Futuristische ontwikkelingen

[Pilgrim]

Space tourism will lift-off in 2018 | The Economist
The Economist - Gepubliceerd op 8 nov. 2017

[Ariel]

Two robots debate the future of humanity

[Pilgrim]

With artificial Intelligence we're summoning the Demon - Elon Musk
jesussaves7777 - Gepubliceerd op 31 aug. 2017

[Pilgrim]

'Killer robots zijn geen denkbeeldig gevaar meer'

Caroline Kraaijvanger, 14 november 2017



Wapensystemen worden nu al steeds autonomer.

Tot die conclusie komt vredesorganisatie PAX in een nieuw rapport. De organisatie presenteert het rapport vandaag in Genève, waar een VN-bijeenkomst over killer robots is begonnen.

Killer robots
Bij killer robots moet je denken aan “machines die zelf kunnen bewegen, dus zonder aansturing van de mens, en machines die zelf kunnen schieten,” zo vertelde Koen Hindriks, oprichter en CEO van Interactive Robotics eerder dit jaar aan Scientias.nl. “Dus bijvoorbeeld een drone die uitgerust is met wapentuig.” Gewapende drones zijn er op dit moment al. Maar ze worden nog – op afstand – door mensen bestuurd. En Hindriks wilde dat graag zo houden. “Machines moeten niet gaan bepalen op wie er wel of niet geschoten wordt.”

Ze komen eraan
Dergelijke machines lijken misschien nog ver weg. Maar schijn bedriegt, zo blijkt uit het PAX-onderzoeksrapport. In het rapport worden tal van wapensystemen aangehaald die op dit moment al in gebruik of in ontwikkeling zijn en een zekere mate van autonomie kennen. De meeste van deze wapensystemen worden nu nog op afstand door mensen bestuurd, maar kunnen in principe – hetzij met enige aanpassing – ook volledig autonoom worden ingezet.

Veel vragen
Met het rapport hoopt PAX een brede discussie aan te zwengelen. Want als het over autonome wapens gaat, moet er nog heel wat worden uitgekristalliseerd. “Kunnen deze wapens zich aan de internationale humanitaire wetten houden? Kunnen ze onderscheid maken tussen soldaten en burgers en bepalen of een aanval binnen proporties is? Kunnen deze wapens het gebruik van gewapend geweld laagdrempeliger maken? En wat gebeurt er als dictators of terroristen de handen op deze wapens kunnen leggen? Wie is verantwoordelijk als er iets mis gaat? En welke impact hebben ze op de mensenrechten als politiemachten ook deze technologie gaan gebruiken?” Het zijn zomaar wat vragen die PAX in het onderzoeksrapport opwerpt. En die – als het aan PAX ligt – leiden naar een heldere conclusie: een machine moet nooit zelf kunnen beslissen om mensen te doden of pijn te doen, want “dat gaat in tegen het principe van de menselijke waardigheid en besteedt het morele denken op onacceptabele wijze uit”.

Politiek
Zo uitgesproken als PAX is, zo onscherp is het standpunt van de internationale gemeenschap. Zo heeft elk land weer een andere mening over de kwestie (en zijn er zelfs landen die zich er helemaal niet over uitspreken). Sommige staten willen een verbod op killer robots. Anderen zien meer in regulering. En weer anderen – waaronder Nederland – ziet bestaand internationaal oorlogsrecht als afdoende. Kortom: er is nog geen consensus omtrent de killer robots. En de tijd dringt. “Het is essentieel dat staten deze korte tijd optimaal gebruiken om vooruitgang te boeken,” aldus Miriam Struyk, verbonden aan PAX. “De technologie dendert voort, zoals wij ook in ons rapport laten zien, terwijl de diplomatie vertraagt. Staten moeten nu duidelijk maken over welke beslissingen en functies we menselijke controle willen behouden.”

Deze week wordt de eerste stap gezet richting consensus, met de VN-bijeenkomst in Genève. Maar of er in een weekje tijd echt wat bewerkstelligd kan worden? Dat lijkt twijfelachtig. Maar het kan zeker het begin zijn van een breedgedragen discussie op politiek niveau die uiteindelijk uitmondt in een helder standpunt omtrent een gevaar dat rap op ons afstormt.

Hoewel de politiek het probleem van de killer robots nog maar net ontdekt, waarschuwen onderzoekers al jaren voor de geautomatiseerde wapensystemen. In 2015 riepen ruim 2000 experts op het gebied van kunstmatige intelligentie en robotica de VN op om in actie te komen en een standpunt in te nemen omtrent de killer robots. Afgelopen zomer kreeg die brief een vervolg. Dit keer werd deze ondertekend door technologiebedrijven en wetenschappers. Een unicum: het komt niet zo vaak voor dat wetenschappers én bedrijven de politiek oproepen om maatregelen te nemen die leiden tot beperkingen binnen hun eigen vakgebied.

https://www.scientias.nl/killer-robots- ... vaar-meer/

[Pilgrim]

Why the rise of the robots won’t mean the end of work
Vox - Gepubliceerd op 13 nov. 2017



The Rise of the Machines – Why Automation is Different this Time
Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell - Gepubliceerd op 8 jun. 2017

[xplosive]

Eigenlijk is in de basis alles al gezegd over wat de aanstaande revolutie van zeer geavanceerde kunstmatige intelligentie allemaal teweeg zou kunnen brengen. Het is nu alleen nog maar een kwestie van hoe snel het een en ander zich gaat ontvouwen en hoe adequaat allerlei volksbewegingen daarop gaan reageren en anticiperen.

[Pilgrim]

Scientists Invent Oxygen Particle That If Injected, Allows You To Live Without Breathing

New Medical Discovery
A team of scientists at the Boston Children’s Hospital have invented what is being considered one the greatest medical breakthroughs in recent years. They have designed a microparticle that can be injected into a person’s bloodstream that can quickly oxygenate their blood. This will even work if the ability to breathe has been restricted, or even cut off entirely.

This finding has the potential to save millions of lives every year. The microparticles can keep an object alive for up to 30 min after respiratory failure. This is accomplished through an injection into the patients’ veins. Once injected, the microparticles can oxygenate the blood to near normal levels. This has countless potential uses as it allows life to continue when oxygen is needed but unavailable. For medical personnel, this is just enough time to avoid risking a heart attack or permanent brain injury when oxygen is restricted or cut off to patients.

Dr. John Kheir, who first began the study, works in the Boston Children’s Hospital Department of Cardiology. He found inspiration for the drug in 2006, when he was treating a girl in the ICU who had a severe case of pneumonia. At the time, the girl didn’t have a breathing tube, when at the time she suffered from a pulmonary hemorrhage. This means her lungs had begin to fill up with blood, and she finally went into cardiac arrest. It took doctors about 25 minutes to remove enough blood from her lungs to allow her to breath. Though, the girl’s brain was severely injured due to being deprived of oxygen for that long and she eventually died.

