If you’ve used Planet Generator, you must’ve noticed how it offers, among other things, what I refer to as “civilizational data”. These also include trivia for the imaginary cultures of the program, in the style of “Arranging a visit to Orphne? Avoid Flöchixäwu — and its rather ferocious beasts”. Such phrases are examples of automatic text.
To be clear, these examples are not entirely automatic – in the sense, they’re not made out of thin air, perhaps using AI or at least combining texts from other sources. Rather, they’re based on syntactic patterns I’ve offered the program, together with sets of words to choose from.
But it’s precisely this simplicity that makes this strategy attractive. It’s trivial to use, and the possible combinations it can come up with is staggeringly high.
So, in this post, I’m offering you a look under the hood of Planet Generator, showing you how it generates its automatic text. It’s easy, educating (in terms of teaching us how language operates), and revealing.
