I thought it would be interesting to ask ChatGPT to write this editorial for me (and no, the computer output is not what you are reading here). For your interest, Lydia has kindly allowed me to post the AI created editorial, which was generated with minimal input, as well as this one (definitely not produced with machine intelligence, or perhaps intelligence of any kind!) The result is instructive – some of it is quite good, even poetic; some is relevant, but one section is flat out rubbish. The computer “intelligence” has completely missed the fact that Probus clubs do not fundraise – an attribute built right into the constitution. Part of the reason the earliest Probus clubs were formed, was as a spin-off from Rotary, by Rotarians who felt they had done their share of fundraising.

So the bottom line is that I am passing on the President’s mantle to the safe hands of a real live human and I hope that it will be well beyond my lifetime before the role can be filled by a robot, however artificially intelligent he, she, or it may be. Finally, a huge thank you to those who have supported me in my role as President, and I wish our Club a great year for its 2024-2025 season.

Ada Dixon

You can find this month’s complete issue and past editions of CURRENTS here.

Read your copy of CURRENTS or see the web to find out more about  Activities,  Events,  and Travel in our club.

Direct comments about CURRENTS to Lydia Koop, lydia04@rogers.com. If you need to be sent another copy of CURRENTS please email crprobus@gmail.com.