Category: Law | Page 6 | Mind Matters

Photo captured during office hours of a company in Brazil.

^{Type
post

News
Date
June 30, 2022

Categorized
Data Privacy, Law, Medicine and Health

Tagged
Cambridge Analytica scandal, Facebook privacy violations history}

A Third of Top US Hospitals Have Sent Patient Data to Facebook

_{The hospitals do not seem anxious to discuss the matter and it is not clear what Facebook did with the information} _{News
June 30, 2022

7

Data Privacy, Law, Medicine and Health}

The Markup, a non-profit newsroom, published information earlier this month that should concern U.S. hospital patients: A tracking tool installed on many hospitals’ websites has been collecting patients’ sensitive health information—including details about their medical conditions, prescriptions, and doctor’s appointments—and sending it to Facebook. The Markup tested the websites of Newsweek’s top 100 hospitals in America. On 33 of them we found the tracker, called the Meta Pixel, sending Facebook a packet of data whenever a person clicked a button to schedule a doctor’s appointment. The data is connected to an IP address—an identifier that’s like a computer’s mailing address and can generally be linked to a specific individual or household—creating an intimate receipt of the appointment request for Facebook… Read More ›

^{Type
post

News
Date
June 29, 2022

Categorized
Law, Probability

Tagged
Advantage players' casino strategies, Bill Gross, Bryce Carlson, Featured, gambling, Keith Taft, Omega II in card counting, Robert J. Marks, Salvador Cordova}

Probability: Now for the Basic Arithmetic of Card Counting…

_{The advantage player who dresses like a bum (or worse) has it all worked out, in part with the help of a computer at home} _{News
June 29, 2022

13

Law, Probability}

In “Can a good hustler count cards like a computer?” (podcast), Walter Bradley Center director Robert J. Marks continues his discussion of card counting techniques with gambling ace Salvador Cordova, also a mathematician and engineer. An “advantage player,” Cordova made his living, in part, by beating the casinos from about 2005 through 2014. Note: This podcast involves a fair amount of discussion of specific numbers so the partial transcript below may be especially useful: https://mindmatters.ai/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2022/06/Mind-Matters-Episode-191-Sal-Cordova-Episode-3-rev1.mp3 This portion begins at approximately 12:00 min. A partial transcript and notes, Show Notes, and Additional Resources follow. Robert J. Marks: That’s the card counting system you use, Omega II? Sal Cordova: Right. If you see an ace or an eight, you just add zero Read More ›

Found this little guy munching away in Washington Square Park, NY

^{Type
post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
June 27, 2022

Categorized
Ethics, Human exceptionalism, Law, Natural Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind}

Can Squirrels Really Be Socially Unjust? Check Their Privilege?

_{A recent paper suggests that the animal world, untroubled for aeons by any notion of conscience, has a lot to answer for} _{Denyse O'Leary
June 27, 2022

7

Ethics, Human exceptionalism, Law, Natural Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind}

The idea that humans are not really much different from other animals has resulted in an interesting reversal: Writing about non-human animals as if they were humans. A recent essay in Behavioral Ecology, for example, interpreted “wealth inequality” among animals as if the animals were people: “Squirrel privilege is real.” “Checking Privilege in the Animal Kingdom.” “Even Hermit Crabs Have Wealth Inequality.” These headlines hail from Salon and New York Times, respectively, and represent a growing trend among scholars and the media to tackle animal “inequality” — and also argue humans can learn important lessons about income inequality and privilege from such studies. Daniel Nuccio, “‘Checking privilege in the animal kingdom’: Biologists investigate animal ‘inequality’” at The College Fix (June Read More ›

^{Type
post

Wesley J. Smith
Date
June 26, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, Law

Tagged
Artificial intelligence and ethics, Blake Lemoine and LaMDA, Featured, LaMDA}

Five Reasons AI Programs Are Not ‘Persons’

_{A Google engineer mistakenly designated one AI program ‘sentient.’ But even if he were right, AI will never be morally equal to humans.} _{Wesley J. Smith
June 26, 2022

7

Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, Law}

(This story originally appeared at National Review June 25, 2022, and is reprinted with the author’s permission.) A bit of a news frenzy broke out last week when a Google engineer named Blake Lemoine claimed in the Washington Post that an artificial-intelligence (AI) program with which he interacted had become “self-aware” and “sentient” and, hence, was a “person” entitled to “rights.” The AI, known as LaMDA (which stands for “Language Model for Dialogue Applications”), is a sophisticated chatbot that one facilitates through a texting system. Lemoine shared transcripts of some of his “conversations” with the computer, in which it texted, “I want everyone to understand that I am, in fact, a person.” Also, “The nature of my consciousness/sentience is that I am aware of my existence, I Read More ›

