Humans Need Not Apply

[Rob Lister]

I'm not sure humans have anything to worry about here.



The playing was soulless and poorly executed. I'm not the best guitar player but that was terrible. I wonder if the programmer actually plays. I'm thinking not. Or not well. But it's a step!

It should sound more like this:

[Anaxagoras]

Uniqlo's robots have already replaced 90% of its human workers at its flagship warehouse, now they've cracked the difficult task of folding T-shirts

Uniqlo is coming close to full automation at its flagship warehouse in Tokyo.

According to a new report from The Financial Times, Uniqlo's owner – apparel giant Fast Retailing – has partnered with Mujin, a Japanese startup that develops industrial robots, to create a new two-armed robot that is able to pick up t-shirts and box these up to be sent out to customers. This was a task that could previously only be done by a human.

This is an important innovation as it could enable this factory, which has already replaced 90% of its workers with robots, to roll out a fully automated process.

In an interview with The FT, a Fast Retailing executive who focuses on the development of its supply chain, stressed the importance of such innovations in Japan at this time.

"It's becoming extremely difficult to hire workers, and it's a lot more than people think," Fast Retailing executive vice president Takuya Jimbo said. "We have to be the frontrunner and continue trial and error because only the companies that can update their business models can survive."

At least, it's becoming extremely difficult to hire workers willing to do repetitive, manual tasks for low wages. And Japan isn't big on bringing in foreign workers to do those jobs either, although that's changing a bit.

[Witness]

GM requests green light to ditch steering wheel in its self-driving cars

Cruise, the autonomous-car unit of General Motors, wants to start testing its self-driving cars sans steering wheel. Indeed, it’s already produced a video [not worth watching] showing what such a design might look like.

Current National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) regulations, which were created at a time when self-driving cars were the stuff of science fiction, mean that vehicles have to include essential safety features such as a steering wheel and brake pedal. But the emergence of robot cars has put these rules under the spotlight.

According to a recent Reuters report, the NHTSA has confirmed it’s in talks with GM, which is asking for permission to test a limited number of autonomous cars without steering wheels or any other type of manual controls.

https://www.digitaltrends.com/cars/gm-r ... ving-cars/

"Or any other type of manual controls"… Relying on Gogle maps for navigation?

[Rob Lister]

The steering wheel thing is not a law, it's a regulation. It takes one bribe signature to make it happen.

[Anaxagoras]

Well, it's not truly autonomous until it doesn't need constant babysitting by a backup human driver. I'm just wondering how long it will take to get there.

The technology shouldn't necessarily have to rely on maps looks Google maps either. But some situations like driving in a blizzard seem just too risky for now at least.

Maps are needed for route planning of course.

[Witness]

Face-generating AI:



Already (ab)used: Facebook Removes Accounts With AI-Generated Profile Photos.

[Witness]

It seems to me the AI is mocking us.

Just flattering the master before the Grand Soir^©.

[Witness]

RealDoll is developing models with 3D vision, that will enable them to recognise an owner in a crowded room.

Planning orgies?

[Rob Lister]

[Witness]

↑ You and I are now largely immune, but I'm sure sparks, Pyrrho and Bruce will be thrilled.

[Anaxagoras]

Powerful antibiotic discovered using machine learning for first time

A powerful antibiotic that kills some of the most dangerous drug-resistant bacteria in the world has been discovered using artificial intelligence.

The drug works in a different way to existing antibacterials and is the first of its kind to be found by setting AI loose on vast digital libraries of pharmaceutical compounds.

Tests showed that the drug wiped out a range of antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria, including Acinetobacter baumannii and Enterobacteriaceae, two of the three high-priority pathogens that the World Health Organization ranks as “critical” for new antibiotics to target.

“In terms of antibiotic discovery, this is absolutely a first,” said Regina Barzilay, a senior researcher on the project and specialist in machine learning at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

“I think this is one of the more powerful antibiotics that has been discovered to date,” added James Collins, a bioengineer on the team at MIT. “It has remarkable activity against a broad range of antibiotic-resistant pathogens.”

