Artificial intelligence looks like a political campaign manager’s dream because it could tune its persuasion efforts to millions of people individually – but it could be a nightmare for democracy.
An X-ray image comparing a healthy spine and one showing signs of ankylosing spondylitis.
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Quantum machine learning models could help us create AI systems that are almost impenetrable by hackers. But in the hands of hackers, the same technology could wreak havoc.
Approach all information with some initial skepticism.
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Generative AIs may make up information they serve you, meaning they may potentially spread science misinformation. Here’s how to check the accuracy of what you read in an AI-enhanced media landscape.
Researchers are working on untangling the neural circuitry of chronic and acute pain.
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Pain has long been subjectively measured, leading to frustrations for patients and doctors alike. Identifying neural biomarkers of pain could improve diagnosis and lead to better treatments of chronic pain conditions.
You can’t see inside any opaque box, but the color black adds an air of mystery.
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Metaphorical black boxes shield the inner workings of AIs, which protect software developers’ intellectual property. They also make it hard to understand how the AIs work – and why things go wrong.
Artificial intelligence tools are making waves in almost every aspect of life, and astronomy is no different. An astronomer explains the history and future of AI in understanding the universe.
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if a machine can ascribe intent to the events and experiences befalling it, this raises the question of identity and what it means to be aware of oneself and others
SAURON: radio intensity (purple) from MeerKAT overlaid on an optical image from the Dark Energy Survey.
Michelle Lochner / The Dark Energy Survey Collaboration 2005
The technology exists to build autonomous weapons. How well they would work and whether they could be adequately controlled are unknown. The Ukraine war has only turned up the pressure.
AI’s ability to identify ‘technosignatures’ missed by classical algorithms is an exciting step forward for radio astronomers.
Counterfactuals are claims about what would happen, were something to occur in a different way. For instance, we can ask what the world would be like had the internet never been developed.
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AI models are increasingly being used to make important decision about people’s lives – just take Robodebt. Yet the complexity of these systems means we hardly understand them.