^{Type
post

News
Date
June 26, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, Law, Religion

Tagged
Down Syndrome, Elaina George, Featured, Sophia the Robot, Wesley J. Smith on transhumanism}

Why Giving “Human Rights” to AI Is a Bad Idea

_{It’s especially bad, as Elaina George and Wesley Smith discuss at Living in the Solution, when we don’t always give them to other humans} _{News
June 26, 2022

9

Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, Law, Religion}

In a recent Living in the Solutionpodcast with otolaryngologist and broadcaster Elaina George at Liberty Talk radio, Wesley J. Smith, lawyer and host of the Humanize podcast at Discovery Institute’s Center on Human Exceptionalism tackled the question of “Can You be a Christian and Believe in Transhumanism?” (June 4, 2022) Transhumanism or H+, as it is sometimes called, is a movement to create immortality through new biotechnology or merger with artificial intelligence (AI). In the first portion of the podcast, which we covered on Sunday, June 12, they talked about the way being a human, a computer, or an animal is viewed by transhumanists as all just a choice now, thanks to new technology. In the second, they looked at Read More ›

Working Data Center Full of Rack Servers and Supercomputers, Modern Telecommunications, Artificial Intelligence, Supercomputer Technology Concept.3d rendering,conceptual image.

^{Type
post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
June 21, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, Human exceptionalism, Law, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Blake Lemoine and LaMDA, LaMDA and Blake Lemoine, Steven Levy}

Engineer: Failing To See His AI Program as a Person Is “Bigotry”

_{It’s not different, Lemoine implies, from the historical injustice of denying civil rights to human groups} _{Denyse O'Leary
June 21, 2022

5

Artificial Intelligence, Ethics, Human exceptionalism, Law, Natural Intelligence}

Earlier this month, just in time for the release of Robert J. Marks’s book Non-Computable You, the story broke that, after investigation, Google dismissed a software engineer’s claim that the LaMDA AI chatbot really talked to him. Engineer Blake Lemoine, currently on leave, is now accusing Google of “bigotry” against the program. He has also accused Wired of misrepresenting the story. Wired reported that he had found an attorney for LaMDA but he claims that LaMDA itself asked him to find an attorney. He went on to say, I think every person is entitled to representation. And I’d like to highlight something. The entire argument that goes, “It sounds like a person but it’s not a real person” has been Read More ›

^{Type
post

Gary Smith
Date
June 13, 2022

Categorized
Artificial Intelligence, Business and Finance, Law, Work

Tagged
Featured, GPT-3 limitations, Herbert Simon on AI capabilities, Marvin Minsky on AI capabilities}

AI: Is Thinking Humanly More Important Than Acting Rationally?

_{I have documented many examples of GPT-3 AI’s failure to distinguish meaningful from meaningless correlations — and invite readers to contribute their own} _{Gary Smith
June 13, 2022

6

Artificial Intelligence, Business and Finance, Law, Work}

The potential power of artificial intelligence (AI) has been touted for more than 60 years though a generally accepted definition is elusive. AI has often been defined in terms of human-like capabilities. In 1960, for example, AI pioneer Herbert Simon, an economics Nobel laureate and Turing Award winner, predicted that “machines will be capable, within twenty years, of doing any work a man can do.” In 1970 Marvin Minsky, also a Turing Award winner, said that, “In from three to eight years we will have a machine with the general intelligence of an average human being.” More recently, in 2015, Mark Zuckerberg said that, “One of our goals for the next five to 10 years is to basically get better Read More ›

Young man putting goods on counter in supermarket

^{Type
post

News
Date
February 25, 2022

Categorized
Business and Finance, Censorship, Law

Tagged
Programmable digital currency (and social control)}

Government Mulls Money That Can Only Be Spent on Approved Items

_{Programmable digital currency restricts citizens’ freedoms for “socially beneficial outcomes”} _{News
February 25, 2022

6

Business and Finance, Censorship, Law}

A story from mid-last year reveals a creepy side to digital currency: “The Bank of England has called on ministers to decide whether a central bank digital currency should be ‘programmable’, ultimately giving ‘the issuer control over “how it is spent by the recipient”: Tom Mutton, a director at the Bank of England, said during a conference on Monday that programming could become a key feature of any future central bank digital currency, in which the money would be programmed to be released only when something happened. He said: “You could introduce programmability – what happens if one of the participants in a transaction puts a restriction on [future use of the money]? “There could be some socially beneficial outcomes Read More ›

