Lifeboat Foundation

Researchers found a simple way to make ChatGPT, Bard, and other chatbots misbehave, proving that AI is hard to tame.

Microsoft is the AI frontrunner, thanks to its early OpenAI partnership and years of shrewd management. Here’s how CEO Satya Nadella plans to keep his lead.

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Ever since Voyager 2 flew past Neptune in 1989, the giant dark smudges that appear in the distant planet’s atmosphere have presented a strange puzzle.

Continue reading “Mysterious Dark Vortex on Neptune Seen From Earth For First Time” »

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Continue reading “Why Is 1/137 One of the Greatest Unsolved Problems In Physics?” »

A new analysis shows that “open source” AI tools like Llama 2 are still controlled by big tech companies in a number of ways.

Disavowal, though, is not only about waste. The disavowal of dark truths is arguably a theme of modernity itself. Modern practices around death are revealing in this regard: In many traditional societies, a corpse is kept in the family space until its burial; in most modern societies, the dead body is carted off immediately. Embalming is common to halt (and hide) the process of decay. It is precisely this approach that Lee’s mushroom burial suit is critiquing.

From a fungal vantage point, this system is indeed psychotic. Mycoremediation may not be the systemic intervention that was hoped for, but as an expression of one’s personal concern for our toxified landscape, it is far from insignificant. Rather, it is a tangible way for people without much institutional power to engage in the ongoing fight against environmental damage, to try to contain the disasters seeping around us. As a domestic intervention, mycoremediation is modest but culturally meaningful — a method of repair and reconnection.

The power of fungi comes from the proximity they have with dark truths: the abject, the mess we need to face, mortality, vitality, kinship. In other contexts, this proximity elicits wariness, but in our current crisis, it holds the possibility of a healing power — a pharmacological power. Fungi can take on the mess and the junk, break it down and transform and incorporate it rather than ignore it.

Drug development is a huge component of healthcare research that continues to grow, however, about 90% of drugs generated fail to make it to clinical trials. Drugs designed to target cancer fail due to many different obstacles including the tumor microenvironment (TME), which is the area surrounding the tumor. The TME is comprised of multiple cells generated to suppress the immune system and allow the tumor to grow. Since there are many mechanisms involved that makeup the TME, it is difficult to prescribe patients anti-cancer drugs that completely kill the tumor. Often a combination therapies are needed, but doctors run the risk of adverse side effects in patients due to toxicity of too many drugs.

Recently, a study published in eLife from Dr. Jennifer Gerton at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research in Kansas City, Missouri reported one critical reason why patients may experience unexpected side effects on the cellular level.

SBUDNIC, built by an academically diverse team of students, was confirmed to have successfully reentered Earth’s atmosphere in August, demonstrating a practical, low-cost method to cut down on space debris.

When it comes to space satellites, getting the math wrong can be catastrophic for an object in orbit, potentially leading to its abrupt or fiery demise. In this case, however, the fiery end was cause for celebration.

About five years ahead of schedule, a small cube satellite designed and built by Brown University students to demonstrate a practical, low-cost method to cut down on space debris reentered Earth’s atmosphere sometime on Tuesday, Aug. 8 or immediately after—burning up high above Turkey after 445 days in orbit, according to its last tracked location from U.S. Space Command.

Flying robotic systems have already proved to be highly promising for tackling numerous real-world problems, including explorations of remote environments, the delivery of packages in inaccessible sites, and searches for survivors of natural disasters. In recent years, roboticists and computer scientists have introduced a multitude of aerial vehicle designs, each with distinct advantages and features.

Researchers at Sharif University of Technology in Iran recently carried out a study exploring the potential of flying robotic systems with a single wing, known as mono-wing aerial vehicles. Their paper, published in the Journal of Intelligent & Robotic Systems, outlines a new approach that could help to better control the flight of these vehicles as they navigate their surrounding environment.

“Unconventional vehicles inspired by natural phenomena consistently captivate the attention of engineers,” Afshin Banazadeh, one of the researchers who carried out the study, told Tech Xplore. “One such vehicle, the mono-wing, a single-bladed aerial vehicle, is no exception.