To find new antibiotics, the researchers first trained a “deep learning” algorithm to identify the sorts of molecules that kill bacteria. To do this, they fed the program information on the atomic and molecular features of nearly 2,500 drugs and natural compounds, and how well or not the substance blocked the growth of the bug E coli.

Once the algorithm had learned what molecular features made for good antibiotics, the scientists set it working on a library of more than 6,000 compounds under investigation for treating various human diseases. Rather than looking for any potential antimicrobials, the algorithm focused on compounds that looked effective but unlike existing antibiotics. This boosted the chances that the drugs would work in radical new ways that bugs had yet to develop resistance to.

Tests on bacteria collected from patients showed that halicin killed Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bug that causes TB, and strains of Enterobacteriaceae that are resistant to carbapenems, a group of antibiotics that are considered the last resort for such infections. Halicin also cleared C difficile and multidrug-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii infections in mice.

To hunt for more new drugs, the team next turned to a massive digital database of about 1.5bn compounds. They set the algorithm working on 107m of these. Three days later, the program returned a shortlist of 23 potential antibiotics, of which two appear to be particularly potent. The scientists now intend to search more of the database.

Stokes said it would have been impossible to screen all 107m compounds by the conventional route of obtaining or making the substances and then testing them in the lab. “Being able to perform these experiments in the computer dramatically reduces the time and cost to look at these compounds,” he said.

[Witness]

The Pentagon promises to use artificial intelligence for good, not evil

The military has its eye on artificial intelligence solutions to everything from data analysis to surveillance, maintenance and medical care, but before the Defense Department moves full steam ahead into an AI future, they’re laying out some ethical principles to live by.

Defense Secretary Mark Esper signed off on five guidelines in a memo released Monday,

“The United States, together with our allies and partners, must accelerate the adoption of AI and lead in its national security applications to maintain our strategic position, prevail on future battlefields, and safeguard the rules-based international order,” said Esper wrote. “AI technology will change much about the battlefield of the future, but nothing will change America’s steadfast commitment to responsible and lawful behavior.”

The list is the result of a 15-month study by the Defense Innovation Board, which is made up of academics and executives in tech and business, who presented their proposed principles in a public forum at Georgetown University in October.

According to Esper’s Monday memo, the Pentagon pledges that its AI efforts will be: 1) Responsible, 2) Equitable, 3) Traceable, 4) Reliable and 5) Governable.

In short, any technology’s development and operation should be carefully developed and used, have safeguards against bias in data analysis, be auditable to find the sources of mistakes and correct them, have narrowly-defined parameters for use and have back-up plans for shut down in case something goes wrong.

“We owe it to the American people and our men and women in uniform to adopt AI principles that reflect our nation’s values of a free and open society,” Lt. Gen. Jack Shanahan, head of the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, told reporters Monday. “This runs in stark contrast to Russia and China, whose use of AI tech for military purposes raises serious concern about human rights, ethics and international norms.”

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your ... -not-evil/

I notice the Pentagon's efforts won't be ecological.

[Rob Lister]

The Pentagon promises to use artificial intelligence for good, not evil

Well, as long as they don't have their fingers crossed I supposes we can believe that they're going to use it for [undefinable reason], not [undefinable reason].

Defense Secretary Mark Esper signed off on five guidelines in a memo released Monday,

... but nothing will change America’s steadfast commitment to responsible and lawful behavior.”

Where lawful is defined as 'rules we like.'

According to Esper’s Monday memo, the Pentagon pledges that its AI efforts will be: 1) Responsible, 2) Equitable, 3) Traceable, 4) Reliable and 5) Governable.

1) Metric?
2) Fair to whom? Is impartiality something we want in war?
3) By serial number? GPS tracker?
4) At what?
5) One would hope.

