Super-literate software reads and comprehends better than humans. IN A lab next to the river on New York’s Upper West Side a computer will soon start reading. It is part of a cadre of computers that are learning to read more like humans, helping us digest and understand society’s huge volumes of text on a large scale. Called the Declassification Engine, it will comb through 4.5 million US State Department cables from the 1930s to the 1980s – everything the department has declassified so far. It’s more than any human could read, but the software will analyse the lot, mapping social connections and looking for new narratives about the behaviour of US diplomats and officials abroad in the 20th century, says Owen Rambow, a computer scientist at Columbia University, which runs the Declassification Engine.
“A cable might talk about a meeting with the foreign minister of Turkey,” says Rambow. Advertisement The Declassification Engine isn’t the only computer with the ability to read. “You could ask similar questions about everyday life,” says Chaturvedi. Uk.businessinsider. Most human beings get about 75 years of existence. That's about 3,900 weeks. Or 27,000 days. Or 648,000 hours. We spend about a third of those hours sleeping, a number that hasn't changed much over the centuries. What has changed is what we do with the remaining time. As the following two charts show, over the past 150 years, thanks to the irrepressible inventiveness and ingenuity of the human animal, we have engineered a profound shift in what we do with our waking hours.
There are 168 hours in a week. 56 go to sleeping, which leaves 112 for everything else. 150 years ago, we spent about 70 of those 112 waking hours working. Thanks to the remarkable productivity enhancements we have made over the past 150 years, the average workweek in most countries has dropped by about 30 hours: Max Roser, Our World In Data This remarkable drop in working hours has freed up a lot of extra time. We spend them watching television. Ofcom. Andrew McAfee – Non-Technologists Agree: It’s the Technology.
Two papers came out last year that examined important issues around jobs and wages. Both are in top journals. Both were written by first-rate researchers, none of whom specialize in studying the impact of technology. And both came to the same conclusion: that digital technologies were largely responsible for the phenomena they examined. The first paper, by David Dorn and my MIT colleague David Autor, is about how jobs and wages changed in America from 1980-2005. Equally admirable are the graphs the authors draw to illustrate their main findings. Autor and Dorn are clear on what accounts for this shift: The adoption of computers substitutes for… workers performing routine tasks—such as bookkeeping, clerical work, and repetitive production and monitoring activities—which are readily computerized because they follow precise, well-defined procedures.
And what doesn’t: Is this because of globalization? The AI boss that deploys Hong Kong's subway engineers. Who’s in charge? JUST after midnight, the last subway car slips into its sidings in Hong Kong and an army of engineers goes to work. In a typical week, 10,000 people carry out 2600 engineering works across the system – from grinding rough rails smooth and replacing tracks to checking for damage. People might do the work, but they don’t choose what needs doing. Instead, each task is scheduled and managed by artificial intelligence.
Hong Kong has one of the world’s best subway systems. It has a 99.9 per cent on time record – far better than London Underground or New York’s subway. It is owned and run by MTR Corporation, which also runs systems in Stockholm, Melbourne, London and Beijing. “It will probably be Beijing first,” says Andy Chun of Hong Kong’s City University, who designed the AI system and worked with MTR to build it into their systems. Chun’s AI program works with a simulated model of the entire system to find the best schedule for necessary engineering works. Rise of the machines as ANZ brings in robot workers to do the 'boring' jobs. First jobs went to India, now ANZ Banking Group is leading the way locally in a global rise of robot software systems, which can do the work of employees in fields ranging from payroll administration to helpdesk support and customer service in a fraction of the time.
ANZ has spent the past year refining a well-developed program of work in an emerging field known as Robotic Process Automation (RPA), whereby tasks previously conducted by employees are now done by increasingly intelligent software that learns on the job. Much of the robotic work is initially being conducted in ANZ's network of so-called captive centres or hubs in India, the Philippines and China, but some Australian roles are already changing to incorporate the new systems. The bank says it is not a job reduction strategy, rather it is a move to existing operations and to refocus human workers on new areas. Not for culling staff Monotonous, time-consuming tasks the focus Improving, not replacing jobs. Uk.businessinsider. Japan opens world's first robot hotel - CNN Video. Japan opens world's first robot hotel Japan opens world's first robot hotel Replay More Videos ... Stories worth watching (14 Videos) New Horizons passes Pluto after 3 billion-mile journey See amazing response after boy, 4, loses dad Car owner catches mechanics doing this ...
Woman is reunited with her dog after more than 3 years New horned dinosaur species discovered Taylor Swift stuns kid with $50K gift What to binge watch this summer The U.S. military's $400B fighter jet Japan opens world's first robot hotel Dying dog's bucket list adventure Cosby co-star: Cosby is guilty Eagle Scout sets great example of unity with THIS Drug bust leads to wedding dress sale Robber unaware former Marine is behind him The world's biggest 'Star Wars' collection Source: CNN. This solar powered floating farm can produce 20 tons of vegetables every day. From design practice, Forward Thinking Architecture, come a set of modular floating farms that harvest sunlight and rainwater, as well as desalinate saltwater and grow thousands of tons of vegetables ever year. Inspired by Chinese floating fish farms, these rectangular units measure 200x350 meters and can connect with other modules via walkways.
