Friday, May 5, 2023

NSECC and AI ChatGPT

 

Waterkeepers have the good fortune to have a report from a well-respected hydrogeologist

It cites "various significant omissions, discrepancies and contradictions within the hydrogeological assessment".

We sent it off to NSECC for their information and got this unsigned and undated reply:


Kip McCurdy wrote to Lanying Zhao at NSECC

Dear Ms. Zhao,

Can you confirm that you are the author of the unsigned and undated department response to the Hubley review?  Will you provide us with details of your academic credentials and a complete Curriculum Vitae so that we may properly evaluate and credit the response?

Sincerely,

Kip McCurdy

for

The Annapolis Waterkeepers


And heard back the same day:


Good afternoon Mr. McCurdy,

 

Thank you for reaching out.  The report has been prepared on behalf of the Department and this is a departmental response.

The information has been reviewed by various qualified individuals within our Department and we will not be providing specific information

on individual employees.

 

Thank you,

 

Lori Skaine

Regional Director, Western

Nova Scotia Environment & Climate Change

Inspection, Compliance, and Enforcement Division

136 Exhibition St.

Kentville, NS

B4N 4E5


Now this is a ridiculous and unprofessional answer.  Was it written by a high school intern?  Was it written at all, or just plagiarized from Wikipedia?  This is junk science until someone owns up to writing it.  


We've had this runaround before.

1 comment:

Parker Donham said...

That response is arrogant. It's also typical of how the Nova Scotia government has come to handle citizen inquiries.

For decades, the government published a telephone book of senior government officials. Now it requires sleuthing to uncover the phone number of any official.

Even when I try to call what used to be the direct line for various officials, the call is rooted to a low-level GateKeeper, who demands to know what I want and when I want it, and then we'll route the call as s/he sees fit.

Freedom of Information requests are no longer handled by the department that receives the request. That department still collects all the records that are responsive to the request, but a centralized committee within the in-apply named Access Nova Scotia does the redacting. This means that no departmental knowledge goes into deciding how to handle optional reductions, of which the ACT has many. Instead, all optional redactions are redacted, as if they were mandatory.
That response is arrogant. It's also typical of how the Nova Scotia government has come to handle citizen inquiries.

For decades, the government published a telephone book of senior government officials. Now it requires sleuthing to uncover the phone number of any official.

Even when I try to call what used to be the direct line for various officials, the call is rooted to a low-level GateKeeper, who demands to know what I want and when I want it, and then we'll route the call as s/he sees fit.

Freedom of Information requests are no longer handled by the department that receives the request. That department still collects all the records that are responsive to the request, but a centralized committee within the in-apply named Access Nova Scotia does the redacting. This means that no departmental knowledge goes into deciding how to handle optional reductions, of which the ACT has many. Instead, all optional redactions are redacted, as if they were mandatory.