CategoryMachine Learning
Brains are not billions of little computers
Despite the hype. Also, life forms are not machines and neurons are not neural networks
Can Tim Berners-Lee, who invented the World Wide Web, save it from humanity?
Berners-Lee has launched a global campaign for a Magna Carta to “protect people’s rights online from threats such as fake news, prejudice and hate”
Canada demands intimate banking data from a half million citizens
The goal of the program, recently uncovered by media, is to develop a “new institutional personal information bank” for government use.A Canadian TV station recently provided a dramatic insight into how far Western governments are prepared to go, using advanced data gathering techniques, to surveil the lives of citizens: Statistics Canada is asking banks across the country for financial transaction data and personal information of 500,000 Canadians without their knowledge. Global News has learned. Documents obtained by Global News show the national statistical agency plans to collect “individual-level financial transactions data” and sensitive information, like social insurance numbers (SIN), from Canadian financial institutions to develop a “new institutional personal information bank.” Andrew Russell and David Akin, “EXCLUSIVE: Stats Canada requesting banking information of 500,000 Canadians without their knowledge” at Global News Further investigation showed that the government agency has already Read More ›
Human intelligence as a halting oracle
Jonathan Bartlett proposes to model the human mind as a halting oracle
Did AI show that we are “a peaceful species” triggered by religion?
No, but this episode shows how science media sometimes help mislead the publicUnfortunately, most of the public knows about science only through science media professionals. And it is apparent that science media professionals often know little to nothing of what they are talking about.
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A chilling snippet from mass surveillance in China
China is helping other countries restrict their citizens’ internet, while shunning the U.S.
Life after Google: More private and more profitable?
Reviewing Gilder’s Life after Google, Ralph Benko asks, If our attention is worth billions, shouldn’t we market it?
Too late to prevent being ruled by The Algorithm?
Dilbert’s creator, Scott Adams, tells Ben Shapiro why he thinks politicians soon won't matter
Who assumes moral responsibility for self-driving cars?
Can we discuss this before something happens and everyone is outsourcing the blame?
Self-driving vehicles are just around the corner
On the other side of a vast chasm…
Could AI write novels?
George Orwell thought so, as long as no thinking was involved
How Do Bitcoins Work Anyway?
And what's their future? A roundup for non-geeksEverywhere these days one hears people foretelling the fortunes of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin—like so many fairies, good and bad, wishing around a cradle. Most people, including New Yorker staff writer Nick Paumgarten, have hoped to just avoid the scene, partly because few enthusiasts can even explain what the cryptocurrencies are or why they exist. But Paumgarten dove in and his recent long form article offers helpful explanations along with illuminating profiles of digital currency pioneers. First, why? Bitcoin and Ethereum enthusiasts want, in Paumgarten’s words, “a better, decentralized version of the World Wide Web—a Web 3.0—more in keeping with the Internet’s early utopian promise than with the invidious, monopolistic hellscape it has become. They want to seize back the tubes, and Read More ›
Guess what? You already own a self-driving car
Tech hype hits the stratosphere
Would Google be happier if America were run more like China?
This might be a good time to ask
Facebook’s old motto was “Move fast and break things”
With the current advertising scandal, it might be breaking itself
AI computer chips made simple
The artificial intelligence chips that run your computer are not especially difficult to understand
Hacks damage Facebook, kill Google+
The internet changes everything. For example, it makes the Big Guys more vulnerable, not less vulnerable, than bit players
Did AI teach itself to “not like” women?
No, the program did not teach itself anything. But the situation taught the company something important about what we can safely automate.Back in 2014, it was a “holy grail” machine learning program, developed in Scotland, that would sift through online resumes, using a one-to-five star rating system and cull the top five of 100, saving time and money. Within a year, a problem surfaced: It was “not rating candidates for software developer jobs and other technical posts in a gender-neutral way.”
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