Lifeboat Foundation

OpenAI has landed itself in hot water for pushing out an update to ChatGPT that features a virtual assistant with an uncanny vocal resemblance to Scarlett Johansson — and it could be staring down the barrel of a compelling lawsuit.

Almost instantly, comparisons to the movie “Her” abounded, in which the actress plays a chatbot named Samantha that falls in love with a lonely man. Had OpenAI just aped her role — and her voice? Officially, it said no. Then, Johansson dropped a bombshell: leadership at the AI startup had in fact asked permission to use her voice last year. She said no, and they did it anyway.

University of Southern California Dornsife molecular biologist John Tower suggests that while living things generally prefer stability to conserve energy and resources, instability may also play a crucial role.

A molecular biologist at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences may have found a new “rule of biology.”

A rule of biology, sometimes called a biological law, describes a recognized pattern or truism among living organisms. Allen’s rule, for example, states that among warm-blooded animals, those found in colder areas have shorter, thicker limbs (to conserve body heat) than those in hotter regions, which need more body surface area to dissipate heat.

Segway has taken to the Consumer Electronics Expo (CES) in Las Vegas to unveil a pair of new electric two-wheelers. The first is an electric bicycle called the Xafari, while the latter is a borderline electric motorcycle known as the Xyber.

Both bikes are ostensibly categorized as electric bicycles in the US, fitting within the legal definition of the category. The Xafari even feels like it fits nicely under the e-bike classification, though the Xyber seems to carry a bit more Sur Ron vibes than Schwinn vibes, if you get the idea.

Any way you slice them, both bikes mark a major push deeper into the industry for Segway as the company continues to expand in the micromobility category.

Earlier this month, Reddit published a Public Content Policy stating: Unfortunately, we see more and more commercial entities using unauthorized access or misusing authorized access to collect public data in bulk, including Reddit public content. Worse, these entities perceive they have no limitation on their usage of that data, and they do so with no regard for user rights or privacy, ignoring reasonable legal, safety, and user removal requests.

In its blog post on Thursday, Reddit said that deals like OpenAI’s are part of an open Internet. It added that part of being open means Reddit content needs to be accessible to those fostering human learning and researching ways to build community, belonging, and empowerment online.

Reddit has been vocal about its interest in pursuing data licensing deals as a core part of its business. Its building of AI partnerships sparks discourse around the use of user-generated content to fuel AI models without users being compensated and some potentially not considering that their social media posts would be used this way. OpenAI and Stack Overflow faced pushback earlier this month when integrating Stack Overflow content with ChatGPT. Some of Stack Overflow’s user community responded by sabotaging their own posts.

This spring, the Hastings Center Report added a new series of essays named after the field its pieces aim to explore. Neuroscience and Society produces open access articles and opinion pieces that address the ethical, legal, and societal issues presented by emerging neuroscience. The series will run roughly twice a year and was funded by the Dana Foundation to foster dynamic, sustained conversation among neuroscience researchers, legal and ethics scholars, policymakers, and wider publics.

The first edition of the series focuses on the topic of research studies and what is owed to people who volunteer to participate in clinical trials to develop implantable brain devices, such as deep-brain stimulators and brain-computer interfaces.

Imagine you have lived with depression for most of your life. Despite trying numerous medications and therapies, such as electroconvulsive therapy, you have not been able to manage your symptoms effectively. Your depression keeps you from maintaining a job, interacting with your friends and family, and generally prevents you from flourishing as a person.

A recent study revealed that when individuals are given two solutions to a moral dilemma, the majority tend to prefer the answer provided by artificial intelligence (AI) over that given by another human.

The recent study, which was conducted by Eyal Aharoni, an associate professor in Georgia State’s Psychology Department, was inspired by the explosion of ChatGPT and similar AI large language models (LLMs) which came onto the scene last March.

“I was already interested in moral decision-making in the legal system, but I wondered if ChatGPT and other LLMs could have something to say about that,” Aharoni said. “People will interact with these tools in ways that have moral implications, like the environmental implications of asking for a list of recommendations for a new car. Some lawyers have already begun consulting these technologies for their cases, for better or for worse. So, if we want to use these tools, we should understand how they operate, their limitations, and that they’re not necessarily operating in the way we think when we’re interacting with them.”

“There is still a great deal of stigma around the use of substances during pregnancy,” said Dr. Jamie Lo, M.D., M.C.R. “Our hope is that this research supports more open and productive conversations that ultimately result in a healthier pregnancy.”

It has long been known that smoking during pregnancy can result in bad health for newborns, but what are the consequences of smoking both nicotine and cannabis during pregnancy? This is what a recent study published in JAMA hopes to address as a team of researchers investigated the potential health risks for newborns when pregnant mothers smoke both nicotine and cannabis during pregnancy. This study holds the potential to help researchers, medical practitioners, and the public better understand the health risks of cannabis as its recreational use continues to become legalized across the United States.

“With the growing legalization of cannabis around the country, there is often a perception that cannabis is safe in pregnancy,” said Dr. Jamie Lo, M.D., M.C.R., who is an associate professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the Oregon Health & Science University School of Medicine and a co-author on the study. “Because we know that many people who use cannabis often use tobacco or nicotine products, we wanted to better understand the potential health implications on both the pregnant individual and the infant.

Continue reading “Health Risks of Concurrent Cannabis and Nicotine Use During Pregnancy” »

The wireless companies plan to appeal the FCC’s $200 million fine over the handling of user location data.

The natural vein structure found within leaves—which has inspired the structural design of porous materials that can maximize mass transfer—could unlock improvements in energy storage, catalysis, and sensing thanks to a new twist on a century-old biophysical law.