Microparticle Composition
The microparticles used are composed of oxygen gas pocketed in a layer of lipids. A Lipid is a natural molecule that can store energy and act as a part of a cell membrane, they can be made of many things such as wax, vitamins, phospholipids, and in this case fat is the lipid that stores the oxygen.

These microparticles are around two to four micrometers in length and carry about three to four times the oxygen content of our own red blood cells. In the past, researchers had a difficult time succeeding as prior tests caused gas embolism. This meant that the gas molecules would become stuck trying to squeeze through the capillaries. They corrected this issue by packaging them into small deformable particles rather ones where the structure was rigid.

Potential Future Uses
Medical: There is the obvious medical uses where the microparticles can be used to save off death from a restriction in breathing due to inflammation of the lungs, collapsed lungs, and the like. It would be good to have these injections ready in hospitals and ambulances for when the time is needed.

Military: Can you imagine a navy seals capability when they wouldn’t need to surface for air and could stay underwater for over 20 minutes? If a boat was to begin to sink, you could shoot yourself as the boat is going down to ensure you aren’t drowned in the under current of the sinking vessel. How about for toxic gases when a facemask is unavailable. The military could have a number of uses for such a medical advancement.

Private Sector: Really this can be used as a precaution for anything nautical where the potential to drown is a real danger. Deep sea rescue crews could inject themselves prior to making a rescue, underwater welders can use it in case they become stuck or air is lost to their suits. The potential use for anything water related seems extremely worthwhile.

Conclusion
In the end, this is an amazing medical advancement and I cant help but recall the movie the Abyss when they took the pill, their helmets filled with air, and they were told they can breathe the water. Well what if they really couldn’t “breathe” water” but since the urge to breathe is natural, that must take place… even if you’re not breathing air per se. But your body was provided with enough oxygen for a time period by taking a pill. It’s just goes to show that anything, absolutely anything that can be thought up, can potentially one day become reality. Thank you scientists, for reminding me that people and their ingenuity are nothing short of awesome.

http://www.techwench.com/scientists-inv ... breathing/

Vreemd!

[Ali Yas]

I cant help but recall the movie the Abyss when they took the pill, their helmets filled with air, and they were told they can breathe the water.

Schrijver moet die film nog maar eens gaan kijken.

Overigens vraag ik me wel af hoe een mens die rommel weer uit zijn bloed krijgt en of hier geen nadelen aan zitten. Verhalen met alleen maar positieve punten moeten gewantrouwd worden.

[Pilgrim]

Deze robot kan backflips (en ja, daar zijn beelden van!)

Caroline Kraaijvanger, 20 november 2017

Ook turnen is niet langer het domein van mensen alleen.

De afgelopen jaren hebben we lijdzaam moeten toezien hoe robots het ene na het andere menselijke kunstje onder de knie kregen. Zo kunnen ze al aardig voetballen – zeker in vergelijking met niet nader te noemen nationale elftallen – en zijn ze in staat tot tal van huishoudelijke taken: van was opvouwen tot pannenkoeken bakken. En dan zijn er nog robots die muziek kunnen maken en schrijven en zelfstandig kunnen zaaien en oogsten. Om nog maar te zwijgen van de robots die zich zelfstandig kunnen voortplanten.

Turnen
Reden genoeg om je af te vragen of er eigenlijk nog zaken zijn die robots niet onder de knie kunnen krijgen. Nou ja, die zijn er zeker. Turnen is bijvoorbeeld nog behoorlijk lastig voor de vaak zware, bekabelde, weinig lenige en instabiele robots. Tenminste: dat was tot voor kort zo. Want nu is er Atlas, een robot waar Boston Dynamics in opdracht van het Amerikaanse DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) al een tijdje aan knutselt. En die robot kan turnen.

Backflip
Ben je nog niet overtuigd? Misschien dat onderstaand filmpje waarin de robot hoge sprongen maakt en een foutloze backflip uitvoert, helpt.



Oké, het WK Turnen lijkt nog ver weg. Maar je moet niet vergeten dat deze robot pas in 2013 het levenslicht zag en toen aanzienlijk zwaarder was en zijn energie via lange kabels kreeg aangevoerd (zie filmpje hieronder). Dan is de evolutie van deze robot toch vrij vlot gegaan.



https://www.scientias.nl/robot-backflip ... r-beelden/

[Pilgrim]

Volledig zelfsturende auto is geen sciencefiction meer

Gepubliceerd: 20 november 2017



De automarkt is flink in beweging door onder meer elektrisch rijden, de vele autodeel-initiatieven én autonoom rijden. Een volledig zelfsturende auto behoort niet meer tot sciencefiction: in de nabije toekomst zullen er steeds vaker autonome systemen in de auto verschijnen.

Het geloof in de zelfsturende auto is groot, zowel bij auto- als technologiefabrikanten. En ook de consument blijkt klaar te zijn om in een deels autonoom bestuurde auto plaats te nemen.

Een recent onderzoek van ICT-verlener Capgemini laat zien dat 81 procent van de achtduizend ondervraagden bereid is om extra te betalen voor een auto met autonome systemen.

Race tussen fabrikanten
Op dit moment is het al mogelijk om automatisch in te parkeren en zal een auto met zelfsturende functie vanzelf remmen wanneer het een obstakel nadert, zoals een kind dat de weg oversteekt. Maar dit is nog maar het begin.

De systemen die nu in ontwikkeling zijn nemen deeltaken van de bestuurder over zoals rijden in de file, op eenbaanswegen of stedelijke omgevingen. De rijder kan in deze situaties nog altijd de controle terugnemen.

De volledig zelfsturende auto is inmiddels ook in zicht. Geschat wordt dat in 2020 de eerste volledig autonome auto's op de markt komen. Renault wil in dit jaar de eerste autofabrikant zijn die auto's op de markt brengt met de 'eyes off/hands off' technologie voor een betaalbare prijs.

De fabrikant is al een tijd lang bezig om dit te kunnen realiseren. Niet lang geleden presenteerden ze in Amsterdam drie demonstratiemodellen, onder de naam 'Renault Espace Autonomous Driving'. Deze conceptcars hebben inmiddels duizenden uren op de openbare weg in Europa gereden.

Renault Design Award 2017
Omdat Renault gelooft in autonoom rijden, daagden ze zes designduo's van de TU Delft uit om deze functie terug te laten komen in hun ontwerpen voor de Renault Design Award 2017. In deze competitie geven de studenten hun visie op de auto van 2030. In hun ontwerpen, gebaseerd op zes thema's uit Renault's designfilosofie (Love, Explore, Family, Work, Play en Wisdom), wordt veelvuldig gebruikgemaakt van zelfrijdende auto’s.

