TagDonald Trump
Robert J. Marks on Fox News
Dr. Marks talked about the hype over AI and where the danger really liesRobert J. Marks, director of the Walter Bradley Center, was the subject of a new op-ed at Fox News, which featured his unique insights on artificial intelligence and how it can best be used by human beings. Contrary to much of the present alarmism over AI systems like ChatGPT, Marks remains level-headed about AI’s place in today’s world, pushing back against “sci-fi” apocalypticism while at the same time addressing real issues and concerns. Marks said, “No, AI is not going to take over. You’re not going to be its pet in the future. It’s going to be a tool which disrupts society, but we’re still going to be in charge. -Scott Whitlock, AI expert warns of too much ‘hype’: Humans Read More ›
Note to Parents: Grooming and Wokeness Are Embedded in Chatbots
With or without tuning, all AI chatbots are biased one way or another. AI without bias is like water without wetFirst impressions of a person can be wrong. Further interactions can reveal disturbing personality warts. Contrary to initial impressions, we might find out they lie, they are disturbingly woke, they can’t do simple math, their politics is on the extreme left, and they have no sense of humor or common sense. I have just described Open AI’s GPT3 chatbot, ChatGPT. Initially, users are gobsmacked by the its performance. Its flashy prose responses to simple queries look amazing. But become roommates with the chatbot for a few hours and its shortcomings become evident . It can’t get its facts straight, can’t do simple math problems, hates Donald Trump, and is being groomed to be “woke.” Its performance warts are so numerous that Bradley Center Senior Fellow Gary N. Smith hoists a Read More ›
Why Do Twitter Jobs Matter More Than Data Privacy?
The Musk ‘n Twitter show won’t leave town any time soon and it obscures a much bigger, deeper issueElon Musk sure knows how to create a drama. First, a brief update because you probably had better things to do this weekend: Doom I! “1,200 Twitter Employees Resign, Company Closes All Offices” (Rolling Stone, November 18, 2022) Get this: “Twitter offices have been closed down and employees are resigning in droves, leading to growing fears that the service could shut down at any time.” (ScreenRant, November 18, 2022) “While it’s unlikely that Twitter will shut down entirely, departing employees are warning of service outages, glitches and safety risks. (NPR November 18, 2022) Worth noting: Musk has reinstated satire site Babylon Bee and Project Veritas, and, after conducting a poll, has also reinstated former U.S. president Donald Trump (who currently Read More ›
Trump Releases Truth Social, Users Run Into Errors
The jury is out on whether this will stand as a true rival to TwitterLast week, former President Trump unveiled his new social media app: Truth Social, a free-speech alternative to Twitter. It immediately became the number one free app on Apple’s App Store and boasted half a million users within its first forty-eight hours. But hiccups soon followed, including error messages and long wait times for access to the platform. The app went live on February 21, which was (perhaps not coincidentally) President’s Day. But those who signed up to join were automatically placed on a waitlist, numbering in the hundreds of thousands. When a Post reporter tried to sign up for a Truth social account on Tuesday morning, he was told that he was number 387,392 on a waitlist. “We love you, and you’re Read More ›
Florida Governor, Nation States, Take On Big Tech
Rattled by censorship and deplatforming, many jurisdictions are looking at ways to make Silicon Valley respect citizens’ rights. Florida’s Governor DeSantis may be the most colorfulAt a press conference on Monday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis offered a look at new legislation that forms part of his initiative to reduce the power of Big Social Media to harvest and sell data on users: The act, should it pass muster in the state House and Senate, would force tech platforms to disclose what data they have on Floridians to those users and delete that information if requested. The law would also ask companies not to sell the data and would create legal avenues to sue for noncompliance. Whether one state will be able to regulate such massive companies that operate on a global scale remains to be seen — likely in a court of law. Emily Jacobs, Read More ›
How Russia Uses New Tech to Create Chaos in the United States
