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Annaka Harris is the author of Conscious: A Brief Guide to the Fundamental Mystery of the Mind. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:
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Annaka’s Articles:
1. What Is Time?: http://nautil.us/what-is-time-238478
2. A Solution to the Combination Problem: http://annakaharris.com/the-future-of-panpsychism.
3. Consciousness Isn’t Self-Centered: http://nautil.us/consciousness-isnt-self_centered-237720
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2. Being You: https://amzn.to/3RsxdBQ
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OUTLINE:
0:00 — Introduction.
0:53 — Free will.
54:10 — Consciousness.
1:24:42 — Depression.
1:37:59 — Psychedelics.
1:45:58 — Meditation.
1:50:22 — Ideas.
2:14:08 — AI sentience.
2:31:30 — Suffering.
2:34:26 — Meaning of life.

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Artificial neural networks that are inspired by natural nerve circuits in the human body give primates faster, more accurate control of brain-controlled prosthetic hands and fingers, researchers at the University of Michigan have shown. The finding could lead to more natural control over advanced prostheses for those dealing with the loss of a limb or paralysis.

The team of engineers and doctors found that a feed-forward neural network improved peak finger velocity by 45% during control of robotic fingers when compared to traditional algorithms not using neural networks. This overturned an assumption that more complex neural networks, like those used in other fields of machine learning, would be needed to achieve this level of performance improvement.

“This feed-forward network represents an older, simpler architecture—with information moving only in one direction, from input to output,” said Cindy Chestek, Ph.D., an associate professor of biomedical engineering at U-M and corresponding author of the paper in Nature Communications.

Imagine you’re driving your Tesla, or an equivalent electric car, down the highway. Your battery is running low. Sure, you could pull off at the next exit and spend time, and energy, searching for a recharging station. Or you could simply change lanes and drive over special charging strips embedded in the road.

That’s the vision of Khurram Afridi, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering in the College of Engineering. He’s pioneering an innovative approach for the wireless charging of electric vehicles, autonomous forklifts and other mobile machines, while they remain in motion.


Cornell researchers are pioneering an innovative approach for the wireless charging of electric vehicles and other machines while they remain in motion.

Summary: A new biological sensor sends electrical information in response to the presence of an odor which the robot is able to detect and interpret.

Source: Tel Aviv University.

A new technological development by Tel Aviv University has made it possible for a robot to smell using a biological sensor. The sensor sends electrical signals as a response to the presence of a nearby odor, which the robot can detect and interpret.

Researchers at Chalmers University of Technology have made a ground-breaking discovery in the field of synthetic DNA, using AI to control the cells’ protein production.

This new technology could revolutionize the way we produce vaccines, drugs for severe diseases, and alternative food proteins by making the process faster and significantly cheaper than current methods.

The process of gene expression is fundamental to the function of cells in all living organisms. In simple terms, the genetic code in DNA is transcribed into the molecule messenger RNA (mRNA), which tells the cell’s factory which protein to produce and in what quantities.

What could the consequences be in the future?

An interesting tweet is making headlines regarding Amazon’s adoption of robots within its company. Posted by Sam Korus, the tweet includes a graph showing the relative numbers of robots and human employees (in the thousands) at the beginning of every year between 2013 and 2022.

The graph shows a growing trend in the number of humans and robots over time, with a noticeable uptick during the pandemic as people spent more time shopping online at home. Korus’ tweet predicts that more robots will be employed than humans at some point in the future; he might have a point.


Oselote/iStock.

It wouldn’t surprise me if Amazon added more robots than people at some point within the next few years.


pic.twitter.com/44aV4dEAmM— Sam Korus (@skorusARK) January 13, 2023

The expertise of GPT3.5 at the industrial scale.

If you are tired of your requests to access ChatGPT being waitlisted repeatedly, Microsoft has some good news for you. The chatbot is coming soon to Azure Open AI services, where businesses can access the most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) in the world, the company said in a press release.

ChatGPT, the chatbot released on November 30 last year, has caught the imagination of engineers and non-engineers alike. The large language model used by the platform allows the AI to help answer user queries in a conversational style.


NurPhoto/Getty.

Microsoft teamed up with OpenAI in July 2019 to accelerate breakthroughs in the field of AI. On its part, Microsoft used its expertise in computing to build AI supercomputers exclusively for OpenAI and, since November 2021, has been offering the Azure OpenAI service for enterprise customers.

Tel-Aviv-based AI21 Labs launched today Wordtune Spices, a writer-augmentation tool based on generative AI. Selecting from 12 different cues, writers can generate a range of textual options to add to and enhance sentences. Spices can also suggest statistics to strengthen an argument or sharpen a detail.

AI21 says Spices is not intended to replace writers but to function as a writing assistant, suggesting additional complete sentences that improve and enhance the text that is being written. It could help refine and enrich the main message of the text, bolster and enrich arguments, and add creative expressions such as a joke or inspirational quote.


AI21 is addressing the limitations of Large Language Models (LLM) by combining deep learning with old-fashioned AI.