>On Monday, OpenAI announced a new model in the GPT-3 family of AI-powered large language models, text-davinci-003, that reportedly improves on its predecessors by handling more complex instructions and producing longer-form content. Almost immediately, people discovered that it could also generate rhyming songs, limericks, and poetry at a level GPT-3 could not previously produce.
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>Introduced in 2020, GPT-3 gained renown for its ability to compose text in various styles at a similar level to a human, thanks to extensive training on text scraped from the Internet and data pulled from books. It uses statistical associations between learned word positions to predict the next best word in the sequence while reading from the prompt.
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>Of course, generating poetry with a machine is hardly a new pastime. Even as far back as 1845, inventors have been crafting ways to write expressive verse through automation. But in particular, experts note that GPT-3's latest update feels like a step forward in complexity that comes from integrating knowledge about a wide variety of subjects and styles into one model that writes coherent text.
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>Beyond poetry, GPT-3 still has its flaws, as some have examined in detail. While its factual accuracy has reportedly increased over time, it can still easily generate false information, limiting its applications. And GPT-3's short-term memory is generally limited to what you've recently fed it within a prompt. But when it comes to purely creative fictional output, GPT-3 hits the mark fairly well.
It will be interesting to see how this technology is initially going to be (ab)used, especially by those in the commercial creative sectors.
>It's no easy feat to come up with a tasty-but-healthy alternative to one of our favorite treats. "The most difficult aspect of developing an alternative food is getting the texture right," said Risbo. "Whipped cream undergoes a unique transformation that occurs in a complex system where a high saturated fat content makes it possible to whip the cream stiff. So, how do we create an alternative where we avoid the high fat content, while still achieving the right consistency? This is where we need to think innovatively."
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>Risbo and his colleagues only used four ingredients in their experiments: water, edible lactic acid bacteria, a little bit of milk protein, and a thickening agent. There are many kinds of lactic acid bacteria—the kind used by the food industry as a yogurt culture and to preserve cold cuts—and they are plentiful in nature, found in plants and in human/animal mucus membranes and digestive tracts. They also turn out to be ideal building blocks for foods and are roughly the same size as the fat globules in heavy whipping cream.
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>The Danish team made both soft and stiffer versions of their prototype whipped cream using two different varieties of bacteria: Lactobacillus delbrueckii subs. lactis (LBD) and Lactobacillus crispatus (LBC). The LBC strain is more hydrophobic, producing a cream that is stiffer and retains liquid better than the concoction produced with LBD, which is hydrophilic.
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>These experiments were primarily to demonstrate proof of concept, and the resulting foams were evaluated primarily for texture and desirable foamy characteristics—not for taste. So we're not likely to see canisters of "Lacti-Wip" on store shelves any time soon. But the experiments provided valuable insight into how best to create a non-dairy whipped cream alternative with a similar food structure.
It's promising to hear about these initial results with this topic of research, and it will be interesting to see what results from this in the future.
>DuckDuckGo is positioning App Tracking Protection as something like Apple's App Tracking Transparency for iOS devices, but "even more powerful." Enabling the service in the DuckDuckGo app for Android (under the "More from DuckDuckGo" section) installs a local VPN service on your phone, which can then start automatically blocking trackers on DDG's public blocklist. DuckDuckGo says this happens "without sending app data to DuckDuckGo or other remote servers."
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>Google recently gave Android users some native tools to prevent wanton tracking, including app-by-app location-tracking approval and a limited native ad-tracking opt-out. Apple's App Tracking Transparency asks if users want to block apps from accessing the Identifier for Advertisers (IDFA), but apps can still use the largest tracking networks across many apps to better profile app users.
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>Allison Goodman, senior communications manager for DuckDuckGo, told Ars Technica that App Tracking Protection needs Android's VPN permission so it can monitor network traffic. When it recognizes a tracker from its blocklist, it "looks at the destination domain for any outbound request and blocks them if they are in our blocklist and the requesting app is not owned by the same company that owns the domain."
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>Goodman added that "much of the data collected by trackers is not controlled by [Android] permissions," making App Tracking Protection a complementary offering.
It's great to see some more privacy initiatives/innovations from folks such as DDG. This is especially needed in the Android space, given Google/Alphabet's reliance on advertising and data analytics for their revenues.
>"We've already made a decision to be buying out of a plant in Arizona, and this plant in Arizona starts up in '24, so we've got about two years ahead of us on that one, maybe a little less," Cook reportedly said at the meeting, according to Bloomberg. "In Europe, I'm sure that we will also source from Europe as those plans become more apparent."
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>Also present at the meeting were Apple Services chief Eddy Cue and Head of People Deirdre O'Brien.
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>Construction for the TSMC chip fabrication plant in Arizona began in June 2021. The company had initially projected to fire up production in September 2022, but the timeline has been pushed back by about six months.
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>The TSMC plant is expected to go on-line in March 2023. TSMC expects it will reach its production start in early 2024.