The usage of waterways is a great compliment to the farming industry because it makes farming available in so many more locations. It reduces the need to import food by localizing growth and incorporates rivers and lakes as viable "farmland. " Each unit is comprised of three levels. The bottom floor focuses on aquaculture and water desalination, the first floor on hydroponic crop cultivation, and the roof is adorned with solar panels, skylights and rainwater collectors.
Each module is anticipated to make 8,152 tons of vegetables every year and bring in 1,703 tons of fish. Me, myself and iCub: Meet the robot with a self - life - 18 March 2015. WHAT is the self? Rene Descartes encapsulated one idea of it in the 1600s when he wrote: "I think, therefore I am". He saw his self as a constant, the essence of his being, on which his knowledge of everything else was built. Others have very different views.
Writing a century later, David Hume argued that there was no "simple and continued" self, just the flow of experience. Hume's proposal resonates with the Buddhist concept anatta¯, or non-self, which contends that the idea of an unchanging self is an illusion and also at the root of much of our unhappiness. Today, a growing number of philosophers and psychologists hold that the self is an illusion. But even if the centuries-old idea of it as essential and unchanging is misleading, there is still much to explain, for example: how you distinguish your body from the rest of the world; why ... Exponential Technologies | Peter H. Diamandis. AI interns: Software already taking jobs from humans - life - 31 March 2015. ARABIC MIX 2014 BEST BELLY DANCE DABKE REMIX ARAB RAI DJ ALCAPONE KURDISH عربی العربية رقص دبكة.
The AI Revolution: The Road to Superintelligence | Tim Urban. Artificial superintelligence is coming, probably whether we like it or not, and probably within our lifetimes. If many of the experts are correct, this will either be our greatest dream or our worst nightmare. Here's why. "We are on the edge of change comparable to the rise of human life on Earth. " --Vernor Vinge What does it feel like to stand here?
It seems like a pretty intense place to be standing -- but then you have to remember something about what it's like to stand on a time graph: You can't see what's to your right. So here's how it actually feels to stand there: Which probably feels pretty normal. The Far Future: Coming Soon Imagine taking a time machine back to 1750, a time when the world was in a permanent power outage, long-distance communication meant either yelling loudly or firing a cannon in the air, and all transportation ran on hay. This experience for him wouldn't be surprising or shocking or even mind-blowing; those words aren't big enough. This isn't science fiction.
The bitcoin rush: Pioneers on the financial frontier - tech - 29 January 2015. Meet miners, outlaws and sheriffs all striving to get ahead in the volatile new world of virtual money THE past year has seen a 21st century gold rush, and speculators have been falling over themselves for a piece of the action. The discovery of gold always brings a world in its wake and bitcoin – a virtual currency "mined" using a computer – is no exception. There are miners chasing gold, crooks targeting the naive, black market traders operating outside the law and regulators trying to bring order to an upstart community.
Read on to meet some of the movers and shakers in this brave new world. The coin rush (Image: Andrew Degraff) In late 2013, bitcoin miner Dave Carlson feared for the safety of his business. Peer-to-peer lending heralds mortgages without banks - tech - 23 January 2015. Crowdsourced loans and peer-to-peer lending are cutting banks out of the mortgage market – and this is just the start NEED a mortgage? In the near future you may find yourself canvassing strangers online for a loan instead of your bank. The rise of a new kind of crowdfunding website is opening up the potential for everyone to take part in – and profit from – financial services, without a bank in sight. Peer-to-peer (P2P) lending, which connects those who need money with those looking to grow their own, has enjoyed a dramatic rise in popularity in recent years, fuelled by a shortage of credit at one end and lacklustre interest rates at the other.
The trend began in earnest when sites like Zopa began helping people secure personal loans through crowdsourced funding. The system works by allowing people from all walks of life to pool their money and act as a lender to a home buyer. There are risks, however. Thomas believes crowdfunding initiatives could change the face of the housing market. As Robots Grow Smarter, American Workers Struggle to Keep Up. A machine that administers sedatives recently began treating patients at a Seattle hospital. At a Silicon Valley hotel, a bellhop robot delivers items to people’s rooms. Last spring, a software algorithm wrote a breaking news article about an earthquake that The Los Angeles Times published. Although fears that technology will displace jobs are at least as old as the Luddites, there are signs that this time may really be different. The technological breakthroughs of recent years — allowing machines to mimic the human mind — are enabling machines to do knowledge jobs and service jobs, in addition to factory and clerical work.
