Dr Ima Kwak hesitated. The oblique angle of the antique mirror captured him seated in his wood-panelled office; the leather olive-green captain\u2019s chair highlighted his status. He caught himself glancing and sighed. That advert had sounded promising.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cImmersive Scenarios ensure every trainee surgeon is practice-ready for ONLY<\/strong><\/em> a fraction of your traditional cost.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Still he held back from clicking the know-more<\/em> link. The responsibilities of Regional Post-Graduate Dean in Medical Education had over the 26 years seeped, morphed and varicosed as if from an untreatable haemophiliac. It now included fiscal responsibility and he was at heart a clinician not an accountant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n Who to consult? Any colleagues who might understand would regard peer consultation as a sign of indecision, weakness and him as a prime candidate for early retirement. He was not ready for that. Golfing friends would simply be unable to grasp what he was talking about. His wife had no interest beyond the conference stays at lavish hotels,- with their private hot-tubs and exotic therapies: their 1500 thread Egyptian Cotton sheets: their fine-dining tasting menus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The baitings of his youth,\u201cHere comes duck-face…quack quack,\u201d<\/em> had been decisive in turning an unfortunate name into an asset\u2026 he was unforgettable. Perhaps this had been a clever ploy on the part of his Korean parents. He remembered them as aspirational, courageous and above all supportive. He had never had the nerve to quiz them about his name\u2019s origin. Now it was too late.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So who to turn to? Chat GPT seemed worth a try.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cExplain how an image is formed in a mirror\u201d Dr Kwak asked<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt depends if the mirror is plane or curved. In a plane mirror the light rays converge and this indicates a real image. This is represented formulaic-ally with a plus sign. In a convex mirror the light rays only appear<\/em> to be converging and this happens behind the mirror, so the image is a virtual image, \u2013 negative if you use the algorithm\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cVirtual not real? Does that mean a false image? a false reality? And what does \u201creverse error\u201d <\/strong>on the printermean\u2026.. that it\u2019s incorrectly scanned as positive when it\u2019s actually negative? If I see myself in a mirror am I seeing my real self or a false self, an avatar? Speak!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cLets not go down that philosophical rabbit hole\u201d The seductive female GBT voice had rapidly learnt that a self-deprecating presentation of ignorance was more acceptable to Ima than than outright admission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cOK Move on. When would you treat peroneal weakness surgically and what would it cost within 5 to 10 percent\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFor 3rd<\/sup> degree tears after childbirth when reconstructive surgery is necessary.\u201d Costing impossible to assess without further information\u201d Chat GBT purred <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNo peroneal, the outer side of the leg, not the perineal, pelvic floor.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s the problem with these chatbots.. Their hearing is flawed and they get easily confused.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n Dr Kwak thought as he returned to the advert and clicked the know-more<\/em> link<\/p>\n\n\n\n He looked towards the mirror. A blank.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Dr Ima Kwak hesitated. The oblique angle of the antique mirror captured him seated in his wood-panelled office; the leather olive-green captain\u2019s chair highlighted his status. He caught himself glancing and sighed. That advert had sounded promising. \u201cImmersive Scenarios ensure every trainee surgeon is practice-ready for ONLY a fraction of your traditional cost.\u201d Still he held […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"no","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_10158782359051062_103813597863211":"","twitter_1225722811282530305_1225722811282530305":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[{"account":"facebook_10158782359051062_103813597863211","service":"facebook","timestamp":1753429130,"status":"success"},{"account":"twitter_1225722811282530305_1225722811282530305","service":"twitter","timestamp":1753429131,"status":"error"}],"rop_publish_now_status":"done","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1490,1646],"tags":[1007,95,8,122,20,1675,1676,1218,816,525,1677,687,11,160,117],"class_list":["post-2460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1490","category-the-mirror","tag-dr","tag-had","tag-he","tag-him","tag-his","tag-image","tag-kwak","tag-mirror","tag-now","tag-only","tag-ready","tag-their","tag-was","tag-who","tag-would"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbrNJE-DG","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2460"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2460\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2462,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2460\/revisions\/2462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.swanseawriterscircle.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}