Alle ontwerpen van deze jonge designers vind je hier.

Door: Renault

https://www.nu.nl/advertorial/advertori ... -meer.html

[Pilgrim]

Philip Hammond pledges driverless cars by 2021 and warns people to retrain

Gwyn Topham, Thursday 23 November 2017


The near future: an autonomous self-driving vehicle at a media event in Milton Keynes. Photograph: Justin Tallis/AFP/Getty Images

UK chancellor says driverless vehicles will revolutionise people’s lives but says for some it will be ‘very challenging’

The chancellor has warned that a million British workers will need to retrain with the driverless cars set to revolutionise the workplace and people’s lives.

Philip Hammond reaffirmed a budget pledge to ensure “genuine driverless vehicles” on Britain’s roads by 2021 – and said people should be prepared for it to be “very challenging”.

While manufacturers have launched increasingly autonomous vehicles, and advanced trials of driverless technology have started this month, industry experts query how and when such a transition will take place. Hammond told the BBC Today programme: “It will happen, I can promise you. It is happening already ... It is going to revolutionise our lives, it is going to revolutionise the way we work. And for some people this will be very challenging.”

He added: “The challenge for us is making sure that the million-odd people in the UK who drive for a living, over the next 10, 20 years or so, as driverless vehicles come in, are able to retrain and re-skill so they can take up the many, many new jobs that this economy will be throwing up.”

Hammond has spent much of the week discussing autonomous vehicles, although a planned ride in a driverless car was ruled out by aides as a potentially unfortunate photo opportunity. However, the budget did little to underpin his words, bar a commitment to legislate for autonomous driving without a human at the wheel – a reform already progressing through parliament in the automated and electric vehicles bill – fuelling some scepticism.

The transport commentator Christian Wolmar, author of Driverless Cars: On A Road To Nowhere, suggested it was a “dead-cat issue” to distract from bigger questions about the budget. “It’s a complete fantasy that we will have any driverless car by 2021 - and moreover why would we want them? What issue is this solving?”

But others working on development say rapid progress will be made in bringing such cars to Britain’s streets. Prof Nick Reed, head of mobility R&D at Bosch, said: “We should be well advanced into testing of automated vehicles by that time - there are further regulatory hurdles, but I believe that is what [Hammond is] committed to address. We’ve seen the move by Waymo in Phoenix to move to trials without a driver in the seat, and so the race is on - that’s the challenge.”

Waymo, a company that started as part of Google, launched tests of fully driverless taxis on the streets of Phoenix, Arizona, this month, and residents are expected to be able to hail them via an app in coming months. Two weeks ago Navya, a French manufacturer, unveiled a new city taxi ready for production with no driving seat, steering wheel or brakes that a human driver could use. Meanwhile, Jaguar Land Rover revealed it was testing self-driving vehicles on public roads in Coventry, albeit with a driver in the front seat – the first traditional UK-built car to run autonomously.

Reed added: “There will be vehicles with automated capabilities for sale in that time frame, no question: Ford are saying vehicles without steering will be available by 2021. It’s just a question of what geographical constraints they can operate in an automated mode.”

Wolmar argues that questions over how driverless cars will interact with pedestrians and other road users are largely insoluble. “There might be some limited uses in controlled areas like an airport shuttle but the notion that there will ever be a dominance of driverless cars in the centre of London is a fantasy that goes with jetpacks and rockets to Sydney. Politicians are in great danger of swallowing this idea. It’s not going to happen.”

A widespread motor industry view is that car technology is ahead of both the wider infrastructure and both the legal and insurance frameworks surrounding it. The National Infrastructure Commission launched an innovation prize alongside the budget to consider how roads should be built and developed now to prepare for autonomous cars.

Charlie Henderson, roads expert at PA Consulting Group, believes that such vehicles will not be a common sight for 10 years or more, and that time could be needed to address infrastructure. “Manufacturers are designing AVs on the assumption that roads are in good condition – with clear lane markings, unobscured signs and signals, and good quality surfaces. But we all know that’s not the reality.”

Matthew Channon, a law lecturer at Exeter University specialising in driverless cars, said the impending legislation still had gaps and said a lot of clarification was needed. “What are they doing in terms of liability about hacking? How do they regulate and compensate? But the biggest issue is public perception of what vehicles can do.” Channon believes driverless vehicles will be on the roads by 2021, but not in regular public use.

Reed concurs that issues remain: “We still need to learn a huge amount about how the vehicles respond to complex situations. Where roads are predictable, evidence shows vehicles can handle that task. Roundabouts and busy urban environments are still challenging. But the programmes and trials are helping us achieve that.”

Artificial intelligence is being developed to help cars understand human gestures and intentions. Trials and research conducted by Reed and others at Greenwich have included driverless vehicles in action – pods carrying passengers on fixed routes, and delivery robots on the streets – but also Land Rovers driven by humans with a computer shadowing their movements, to detect and emulate the interactions in normal traffic.

Reed said: “I think we will be able to overcome the challenges. We’re not just replacing cars with driverless cars in the future – it’s about creating new mobility systems to get around our cities and country in the future.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/ ... to-retrain

[Pilgrim]

The jury's still out on whether universal basic income will save us from job-stealing robots

Dylan Love, Contributor - Nov. 24, 2017


Elon Musk, founder, CEO and lead designer at SpaceX and co-founder of Tesla, is a big fan of Universal Basic Income. Aaron P. Bernstein/Reuters

Does free money change nothing or everything?

Universal basic income (UBI) is the hottest idea in social security since Franklin Roosevelt signed the New Deal in 1935, and it is fairly understood as free money given to citizens by their government. Though the idea traces its roots back to the 16th century as a “cure for theft,” UBI has gained new consideration and momentum these days, as high-profile techno-doomsayers like SpaceX founder Elon Musk point to it as an economic solution for big problems predicted to arrive soon.

The future is coming, Musk and his ilk warn, and it’s bringing increased automation and intelligent technologies with it that will eventually overtake the human capacity for work. All-capable robots will cause widespread human unemployment, goes the thinking, plaguing our income and livelihood for generations.

If the “robots are stealing jobs” on the level that the party line portends, then UBI presents itself as a compelling solution to this unusual, hypothetical problem. There’s already some real-world precedent for it: a UBI pilot program in Finland sees the government send a small amount of money to 2,000 unemployed Finns each month, and the initial results are quite positive.

That’s why I was surprised to hear Andrew McAfee, co-director of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy, raise his voice against basic income as a feasible path forward in our unknown future. McAfee’s job description sees him appraise big human issues and opportunities in our present era of technological progress, so he had a lot to say when UBI emerged as a conversation topic in panel discussion at HubWeek, Boston’s weeklong festival on art, science, and innovation. His skeptical point of view presents a strong contrast against the UBI hype machine. Doesn’t he know how cool free money is?