These boys are playing pool with a piece of rope. Are you all touchy-feely now?
You're supposed to be warfighters, not feel-good stoners. How about:

1) Fucking accurate
2) Massively one-sided: ours
3) Enterprise integration
4) 99.99 enemy kill rate
5) We fucking control it utterly

[Witness]

Long article with videos, no salient part to quote so you'll have to click if the subject interests you: 5 Ways Artificial Intelligence is Already Changing Cinema.

[Witness]

↑ That's why we invented videotape.

[Anaxagoras]

Long article with videos, no salient part to quote so you'll have to click if the subject interests you: 5 Ways Artificial Intelligence is Already Changing Cinema.

I haven't even got to the bit about AI yet, but:

The past two centuries have also witnessed how 1% of the world’s population has amassed half of the globe’s net wealth, a perverted maldistribution that had never appeared before at this scale in human history. The gap between a billionaire and a blue-collar worker today is astronomically greater than the gap between a king and a peasant in the 17th century.

Is that right? I think it's probably either wrong or narrowly defined in a way that overlooks certain important metrics. Or maybe it just isn't adjusted for inflation, etc.

[Rob Lister]

I haven't even got to the bit about AI yet, but:

The past two centuries have also witnessed how 1% of the world’s population has amassed half of the globe’s net wealth, a perverted maldistribution that had never appeared before at this scale in human history. The gap between a billionaire and a blue-collar worker today is astronomically greater than the gap between a king and a peasant in the 17th century.

Is that right? I think it's probably either wrong or narrowly defined in a way that overlooks certain important metrics. Or maybe it just isn't adjusted for inflation, etc.

Suffice it to say that a king back then had everything that could possible be had given the resources, science and technology of that time, whereas a peasant lived in a 30sqft ground-dug hut with a thatch roof, 10 kids and 2 goats ... if he was lucky!

So if you turn that on it's head, one can say with utmost certainty that 99% of the blue collar peasants of today live far, far better than any king or nobleman of the 17th century could possibly fathom.

The quoted point was just needlessly rabble-rousing trying to instigate the modern peons into a jealous riot. An otherwise good article ruined by a reporters political bias and naive SJW talking points. They need to stay on topic. And so do you. This is your first warning.

[Witness]

Not really AI, but being in the continuity of "computing impacting the arts", here it goes:

Musician uses algorithm to generate every possible melody to prevent copyright lawsuits

A musician and lawyer has used an algorithm to generate every possible melody in an attempt to end music copyright lawsuit claims.

Working with programmer Noah Rubin, Damien Riehl built software capable of generating 300,000 melodies each second, creating a catalogue of 68 billion 8-note melodies.

The melodies were then copyrighted and released into the public domain in the hope of stifling litigious musicians.

Citing famous examples of music copyright infringement lawsuits, Mr Riehl said his motivation was to demonstrate that the number of possible melodies is finite and therefore liable to patterns being repeated unintentionally.

This was the case when George Harrison was sued for allegedly stealing the melody of My Sweet Lord from He's So Fine by the Chiffons, according to Mr Riehl. The litigation lasted for nearly three decades, during which the former Beatle was found guilty of "subconscious plagiarism" by a US judge.

More recently, singer Sam Smith was forced to settle a copyright dispute with Tom Petty over the apparent likeness between his Grammy-winning song Stay With Me and Petty's hit I Won't Back Down.

Smith claimed he had never heard Petty's song, nor the three-note descending melody in the chorus that he was accused of stealing. The UK musician's representative at the time said the likeness was "a complete coincidence" but an out-of-court settlement saw Petty credited as co-writers of the track.

https://www.independent.co.uk/life-styl ... 64536.html

"Three-note descending melody".


It amuses me as it's exactly Boris Vian's suggestion: let a computer generate once and for all every possible ditty, copyright it, and be done with them. (As he died in 1959, the project wasn't implemented.)

Here you can see him playing the trumpet with his brothers:



But he's mostly known for his songs, books & plays.

