Monthly Archives: September 2022

Call it the Skynet hypothesis, Artificial General Intelligence, or the advent of the Singularity for years, AI experts and non-experts alike have fretted (and, for a small group, celebrated) the idea that artificial intelligence may one day become smarter than humans.

According to the theory, advances in AI specifically of the machine learning type thats able to take on new information and rewrite its code accordingly will eventually catch up with the wetware of the biological brain. In this interpretation of events, every AI advance from Jeopardy-winning IBM machines to the massive AI language model GPT-3 is taking humanity one step closer to an existential threat. Were literally building our soon-to-be-sentient successors.

Except that it will never happen. At least, according to the authors of the new book Why Machines Will Never Rule the World: Artificial Intelligence without Fear.

Co-authors University at Buffalo philosophy professor Barry Smith and Jobst Landgrebe, founder of German AI company Cognotekt argue that human intelligence wont be overtaken by an immortal dictator any time soon or ever. They told Digital Trends their reasons why.

Digital Trends (DT): How did this subject get on your radar?

Jobst Landgrebe (JL): Im a physician and biochemist by training. When I started my career, I did experiments that generated a lot of data. I started to study mathematics to be able to interpret these data, and saw how hard it is to model biological systems using mathematics. There was always this misfit between the mathematical methods and the biological data.

In my mid-thirties, I left academia and became a business consultant and entrepreneur working in artificial intelligence software systems. I was trying to build AI systems to mimic what human beings can do. I realized that I was running into the same problem that I had years before in biology.

Customers said to me, why dont you build chatbots? I said, because they wont work; we cannot model this type of system properly. That ultimately led to me writing this book.

Professor Barry Smith (BS): I thought it was a very interesting problem. I had already inklings of similar problems with AI, but I had never thought them through. Initially, we wrote a paper called Making artificial intelligence meaningful again. (This was in the Trump era.) It was about why neural networks fail for language modeling. Then we decided to expand the paper into a book exploring this subject more deeply.

DT: Your book expresses skepticism about the way that neural networks, which are crucial to modern deep learning, emulate the human brain. Theyre approximations, rather than accurate models of how the biological brain works. But do you accept the core premise that it is possible that, were we to understand the brain in granular enough detail, it could be artificially replicated and that this would give rise to intelligence or sentience?

JL: The name neural network is a complete misnomer. The neural networks that we have now, even the most sophisticated ones, have nothing to do with the way the brain works. The view that the brain is a set of interconnected nodes in the way that neural networks are built is completely nave.

If you look at the most primitive bacterial cell, we still dont understand even how it works. We understand some of its aspects, but we have no model of how it works let alone a neuron, which is much more complicated, or billions of neurons interconnected. I believe its scientifically impossible to understand how the brain works. We can only understand certain aspects and deal with these aspects. We dont have, and we will not get, a full understanding of how the brain works.

If we had a perfect understanding of how each molecule of the brain works, then we could probably replicate it. That would mean putting everything into mathematical equations. Then you could replicate this using a computer. The problem is just that we are unable to write down and create those equations.

BS: Many of the most interesting things in the world are happening at levels of granularity that we cannot approach. We just dont have the imaging equipment, and we probably never will have the imaging equipment, to capture most of whats going on at the very fine levels of the brain.

This means that we dont know, for instance, what is responsible for consciousness. There are, in fact, a series of quite interesting philosophical problems, which, according to the method that were following, will always be unsolvable and so we should just ignore them.

Another is the freedom of the will. We are very strongly in favor of the idea that human beings have a will; we can have intentions, goals, and so forth. But we dont know whether or not its a free will. That is an issue that has to do with the physics of the brain. As far as the evidence available to us is concerned, computers cant have a will.

DT: The subtitle of the book is artificial intelligence without fear. What is the specific fear that you refer to?

BS: That was provoked by the literature on the singularity, which I know youre familiar with. Nick Bostrom, David Chalmers, Elon Musk, and the like. When we talked with our colleagues in the real world, it became clear to us that there was indeed a certain fear among the populace that AI would eventually take over and change the world to the detriment of humans.

We have quite a lot in the book about the Bostrum-type arguments. The core argument against them is that if the machine cannot have a will, then it also cannot have an evil will. Without an evil will, theres nothing to be afraid of. Now, of course, we can still be afraid of machines, just as we can be afraid of guns.