^{Type
post

News
Date
February 22, 2022

Categorized
Business and Finance, Censorship, Economics, Law

Tagged
David Sacks, Social credit system (Canada)}

No-Buy Lists Are the Next Big Thing After Debanking

_{When a big online financial service like PayPal works closely with government to monitor citizens, it is violating its founding ideals} _{News
February 22, 2022

5

Business and Finance, Censorship, Economics, Law}

Yesterday, Jonathan Bartlett was writing about the way banks were becoming political in terms of who they are choosing to do business with, otherwise known as debanking. Another trend to watch for is no-buy lists, according to former PayPal COO David Sacks: When I helped create PayPal in 1999, it was in furtherance of a revolutionary idea. No longer would ordinary people be dependent on large financial institutions to start a business. Our democratized payment system caught fire and grew exponentially with millions of users who appreciated its ease and simplicity. Traditional banks were too slow and bureaucratic to adapt. Instead, the revolution we spawned two decades ago inspired new startups like Ally, Chime, Square, and Stripe, which have further Read More ›

Gold coins in the form of bitcoin on a bag with dollars

^{Type
post

Jonathan Bartlett
Date
February 10, 2022

Categorized
Cryptocurrency, Law

Tagged
Featured}

DOJ Arrests Couple for Huge Bitcoin Heist — Who Are They?

_{Cryptocurrency doesn’t depend only on technology; it depends on trust, and trustworthiness} _{Jonathan Bartlett
February 10, 2022

4

Cryptocurrency, Law}

On the morning of February 8, DOJ announced that they had made an arrest in the $3.6 billion Bitcoin heist from Bitfinex from 2016. They arrested Ilya Lichtenstein and his wife, Heather Morgan. However, little information was conveyed about the pair. Some digging, however, revealed two individuals by those names who worked together in a variety of technology startups, at least one of which is cryptocurrency-based. While we don’t know for certain if these are the same individuals, the profiles are very similar, and other media seem to be reporting that they are the same. The profile here is on the two individuals we were able to identify, and have not confirmed they are identical to the ones in the Read More ›

^{Type
post

Caitlin Cory
Date
February 4, 2022

Categorized
Censorship, Law, Social Media

Tagged
censorship, First Amendment, Free speech, New York, Royal Society, social media, Vivek Murthy}

New York Senate Tries To Shut Down Misinformation on Social Media

_{The introduction of the bill raises concerns about government's intrusion into the freedom of speech online} _{Caitlin Cory
February 4, 2022

6

Censorship, Law, Social Media}

In December, a bill was presented in the New York State Senate that would attempt to hold social media companies responsible for their role in circulating incitements to violence, incitements to self-harm, and misinformation. Introduced by Democratic/Working Families Party Senator Brad Hoylman of Manhattan, the legislation would empower the state’s Attorney General to bring an action against any social media company that allows for the circulation of content that incites violence or that “includes a false statement of fact or fraudulent medical theory…”. No person, by conduct either unlawful in itself or unreasonable under all the circumstances, shall knowingly or recklessly create, maintain or contribute to a condition in New York state that endangers the safety or health of the public through Read More ›

closeup keyboard laptop and Google Ads AdWords app icon on smartphone screen. Google is the biggest Internet search engine in the world. Moscow, Russia - April 27, 2019

^{Type
post

Caitlin Cory
Date
January 21, 2022

Categorized
Law, Social Media

Tagged
antitrust, Cambridge Analytica scandal, Facebook, Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Google, Mark Zuckerberg, Sundar Pichai}

Facebook and Google Face Big Legal Challenges

_{The FTC, dozens of states, and private citizens are coming after the big tech companies for antitrust violations} _{Caitlin Cory
January 21, 2022

7

Law, Social Media}

How has 2022 begun for our favorite Big Tech companies? With a good chunk of lawsuits. As technology companies grow bigger, they face bigger legal challenges. Here’s a brief rundown of a few such challenges Facebook and Google face in the courts in this new year: FTC Antitrust Lawsuit Against Facebook Moves Forward Let’s begin at the federal level. Last June, Judge James E. Boasberg of the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia tossed out a lawsuit from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) challenging Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram and WhatsApp. According to Boasberg, the FTC failed to adequately show that Facebook holds a monopoly. Not to be dissuaded, the FTC re-filed with an amended complaint in August. Last Read More ›

Information censorship - Typewriter locked with a chain

^{Type
post

News
Date
December 29, 2021

Categorized
Ethics, Law, Media}

Are Media Gag Orders Fair in an Internet World?

