Lifeboat Foundation

Artificial intelligence allows anyone to keep chatting away from beyond the grave.

BEIJING A Google artificial intelligence program defeated a Chinese grand master at the ancient board game Go on Tuesday, a major feather in the cap for the firm’s AI ambitions as it looks to woo Beijing to gain re-entry into the country.

In the first of three planned games in the eastern water town of Wuzhen, the AlphaGo program held off China’s world number one Ke Jie in front of Chinese officials and Google parent Alphabet’s (GOOGL.O) chief executive Eric Schmidt.

The victory over the world’s top player — which many thought would take decades to achieve — underlines the potential of artificial intelligence to take on humans at complex tasks.

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China is also planning to use the initiative to flex its scientific and engineering muscles, officials made clear at a 2-day Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation that ended yesterday in Beijing. “Innovation is an important force powering development,” Xi said in a speech to the opening session of the forum. And so the initiative will include technical cooperation in fields including artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, quantum computing, and smart cities. He also mentioned the need to pursue economic growth that is in line with sustainable development goals, and that rests on environmentally friendly approaches.

Investment also planned in artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, and other fields.

The full impact of self-driving cars on society is several decades away — but when it hits, the job losses will be substantial for American truck drivers, according to a new report from Goldman Sachs.

When autonomous vehicle saturation peaks, U.S. drivers could see job losses at a rate of 25,000 a month, or 300,000 a year, according to a report from Goldman Sachs Economics Research.

Truck drivers, more so than bus or taxi drivers, will see the bulk of that job loss, according to the report. That makes sense, given today’s employment: In 2014, there were 4 million driver jobs in the U.S., 3.1 million of which were truck drivers, Goldman said. That represents 2 percent of total employment.

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A robotic police officer is making its debut on the streets of Dubai tomorrow night — and I hope everyone there has watched Robocop.

The uniformed bot greeted visitors to the Gulf Information Security and Expo Conference. After the conference wraps on Tuesday, it will be deployed to the streets of Dubai.

The robot rolls around on wheels. It can salute, bow, speak in multiple languages, and recognize hand gestures from up to 1.5 meters away, according to the Khaleej Times. It also has a tablet lodged in its chest which civilians can use to report crimes, according to The Daily Mail. It was designed by the Dubai police, with assistance from IBM’s Watson and Google.

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Despite the NSA confirming the existence of Skynet, we all should be grateful that technology has not yet advanced to the stage where a liquid metal T-1000 terminator can shape-shift its way into your home and demand to see John Connor.

But scientists in China are making a solid effort make a less sinister version of this scenario at reality, by creating liquid metal droplets that could one day make “self-powered liquid metal machines” a real possibility.

Because of their excellent conductivity, low toxicity, and shape-shifting abilities, liquid metal alloys have been put to good use in targeting cancer cells, creating nature-inspired self-fuelled motors for robots, and many other liquid metal biomaterials.

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I wonder if this will allow the body’s current healing abilities to remain robust or will the body’s healing abilities fall off as it will not have to work as hard.

In the near future, tiny microscopic robots will fix our cells so that they never get old or fall apart.

Here’s a write-up of Moogfest that has a section dedicated to the Immortality Bus and transhumanism:

The ExitEvent team is all hands on deck for the next four days as we try to capture all the cool stuff going on in downtown Durham for Moogfest. We’ll post photos, videos, stories and soundbites as we get them. Feel free to submit your own captures as well!

Continue reading “Moogfest Day Three Highlights: Robot Car, Immortality Bus & Particle Physics” »

Ahead of the fund’s launch on Saturday, Mr. Son said it would focus on investing in sectors including artificial intelligence, smart devices and semiconductors. “We already have lots in the pipeline,” he said. “We are investing into genome sequencing. We are investing in virtual-reality simulations, the games, and so on.”

Japan’s SoftBank Group and Saudi Arabia’s sovereign-wealth fund on Saturday launched the world’s largest technology fund, a nearly $100 billion vehicle that will steer capital to cutting-edge technologies in U.S. startups and other global firms.

In a statement, SoftBank said the fund secured $93 billion of committed capital. The so-called SoftBank Vision Fund is targeting a total of $100 billion within 6 months. The fund’s creation coincides with U.S. President Donald Trump’s two-day visit to Saudi Arabia, where he is…

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