Information warfare is part of the new Russian warfare strategy known as the Gerasimov and Primakov doctrinesIn last Thursday’s podcast, Walter Bradley Center director Robert J. Marks hosted Denise Simon, an intelligence analyst, talking about the way hostile foreign powers can use AI to generate false information. Denise Simon describes that and other techniques as a “new art form” and this time she explains how Russia uses it against the United States. https://episodes.castos.com/mindmatters/Mind-Matters-119-Denise-Simon.mp3 A partial transcript follows. This portion begins at about 09.33. Show notes and links follow. Robert J. Marks: We’ve been talking primarily about disrupting media with fake news. What other sort of things are the Russians doing? Denise Simon: They will create fake companies in the United States. They will hide money and people in the United States. In fact, they just found Read More ›
Mexican President Wants Free Speech Coalition Re Social Media
“How can a company act as if it was all powerful, omnipotent, as a sort of Spanish Inquisition on what is expressed?” he asked.In response to the recent banning of former United States President Donald Trump from Facebook and Twitter, Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador announced last week that he is organizing a coalition of global leaders to seek solutions to the power currently wielded by social media giants. “I can tell you that at the first G20 meeting we have, I am going to make a proposal on this issue,” he said on Thursday. “Yes, social media should not be used to incite violence and all that, but this cannot be used as a pretext to suspend freedom of expression.” According to the Washington Post, one of his proposed solutions is a “state-run social network” that would exist “without censorship” as Read More ›
Does Government Watch Us on Social Media? Yes… So Does Business
They may all be getting to know you way better than you feel comfortable withDiscerning public opinion on political and national security issues via social media platforms showed its worth during the Arab Spring of 2010. The protests, which began in Tunisia, spread throughout the Middle East, where social media were the key platform for expressing anger about corruption, poverty, human rights violations, unemployment, and authoritarianism. These protests resulted in changes to leadership and policy in Libya, Egypt, and Yemen. They also resulted in immigration issues and sadly, even terror attacks, military conflicts, and civil war. Social media not only enables coordinated action such as rallies, strikes, resistance, riots, and other methods of activism but also provides status reports and communicates outcomes. One research team has developed an AI metric for predicting such events: Read More ›
Election Models: Predicting the Past is Easy — and Useless
You can seldom see where you are going by looking in a rear-view mirror
Twenty Years on, Aliens Still Cause Global Warming
Over the years, the Jurassic Park creator observed, science has drifted from its foundation as an objective search for truth toward political power gamesIn 2003, author and filmmaker Michael Crichton (1942–2008), best known for Jurassic Park, made a now-famous speech at Caltech, titled “Aliens Cause Global Warming.” The title was humorous but the content was serious. He was not addressing some strange theory of global warming; he was warning about the politicization of science. Crichton (left, in 2002, courtesy Jon Chase, Harvard CC 3.0), noted that, over the years, science has drifted away from its foundation as an objective search for truth and given itself over to political power games. The first time that he witnessed that was with the famous Drake Equation, used to turn SETI speculations about space aliens into a science. The Drake equation was a series of probabilities multiplied Read More ›
Serious Investors Should Embrace the Stock Market Algos!
We can use computers’ inability to distinguish meaning from noise in data to our advantageComputer algorithms are much, much better than humans at discovering statistical patterns but much, much worse than humans at discerning whether the patterns are meaningful. Wise investors can use the resulting blips to their advantage.
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Prof: Google Must Not Choose the Next President
Robert Epstein, a Clinton supporter in 2016, thinks Big Tech meddling is a risk. And, he says, he isn’t planning on suicideHe doesn’t want Silicon Valley to use its near-monopoly power over search engines and social media to manipulate the information available to the lone voter in the booth.
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Random Thoughts on the Passing Scene: How to Spell Gud
Also, Google and Apple ditching college degree requirements is not really that newTwenty years or so ago, when I worked in Seattle, Microsoft was famous for the testing coding skills of their applicants and asking Mensa-like questions. Degrees were secondary.
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