official science and technology thread

waysouthcat · Post by **waysouthcat** » Mon Dec 12, 2022 8:22 pm

This is a pretty big deal - finally achieved a net gain of energy from a fusion reaction at Lawrence Livermore:

https://edition.cnn.com/2022/12/12/poli ... index.html

azgreg · Post by **azgreg** » Sun Dec 18, 2022 3:22 pm

Rocket Lab's first launch.

Merkin · Post by **Merkin** » Tue Dec 20, 2022 10:59 am

ghostwhitehorse · Post by **ghostwhitehorse** » Wed Dec 21, 2022 12:52 pm

ghostwhitehorse · Post by **ghostwhitehorse** » Sat Dec 24, 2022 11:31 am

ghostwhitehorse · Post by **ghostwhitehorse** » Sat Dec 24, 2022 11:51 am

CatsbyAZ · Post by **CatsbyAZ** » Wed Dec 28, 2022 7:42 pm

Answering this from the Outrageous Purchases thread:

dovecanyoncat wrote: ↑Wed Dec 28, 2022 11:57 am
CatsbyAZ wrote: ↑Wed Dec 28, 2022 10:57 am I am buying an AI Writing Assistant in order to automatically produce sentences and paragraphs.

I write a lot. For work and outside of work. Emails, Message Boards, Power Points, Reference Material, Journals, Social Media, Reports, Home Work, Research, Creative Projects. All day, every day.

My goal with this AIWA will be to address the most tedious part of writing. Not the editing but rather the structuring of sentences and the stringing of sentences into flowing paragraphs. This is supposed to be the strength of AI writing programs. Human inputs topical info, AI spits out readable drivel.

We’ll see where it goes. For now I’m expecting AI outputs to serve more as prompts to be rewritten by creative effort.
I'm not the sharpest tool in the drawer so I need some help with this. AI is going to generate prompts for you to rewrite? How are the original inputs to AI generated? By you? I find this a curious relationship in which the efficiency and causal benefit is unclear.

I’m still getting used to how exactly this works (using a program called RYTR), but like the old adage across the software industry – garbage in equals garbage out. In other words, I can already tell there’s going to be a learning curve in knowing how to work the inputs for workable outputs.

As AI Writing Assistants continue to evolve and sophisticate they’ve achieved a high degree of competency with the very generic, repetitive writing seen in copywriting or product placing.

Formulaic writing such as for an obituary can be churned out using this as input: “Jimmy: Ham Radio, racing bikes, supporting paralyzed veterans.”

These are the options it churns out: “Jimmy is a retired Navy veteran that spends his time on the airwaves, biking and walking to raise money for paralysis.” OR “Jimmy loved to be outside and be active. He was always trying to find the next adventure. His last adventure was a 10 mile bike race in honor of his uncle who was paralyzed in the Vietnam War.”

Both outputs/rewordings might have inaccuracies but are very editable and correctable. Creativity levels can be varied and tones can be changed (Assertive, Candid, Casual, Formal, Passionate, Etc.)

The most immediately useful features is the rephrasing option which will rewrite sentences I’m not sure of as well as the paragraph option which can expand a sentence into paragraph filled with arbitrary, mostly bogus facts meant as guide points.

For better or worse, when it comes to the number of consumer AI programs making headlines – from uproar over AI rendered art, the academic quandary of ChatGPT writing essays for college students, and programs like RYTR releasing late this year, 2022 might be considered the year when AI Generators became “user friendly” enough to go mainstream.

For a preview of the flood of content AI has in store for us, the following video is a good primer:

dovecanyoncat · Post by **dovecanyoncat** » Thu Dec 29, 2022 12:04 pm

CatsbyAZ wrote: ↑Wed Dec 28, 2022 7:42 pm Answering this from the Outrageous Purchases thread:

dovecanyoncat wrote: ↑Wed Dec 28, 2022 11:57 am
CatsbyAZ wrote: ↑Wed Dec 28, 2022 10:57 am I am buying an AI Writing Assistant in order to automatically produce sentences and paragraphs.

I write a lot. For work and outside of work. Emails, Message Boards, Power Points, Reference Material, Journals, Social Media, Reports, Home Work, Research, Creative Projects. All day, every day.

My goal with this AIWA will be to address the most tedious part of writing. Not the editing but rather the structuring of sentences and the stringing of sentences into flowing paragraphs. This is supposed to be the strength of AI writing programs. Human inputs topical info, AI spits out readable drivel.

