Tag: ai

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Is future bright or domination over others? Live life on our own terms

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Ancient Oracles and medieval astrology that preceded used to be the prophets of the yesteryears which is taken over by the Tech empires. Award-winning University of Oxford Professor Carissa Véliz in Prophecy argues why we must reclaim that power and shows us how.   For thousands of years, oracles, seers and astrologers advised leaders and commoners alike about the future. But predictions are often power plays in disguise obfuscating accountability and stripping individuals of their agency. Today we face the same threat of powerful prophets but under a new façade: tech.   Not only do modern predictions made by tech … Continue reading Is future bright or domination over others? Live life on our own terms

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Free Will and Prediction are vital to intelligence, brain and life itself

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For some AI researchers a large neural net that predicts next words seems to produce a system with general intelligence, although neuroscientists believe that the brain evolved precisely to predict the future- the “predictive brain” hypothesis. Blaise Agüera Y Arcas, vice president of Google, programmer and founder of its research team Paradigms of Intelligence,  in What Is Intelligence, prediction is fundamental not only to intelligence and the brain, but to life itself – by exploring the wide-ranging implications. The radical perspectives on the computational properties of living systems, the evolutionary and social origins of intelligence, the relationship between models and reality, … Continue reading Free Will and Prediction are vital to intelligence, brain and life itself

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Instruments of Wealth extraction which aids the spread of autocracy

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“The magic of Tim Wu’s The Age of Extraction is its simplicity, and breaks down one of the greatest challenges of our age- the unaccountable power of tech platforms, explaining your online life is draining your wallet. Our world is dominated by a handful of tech platforms, who provide great conveniences and entertainment, but also stand as some of the most effective instruments of wealth extraction ever invented, seizing immense amount of money, data, and attention from all of us. An economy driven by digital platforms and AI influence offers the potential to enrich us, and also threatens to marginalize … Continue reading Instruments of Wealth extraction which aids the spread of autocracy

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Future: Race to invent

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On 17 November, 2023, Sam Altman (38), the enigmatic leader of the AI revolution and the head of OpenAI, buoyed by release of his company’s ChatGPT, was fired on a video call which quickly made headlines around the world. A week later, Altman was back running the company he had cofounded – and most of the directors who voted to fire him were themselves removed from the board, demonstrating his power to bend reality to his will and of how vicious and personal the rush to create this world-changing technology. He set out on a world tour that brought audiences … Continue reading Future: Race to invent

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Spotify sold itself to major record labels as musicians earnings fell

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Music critic and journalist, Liz Pelly, weaves an unsparing investigation into Spotify’s origins and influence on music, with incisive cultural criticism, illuminating how streaming is reshaping music for listeners and artists alike. If you stream a song on Spotify, how money does the artist make? Spotify has been profoundly damaging for all but the most commercially successful musicians and even shaped the kind of music that they make. Like several digital start-ups, Spotify, founded in Sweden in 2006 by tech entrepreneurs Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon, purported to be revolutionsing an industry when really it was just reinforcing the status … Continue reading Spotify sold itself to major record labels as musicians earnings fell

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Has Silicon Valley lost its way?

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Palantir Technologies, a company that is intertwined with the national security state, Silicon Valley’s utopian tech thinking was always untethered from reality and it’s a good thing that it is now ending. Palantir’s co-founder and CEO Alexander C. Karp and Nicholas W. Zamiska claims that in order for the West to retain its global edge – and preserve the freedoms we take for granted – the software industry must renew its commitment to addressing our urgent challenges, including the new arms race for artificial intelligence. Government, in turn, must embrace the most effective features of the engineering mindset that have … Continue reading Has Silicon Valley lost its way?

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Apple has agreed to pay £77m to settle a court case

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Apple has agreed to pay £77m ($95m) to settle a court case aIleging some of its devices were listening to people without their permission. The tech giant was accused of eavesdropping on its customers through its virtual assistant Siri, as the claimants also allege voice recordings were shared with advertisers. Apple’s lawyers say they will confirm they have permanently deleted individual Siri audio recordings collected by Apple prior to October 2019. The tech firm denies any wrongdoing, as well as claims that it “recorded, disclosed to third parties, or failed to delete conversations recorded as the result of a “Siri … Continue reading Apple has agreed to pay £77m to settle a court case

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Bot-distributed misinformation

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Supremacy is  behind-the scenes story of the ruthless shadow battle between Microsoft and Google and their AI companies, their struggles to use their tech for good and the dangerous direction that they’re now going.  Human brain power outstripped by AI. Five years ago no one had heard of Open AI. Now the research firm is powering Microsoft’s software, writing everything from code to school essays and bot-distributed misinformation. In Supremacy AI, ChatGPT and the Race that Will Change the World, journalist Parmy Olson  carefully tracks the rise of two young companies, – the American OpenAI and the British rival DeepMind, … Continue reading Bot-distributed misinformation

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How a $300 gadget can do what $80million F-35 can’t

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Raj M Shah, a 27-year-old US Airforce Captain, on a patrol in 2006, was flying an F-16 fighter jet near Iraq’s border with Iran when he realised that he did not know which side of the border he was on, as he lost sense of direction.  That was a serious problem, entering Iranian airspace could cause an international incident, worse still he might be shot down. Although the $30million F-16 was among the world’s most advanced jets, its navigation system could not graphically pinpoint his location on a moving map. Shah back at base, figured out a simple hack, by … Continue reading How a $300 gadget can do what $80million F-35 can’t

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Embrace the power of AI as the ultimate learning tool

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Salman Khan, in his twenties was working as a hedge fund analyst in Boston when his 12-year-old cousin form New Orleans asked him for  some help with maths, which prompted him to tutor Nadia over the phone and she went from the remedial class to being the top maths student in her school. Soon Khan, decides to give remote lessons in Calculus and Algebra to his other 15 cousins in Louisiana.  He created a website by writing the software that  generated practice questions and recorded videos  to put on YouTube. Soon tens of thousands of students watching his online tutorials … Continue reading Embrace the power of AI as the ultimate learning tool