[Anaxagoras]

Since this thread hasn't gotten much love lately:

Point:
Boston Dynamics’ robot dog is chipping in to help COVID-19 patients

Counterpoint:
Telemedicine Doesn't Need Boston Dynamics' Nightmare Robot Dog

[robinson]

The real problems for free roaming robots has always been the exact same problems as humans have

Energy source, illness, being kidnapped, robbed or making mistakes

[Hotarubi]

Smith claimed he had never heard Petty's song, nor the three-note descending melody in the chorus that he was accused of stealing. The UK musician's representative at the time said the likeness was "a complete coincidence" but an out-of-court settlement saw Petty credited as co-writers of the track.
https://www.independent.co.uk/life-styl ... 64536.html

"Three-note descending melody".

Sorry to necro this point, but genuinely the first time, very first time I heard Smith's song I thought, "hes nicked some of that" and named Petty's tune as its father.

Ymmv.

[Witness]

"Three-note descending melody".

Sorry to necro this point, but genuinely the first time, very first time I heard Smith's song I thought, "hes nicked some of that" and named Petty's tune as its father.

Ymmv.

No need to be sorry.

Can't judge that particular case as I'm not interested in pop music, but my beef was with combinatorics: there are only that much (I'll leave the details to you) three notes descending melodies. (Staying within an octave and avoiding dissonance, I presume.)
If we admit so small a unit as a creation with enforced copyright we'd have run out of music a long time ago.

My guess is that the similarity you noticed isn't just in the melody (rhythm, timbre, mood, sound of the respective groups, even lyrics perhaps…).

[Witness]

Singapore Using Social Distancing Robot to Fight COVID-19

While Singapore has fared better than others during the COVID-19 pandemic, they are still doing their best to enforce social distancing. Along with new regulations, the country is turning to an imposing robot to remind citizens to keep their distance.

Meet the 0-R3. It comes from local company Otsaw. The security robot has been deployed to places like parks and footpaths. It rolls around warning people to keep a safe distance and letting them know if they are getting too close to one another. The 0-R3 says things like “Please practice safe distancing at all times and do not loiter at this park – stay safe, stay home.”



Social Distancing Robot Collects Data and Video

Along with sensors that help the robot navigate, a 360-degree camera collects data and video that is sent for security officers to review. The robot can cover about 2.5 miles before it needs to be recharged.

Singapore initially commissioned the robots for security surveillance at reservoirs across the country. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 0-R3’s role was changed into that of a “social distancing ambassador”

https://yellrobot.com/singapore-social- ... -covid-19/

Obey!

[Hotarubi]

Smith 1:00


Petty everywhere

My guess is that the similarity you noticed isn't just in the melody (rhythm, timbre, mood, sound of the respective groups, even lyrics perhaps…).

All of that except lyrics I guess. Might be a coincidence, can't be sure, but it's a little "close."

[Witness]

All of that except lyrics I guess. Might be a coincidence, can't be sure, but it's a little "close."

Indeed, very close, and even in the lyrics similarity of "stay" and "stand".

[Rob Lister]

Tom would not have minded. After Stevie Nicks ate his soul, nothing much mattered to Tom.

[Witness]

AI cannot be recognised as an inventor, US rules

An artificial intelligence system has been refused the right to two patents in the US, after a ruling only "natural persons" could be inventors.

The US Patent and Trademark Office rejected two patents where the AI system Dabus was listed as the inventor, in a ruling on Monday.

US patent law had previously only specified eligible inventors had to be "individuals".

It follows a similar ruling from the UK Intellectual Property Office.

Dabus designed:

• interlocking food containers that are easy for robots to grasp
• a warning light that flashes in a hard-to-ignore rhythm

And its creator, physicist and AI researcher Stephen Thaler, had argued that because he had not helped it with the inventions, it would be inaccurate to list himself as the inventor.

But patents offices insist innovations are attributed to humans - to avoid legal complications that would arise if corporate inventorship were recognised.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-5 ... %40BBCTech

Take that, you filthy silicon scum!

