Bob Burr versus The Machine

There's a story that I remember from childhood, though most of the details are fuzzy now. It was about Paul Bunyan,the giant lumberjack, and his blue ox Babe. Some city slicker with  a  steam-powered  logging  machine  came  to  town  and challenged them to a contest to see who could do the most work in a certain amount of time. I don't remember how it came out, though I do seem to remember that Paul Bunyan and Babe wandered sadly into the sunset at the end of the tale, so I guess they got beat. It was one of those tales with a certain educational value to it, but I didn't know that the lesson had stuck with me ... until I saw it re-enacted last week.

Instead  of  Paul  Bunyan,  the  legendary  lumberjack, representing the human race, it was Bob Burr the legendary Sherlockian homebody. And rather than a steam-powered logging machine,  encroaching  technology's  champion  was  my  new computer with its CD drive and "SHERLOCK HOLMES on disc!".

The contest was foreshadowed about a year ago, when, in anticipation of an eventual leap in our household technology, I picked up a copy of the Sherlockian Canon on compact disc. The disc included a word search program that claimed to be able to find any word that appeared in the stories, and Ispent the whole year eagerly awaiting a chance to use it.

Then, as destiny would have it. Bob sent out a flyer on this year's Hansom picnic just as my new computer came in. On the flyer was the statement, "As far as I can determine, the word 'picnic' appears nowhere in the Sacred Writings, but we will have one anyway."

Suddenly I had a way to test this quantum leap in Sherlockian research.  I  typed the word "picnic"  into my computer and told it to search. It instantly pointed to HOUN and old Frankland saying, "And I've closed the wood where the Fernworthy  folk used  to  picnic."  Rubbing  my  hands  with devilish glee, I called Bob.

Long-time readers of P & D know that Bob's Sherlockianspecialty has always been food in the Canon. He has gone to great pains in his readings of the stories to take note of every reference to edibles, be they literal or figurative,and he has all that research catalogued and indexed. He used it to test both Goodrich's Good Old Index and Harrington's Canonical Index when they came out. Now we were going to put Bob's  research  up  against  a  colder,  more  unforgiving opponent. Bob versus the machine.

"Try chestnut," Bob suggested.  I  typed  it into the computer. The computer came up with four references.

"I've got seven," Bob replied and we started comparing.Soon I noticed that some of Bob's references to "chestnut"had an "s" on the end. I quickly typed in "chestnuts." The computer spit back the remaining three references.

We went through "cocoanut." Bob and the computer matched up. We went through "curacao." Bob and the computer matched up. Bob threw out challenge after challenge, and the computer met his every query. Finally, we came to "olive."

Bob had two references. The computer had three.

"Guess I missed one," Bob admitted. It was like watching Paul Bunyan and Babe wander sadly into the sunset all over again. Bob was my expert on food and drink in the Canon. It was depressing to see him replaced by technology. Next the damn machine would  start  listing  references  to  Holmes's methods and make me obsolete, too.

Later on I typed "food" into the computer. Twenty-four references, it told me. The word "food" occurs 24 times. Ithen called and asked Bob how many references there are to food in the Canon. His answer was "around sixty to sixty-five." He wasn't sure, because it all depends upon what you classify as  food.  Beef,  scones,  chestnuts  ...  all these things are food to Bob. To the computer, only “food” is food.

Likewise, if you ask my computer to find all the killers in the stories, it will tell you there was only one. Never mind that a few dozen people were killed in the Canon. My computer says there was only one killer, and it only knows that because he was called "Killer" Evans. Life is hardly that simple,  for murder investigators or Sherlockian food scholars.

I hope Bob doesn't walk sadly into the sunset just yet.