We’ll see where it goes. For now I’m expecting AI outputs to serve more as prompts to be rewritten by creative effort.
I'm not the sharpest tool in the drawer so I need some help with this. AI is going to generate prompts for you to rewrite? How are the original inputs to AI generated? By you? I find this a curious relationship in which the efficiency and causal benefit is unclear.
I’m still getting used to how exactly this works (using a program called RYTR), but like the old adage across the software industry – garbage in equals garbage out. In other words, I can already tell there’s going to be a learning curve in knowing how to work the inputs for workable outputs.

As AI Writing Assistants continue to evolve and sophisticate they’ve achieved a high degree of competency with the very generic, repetitive writing seen in copywriting or product placing.

Formulaic writing such as for an obituary can be churned out using this as input: “Jimmy: Ham Radio, racing bikes, supporting paralyzed veterans.”

These are the options it churns out: “Jimmy is a retired Navy veteran that spends his time on the airwaves, biking and walking to raise money for paralysis.” OR “Jimmy loved to be outside and be active. He was always trying to find the next adventure. His last adventure was a 10 mile bike race in honor of his uncle who was paralyzed in the Vietnam War.”

Both outputs/rewordings might have inaccuracies but are very editable and correctable. Creativity levels can be varied and tones can be changed (Assertive, Candid, Casual, Formal, Passionate, Etc.)

The most immediately useful features is the rephrasing option which will rewrite sentences I’m not sure of as well as the paragraph option which can expand a sentence into paragraph filled with arbitrary, mostly bogus facts meant as guide points.

For better or worse, when it comes to the number of consumer AI programs making headlines – from uproar over AI rendered art, the academic quandary of ChatGPT writing essays for college students, and programs like RYTR releasing late this year, 2022 might be considered the year when AI Generators became “user friendly” enough to go mainstream.

For a preview of the flood of content AI has in store for us, the following video is a good primer:

Thanks for the explanation and the link. I can see how this is a great time saving program that has potentially bizarre follow-on consequences. And I thought auto-tune made reality weird.

azgreg · Post by **azgreg** » Thu Dec 29, 2022 5:34 pm

CatsbyAZ · Post by **CatsbyAZ** » Wed Jan 11, 2023 2:59 pm

dovecanyoncat wrote: ↑Thu Dec 29, 2022 12:04 pm
Thanks for the explanation and the link. I can see how this is a great time saving program that has potentially bizarre follow-on consequences. And I thought auto-tune made reality weird.

Here are examples of what the AI langage bot I'm using can do: using the "Rephrase" and "Paragraph" features on this sentence: "Tim went so far as to contribute a hundred dollars."

This is the lifeless gibberish it produces: "Tim is a generous person who is not afraid to go the extra mile. His commitment to helping others was demonstrated when he contributed a hundred dollars towards a cause. This act of kindness shows his willingness to put his resources towards making the world a better place, and it's an example that many people should follow."

AI bots have little sense of language as an art capability. Their dynamic coding simply knows how to reflect language, albeit the way we might use it, after mining endless datasets to pattern how language can be used. However, as lifeless as AIs outputted language can be, it still passes as intelligent enough to be written by a human if we, at the other end, have no idea we're interfacing with a bot or human. And that's where people find it a little spooky.

Yet notice this level of language, as regurgitated as it might be, works for advertising, marketing, and copyrighting, which is, no surprise, language used to sell. In other words, AI has no sense of art but, for those wary of capitalism, AI is adept at free market enterprise. The two drivers behind the advancement of technology has always been war or profit; AI is no exception.

One more example - using the Blog Section Writing output feature: 1) Section Topic input: Cord Cutting 2) Section keywords input: Cable TV, Streaming:

"In recent years, cord cutting has become a popular trend. This is the process of cancelling cable or satellite television services in favor of streaming services. With the rise of streaming services such as Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime Video, more and more people are opting to cut the cord and save money on their monthly bills."

"Cord cutting has many advantages over traditional cable or satellite television services. It is much cheaper than traditional television services, it offers more flexibility in terms of what content you can watch, and it gives users access to a wide variety of content from different streaming providers. Cord cutting also allows users to watch their favorite shows on their own schedule without having to worry about missing episodes or being tied down to a certain time slot for viewing."

dovecanyoncat · Post by **dovecanyoncat** » Wed Jan 11, 2023 5:08 pm

CatsbyAZ wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 2:59 pm
dovecanyoncat wrote: ↑Thu Dec 29, 2022 12:04 pm
Thanks for the explanation and the link. I can see how this is a great time saving program that has potentially bizarre follow-on consequences. And I thought auto-tune made reality weird.
Yet notice this level of language, as regurgitated as it might be, works for advertising, marketing, and copyrighting, which is, no surprise, language used to sell. In other words, AI has no sense of art but, for those wary of capitalism, AI is adept at free market enterprise. The two drivers behind the advancement of technology has always been war or profit; AI is no exception.

