Haiku 2023–264

I don’t know what to

do with my life right now I

just want to be (able)

— —

Buckle up folks, this one is going metaphysical. Our journey starts with this question…

Did I write this haiku?

Here’s how this haiku came to be — I typed the word ‘I’ in the text app of my iPhone and picked the first word suggested by auto correct until I reached seventeen syllables… or I guess eighteen since the lone two-syllable word it suggested was for the seventeenth syllable. With that in mind, it would seem that iOS is responsible for this haiku.

Not so fast…

How does auto correct work anyway? The more you use your phone, the more it predicts what you’re going to say based on you’ve said before. For example, if you type ‘Five Somewhat’ into your phone, what word does it suggest next? For me, it suggests ‘comprehensible’ which doesn’t make a lick of sense unless you know that that is a combination of words I use on my phone every weekday (long story that, we may go down that rabbit hole another day). That suggests that I might have had a hand in writing this one after all.

Want to go even deeper? Let’s try these thoughts regarding potential influences on for size…

• Have the programmers at Apple made a conscious decision that would explicitly prevent iOS from suggesting what I would truly would have said?
• What kind of influence have others had on the Apple programmers to affect what words may be suggested? (think teachers, professors, bosses, family members, etc.)
• Have I ever made corrections to IOS corrections in the past that would influence how the app is programmed?
• Have I ever crossed paths in real life with an Apple programmer that would change how the app works?
• Have I, as insignificant as I am, influenced modern English in any way that would modify what’s suggested? (Need a visual for this? Think of the gravitational pull of a pencil versus that of the earth. It’s almost nothing, but not nothing.)

I could go on and on, but I do believe that I need to answer the question — did I write this haiku? My answer is ‘no’, I didn’t, but I did create it.

I welcome your comments below.