But thats because the machines are being managed by people with evil ends. But then its not AI that is evil; its the people who build and program the AI

DT: Why does this notion of the singularity or artificial general intelligence interest people so much? Whether theyre scared by it or fascinated by it, theres something about this idea that resonates with people on a broad level.

JL: Theres this idea, started at the beginning of the 19th century and then declared by Nietzsche at the end of that century, that God is dead. Since the elites of our society are not Christians anymore, they needed a replacement. Max Stirner, who was, like Karl Marx, a pupil of Hegel, wrote a book about this, saying, I am my own god.

If you are God, you also want to be a creator. If you could create a superintelligence then you are like God. I think it has to do with the hyper-narcissistic tendencies in our culture. We dont talk about this in the book, but that explains to me why this idea is so attractive in our times in which there is no transcendent entity anymore to turn to.

DT: Interesting. So to follow that through, its the idea that the creation of AI or the aim to create AI is a narcissistic act. In that case, the concept that these creations would somehow become more powerful than we are is a nightmarish twist on that. Its the child killing the parent.

JL: A bit like that, yes.

DT: What for you would be the ultimate outcome of your book if everyone was convinced by your arguments? What would that mean for the future of AI development?

JL: Its a very good question. I can tell you exactly what I think would happen and will happen. I think in the midterm people will accept our arguments, and this will create better-applied mathematics.

Something that all great mathematicians and physicists are completely aware of was the limitations of what they could achieve mathematically. Because they are aware of this, they focus only on certain problems. If you are well aware of the limitations, then you go through the world and look for these problems and solve them. Thats how Einstein found the equations for Brownian motion; how he came up with his theories of relativity; how Planck solved blackbody radiation and thus initiated the quantum theory of matter. They had a good instinct for which problems are amenable to solutions with mathematics and which are not.

If people learn the message of our book, they will, we believe, be able to engineer better systems, because they will concentrate on what is truly feasible and stop wasting money and effort on something that cant be achieved.

BS: I think that some of the message is already getting through, not because of what we say but because of the experiences people have when they give large amounts of money to AI projects, and then the AI projects fail. I guess you know about the Joint Artificial Intelligence Center. I cant remember the exact sum, but I think it was something like $10 billion, which they gave to a famous contractor. In the end, they got nothing out of it. They canceled the contract.

(Editors note: JAIC, a subdivision of the United States Armed Forces, was intended to accelerate the delivery and adoption of AI to achieve mission impact at scale. It was folded into a larger unified organization, the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Officer, with two other offices in June this year. JAIC ceased to exist as its own entity.)

DT: What do you think, in high-level terms, is the single most compelling argument that you make in the book?

BS: Every AI system is mathematical in nature. Because we cannot model consciousness, will, or intelligence mathematically, these cannot be emulated using machines. Therefore, machines will not become intelligent, let alone superintelligent.

JL: The structure of our brain only allows limited models of nature. In physics, we pick a subset of reality that fits to our mathematical modeling capabilities. That is how Newton, Maxwell, Einstein, or Schrdinger obtained their famous and beautiful models. But these can only describe or predict a small set of systems. Our best models are those which we use to engineer technology. We are unable to create a complete mathematical model of animate nature.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Read the original:

Why AI will never rule the world - Digital Trends

Later today, NASAs DART spacecraft will attempt to smash into a non-threatening asteroid. Its one of the most important things weve done in space if not the most important thing as this experiment to deflect a non-threatening asteroid could eventually result in a robust and effective planetary defence strategy for protecting life on Earth.

Weve landed humans on the Moon, transported rovers to Mars, and sent spacecraft to interstellar space, yet nothing compares to what might happen today when NASAs DART spacecraft smashes into Dimorphos, the smaller member of the Didymos binary asteroid system. Should all go according to plan, DART will smash directly into the 160-metre wide asteroid at 9:14 a.m. AEST (watch it live here) and change the rocks speed by around 1%. Thats a small orbital adjustment for an asteroid, but a giant leap for humankind.

NASAs DART mission, short for Double Asteroid Redirection Test, wont mean that we suddenly have a defence against threatening asteroids, but it could demonstrate a viable strategy for steering dangerous asteroids away from Earth. Itll be many more years before our competency in this area fully matures, but it all starts today with DART.

