Linguistic analytics for fun and profit.
As I was wallowing in the sunny emotional afterglow of a recent Rick and Morty episode, it came to be that I was browsing a r/RickandMorty thread wherein someone posted an personality analysis of Rick’s character by plugging in dialogue into this Watson Personality Insights System thing. The reading of Rick Sanchez that Big Blue spat out was insightful and immediately interesting, because I’m a little transfixed with the idea of having computational analysis deconstruct everything.
So what do? I grabs a few random blog posts and dumped it in for processing and this is what it the world’s greatest super computer revealed about yours truly:
>You are a bit compulsive, somewhat critical and skeptical.
>You are intermittent: you have a hard time sticking with difficult tasks for a long period of time. You are self-conscious: you are sensitive about what others might be thinking about you. And you are proud: you hold yourself in high regard, satisfied with who you are.
>You are motivated to seek out experiences that provide a strong feeling of prestige.
>You consider independence to guide a large part of what you do: you like to set your own goals to decide how to best achieve them. You are relatively unconcerned with tradition: you care more about making your own path than following what others have done.
Furthermore we get a table of “Data Behind Your Personality”:
Which is then visualized thus:
Interesting enough. Modesty and Self-Discipline both at 3%, well duh-doy. Self-Expression a whopping 4%. So I’m repressed and proud of it! Nothing world shattering, but nothing I’d immediately disagree with. So I thought, okay, let’s run a chunk of fiction I’ve written through and see what shakes out and if it differs from a random selection of off-the-cuff Nicolle. Here’s what we get:
>You are a bit inconsiderate, shrewd and expressive.
>You are carefree: you do what you want, disregarding rules and obligations. You are cautious of others: you are wary of other people’s intentions and do not trust easily. And you are laid-back: you appreciate a relaxed pace in life.
>Your choices are driven by a desire for discovery.
>You are relatively unconcerned with tradition: you care more about making your own path than following what others have done. You consider helping others to guide a large part of what you do: you think it is important to take care of the people around you.
All of which was quite interesting, given the characters and major themes of the piece I ran through. The narrative itself, while incomplete, hinged on a character having a sort of anti-establishment epiphany.
I don’t know that this arms me with anything actionable, but it makes for a time-consuming curiosity. Chalk it up to the deep-seated human lust for quantification and my on-going obsession with having computational analysis provide the keen sort of personal insights that I desperately lack in self-awareness.