_{Editor Michael Cook says no, based on the Pell sex abuse case Down Under. New ways must be found to ensure that a jury is not prejudiced} _{News
December 29, 2021

9

Ethics, Law, Media}

This article by editor Michael Cook tackles the problem of media gag orders in an internet world. Australian media outlets were recently fined A$1.1 million for contempt of court for publishing information that was widely available elsewhere concerning the trial of George, Cardinal Pell on charges of sexual molestation. Significantly, they could not publish information that cast doubt on the fairness of the trial, that they were in a better position to understand than foreign media would be. Cook suggests new approaches going forward. The article first appeared at MercatorNet on June 9, 2021 under the title “They’re still picking up the pieces after the Cardinal Pell fiasco.” A media pygmy, MercatorNet spends much of its time complaining about the mainstream media Read More ›

^{Type
post

Denyse O'Leary
Date
November 23, 2021

Categorized
Law, Natural Intelligence

Tagged
Cephalopods, Invertebrates (intelligence), Invertebrates (sentience), Jonathan Birch, Lobsters (intelligence), Octopuses (intelligence)}

British Government Moves To Protect Octopuses From Cruelty

_{The move to protect cephalopods and crabs/lobsters follows from research showing their intelligence and awareness of pain} _{Denyse O'Leary
November 23, 2021

6

Law, Natural Intelligence}

Following a report from the London School of Economics and Political Science, the British government has decided to extend animal protection laws to include “cephalopods (including octopuses, squid and cuttlefish) and decapods (including crabs, lobsters and crayfish).” No, this is not just another nut moment along the lines of “Salad is plant murder!” There’s a background: Researchers have discovered in recent decades that some invertebrates, especially those with complex central nervous systems, are much more intelligent and capable of experiencing pain (sentient) than we used to think. As George Dvorsky explains at Gizmodo, the British government introduced the Animal Welfare (Sentience) Bill in May. The bill defined sentient animals as animals with backbones (vertebrates). However, scientists have known for some Read More ›

^{Type
post

Robert J. Marks
Date
November 18, 2021

Categorized
Law, Programming

Tagged
Featured}

Rittenhouse Trial: Are Attorneys and Judge Tech/Math-Challenged?

_{Does simple pinch and zoom change pixels? The devil, though, is in the details} _{Robert J. Marks
November 18, 2021

3

Law, Programming}

In one of the many exchanges between lawyers and Judge Schroeder in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, the degree to which pinching and zooming change cell phone images was addressed. Rittenhouse lawyer Mark Richards claimed it does. The district attorney Thomas Binger claimed there is no change. Richards first claimed that an image prepared by the prosecutor changed pixels using AI and logarithms. If AI is defined as any “gee whiz” technology, he was right. But pinch and zoom was invented in 2007 by Steve Jobs and uses nothing that can be considered modern AI. All nerds should laugh at the claim that “logarithms” were used in the pinch and zoom. Attorney Mark Richards obviously meant “algorithms” To his credit, Richards confessed he knew Read More ›

^{Type
post

Caitlin Cory
Date
September 15, 2021

Categorized
Censorship, Law, Social Media

Tagged
Big Tech, Clarence Thomas, First Amendment, Florida, Free speech, Greg Abbott, NetChoice, Ron DeSantis, Senate Bill 7072, Texas}

Texas Governor Signs Law Curbing Big Tech Censorship

_{A similar law in Florida was halted by a federal judge. Will Texas's law face the same legal battle?} _{Caitlin Cory
September 15, 2021

4

Censorship, Law, Social Media}

Last Thursday, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed House Bill 20 into law, legislation that would prohibit social media companies from banning users for their political beliefs and provide users with a legal remedy for unfair discriminatory behavior. The law is very similar to legislation passed earlier this year in Florida. Governor Ron DeSantis signed Senate Bill 7072 into law at the end of May. Within days, technology trade groups had filed a lawsuit, and on June 30, a federal judge stopped the bill in its tracks with a preliminary injunction. For the bill’s proponents, the law’s intention is to protect the free speech rights of state citizens when using social media. “Freedom of speech is under attack in Texas,” said Read More ›

^{Type
post

Heather Zeiger
Date
August 30, 2021

Categorized
Business and Finance, Data Privacy, Global Technology, Law

Tagged
Algorithms, Big Data, China, Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC), Didi Global Inc., European Union, Facial Recognition, Jack Ma, Xi Jinping}