At a NASA press briefing on September 22, Lindley Johnson, manager of NASAs Near-Earth Object Observations program, described DART as one of the most important missions in space history but also in the history of humankind. I wholeheartedly agree. Missions to the Moon, Mars, and Pluto are important and monumental in their own right, but this proof-of-concept experiment could literally lead to defensive measures against an existential threat. So yeah, pretty damned important.

The dino-extinguishing asteroid measured somewhere between 10-15 kilometres wide and was travelling around 13 km per second when it struck Mexicos Yucatan Peninsula some 66 million years ago. The collision wiped out 75% of all species on Earth, including every animal larger than a cat. And of course, it ended the 165-million-year reign of non-avian dinosaurs.

Asteroids of that size dont come around very often, but thats not to say our planet is immune from plus-sized space rocks. Recent research estimates that somewhere between 16 and 32 asteroids larger than 5 km wide strike Earth once every billion years. Thats about once every 30 million to 65 million years. That said, impacts with asteroids wider than 10 km are exceptionally rare, happening once every 250 million to 500 million years.

Despite the infrequency of these events, its the kind of impact that would wipe out our civilisation. Developing the means to defend ourselves is obviously a smart idea, but the threat of colossal asteroids isnt what keeps me up at night its the smaller ones that are much more likely to strike our planet.

The Southwest Research Institute says our atmosphere shreds most incoming asteroids smaller than 50 metres in diameter. Objects that reach the surface, including objects smaller than 2 km in size, can cause tremendous damage at local scales, such as wiping out an entire city or unleashing a catastrophic tsunami. As Johnson explained during the DART press briefing, asteroids the size of Dimorphos strike Earth about once every 1,000 years. The solar system is home about a million asteroid larger than 49.99 m wide. An estimated 2,000 near-Earth objects (NEOs) are larger than 2 km wide. Impacting asteroids at sizes around 2 km will produce severe environmental damage on a global scale, according to SWRI. And as noted, impacting asteroids wider than 10 km can induce mass extinctions.

NASA categorizes asteroids as being potentially hazardous if theyre 30 to 50 metres in diameter or larger and their orbit around the Sun brings them to within 8 million km of Earths orbit. The space agency works to detect and track these objects with ground- and space-based telescopes, and its Centre for Near Earth Object Studies keeps track of all known NEOs to assess potential impact risks.

As it stands, no known threat to Earth exists within the next 100 years. NASA is currently monitoring 28,000 NEOs, but astronomers detect around 3,000 each year. Theres a chance that a newly detected asteroid is on a collision course with Earth, in which case a DART-like mitigation would come in handy. But as Johnson explained, this type of scenario and our ensuing response wont likely resemble the way theyre depicted in Hollywood films, in which we typically have only a few days or months to react. More plausibly, wed have a few years or decades to mount a response, he said.

To protect our planet against these threats, Johnson pointed to two key strategies: detection and mitigation. NASAs upcoming Near-Earth Object Surveyor, or NEO Surveyor, will certainly help with detection, with the asteroid-hunting spacecraft expected to launch in 2026. DART is the first of hopefully many mitigation experiments to develop a planetary shield against hazardous objects.

DART is a test of a kinetic impactor, but scientists could develop a host of other strategies, such as using gravity tractors or nuclear devices, the latter of which could be surprisingly effective at least according to simulations. The type of technique employed will largely depend on factors having to do with the specific asteroid in question, such as its size and density. Kinetic impactors, for example, may be useless against so-called rubble pile asteroids, which feature loose conglomerations of surface material. Dimorphos is not expected to be a rubble pile, but we wont know until DART smashes into it. As Johnson said, planetary defence is applied planetary science.

A case can be made that space experiments to help us live off-planet are more important than asteroid deflection schemes. Indeed, we currently lack the ability to live anywhere other than Earth, which limits our ability to save ourselves from emerging existential risks, such as run-away global warming, malign artificial superintelligence, or molecular nanotechnology run amok.

Yes, its important that we strive to become a multi-planet species and not have all our eggs in one basket, but thats going to take a very long time for us to realise, while the threat of an incoming asteroid could emerge at any time. Wed best be ready to meet that sort of threat, while steadily developing our capacity to live off-planet.

