An exploration of the hard science fiction ways a zombie apocalpyse might become a reality. My Interview with Dr. Travis Langley https://youtu.be/tgEITq1puc0?…
Scientists have pinpointed the location of the place where an asteroid hit Earth approximately 750,000 years ago.
In a study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the planetary scientists released evidence showing that the location of impact crater they have been seeking for decades is on the Bolaven Plateau in southern Laos.
💥Join us on our Journey to 1 Million Subscribers💥 Liv Boeree is a British science communicator, television presenter and former professional poker player. She is a World Series of Poker and European Poker Tour champion, and is the only female player in history to have won both a WSOP bracelet and an EPT event. She has a degree in astrophysics and uses her YouTube channel @LivBoeree to discuss science, game theory, probabilities, extinction risk and AI.
A nuclear attack on the United States’ missile silos would blow radioactive fallout to every state and parts of Mexico and Canada, killing more than 300 million people in its wake.
When it comes to nightmare scenarios for the United States, a nuclear attack from a foreign power has to rank among the worst possible choices. While the likelihood of such a strike is low, that does not stop experts from trying to prepare for any possibility. A story by Business Insider lists the following six cities as the most likely to be at risk in the vent of a future nuclear attack on the United States:
1) Chicago, Illinois.
2) Houston, Texas
Diverse and full of sea life, the Earth’s Devonian era—taking place more than 370 million years ago—saw the emergence of the first seed-bearing plants, which spread as large forests across the continents of Gondwana and Laurussia.
However, a mass extinction event near the end of this era has long been the subject of debate. Some scientists argue the Late Devonian mass extinction was caused by large-scale volcanic eruptions, causing global cooling. Others argue a mass deoxygenation event caused by the expansion of land plants was to blame.
A recently published study in the journal Communications Earth & Environment led by researchers at IUPUI now posits that both factors played a role—and draws attention to the environmental tipping points the planet faces today.
The development of artificial intelligence poses potential risks to society and requires a shift in goal definitions, consideration of the motivational landscape, and wisdom to prevent self-extinction and promote sustainability.
On this episode, Daniel Schmachtenberger returns to discuss a surprisingly overlooked risk to our global systems and planetary stability: artificial intelligence.
Continue reading “Risks of Artificial Intelligence & Shifting Goal Definitions” »
Micrometeorites, tiny space rocks, may have helped deliver nitrogen, a vital life ingredient, to Earth during our solar system’s early days. This finding was published in Nature Astronomy on November 30 by an international research team, including scientists from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa and Kyoto University. They discovered that nitrogen compounds like ammonium salts are common in material from regions distant from the sun. However, how these compounds reached Earth’s orbit was unclear.
The study suggests that more nitrogen compounds were transported near Earth than previously thought. These compounds could have contributed to life on our planet. The research was based on material collected from the asteroid Ryugu by Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft in 2020. Ryugu, a small sun-orbiting rocky object, is carbon-rich and has experienced considerable space weathering due to micrometeorite impacts and solar charged ions.
The scientists studied the Ryugu samples to understand the materials reaching Earth’s orbit. They used an electron microscope and found the Ryugu samples’ surface covered with tiny iron and nitrogen minerals. They theorized that micrometeorites carrying ammonia compounds collided with Ryugu. This collision sparked chemical reactions on magnetite, resulting in iron nitride formation.
The potential impact of generative AI on the economy, society, and work is polarizing, swinging from the positive benefits of a technological revolution to doomsday scenarios. The authors have come to think about this issue as points on a spectrum and have created a sports analogy to help think about it: AI tools can range from steroids, to sneakers, to a coach, each representing a different relationship between human users and the technology. Steroids elevate short-term performance, but leave you worse off in the long term. AI-powered tools can instead be used to augment people’s skills and make them more productive — much like a good running sneaker. On the most desirable end of the spectrum, AI-powered tools can be used like a coach that improves people’s own capabilities. This framework can be used to help conceptualize how we might craft AI-based tools that enhance rather than diminish human capabilities.
Page-utils class= article-utils—vertical hide-for-print data-js-target= page-utils data-id= tag: blogs.harvardbusiness.org, 2007/03/31:999.368607 data-title= A Sports Analogy for Understanding Different Ways to Use AI data-url=/2023/12/a-sports-analogy-for-understanding-different-ways-to-use-ai data-topic= AI and machine learning data-authors= Jake M. Hofman; Daniel G. Goldstein; David M. Rothschild data-content-type= Digital Article data-content-image=/resources/images/article_assets/2023/11/Nov23_22_200404124-001-383x215.jpg data-summary=
Will next-gen tools be used as a steroid, sneaker, or coach?
To address the long-standing debate about whether a massive asteroid impact or volcanic activity caused the extinction of dinosaurs and numerous other species 66 million years ago, a team at Dartmouth College took an innovative approach — they removed scientists from the debate and let the computers decide.
The researchers report in the journal Science a new modeling method powered by interconnected processors that can work through reams of geological and climate data without human input. They tasked nearly 130 processors with analyzing the fossil record in reverse to pinpoint the events and conditions that led to the Cretaceous –Paleogene (K–Pg) extinction event that cleared the way for the ascendance of mammals, including the primates that would lead to early humans.