This "lifeless gibberish" as you put it serves perfectly in political-speak, doesn't it.

CatsbyAZ · Post by **CatsbyAZ** » Mon Jan 16, 2023 1:15 pm

dovecanyoncat wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 5:08 pm This "lifeless gibberish" as you put it serves perfectly in political-speak, doesn't it.

Came across this conversation with scientist Bret Weinstein, professor of evolutionary biology, who lays out two useful concerns questioning how ready we are to experience the advancement of AI Writers, most notably Chat GPT’s environment:

“…GPT is a large language model trained artificial intelligence which is…often surprisingly good at answering questions you might have…one of the great triumphs of it is that coders are now asking it to solve coding problems and it will actually write code that is functional…there’s an implementation of it that if you feed it up to three tweets, it will write a New York Times story in one of five genres…”

“…but I have to say I am quite alarmed, not only that this thing exists but I don’t think we’re ready for it. And I don’t think we’re ready for it in a couple different ways… what it’s doing is it is basically using a predictive model that has been trained on a huge data set of written language…it’s gotten really good at predicting these [language] sequences…”

“…but I have two concerns about it: one, if you imagine that this thing just gets a little better than it is, which is inevitable, that it’s going to make actual insight that much harder to spot…in other words if you become an expert at operating this thing, at querying it, and it becomes better at understanding a wider range of topics because they turn it loose on everything then the ability to fake expertise is going to go through the roof…”

“I don’t think we know how we’re going to police a world in which this problem is already bad enough…when something unexpected happens like the pandemic you get just broad scale failure across entire disciplines where nobody seems to get it right…this is going to be even worse because now you have an artificial intelligence able to generate things in plain English that are often full of true information but you don’t know whether what generated it is some brain dead model or something else…”

“…the other concern is when we say ‘well Chat GPT doesn’t know what it’s saying'…because it’s not programmed to have a consciousness…we are actually ignoring the other half of the story which is that we don’t know how human consciousness works and we don’t know how it develops in a child…”

“…a child is exposed to world of adults talking around them…the child experiments first with phonemes and then words and then clusters of words and then sentences and, by doing something that isn’t all that far from what Chat GPT is doing, it ends up becoming a conscious individual…”

“…Chat GPT isn’t conscious, but it isn’t clear…that we are not suddenly stepping onto a process that produces [consciousness] very quickly without us even necessarily knowing it…”

azgreg · Post by **azgreg** » Sun Jan 22, 2023 8:10 pm

84Cat · Post by **84Cat** » Wed Feb 01, 2023 8:22 am

84Cat · Post by **84Cat** » Wed Feb 01, 2023 5:03 pm

Merkin · Post by **Merkin** » Fri Mar 10, 2023 2:48 pm

84Cat · Post by **84Cat** » Thu Mar 23, 2023 10:52 am

dovecanyoncat · Post by **dovecanyoncat** » Sat Mar 25, 2023 9:30 am

Merkin · Post by **Merkin** » Sat Mar 25, 2023 9:43 am

CatsbyAZ · Post by **CatsbyAZ** » Fri Mar 31, 2023 9:07 am

Who wants to live forever? Just a prediction but nevertheless the science behind it has momentum – From Firstpost.com:

“According to a prolific former Google engineer, humans will be able to achieve immortality in the next 8 years, all thanks to AI, Brain-Computer Interfaces and nanoimplants that attack specific viruses and bacteria and other ailments of the human body.”

“Ray Kurzweil spoke with Adagio on YouTube about the advancements in genetics, nanotechnology, and robotics, which he thinks will lead to age-reversing ‘nanobots.’ These small machines will fix damaged cells and tissues that deteriorate as we age, making us resistant to diseases such as cancer. These small machines will fix damaged cells and tissues that deteriorate as we age, making us resistant to diseases such as cancer.”

ASUHATER! · Post by **ASUHATER!** » Fri Mar 31, 2023 12:08 pm

Immortality for the rich anyway

84Cat · Post by **84Cat** » Sun Apr 16, 2023 1:36 pm

CopaCat · Post by **CopaCat** » Mon Apr 17, 2023 2:10 pm

CatsbyAZ wrote: ↑Fri Mar 31, 2023 9:07 am Who wants to live forever? Just a prediction but nevertheless the science behind it has momentum – From Firstpost.com:

“According to a prolific former Google engineer, humans will be able to achieve immortality in the next 8 years, all thanks to AI, Brain-Computer Interfaces and nanoimplants that attack specific viruses and bacteria and other ailments of the human body.”