“I’m absolutely bullish on human labor,” McAfee said, citing a variety of existing problems that can only be solved by human hands and minds right now. “I think about the different kinds of populations needing care. The elderly, the poor, children, the disabled — there's a ton of work to do there. When I think about getting our infrastructure back up to a world class level, there's an amazing amount of work that can only be done by people. We don't have bridge-repairing robots yet. The notion that we're at peak labor is just silly to me.”

He also cautions against implementing UBI in a country like the United States, where we generally don’t face problems of massive deprivation. “If the present situation was that no one could get a job to earn any money, or people were starving on a widespread scale and couldn't cover their basic needs, then I'd be all in favor of UBI. But that's not where we are. We should be mindful about every person who is homeless, but we don't face an epidemic of dire, dire poverty in the United States.”

If anyone’s ears are burning at these comments, it’s surely Zoltan Istvan. In 2014, Istvan founded the Transhumanist Party and ran for president on a platform that revolved around using technology enhance human quality of life and solve societal problems. His bid for the highest office in the land ultimately proved unsuccessful, but it was a strong publicity campaign that raised technology policy issues that will soon come to bear. Part of Istvan’s presidential platform involved a UBI implementation, and he’s holding fast to that in his present-day bid for governor of California.

“Many of the best basic income plans also take at least a decade to implement so that they don't disrupt the economy too quickly,” says Istvan. “My basic income plan, called a Federal Land Dividend, will take at least two decades to successfully implement. This isn't for today, but for the near-term tomorrow, when driverless cars, robot food servers, and AI attorneys — just to name a few — do everything for us, leaving tens of millions unemployed forever.” His idea for financing a basic income for every American would see the federal government lease out its vast land holdings to the forecasted tune of $1,700 per month per person.

If such a plan came to fruition, with every American citizen receiving nearly two grand per month, what would happen? Istvan and McAfee agree on at least one point: it’s expensive to give money away for free. Not only is there the sum being paid to each citizen, but the logistics of tracking and organizing payments at scale also comes with costs.

The thinkers fundamentally disagree on the role that free money plays in the recipient’s life. To McAfee, it’s too little too late. He invokes a thought experiment: imagine the communities at the depths of despair, ravaged by low social capital, and faced with problems ranging from poverty to drug addiction, mental illness, and beyond. “Which of the problems in those communities would be solved by a government check showing up every month from the government?” he asks. “My answer is clear: none, absolutely none.”

To Istvan, UBI presents itself more as an economic booster shot for every citizen, giving each household a meaningful bump in income. “Giving people free money makes them more eager for more money, because it improves their lives. I completely disagree that that money won't change anything. That's nuts. Money changes everything.”

Istvan remains convinced that peak labor is coming, and it’s coming “sooner than the experts want to admit.” McAfee instead sees no smoke or fire, and points to a different narrative about what can happen when human innovation and entrepreneurship interact with technology and the job market: “As we saw at IDE’s Inclusive Innovation Challenge, people are going to gain different kinds of economic opportunity by learning new skills, gaining access to technology, or building business models that rely on different levels of human labor.”
Only time will tell whether the machines come for our jobs en masse. If they do, then how important is money at that point?

http://www.businessinsider.com/will-uni ... ?r=UK&IR=T

[xplosive]

 

China inches toward AI supremacy as US continues to ignore science

by Tristan Greene — November 30, 2017, 18:33

A think-tank focused on security and defense yesterday released a report indicating China is no longer a distant second in the AI arms race, but quickly catching up. According to the analysis, the US can expect its current lead to continue for another five years before vanishing.

The Center for a New American Security (CNAS) conducted an in-depth review of China's artificial intelligence initiatives, including a deep-dive into the ramifications it will have for the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA).

According to CNAS adjunct fellow Elsa Kania, who researched and wrote the report:

• Although the PLA's initial thinking on AI in warfare has been influenced by careful analysis of U.S. military initiatives, its approach could progressively diverge from that of the United States, based on its distinct strategic culture and organizational dynamics.

TNW previously reported on China's dedication to becoming the world's leading AI superpower by 2025. That timeline may be in need of an update.

Perhaps even more troublesome is a Reuters report indicating that Chinese firms have been "skirting U.S. oversight and gaining access to sensitive U.S. AI technology with potential military applications by buying stakes in U.S. firms."

The report goes on to say US lawmakers have since addressed those concerns and efforts are underway to prevent further such circumvention, but it paints a high-definition picture of just how invested China is in the future of AI.

Furthering the rising specter of a world dominated by China's AI-powered military are Kania's observations on the direction the PLA is pursuing:

• Certain PLA thinkers even anticipate the approach of a "singularity" on the battlefield, at which human cognition can no longer keep pace with the speed of decision-making and tempo of combat in future warfare.

It's certainly terrifying to imagine a world where whoever has the best better-than-humans machines will claim military supremacy, but there's probably still time for the US (and its allies) to change the trajectory.

The keys to success, according to CNAS, will involve the US engaging in a three-fold strategy:

1. "Mitigate illicit and problematic technology transfers," which sounds a lot like stopping rival countries from exploiting US AI startups.
2. "Ensure that there is adequate funding for and investments in next-generation research and development," an idea that would, presumably, work better if the Trump administration actually named a leader for its Office of Science and Technology Policy. Seriously, in 41 years no President has taken this long to fill this crucial post.
3. "Sustain and build upon the current U.S. competitive advantage in human capital through formulating policies to educate and attract top talent," something which, again presumably, would also work better if the Trump administration wasn't clearly more interested in repelling immigrants than attracting talent.

It might be the right time for some like Elon Musk or Professor Hawking to clarify their doomsday statements on AI.

I wonder what they think the reward for second place (or third – behind Russia) will be.

[Ali Yas]

... better if the Trump administration actually named a leader for its Office of Science and Technology Policy

Linkse kul. Alsof de overheid een cruciale rol speelt in welke ontwikkeling dan ook (behalve in die van de staatsschuld).

[Pilgrim]

Google’s Artificial Intelligence Built an AI That Outperforms Any Made by Humans

By Dom Galeon and Kristin Houser on December 1, 2017

Google's AutoML project, designed to make AI build other AIs, has now developed a computer vision system that vastly outperforms state-of-the-art-models. The project could improve how autonomous vehicles and next-generation AI robots "see."

An AI That Can Build AI
In May 2017, researchers at Google Brain announced the creation of AutoML, an artificial intelligence (AI) that’s capable of generating its own AIs. More recently, they decided to present AutoML with its biggest challenge to date, and the AI that can build AI created a “child” that outperformed all of its human-made counterparts.