More conceptually, the DART experiment is our introduction to solar system re-engineering. Subtly altering the orbit of a tiny asteroid is a puny first step, but our civilisation is poised to engage in more impactful interventions, as we re-architect our immediate celestial surroundings to make it safer or find better ways of exploiting all that our solar system has to offer. These more meaningful interventions, in addition to removing asteroid threats, could involve the geoengineering of planets and moons or even tweaking the Sun to make it last longer.

But Im getting a bit ahead of myself. First things first and fingers firmly crossed that DART will successfully smash into its unsuspecting target later today.

Link:

Why DART Is the Most Important Mission Ever Launched to Space - Gizmodo Australia

By Neia Balao 2:02am PDT, Sep 27, 2022

You can take the girl out of the honky tonk, but you can't take the honky tonk out of the girl! Believe it or not, it's been two decades since we were first introduced to and fell in love with Reese Witherspoon's adorable Southern belle-turned-New York City socialite Melanie Smooter (err Carmichael). To mark the romantic comedy's 20th anniversary on Sept. 27, 2022, Wonderwall.com is checking in on Reese and the film's other stars to see how they've aged and what they're up to all these years later!

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By the time she starred in "Sweet Home Alabama," Hollywood darling Reese Witherspoon had already appeared in two buzzy and now-iconic films: "Cruel Intentions" and "Legally Blonde." In 2005 at 29, Reese achieved a career milestone when she earned the Academy Award for best actress for her performance as June Carter Cash in "Walk the Line." Under her production company Hello Sunshine, Reese has shifted her focus to television, having starred on and produced HBO's "Big Little Lies" (for which she earned an Emmy for outstanding limited series), Hulu's "Little Fires Everywhere" and Apple TV+'s "The Morning Show," on which she currently stars with Jennifer Aniston. After divorcing "Cruel Intentions" co-star Ryan Phillippe, with whom she has two kids who are now adults, Reese found love with talent agent Jim Toth. They married in 2011 and welcomed son Tennessee in 2012.

RELATED: Reese Witherspoon's life in photos

Josh Lucas played Jake Perry, Melanie's big first love and estranged husband who never left Pigeon Creek, Alabama.

Josh Lucas landed roles in a slew of flicks including "Hulk," "Poseidon" and "Life as We Know It." More recently, he appeared in the Oscar-winning sports drama "Ford v Ferrari" and "The Forever Purge." He's found success on the small screen too, including a stint on Paramount's neo-Western drama "Yellowstone." Josh was married to Jessica Ciencin Henriquez from 2012 to 2014. They share a son, Noah.

Patrick Dempsey portrayed Andrew Hennings, Melanie's super-handsome (and super-dreamy!) fianc in New York City.

Many of us know where Patrick Dempsey ended up: He played as McDreamy on "Grey's Anatomy" for 10 years. In addition to starring on the hit Shonda Rhimes series earning two SAG Awards and some Golden Globe nominations along the way Patrick also had leading man roles in films like "Made of Honor," "Valentine's Day," "Enchanted" and "Bridget Jones's Baby." Patrick, an auto racing enthusiast who's competed in a few races over the years, has been married to makeup artist Jillian Fink, with whom he shares three kids, since 1999.

Candice Bergen played Kate Hennings, the mayor of New York City who's Andrew's mother. She's extremely suspicious of Melanie and her intentions with her son.

Candice Bergen is no stranger to fame and critical acclaim! In fact, the actress had already earned Oscar and BAFTA nominations and won Golden Globes and Emmys long before she appeared in "Sweet Home Alabama." After her portrayal as the conniving New York City politician, the actress appeared on ABC's "Boston Legal" and a reboot of her hit series "Murphy Brown" as well as films like "Bride Wars," "The Meyerowitz Stories," "Book Club" and, more recently, "Let Them All Talk."

Nathan Lee Graham portrayed glamorous and sartorially savvy Frederick Montana, Melanie's fashion mentor and close friend. Rhona Mitra played one of Melanie's best friends in New York City, model Tabatha Wadmore-Smith.