And over the same 15-year period that digital technology has inserted itself into nearly every aspect of life, the job market has fallen into a long malaise. Even with the economy’s recent improvement, the share of working-age adults who are working is substantially lower than a decade ago — and lower than any point in the 1990s. Photo Lawrence H. Mr. Nonemployed. Will remote-controlled robots clean you out of a job? - opinion - 04 December 2014. Who are you looking at? (Image: Yves Gellie/Picture Tank) "Digital immigrants" in other countries could soon guide robots around your house. Some find that creepy – and that could be just the start of the trouble THE death of distance.
That was the great promise of the internet in its early days: by making cheap, immediate communication possible around the world, it would eliminate geographical constraints on relationships, media and commerce. Twenty-odd years later, much of that promise has come to pass: all manner of work is now done remotely. Perhaps not for much longer. Robotics thus has the potential to help countries that are short of labour by, in effect, importing virtual workers – if it can win public acceptance. That will be challenging. Many of the jobs that are in the roboticists' sights are already done by immigrants. We are likely to see cultural difficulties arise, too. But that resistance may not last. More From New Scientist Promoted Stories Developing a Cloud Strategy?
Computers are learning to see the world like we do - tech - 29 October 2014. It is surprisingly difficult to build computers that can recognise the many different objects we see every day, but they are getting better all the time WHAT animal is in the picture above? Glance at the page, wheels in the brain spin: yeah, that's a bird. The response comes so fast that you barely notice the processing behind it. If only machines found it that easy. Artist Randall Munroe had thrown down the gauntlet: last week, image host Flickr launched Park or Bird, a website designed to solve the exact problem in the comic.
"It's showing that image intelligence is happening very quickly," he says. Park or Bird wasn't the result of a sudden whim. The promise of object recognition extends far beyond better search through photos. "The sort of algorithms that we're using at Flickr right now are exactly the sort of algorithms that are going to be helping robots see and navigate visually," says Yahoo's Simon Osindero. Still, certain objects consistently trip computers up. Promoted Stories. Ask the crowd: Robots learn faster, better with online helpers. University of Washington computer scientists have shown that crowdsourcing can be a quick and effective way to teach a robot how to complete tasks. Instead of learning from just one human, robots could one day query the larger online community, asking for instructions or input on the best way to set the table or water the garden.
The research team presented its results at the 2014 Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers International Conference on Robotics and Automation in Hong Kong in early June. "We're trying to create a method for a robot to seek help from the whole world when it's puzzled by something," said Rajesh Rao, an associate professor of computer science and engineering and director of the Center for Sensorimotor Neural Engineering at the UW. "This is a way to go beyond just one-on-one interaction between a human and a robot by also learning from other humans around the world. " To gather more input about building the objects, the robots turned to the crowd. Watson in your pocket: Supercomputer gets own apps - tech - 28 April 2014. In Stephen Wolfram's future, 'a box of a trillion souls' will create any universe we want (interview) | VentureBeat | Dev | by Dylan Tweney.
Online university courses can't change the world alone - opinion - 10 March 2014. Rolls-Royce believes time of drone cargo ships has come. Wikipedia-size maths proof too big for humans to check - physics-math - 17 February 2014. Google buys AI firm DeepMind to boost image search - tech - 27 January 2014. The Rich and Their Robots Are About to Make Half the World's Jobs Disappear.
Will Work For Free | OFFICIAL RELEASE | 2013. A smart-object recognition algorithm that doesn’t need humans. Vertical farms sprouting all over the world - tech - 16 January 2014. Virtual tailor measures you up for perfect online shop - tech - 03 January 2014. Eight ways robots stole our jobs in 2013. Singapore Is Pioneering Vertical-Farming Technology.
ButtonMasher: AI takes on humans to create video game - tech - 02 January 2014. The mystery of Google's sudden robotics splurge - tech - 16 December 2013. Quantum lab is dazzling vision of computer chip future - tech - 28 November 2013. Robotutor marks the homework of a class of thousands - 26 November 2013. Andreas Raptopoulos: No roads? There’s a drone for that. Why This Might Be the Model T of Workplace Robots. Barilla lancia il più grande magazzino automatizzato al mondo. E apre a nuove acquisizioni fuori dall'Europa. Penal code: The coming world of trial by algorithm - tech - 06 September 2013. TV | How to grow spinach on Mars. Daniele Mancinelli. Hector Ruiz: The Evolution of Cognitive Computing. Emily Monosson – Robot evolution. The Best Websites for Free Online Courses, Certificates, Degrees, and Educational Resources.
Automated Science, Deep Data, and the Paradox of Information. Commercial quantum computer leaves PC in the dust - physics-math - 10 May 2013. Robots Will Steal Your Job • Robots Are Taking Our Jobs, And We Will Take Their Money. Think Your Job Is Robot-Proof | Robots Are Taking Over the Office. The Robot Reality: Service Jobs Are Next to Go. Bluebrain | EPFL. Researchers say AI prescribes better treatment than doctors.
Japan to field test rehabilitation robots. iRobot proposes 3-D printing with less human intervention.