The Google researchers automated the design of machine learning models using an approach called reinforcement learning. AutoML acts as a controller neural network that develops a child AI network for a specific task. For this particular child AI, which the researchers called NASNet, the task was recognizing objects — people, cars, traffic lights, handbags, backpacks, etc. — in a video in real-time.

AutoML would evaluate NASNet’s performance and use that information to improve its child AI, repeating the process thousands of times. When tested on the ImageNet image classification and COCO object detection data sets, which the Google researchers call “two of the most respected large-scale academic data sets in computer vision,” NASNet outperformed all other computer vision systems.

According to the researchers, NASNet was 82.7 percent accurate at predicting images on ImageNet’s validation set. This is 1.2 percent better than any previously published results, and the system is also 4 percent more efficient, with a 43.1 percent mean Average Precision (mAP). Additionally, a less computationally demanding version of NASNet outperformed the best similarly sized models for mobile platforms by 3.1 percent.

A View of the Future
Machine learning is what gives many AI systems their ability to perform specific tasks. Although the concept behind it is fairly simple — an algorithm learns by being fed a ton of data — the process requires a huge amount of time and effort. By automating the process of creating accurate, efficient AI systems, an AI that can build AI takes on the brunt of that work. Ultimately, that means AutoML could open up the field of machine learning and AI to non-experts.

As for NASNet specifically, accurate, efficient computer vision algorithms are highly sought after due to the number of potential applications. They could be used to create sophisticated, AI-powered robots or to help visually impaired people regain sight, as one researcher suggested. They could also help designers improve self-driving vehicle technologies. The faster an autonomous vehicle can recognize objects in its path, the faster it can react to them, thereby increasing the safety of such vehicles.

The Google researchers acknowledge that NASNet could prove useful for a wide range of applications and have open-sourced the AI for inference on image classification and object detection. “We hope that the larger machine learning community will be able to build on these models to address multitudes of computer vision problems we have not yet imagined,” they wrote in their blog post.

Though the applications for NASNet and AutoML are plentiful, the creation of an AI that can build AI does raise some concerns. For instance, what’s to prevent the parent from passing down unwanted biases to its child? What if AutoML creates systems so fast that society can’t keep up? It’s not very difficult to see how NASNet could be employed in automated surveillance systems in the near future, perhaps sooner than regulations could be put in place to control such systems.



Thankfully, world leaders are working fast to ensure such systems don’t lead to any sort of dystopian future.

Amazon, Facebook, Apple, and several others are all members of the Partnership on AI to Benefit People and Society, an organization focused on the responsible development of AI. The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEE) has proposed ethical standards for AI, and DeepMind, a research company owned by Google’s parent company Alphabet, recently announced the creation of group focused on the moral and ethical implications of AI.

Various governments are also working on regulations to prevent the use of AI for dangerous purposes, such as autonomous weapons, and so long as humans maintain control of the overall direction of AI development, the benefits of having an AI that can build AI should far outweigh any potential pitfalls.

https://futurism.com/google-artificial- ... -built-ai/

[xplosive]

 

The Artificial Intelligence War

Phoenix Normand 03/12/2017

I'm worried and won't lie. I'm not sleeping well at all these days because I'm seriously concerned about the futures of Executive Assistants everywhere...especially my MEGAs. Maybe it was a mistake, but I took a plunge down the rabbit hole and started binge watching YouTubes from Elon Musk, Bill Gates, and Sam Harris all having similar, REAL fears about the future of Artificial Intelligence and how it will impact business and jobs over the next 5 - 10 years.

AI left unchecked has the potential to completely eclipse the human race. I need you to hear me when I tell you this. Artificial Intelligence has the potential, in a very short amount of time, to displace tens of millions of workers around the globe by automating them right out of their jobs. The assumption is that we have the ability to control the growth and reach of AI and we would "never allow machines to outsmart us." Sadly, that would be incredibly trusting and foolish an assumption.

Machines are learning at a rapid pace. LEARNING! Not simply being told what to do. They are self-correcting their errors, building upon the algorithms programmed into them and figuring out how to perfect processes based on an algorithmic version of what they perceive to be perfection.

At the moment, we have an increasingly slippery grip on their abilities, but it's only a matter of time before we start handing over the reins and allowing these machines to craft the new existence that we'll all be forced to comply with and fit ourselves into. I'm sure many of you are rolling your eyes and writing me off as "dramatic" or even a little "cray cray." But I have zero issue playing the "I Told You So" card on you when my predictions come to fruition. So, listen up!

If you’re an Executive Assistant, I’d say you’ve got 2 good years left to do your job in the same manner you’ve always done it. Probably less. For those of you who think that Executive Assistants are so “specialized” and “unique” that they could never be replaced, please allow me to lovingly slap you across the face. Our role has historically been one that does the most, but garners the least amount of respect within the organization.

Shit, we still have issues walking into our Exec’s office and demanding pay commensurate with the work that we actually do and all of the miracles we perform on a daily basis! We can’t even advocate for ourselves 90% of the time, yet we feel we’re somehow indispensable “because soft skills.”

Reality check. Your soft skills likely won’t save most of your jobs once spreadsheets start flowing across your boss’ desk showing the tremendous value to the company by getting rid of the expensive Admin layer, bringing on that cool, new shiny object “Alexa,” and maybe keeping one admin around to help Alexa out and set up/tear down the conference room each day. I say this both will love and with urgency, THIS IS WAR!

1. It’s Time to Start Doing Your Research

This is for EVERYONE, not just Executive Assistants. The hyper automation of business is not just a thing, it’s a reality, and one that will soon create much turmoil in our lives. Unless you have a job that is such a unique specialty that AI has no chance of automating you out of your seat, you need to get seriously proactive and strategic. You need to really think about everything you currently do in your role and figure out if there’s already an app for it or if there are betas already in play gathering information and gaining steam. If there are, GET NERVOUS.

I recently watched a YouTube of one of the heads of Machine Learning at Microsoft who proudly displayed his Virtual Assistant, Cortana. She’s so advanced that she can handle everything. She can immediately schedule a meeting, send you an invite, answer any question you may have all within seconds of interacting with her. No surly EA having a bad day. No, “give me just a sec, let me check his calendar.” I won’t lie, I was really impressed. Shit, I kinda want one myself! But it represents the beginning of the end of this role hampered only by a few key updates and the amount of time a company has to roll out the technology. You only need the tech installed on machines throughout the organization.

