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May 16, 2017

New 3D-printing method may allow for fast, low-cost, more-flexible medical implants for millions

Posted by in categories: 3D printing, biotech/medical

University of Florida (UF) researchers have developed a method for 3D printing soft-silicone medical implants that are stronger, quicker, less expensive, more flexible, and more comfortable than the implants currently available. That should be good news for the millions of people every year who need medical devices implanted.

Model 3D-printed silicone trachea implant (credit: University of Florida)

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May 16, 2017

Elon Musk Just Unveiled Breakthrough AI Research. Here’s What Your Need to Know

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, robotics/AI

Elon Musk co-founded artificial intelligence non-profit OpenAI just announced it has created an AI system that can learn to complete a task in reality after watching just one demonstration of that task in a simulated environment.

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, OpenAI’s newest robot system should leave humanity blushing. Not only can it successfully replicate human behaviors, it can do so after just a single demonstration of the task.

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May 16, 2017

Proxima B: Our closest neighbouring exoplanet could host ‘alien life’ climate models suggest

Posted by in categories: alien life, climatology, health

Exoplanet Proxima B, which was recently discovered orbiting our closest neighbouring star, may have the potential to support life, new climate simulations have revealed.

Ever since it was identified in August 2016, Proxima B, which stands 4.2 light years away from Earth and close to the Proxima Centauri star, has intrigued scientists. The tantalising prospect that the planet could be habitable has led many to undertake in-depth investigations.

Trending: Who is David Nabarro, the UK candidate to lead the World Health Organisation?

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May 16, 2017

DARPA Wants Artificial Intelligence That Doesn’t Forget Everything It Knows

Posted by in categories: biological, military, robotics/AI

Biological systems don’t completely freeze up when they encounter a new situation, but computers often do.

Biological organisms are pretty good at navigating life’s unpredictability, but computers are embarrassingly bad at it.

That’s the crux of a new military research program that aims to model artificially intelligent systems after the brains of living creatures. When an organism encounters a new environment or situation, it relies on past experience to help it make a decision. Current artificial intelligence technology, on the other hand, relies on extensive training on various data sets, and if it hasn’t encountered a specific situation, it can’t select a next step.

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May 16, 2017

Radicals: Outsiders Changing the World

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, life extension, sex, transhumanism

I get beat up in The Guardian today a bit with a ham-fisted review. But make no mistake, the book Radicals by journalist and Immortality Bus rider Jamie Bartlett, which is coming out in a few days, is important and brilliant: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/may/16/radicals-outsi…ett-review #transhumanism


This thoughtful study of radical movements explores politics, sex and drugs.

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May 16, 2017

Robots that Learn

Posted by in categories: information science, robotics/AI, virtual reality

Last month, we showed an earlier version of this robot where we’d trained its vision system using domain randomization, that is, by showing it simulated objects with a variety of color, backgrounds, and textures, without the use of any real images.

Now, we’ve developed and deployed a new algorithm, one-shot imitation learning, allowing a human to communicate how to do a new task by performing it in VR. Given a single demonstration, the robot is able to solve the same task from an arbitrary starting configuration.

Caption: Our system can learn a behavior from a single demonstration delivered within a simulator, then reproduce that behavior in different setups in reality.

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May 16, 2017

Automation will have a bigger impact on jobs in smaller cities

Posted by in categories: employment, robotics/AI

More migration to megacities is expected in the next few decades, because they have more jobs that are resilient to automation than smaller urban areas.

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May 16, 2017

Your art degree might save you from automation, an AI expert says

Posted by in categories: finance, robotics/AI

When machines control all the world’s finances and run factory floors, what will humans be left to do?

We’ll make art, says Kai-Fu Lee, a former Google and Microsoft executive who has since launched VC firm Sinovation Ventures.

“Art and beauty is very hard to replicate with AI. Given AI is more objective, analytical, data driven, maybe it’s time for some of us to switch to the humanities, liberal arts, and beauty,” Lee told Quartz editor-in-chief Kevin Delaney during a live Q&A session. “Maybe professions where it’s hard to find a job might be good to study.”

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May 16, 2017

This Robot Of Leonardo Da Vinci Is Disturbingly Realistic

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

The android was the star of the International Robot Exhibition 2015 in Tokyo.

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May 16, 2017

Hewlett Packard Enterprise unveils a monster computer that’s made for Mars

Posted by in categories: computing, space travel

https://youtube.com/watch?v=m9t-G9p8LrI

What does a prototype computer with 160 terabytes of memory have to do with missions to Mars? The way Kirk Bresniker sees it, a giant leap in computing is required for the giant leap to the Red Planet.

“That’s actually what we need to wrap around that crew,” Bresniker, chief architect at Hewlett Packard Labs, told GeekWire.

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