Three years after "Sweet Home Alabama" came out, Nathan Lee Graham appeared in another great romantic comedy: "Hitch." In addition to starring on the HBO series "The Comeback," Nathan who's also a Broadway actor and Grammy winner landed a role on the short-lived "Riverdale" spinoff series "Katy Keene," had guest-starring stints on "Scrubs" and "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" and reprised his "Zoolander" role in the 2016 sequel.

Rhona Mitra has mainly found success on the small screen, landing recurring roles on "The Practice," "Boston Legal," "Nip/Tuck" and "The Last Ship." She appeared in 2009's "Underworld: Rise of the Lycans" the film franchise's third installment. More recently, the British actress-model played Mercy Graves on The CW's "Supergirl."

Jean Smart took on the role of Jake's affectionate and caring mother, Stella Kay Perry.

What's Jean Smart up to these days? A lot, actually! The Tony-nominated five-time Emmy winner went on to appear on several TV shows like "24," "Samantha Who?," "Dirty John," "Watchmen" and "Mare of Easttown" plus a slew of films including "Garden State," "Life As We Know It," "A Simple Favor" and, more recently, "Superintelligence." In 2022, she took home the Emmy, Golden Globe and SAG Awards for best lead actress in a comedy series for her performance on "Hacks."

Ethan Embry played one of Melanie's closest childhood friends, Bobby Ray.

Ethan Embry already had fan-favorite '90s flicks "Empire Records," "Can't Hardly Wait" and "That Thing You Do!" under his belt by the time "Sweet Home Alabama" hit theaters. The California native has gone on to appear on the television shows "Brotherhood," "Once Upon a Time," "Sneaky Pete," "Grace and Frankie" and "Stargirl." In 2015, he remarried second wife Sunny Mabrey.

Mary Kay Place played Melanie's micromanaging mother, Pearl Smooter.

Before "Sweet Home Alabama," Mary Kay Place was best known for her work in films like "Being John Malkovich" and "Girl, Interrupted." After appearing in the Reese Witherspoon-led flick, Mary Kay starred on three buzzy HBO series "Big Love," "Bored to Death" and "Getting On" as well as shows like "Lady Dynamite," "Imposters" and "9-1-1: Lonestar." She's also continued to act in movies, popping up in "The Hollars," "Diane," "The Prom" and "Music" in recent years.

Fred Ward played Earl Smooter, Melanie's soft-spoken father.

Fred Ward, who was already an established actor by the time he landed his "Sweet Home Alabama" role, appeared in a handful of lesser known films before going on a brief acting hiatus in 2006. He made his return to the small screen with appearances on "ER" and "Grey's Anatomy." His last credited role came in 2015 on an episode of "True Detective." Fred died at 79 in May 2022.

Read more:

'Sweet Home Alabama' turns 20: See how the cast has aged - Wonderwall

A group of researchers have come to the terrifying conclusion that containing super-intelligence AI may not be possible. They claim that controlling the AI would fall beyond human comprehension.

According to the Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research, in the paper titled, Superintelligence Cannot be Contained: Lessons from Computability Theory, researchers have argued that total containment (in principle) would be impossible due to fundamental limits inherent to computing. It further claims that it is mathematically impossible for humans to calculate an AIs plans, thereby making it uncontainable.

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The authors cite that implementing a rule for artificial intelligence to cause no harm to humans would not be an option if humans cannot predict the scenarios that an AI may come up with. They believe that while a computer system is working on an independent level, humans can no longer set limits. The teams reasoning was inspired in part by Alan Turings formulation of the halting problem in 1936. The problem centres on knowing whether a computer programme will reach a conclusion or an answer; either making it halt or simply loop forever trying to find one.

An excerpt of the paper reads, This is because a superintelligence is multi-faceted, and therefore potentially capable of mobilizing a diversity of resources in order to achieve objectives that are potentially incomprehensible to humans, let alone controllable.

Computer scientist, Iyad Rahwan, Max-Planck Institute for Human Development, Germany said In effect, this makes the containment algorithm unusable. Meaning, machines perform certain important tasks independently, without the programmers fully understanding how they learned it.

However, alternatives have been suggested by the researchers on teaching AI some ethics. Limiting the potential of superintelligence could prevent AIs from annihilating the world, even if they remain unpredictable.

Link:

Research Shows that Superintelligent AI is Impossible to be Controlled - Analytics India Magazine