Let’s say that's a $200K investment. You currently have 8 Executive Assistants of varying levels of experience on your payroll. Let’s assume their average pay is around $85K/yr each, or $680,000/yr. Install the software org-wide and keep one human around, you know, to for that human touch, and you'll still have a savings of almost $400,000 per year. Still feeling irreplaceable? We all know how Execs lick their chops at a savings like that. #getnervous

2. Work on and Master your Interpersonal Communications Skills

We will need to co-exist with our non-human coworkers. There’s no escaping it. Here’s what I see as the first phase of this integration. Machines will automate away much of the administrative and operational components of our jobs. However, what they lack is the interpersonal communication skills and abilities we humans (used to) have on lock. No robot can out-human a human. They can certainly outthink us and perform tasks in a fraction of the time, but they don’t have the smile, charisma, whit, charm, nuance and perception that humans innately have. And I highly doubt that in my lifetime I’ll ever encounter a robot that can drop a perfectly crafted F-bomb with such elegance and timing as yours truly, nor make an entire room of C-suite execs double over in laughter with one remark. Sorry, Siri. You ain’t ME, boo.

Interpersonal communications and stellar customer service will not only experience a renaissance, they will become some of the most sought-after skills of the future. Think about it. Machines will be able to handle all things administrative and operational in record time, creating levels of efficiency and accuracy we have never experienced in business. Which means the in-person client meetings and deal closings will become the new commodity for business as automation speed and accuracy become ubiquitous across all industries because AI. People with incredible interpersonal skills, customer service mastery and the gift of gab will be highly sought after and coveted by companies looking to differentiate themselves from their competition, which will fall into human hands. So, there’s a win. Yay.

But here’s the issue. We have an entire generation of people with the interpersonal skills of a tomato. Drive past a Google bus stop and observe. And, then, feel a little depressed. No one’s talking with one another, unless they’re friends. Their heads are buried in their phones not because they’re working or keeping up with Donald Trump’s tweet faux pas du jour. It’s to avoid all awkward eye contact or random conversation at all costs. Everything vital to interpersonal communication. And it’s not just “the millennials” who are failing miserably at it. It’s pretty much anyone who spends more than 4-5 hours per day staring at their phone and purposely avoid saying, “hello” to the stranger next to them whom they can kinda feel is aching for a little conversation.

We need to begin being present and talking with one another again. Striking up conversation in transit. Putting our phones in our back pockets and chatting up the UBER driver. All of these missed opportunities for some sort of connection has already created a society of clones. We need to look down the road a bit and start adjusting our behavior to suit a future that will rely on interpersonal communication for our survival. If we continue on this path and ignore this critical component, AI will continue to improve, learn and teach itself, automate us out of our jobs and into global unemployment mayhem. It can’t even compute them.

Some of you are probably thinking, “Wait…your business is teaching Executive Assistants. Why are you blowing up your spot and potentially doing damage to your own business?” To which I’ll say this.

I’m a realist. MEGA Assistant University isn’t a money grab for me. What motivates me to get out of bed every morning is the fact that I truly care about the human condition. I care that we all have some sort of opportunity to live the best life we can and, if we have to work, do work that fulfills us and builds us all up. I came from nothing. Like a lot of people. But I always believed in myself, my ability to roll with the punches, and my gift of being able to identify opportunities and consistently capitalize on them before my competition did.

My almost 26 years as a Top 1%, C-suite Executive Assistant has provided me with so much. I repay those blessings 36 Saturdays per year from 9am – 5pm teaching the strategies, mindset and intuition that made me successful to a bunch of passionate Assistants I hope will be just as successful, with far fewer scars and bruises to show for it.

Sadly, I know in my heart that this role and my business have a shelf life that diminishes exponentially with each new release of Alexa, Cortana, Siri, Amy, Shaniqua, and Chantel. And that’s okay. Change doesn’t scare me. In fact, my ability to embrace it continues to keep me far more relevant than most my age and experience level. However, I won’t sit idly by knowing a tsunami is approaching without sprinting to the highest peak I can find and shouting my warning. Those who know me know that I’m not a doomsday prophet or wildly impetuous. I research the shit out of EVERYTHING. It’s the secret sauce of my success.

So please hear me when I say this is NOT a drill. For any of us! Please do your due diligence and start asking questions. Keep an eye on the news outlets and follow Elon, Bill and Sam’s feeds like a hawk. They’re pretty smart kids and frighteningly accurate in their predictions. The inevitable is coming. Please don’t write it off thinking it won’t affect you. It will. You need to diversity NOW. Take some classes. Dust off your desire to start your own business. Get the band back together. Find a specialty or two that can't be automated away and master them. Make sure your kids can carry on a conversation with another human. Master your business etiquette and polish up your polish. We're at T-minus 5 years and counting. It's time to get busy.

Food for thought: The first iPhone was released in June 2007. That’s only 10 years ago, kids. Tesla’s (pronounced TEZ • luh, by the way) about to release its 6th vehicle…a self-driving semi truck. Microsoft and Amazon are combining forces with their Virtual Assistants to offer a more seamless experience from home to office and all points in between. Yep. Already.

Better start perfecting that elevator pitch.

[Pilgrim]

Why This Aging Expert Thinks First 1,000-Year-Old Person is Already Alive

By Mike Brown on December 1, 2017

Aubrey de Grey wants to end aging forever.

Aubrey de Grey has set himself a simple task. The 54-year-old cofounder of the SENS Research Foundation wants to end biological aging for good. So sure is he of his mission, he proclaims the first human being to live to the age of 1,000 has already been born. De Grey believes that, within the next 20 years or so, scientists will finally solve one of humanity’s greatest problems.

“The fact is, aging kills 110,000 people worldwide every fucking day,” de Grey said at a Virtual Futures event attended by Inverse in London on Wednesday, in a conversation with group director Luke Robert Mason. “It doesn’t just kill them. You have to take into account all the suffering that comes before.”

Through his foundation, de Grey is working to solve seven types of aging damage that he believes are the key to a breakthrough. These are tissue atrophy, cancerous cells, mitochondrial mutations, death-resistant cells, extracellular matrix stiffening, extracellular aggregates, and intracellular aggregates. It may sound like a complex salad of jargon, but de Grey claims that because science has an understanding of how to fix all these damages, aging can end for good.

“It unequivocally causes far more suffering than anything else that we have to experience,” de Grey said, “and contrary to the impression that most of humanity has forced itself into, it’s indeed a problem which is amenable through technological intervention.”


Aubrey de Grey.

In the future, de Grey imagines humans will develop rejuvenation clinics to regularly combat these seven issues and send people on their way. These clinics may stay in the realm of the super-rich for a short time, but de Grey believes that a movement will very quickly form to bring these technologies to the general public.

“It will become impossible to get elected unless you have a manifesto commitment to have a real war on ageing,” de Grey said. “Not only in getting the therapy developed as quickly as possible, but also putting in place the infrastructure.”

De Grey dismisses the idea that any of this would be bad for the planet. As he sees it, the question of whether there’s too many people in the world is more an issue around whether our current technologies and consumption rates are destroying the environment. That, he said, is a reason for transitioning the world onto clean energy.

“The fact is, there is no such thing as overpopulation in an absolute sense,” de Grey said.