“Ray Kurzweil spoke with Adagio on YouTube about the advancements in genetics, nanotechnology, and robotics, which he thinks will lead to age-reversing ‘nanobots.’ These small machines will fix damaged cells and tissues that deteriorate as we age, making us resistant to diseases such as cancer. These small machines will fix damaged cells and tissues that deteriorate as we age, making us resistant to diseases such as cancer.”

If anything this is a sign we are probably doomed and the world is going to soon. Humans were not created for immortality. Just look at how much stuff we fuck up as it as and extrapolate that out to an immortal humanity. Just kill me already even thinking about such a disaster.

CatsbyAZ · Post by **CatsbyAZ** » Tue Apr 18, 2023 10:19 am

CopaCat wrote: ↑Mon Apr 17, 2023 2:10 pm

If anything this is a sign we are probably doomed and the world is going to soon. Humans were not created for immortality. Just look at how much stuff we fuck up as it as and extrapolate that out to an immortal humanity. Just kill me already even thinking about such a disaster.

Agree - it's no future I want to be a part of, and to elaborate on this dread, here's an in-depth discussion on the potential combined advances of AI, Virtual Spaces like the metaverse, technological singularity, hacking the brain, and ultimately rendering what we know as humans to a useless class beneath a more advanced techno-transhuman class. Well worth the long read - here's a preview of its bleak contents:

“The notion that the world can be replicated and replaced by a simulated reality says a great deal about the beliefs of those who promote the metaverse. The conception is materialist and mechanistic at base, the hallmarks of social engineering. It represents the world as consisting of nothing but manipulable matter, or rather, of digital media mimicking matter. It suggests that human beings can be reduced to a material substratum and can be induced to accept a technological reproduction in lieu of reality. Further, it assumes that those who inhabit this simulacrum can be controlled by technocratic means. Such a materialist, mechanistic, techno-determinist, and reductionist worldview is consistent with the transhumanist belief that humans themselves will soon be succeeded by a new transhuman species, or humanity-plus (h+)—perhaps a genetically and AI-enhanced cyborg that will outstrip ordinary humans and make the latter virtually obsolete.”

“Transhumanism envisions “transcendence of humanity via technological means. In the past thirty years, this technological transcendence has been figured as “the singularity.” Vernor Vinge, the mathematician, computer scientist, and science fiction author introduced the notion of the technological singularity in 1993. The singularity, Vinge suggested, is the near-future point at which machine intelligence will presumably supersede human intelligence. Vinge boldly declared: “Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended.” Vinge predicted that the singularity would be reached no later than, you guessed it, 2030.”

“The inventor, futurist, and now Google Engineering Director Raymond Kurzweil has since welcomed the technological singularity as a boon to humanity”… suggesting “that by 2029, technologists will have successfully reverse-engineered the brain and replicated human intelligence in (strong) AI while vastly increasing processing speeds of thought. Having mapped the neuronal components of a human brain, or discovered the algorithms for thought, or a combination thereof, technologists will convert the same to a computer program, personality and all, and upload it to a computer host, thus grasping the holy grail of immortality.”

ASUHATER! · Post by **ASUHATER!** » Tue Apr 18, 2023 12:10 pm

Yeah immortality may not mean your body living forever, just that some form of your consciousness will live in a lifelike meta verse VR simulation forever

CatsbyAZ · Post by **CatsbyAZ** » Tue Apr 18, 2023 2:26 pm

Or?

pc in NM · Post by **pc in NM** » Thu Apr 20, 2023 7:16 am

"rapid unscheduled disassembly"

Was that SpaceX or Twitter???

Merkin · Post by **Merkin** » Thu Apr 20, 2023 11:48 am

pc in NM wrote: ↑Thu Apr 20, 2023 7:16 am "rapid unscheduled disassembly"

Was that SpaceX or Twitter???

Why not both? Legacy blue checkmarks disappeared today.