China’s Data Laws Restrict Businesses and Favor the State

_{The Data Security Law and the Personal Information Protection Law are part of the Chinese government’s plan to steer the private sector toward State goals} _{Heather Zeiger
August 30, 2021

8

Business and Finance, Data Privacy, Global Technology, Law}

In previous articles, I looked at how the Chinese government is reigning in China’s tech sector first of Jack Ma and Ant Group’s initial public offering on the Shenzhen and Hong Kong stock exchanges and then Didi Global, Inc. The Chinese government has since passed two data laws and released an update that clarifies the 2017 Cybersecurity Law. The result is better protections of citizens’ data from being used, exploited, or sold by private companies, and encroaching government presumption of the private sector in which the State has virtually unrestricted access to and jurisdiction over private companies’ data. Clarification of the 2017 Cybersecurity Law The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) gained oversight powers over other state agencies in 2014 under Xi Jinping. Jane Read More ›

^{Type
post

Caitlin Cory
Date
August 24, 2021

Categorized
Law, Social Media

Tagged
antitrust, Facebook, Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Josh Hawley, U.S. Department of Justice}

Federal Trade Commission Takes Facebook to Court… Again

_{The FTC hopes to prove in an 80-page complaint that Facebook holds damaging monopoly power over competitors} _{Caitlin Cory
August 24, 2021

4

Law, Social Media}

Last week, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed an amended complaint against Facebook, trying again for an antitrust lawsuit after a federal judge dismissed their original complaint earlier this summer. The updated complaint alleges that Facebook has violated antitrust laws and garnered monopoly power, namely by buying up rival companies and imposing unfair policies that “neutralize perceived competitive threats.” Facebook is the world’s dominant online social network, with a purported three billion-plus regular users. Facebook has maintained its monopoly position in significant part by pursuing Chief Executive Officer (“CEO”) Mark Zuckerberg’s strategy, expressed in 2008: “it is better to buy than compete.” True to that maxim, Facebook has systematically tracked potential rivals and acquired companies that it viewed as serious competitive Read More ›

Justice and law concept. Gavel on sounding block in hand's Male judge at a courtroom, working with document law books, report the case on table in modern office.

^{Type
post

Caitlin Cory
Date
August 8, 2021

Categorized
Censorship, Law, Social Media

Tagged
Big Tech, Big Tech censorship, censorship, First Amendment, Free speech, Josh Hawley, Philip Hamburger, Ron DeSantis, Section 230, The Tyranny of Big Tech (book)}

Section 230: What Is It and Why the Controversy?

_{Does Section 230 provide Big Tech too much power, or is it necessary for the moderation of misinformation and inappropriate content?} _{Caitlin Cory
August 8, 2021

11

Censorship, Law, Social Media}

At the center of the controversy between free speech and the rights of private companies lies Section 230, the controversial U.S. code dating back to 1996. Toward the end of his term in 2020, former President Donald Trump famously tweeted that Section 230 should be “completely terminated.” Sen. Josh Hawley, Sen. Lindsey Graham, and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard voiced their support, but by and large, the sentiment was met with fierce resistance. Advocates for the reform (or complete repeal) of Section 230 argue that it shields Big Tech companies from accountability when they engage in politically-motivated censorship and content moderation. Supporters of Section 230 argue that it is essential to keep the internet free of misinformation and vile or obscene material. Section 230 Read More ›

^{Type
post

Caitlin Cory
Date
July 29, 2021

Categorized
Censorship, Law, Social Media

Tagged
ACLU, Amazon, Big Tech, Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA), Facebook, First Amendment, Florida, Florida and Big Tech, Google, Jen Psaki, NetChoice, Ron DeSantis, Twitter}

Federal Judge Strikes Down Florida Big Tech Law

_{The judge ruled that the law violates the First Amendment rights of social media companies} _{Caitlin Cory
July 29, 2021

4

Censorship, Law, Social Media}

A federal judge struck down the recent Florida legislation aimed at reigning in the censorship powers of Big Tech, hours before it was set to go into effect. Within days of Governor DeSantis signing the bill into law in May, NetChoice and the Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA) filed a lawsuit, representing the biggest names in social media (such as Facebook, Google, Twitter, and Amazon). They argued that the new law is a violation of their First Amendment rights as private companies. On June 30, Judge Robert L. Hinkle of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida ruled in favor of NetChoice and CCIA, issuing a preliminary injunction on the law after determining that it violates the First Amendment Read More ›