With the thousand-year-old human fast approaching, a transition to renewables can’t come soon enough.

https://www.inverse.com/article/38962-w ... n-is-alive

[Pilgrim]

An explanation of the Alcubierre-White Warp Drive | AsteronX
AsteronX - Gepubliceerd op 16 feb. 2017

[Pilgrim]

Why (most) future robots won’t look like robots

Plus: soft robots get superpowers (equivalent to a duck lifting a car)

December 4, 2017


A future robot’s body could combine soft actuators and stiff structure, with distributed computation throughout — an example of the new “material robotics.” (credit: Nikolaus Correll/University of Colorado)

Future robots won’t be limited to humanoid form (like Boston Robotics’ formidable backflipping Atlas). They’ll be invisibly embedded everywhere in common objects.

Such as a shoe that can intelligently support your gait, change stiffness as you’re running or walking, and adapt to different surfaces — or even help you do backflips.

That’s the vision of researchers at Oregon State University, the University of Colorado, Yale University, and École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, who describe the burgeoning new field of “material robotics” in a perspective article published Nov. 29, 2017 in Science Robotics. (The article cites nine articles in this special issue, three of which you can access for free.)

Disappearing into the background of everyday life
The authors challenge a widespread basic assumption: that robots are either “machines that run bits of code” or “software ‘bots’ interacting with the world through a physical instrument.”

“We take a third path: one that imbues intelligence into the very matter of a robot,” says Oregon State University researcher Yiğit Mengüç, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering in OSU’s College of Engineering and part of the college’s Collaborative Robotics and Intelligent Systems Institute.

On that path, materials scientists are developing new bulk materials with the inherent multifunctionality required for robotic applications, while roboticists are working on new material systems with tightly integrated components, disappearing into the background of everyday life. “The spectrum of possible ap¬proaches spans from soft grippers with zero knowledge and zero feedback all the way to humanoids with full knowledge and full feedback,” the authors note in the paper.

For example, “In the future, your smartphone may be made from stretchable, foldable material so there’s no danger of it shattering,” says Mengüç. “Or it might have some actuation, where it changes shape in your hand to help with the display, or it can be able to communicate something about what you’re observing on the screen. All these bits and pieces of technology that we take for granted in life will be living, physically responsive things, moving, changing shape in response to our needs, not just flat, static screens.”

Soft robots get superpowers


Origami-inspired artificial muscles capable of lifting up to 1,000 times their own weight, simply by applying air or water pressure (credit: Shuguang Li/Wyss Institute at Harvard University)

As a good example of material-enabled robotics, researchers at the Wyss Institute at Harvard University and MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) have developed origami-inspired, programmable, super-strong artificial muscles that will allow future soft robots to lift objects that are up to 1,000 times their own weight — using only air or water pressure.

The actuators are “programmed” by the structural design itself. The skeleton folds define how the whole structure moves — no control system required.

That allows the muscles to be very compact and simple, which makes them more appropriate for mobile or body-mounted systems that can’t accommodate large or heavy machinery, says Shuguang Li, Ph.D., a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Wyss Institute and MIT CSAIL and first author of an an open-access article on the research published Nov. 21, 2017 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).


Each artificial muscle consists of an inner “skeleton” that can be made of various materials, such as a metal coil or a sheet of plastic folded into a certain pattern, surrounded by air or fluid and sealed inside a plastic or textile bag that serves as the “skin.” The structural geometry of the skeleton itself determines the muscle’s motion. A vacuum applied to the inside of the bag initiates the muscle’s movement by causing the skin to collapse onto the skeleton, creating tension that drives the motion. Incredibly, no other power source or human input is required to direct the muscle’s movement — it’s automagically determined entirely by the shape and composition of the skeleton. (credit: Shuguang Li/Wyss Institute at Harvard University)

Resilient, multipurpose, scalable
Not only can the artificial muscles move in many ways, they do so with impressive resilience. They can generate about six times more force per unit area than mammalian skeletal muscle can, and are also incredibly lightweight. A 2.6-gram muscle can lift a 3-kilogram object, which is the equivalent of a mallard duck lifting a car. Additionally, a single muscle can be constructed within ten minutes using materials that cost less than $1, making them cheap and easy to test and iterate.

These muscles can be powered by a vacuum, which makes them safer than most of the other artificial muscles currently being tested. The muscles have been built in sizes ranging from a few millimeters up to a meter. So the muscles can be used in numerous applications at multiple scales, from miniature surgical devices to wearable robotic exoskeletons, transformable architecture, and deep-sea manipulators for research or construction, up to large deployable structures for space exploration.

The team could also construct the muscles out of the water-soluble polymer PVA. That opens the possibility of bio-friendly robots that can perform tasks in natural settings with minimal environmental impact, or ingestible robots that move to the proper place in the body and then dissolve to release a drug.

The team constructed dozens of muscles using materials ranging from metal springs to packing foam to sheets of plastic, and experimented with different skeleton shapes to create muscles that can contract down to 10% of their original size, lift a delicate flower off the ground, and twist into a coil, all simply by sucking the air out of them.

This research was funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the National Science Foundation (NSF), and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering.

Wyss Institute | Origami-Inspired Artificial Muscles

[Zie video op de site.]

_______________________________________________________________________________

Abstract of Fluid-driven origami-inspired artificial muscles
Artificial muscles hold promise for safe and powerful actuation for myriad common machines and robots. However, the design, fabrication, and implementation of artificial muscles are often limited by their material costs, operating principle, scalability, and single-degree-of-freedom contractile actuation motions. Here we propose an architecture for fluid-driven origami-inspired artificial muscles. This concept requires only a compressible skeleton, a flexible skin, and a fluid medium. A mechanical model is developed to explain the interaction of the three components. A fabrication method is introduced to rapidly manufacture low-cost artificial muscles using various materials and at multiple scales. The artificial muscles can be programed to achieve multiaxial motions including contraction, bending, and torsion. These motions can be aggregated into systems with multiple degrees of freedom, which are able to produce controllable motions at different rates. Our artificial muscles can be driven by fluids at negative pressures (relative to ambient). This feature makes actuation safer than most other fluidic artificial muscles that operate with positive pressures. Experiments reveal that these muscles can contract over 90% of their initial lengths, generate stresses of ∼600 kPa, and produce peak power densities over 2 kW/kg—all equal to, or in excess of, natural muscle. This architecture for artificial muscles opens the door to rapid design and low-cost fabrication of actuation systems for numerous applications at multiple scales, ranging from miniature medical devices to wearable robotic exoskeletons to large deployable structures for space exploration.