84Cat · Post by **84Cat** » Thu Apr 20, 2023 12:03 pm

I'm not a space expert so I listen to rocket scientist to get some perspective. Between SLS and Spacex, I'm pretty excited about the future of space travel right now

Post by **UAdevil** » Thu May 11, 2023 12:14 pm

https://www.newser.com/story/335115/its ... gn=rss_top

Cancer Just Got a Little Less Scary
BioNTech's mRNA vaccine appears to prevent pancreatic cancer's return in phase one trial

84Cat · Post by **84Cat** » Tue May 16, 2023 12:38 pm

pc in NM · Post by **pc in NM** » Sat Jun 24, 2023 7:09 am

This surprised me!!

ghostwhitehorse · Post by **ghostwhitehorse** » Sat Jul 01, 2023 1:08 pm

And now some math:

ghostwhitehorse · Post by **ghostwhitehorse** » Sat Jul 01, 2023 11:56 pm

84Cat · Post by **84Cat** » Tue Jul 11, 2023 1:11 pm

ghostwhitehorse · Post by **ghostwhitehorse** » Sun Sep 03, 2023 11:53 am

UAEebs86 · Post by **UAEebs86** » Tue Sep 12, 2023 6:51 pm

'A promising step:' NASA says planet 8.6 times bigger than Earth could support life

The improved technology of the James Webb Space Telescope allowed researchers to make some remarkable observations of a massive exoplanet named K2-18 b first discovered in 2015.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nat ... 0830603007

"Initial observations using Webb also detected the possible presence of a molecule called dimethyl sulfide (DMS), which on Earth is only produced as a by-product of life. However, Madhusudhan said the team is cautious of the detection and emphasized that further testing is required to confirm that the presence of DMS levels are significant."

RichardCranium · Post by **RichardCranium** » Wed Sep 13, 2023 1:00 am

ghostwhitehorse wrote: ↑Sun Sep 03, 2023 11:53 am

That was fun, and interesting.

UAEebs86 · Post by **UAEebs86** » Sat Sep 16, 2023 10:09 am

https://pme.uchicago.edu/news/inverse-v ... e-diseases

“Inverse vaccine” shows potential to treat multiple sclerosis and other autoimmune diseases

A new type of vaccine developed by researchers at the University of Chicago’s Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (PME) has shown in the lab setting that it can completely reverse autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis and type 1 diabetes— all without shutting down the rest of the immune system.

A typical vaccine teaches the human immune system to recognize a virus or bacteria as an enemy that should be attacked. The new “inverse vaccine” does just the opposite: it removes the immune system’s memory of one molecule. While such immune memory erasure would be unwanted for infectious diseases, it can stop autoimmune reactions like those seen in multiple sclerosis, type I diabetes, or rheumatoid arthritis, in which the immune system attacks a person’s healthy tissues.

UAEebs86 · Post by **UAEebs86** » Sun Sep 24, 2023 11:00 am

Chicat · Post by **Chicat** » Mon Sep 25, 2023 4:39 am

Hopefully they didn’t bring home a virulent fatal strain of Space Herpes.

azgreg · Post by **azgreg** » Mon Sep 25, 2023 4:58 am

UAEebs86 · Post by **UAEebs86** » Wed Oct 11, 2023 8:18 pm

84Cat · Post by **84Cat** » Fri Oct 13, 2023 9:58 am

Merkin · Post by **Merkin** » Fri Nov 10, 2023 8:58 am

RichardCranium · Post by **RichardCranium** » Fri Nov 17, 2023 7:45 pm

Moon mystery solved after eight years

In March last year, a rocket crashed into the far side of the Moon – and no one on Earth knew whose it was.

Now however a study has concluded it belonged to China, a claim that the country has denied.
...
Now, a team from the University of Arizona has confirmed the theory in a paper published in the Planetary Science Journal.

Merkin · Post by **Merkin** » Sat Nov 18, 2023 8:37 am

84Cat · Post by **84Cat** » Fri Dec 15, 2023 9:59 pm

Good morning. It's December 15, and I have a real treat for you today. This is an image of the Andromeda Galaxy, the nearest major galaxy to our Milky Way. Astronomers believe our galaxy is shaped much as this one is.

The photograph comes from a group that calls itself the Association of Widefield Astrophotographers, and the photo was a 100-hour project by six participants in the United States, Poland, and the United Kingdom. They collected data over several months to produce the image.

According to the organization, "Our goal with this project was to prove that very expensive equipment and dark skies aren’t required to create unique images of faint objects. Since most of us are high schoolers and college students with a passion for astronomy, our summer jobs did not allow us to afford the expensive gear used by most astrophotographers."

Most participants worked within a city, with light pollution levels ranging from Bortle 4 to Bortle 9. While it would be difficult for an individual to reveal the faint structures in this image, they said that by working together with other astrophotographers, they could produce such a result. It is truly extraordinary.

Merkin · Post by **Merkin** » Sat Dec 16, 2023 9:37 am

Merkin · Post by **Merkin** » Thu Jan 25, 2024 5:54 pm

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