CategorySocial Factors
Your Phone Knows Everything Now
And in a world where no data is anonymous, yours may be sold to the highest bidder
Research Showing That Fake News Easily Fools Us Collapses
A recent paper claiming that low-quality news (“fake news”) spreads as quickly on social media as accurate news has been retracted by its authors.
It’s 2019: Begin the AI Hype Cycle Again!
Media seemingly can’t help portraying today’s high-tech world as a remake of I, Robot (2004), starring you and me.
Can an Algorithm Be Racist?
No, the machine has no opinion. It processes vast tracts of data. And, as a result, the troubling hidden roots of some data are exposed
How Can Information Theory Help the Economy Grow?
New information is the true source of new wealth; everyone wins when we learn how to produce it more efficiently
4: Making AI Look More Human Makes It More Human-like!
AI help, not hype, with Robert J. Marks: Technicians can do a lot these days with automated lip-syncs and smiles but what’s behind them?
5: AI Can Fight Hate Speech!
AI can carry out its programmers’ biases and that’s all
9: Will That Army Robot Squid Ever Be “Self-Aware”?
AI help, not hype: What would it take for a robot to be self-aware?
10. Is AI Really Becoming “Human-like”?
AI help, not hype: Here’s #10 of our Top Ten AI hypes, flops, and spins of 2018
Google Search: Its Secret of Success Revealed
The secret is not the Big Data pile. No, Google found a way to harness YOUR wants and needsGoogle is one of the most widely misunderstood success stories of our time. Many of us equate Google with “Big Data,” that is, amassing huge quantities of data and then finding useful statistical patterns. But is that how it succeeded? In Life after Google: The Fall of Big Data and the Rise of the Blockchain Economy, George Gilder criticizes Google primarily on two fronts: First, it is a “walled garden,” a great platform, but inherently isolated and closed. That is a point worth exploring, but not the focus here. The second point, the one I want to touch on, is that Big Data’s day has come and gone. Because Google is a Big Data company, its brightest days are behind it. Read More ›
Study Shows Eating Raisins Causes Plantar Warts
Sure. Because, if you torture a Big Data enough, it will confess to anything
No, Twitter Is Not the New Awful
It’s the Old Awful back for more. It’s the Town Without Pity we all tried to get away from
Consumers Were Not Buying Robots as Friends This Year
The market for drudgery busters remains strong. For dogs and pals, not so much
Can Big Data Help Make Your Book a Best Seller?
It’s more likely to help you picture your odds more clearly and clarify your goals
Science Confronts Credibility Issues?
Not to worry, prestigious researchers blame them on social media trolls and bots
Who Does the Concept of “Intellectual Property” Really Benefit?
Was traditional copyright law meant to protect algorithms that decide people’s financial fate?
Does Democracy Demand a War on Twitterbots?
A key concern is that citizens could be induced to vote for a demagogue by Twitterbots spreading fake news.
Tom Stoppard’s New Play Tackles Consciousness Itself
Consciousness is a hard problem for science, principally because no one quite understands what makes us the subjects of our experiences.