References:
- Yiğit Mengüç, Nikolaus Correll, Rebecca Kramer, Jamie Paik. Will robots be bodies with brains or brains with bodies? Science Robotics 29 Nov 2017: Vol. 2, Issue 12, eaar4527; DOI: 10.1126/scirobotics.aar4527
- Shuguang Li, Daniel M. Vogt, Daniela Rus, and Robert J. Wood. Fluid-driven origami-inspired artificial muscles. PNAS, November 2017 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1713450114 (open access)
http://www.kurzweilai.net/why-most-future-robots-wont-look-like-robots

http://www.kurzweilai.net/why-most-futu ... ike-robots

[Ali Yas]

An explanation of the Alcubierre-White Warp Drive | AsteronX

Wat een onzin die vent uitkraamt...!

"We all know, sooner or later, routine flights to and from space will become commonplace"

Larie. Ruimtereizen is schreeuwend duur en zal dat (verhoudingsgewijs zeker) altijd blijven.

"... to work in space. And when that day comes, we're gonna be awestruck about how vast space really is. Even though we already know this, once we actually begin venturing out there, experiencing it first-hand, it's going to be a real eye opener"

Kul. Foto's van Hubble maken dat veel duidelijker; met naar buiten kijken door een patrijspoortje van een ruimteschip zie je geen bal (tenzij 't een heel grote is, zoals de Aarde vanaf 7000 kilometer).

"Let's face it: space is really big"

Hij meent 't.

"With the current level of space tech it would take us decades to reach Alpha Centauri"

Nee, het kost ons decennia om ons eigen zonnestelsel uit te komen. Om binnen decennia 4 lichtjaar af te leggen moet je een tiende van de lichtsnelheid halen, wat onze mogelijkheden verre overtreft. Ons snelste vaartuig in die richting, de Voyager I, gaat nu 17 km/s; de lichtsnelheid is 300.000 km/s; een tiende daarvan is nog altijd meer dan duizend keer zo snel.

"none will be as fast or as practical as the warp drive"

Fantasie. Zo'n ding bestaat helemaal niet.

Dan, over een wiskundige die eens wat op papier heeft zitten filosoferen:

"The warp drive hyper fast travel within general relativity"

Misleiding. De algemene relativiteitstheorie is een setje noodzakelijk voorwaarden waaraan een kosmologisch model moet voldoen, maar laat ruimte voor allerlei aperte onzin zoals het bestaan van parallelle universa. De Warp Drive past daar goed bij ja.

En daarna begint het gezwam pas echt. Het is niet meer te volgen maar vanwege de aanloop denk ik wel te weten hoe hecht de banden met de realiteit dan nog zijn.

[Pilgrim]

Nou, nou...

Larie. Ruimtereizen is schreeuwend duur en zal dat (verhoudingsgewijs zeker) altijd blijven.

Neeeeee, dat denk ik niet. Als er ooit een vergelijkbare ontwikkeling als met luchtvaart komt zullen de prijzen geweldig dalen. Het probleem is op dit moment de herbruikbaarheid van de lanceervaartuigen. Die brandstof kost geen drol.

De rest van je commentaar laat ik maar voor wat het is...

[xplosive]

What Will Happen in Artificial Intelligence Next Year?



Artificial Intelligence : It will kill us

[xplosive]

 

DeepMind’s AI became a superhuman chess player in a few hours, just for fun

by James Vincent Dec 6, 2017, 8:11am EST

The end-game for Google’s AI subsidiary DeepMind was never beating people at board games. It’s always been about creating something akin to a combustion engine for intelligence — a generic thinking machine that can be applied to a broad range of challenges. The company is still a long way off achieving this goal, but new research published by its scientists this week suggests they’re at least headed down the right path.

In the paper, DeepMind describes how a descendant of the AI program that first conquered the board game Go has taught itself to play a number of other games at a superhuman level. After eight hours of self-play, the program bested the AI that first beat the human world Go champion; and after four hours of training, it beat the current world champion chess-playing program, Stockfish. Then for a victory lap, it trained for just two hours and polished off one of the world’s best shogi-playing programs named Elmo (shogi being a Japanese version of chess that’s played on a bigger board).

One of the key advances here is that the new AI program, named AlphaZero, wasn’t specifically designed to play any of these games. In each case, it was given some basic rules (like how knights move in chess, and so on) but was programmed with no other strategies or tactics. It simply got better by playing itself over and over again at an accelerated pace — a method of training AI known as “reinforcement learning.”

Using reinforcement learning in this way isn’t new in and of itself. DeepMind’s engineers used the same method to create AlphaGo Zero; the AI program that was unveiled this October. But, as this week’s paper describes, the new AlphaZero is a “more generic version” of the same software, meaning it can be applied to a broader range of tasks without being primed beforehand.

What’s remarkable here is that in less than 24 hours, the same computer program was able to teach itself how to play three complex board games at superhuman levels. That’s a new feat for the world of AI.

This takes DeepMind just that little bit closer to building the generic thinking machine the company dreams of, but major challenges lie ahead. When DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis showed off AlphaGo Zero earlier this year, he suggested that a future version of the program could help with a range of scientific problems — from designing new drugs to discovering new materials. But these problems are qualitatively very different to just playing board games, and a whole lot of work needs to be done to find out how exactly algorithms can tackle them. All we can say for certain now, is that artificial intelligence has definitely moved on from just playing chess.

[Ali Yas]

Het probleem is op dit moment de herbruikbaarheid van de lanceervaartuigen. Die brandstof kost geen drol.

Dat is toch een beetje anders dan je denkt. Om in een geschikte baan om de aarde te komen moet je naar 700 km, minstens, dat betekent 70 keer meer hoogte dan een lijnvliegtuig. Op 700 km heb je per kg een potentiële energie van gh = 6.867.000 J, dat is de arbeid die je met 0,4 liter benzine kunt genereren. Alleen moet je niet alleen omhoog, je moet ook nog opzij, namelijk met een gangetje van 7,8 km/s. Met E/m=.5v2 = 30.420.000 J heb je dus nog eens 2 liter benzine nodig. Dus dik 2 liter benzine voor 1 kg last. Vervelend, want die 2 liter benzine moet deels ook mee en dat kost extra benzine enzovoorts. Ziedaar het intrinsieke probleem van ruimtevaart: je kunt de massa waarmee je vertrekt niet in een baan om de aarde krijgen. De massa aan brandstof moet een aantal malen die van de te heffen massa overtreffen, en daarbij is het verstandig onderweg zo veel mogelijk ballast en verpakking te lozen. Ziedaar de achtergrond van de meertrapsraket.

Voor de boosmakende details en concrete getalletjes (let vooral op de 83%), lees "The Tyranny of the Rocket Equation".

[xplosive]

Volgens mij had Pilgrim het niet over de hoeveelheid brandstof maar wel over de kosten ervan. Dat zijn 2 totaal verschillende zaken.

Erg veel brandstof hoeft in verhouding tot de kosten voor het bouwen van een raket maar een drol te kosten (bij wijze van spreken).