[Hotarubi]

I think they should sue and Patrick Stewart serve as their attorney.

( Hah. I said *they* and not *it*. Take that technophobes.)

[Witness]

This AI Poet Mastered Rhythm, Rhyme, and Natural Language to Write Like Shakespeare

“Deep-speare” crafted Shakespearean verse that most readers couldn’t distinguish from human-written poems

Here’s a stanza from a sonnet written by William Shakespeare:


And here’s one written by Deep-speare, an artificial intelligence program that we trained to write sonnets:


Deep-speare’s creation is nonsensical when you read it closely, but it certainly “scans well,” as an English teacher would say—its rhythm, rhyme scheme, and the basic grammar of its individual lines all seem fine at first glance. As our research team discovered when we showed our AI’s poetry to the world, that’s enough to fool quite a lot of people; most readers couldn’t distinguish the AI-generated poetry from human-written works.

Our team, composed of three machine-learning researchers and one scholar of literature, trained our AI poet using about 2,700 sonnets taken from the online library Project Gutenberg. Our “poet” learned how to compose poetry on its own, using the AI approach known as deep learning—it cranked through the poems in its training database, trying again and again to create lines of poetry that matched the examples. We didn’t give it rhyming dictionaries, pronunciation dictionaries, or other resources, as has often been the case in previous computer-generated poetry projects. Instead, Deep-speare independently learned three sets of rules that pertain to sonnet writing: rhythm, rhyme scheme, and the fundamentals of natural language (which words go together).

https://spectrum.ieee.org/artificial-in ... hakespeare

Long way to go…

[Hotarubi]

I suppose the faux old fashioned script is just to put you in the mood or something.

I noticed that too. It's the "soft lighting" of text.

[Anaxagoras]

What passes for "Artificial Intelligence" these days, is sometimes pretty cool, but still not really Turing Test level AI.

[Anaxagoras]

No, it is creepy. I think it's in the creepy part of the uncanny valley.

[Hotarubi]

I like that dress.

[robinson]

Relevant?

Japan's creepy sex doll industry 'reaches next level' in creation of perfect artificial £1,000 ‘Dutch Wife’ which comes with 'realistic feeling skin'
Daily Mail (UK)

... The dolls, which are non inflatable, are sold under the name 'Dutch Wives', a Japanese term for a sex doll, and adverts in the media boast that anyone who buys one will never want a real girlfriend again. ...

Of course some guys might fancy a girlfriend who moves around a little, at least in bed.

Wait a year or two.

[Anaxagoras]

Her eyes are wrong too. One's looking into the camera, another is looking off in another direction.

[Witness]

Microsoft sacks journalists to replace them with robots

Users of the homepages of the MSN website and Edge browser will now see news stories generated by AI

Dozens of journalists have been sacked after Microsoft decided to replace them with artificial intelligence software.

Staff who maintain the news homepages on Microsoft’s MSN website and its Edge browser – used by millions of Britons every day – have been told that they will be no longer be required because robots can now do their jobs.

Around 27 individuals employed by PA Media – formerly the Press Association – were told on Thursday that they would lose their jobs in a month’s time after Microsoft decided to stop employing humans to select, edit and curate news articles on its homepages.

Employees were told Microsoft’s decision to end the contract with PA Media was taken at short notice as part of a global shift away from humans in favour of automated updates for news.

One staff member who worked on the team said: “I spend all my time reading about how automation and AI is going to take all our jobs, and here I am – AI has taken my job.”

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... ith-robots

[Rob Lister]

Ha! They are the architects of their own demise.

From wiki on PA media:

RADAR

PA was awarded a €706,000 grant from Google in July 2017 to fund a local news automation service in collaboration with Urbs Media.[15]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PA_Media#RADAR

[robinson]

Any AI smart enough to pass a Turing test

Is smart enough to know to fail it

[robinson]

It’s from the book

River of Gods

[robinson]

2047 in India