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>The labor pool in Arizona is also creating a challenge for TSMC. Intel already employs 12,000 people and seeks 3,000 more for its expanded facilities. TSMC will have to compete in an already low-unemployment region when seeking talent for its new plant.
It will be interesting to see how this works out for US and European fabs in the long run. Are companies going to be setting up US or EU-based assembly plants as well, or as the article mentions in the end will the chips still need to be shipped to China or India or wherever else the devices will be made in the future.
>It is well-known that all the phases of the manufacturing influence the extraordinary aesthetic and acoustic features of Stradivari’s instruments. However, these masterpieces still keep some of their secrets hidden by the lack of documentary evidence. In particular, there is not a general consensus on the use of a protein-based ground coating directly spread on the wood surface by the Cremonese Master. The present work demonstrates that infrared scattering-type scanning near-fields optical microscopy (s-SNOM) may provide unprecedented information on very complex cross-sectioned microsamples collected from two of Stradivari’s violins, nanoresolved chemical sensitivity being the turning point for detecting minute traces of a specific compound, namely proteins, hidden by the matrix when macro or micro sampling approaches are exploited. This nanoresolved chemical-sensitive technique contributed new and robust evidence to the long-debated question about the use of proteinaceous materials by Stradivari.
>A recent paper published in the journal Analytical Chemistry reported that nanoscale imaging of two such instruments revealed a protein-based layer at the interface of the wood and the varnish, which may influence the wood's natural resonance, and hence the resulting sound. Meanwhile, another paper published in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America showed that the better resonance of older violins produces stronger combination tones, which can also affect the perception of musical tones.
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>It's the varnish that has received the most attention in recent years. The theory dates back to 2006 when Joseph Nagyvary, a professor emeritus of biochemistry at Texas A&M University, made headlines with a paper in Nature claiming that it was the chemicals used to treat the wood—not necessarily the wood itself—that was responsible for the unique sound of a Stradivarius violin.
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>Specifically, it was salts of copper, iron, and chromium, all of which are excellent wood preservers but may also have altered the instruments' acoustical properties. He based his findings on studies using infrared and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy to study the chemical properties of the backboards of several violins (the backboard is the instrument's largest resonant component).
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>While prior research largely focused on the chemistry of the varnishes, Chiaramaria Stani of the Central European Research Infrastructure Consortium (CERIC) and co-authors were keen to take a closer look at the treatments used before varnishing the instruments to fill the outer pores of the wood. It's a matter of considerable academic debate since some studies found just a layer of drying oil between the varnish and the wood. Other studies using chemical staining and gas chromatography showed the presence of proteins—most notably animal glue (collagen) found in two early 18th-century violoncellos, and casein found in a 1730 violin. Traces of unidentified proteins were also detected in violins from 1677, 1706, and 1720 using staining tests.
This looks to be some pretty interesting research on some of the other wood treatments that might have been used in the preparation of the wood before and during the construction of these instruments and ultimately may be of aid to future luthiers as they work to improve their processes.
>A couple of weeks ago EasyList maintainers saw a huge spike in traffic. The overall traffic quickly snowballed from a couple of terabytes per day to 10-20 times that amount. The source of that dramatic surge, it turned out, were Android devices from India. This whole situation rang a bell with us, because last year we had to grapple with the very same problem. Last November, our bandwidth usage shot up through the roof for no good reason. After investigating the issue, we found out that two apps with ad-blocking functionality were abusing our servers.
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>So, the bottom line is this:
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>1 - Many ad blockers cannot download filters updates because EasyList is throttled.
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>2 - EasyList may need to change the domain name. These faulty browsers will DDOS any hosting EasyList chooses as long as they continue to use the easylist.to domain.
This is going to be a challenge for these folks to overcome. Given how many people use these lists in their ad blocker plugins/browsers, this could grow into a larger problem if not resolved. It doesn't seem like there's any straightforward way out of this unfortunately.
>Skeptics of robo-policing, including Tu, say these debates need to happen today to preempt the abuses of tomorrow, especially because of the literal and figurative distance robotic killing affords. Guariglia said, “It in many ways lowers the psychological hurdle for enacting that violence when it’s just a button on a remote control.”
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>With thousands of Andros robots operated by hundreds of police department across the country, those concerned by the prospect of shotgun robots on the streets of Oakland or elsewhere refer to what they say is a clear antecedent with other militarized hardware: mission creep.
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>Once a technology is feasible and permitted, it tends to linger. Just as drones, mine-proof trucks, and Stingray devices drifted from Middle Eastern battlefields to American towns, critics of the PAN disruptor proposal say the Oakland police’s claims that lethal robots would only be used in one-in-a-million public emergencies isn’t borne out by history. The recent past is littered with instances of technologies originally intended for warfare mustered instead against, say, constitutionally protected speech, as happened frequently during the George Floyd protests.
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>“As you do this work for a few years, you come to realize that we’re not really talking about a slippery slope. It’s more like a well-executed playbook to normalize militarization,” said O’Sullivan, of Parity. There’s no reason to think the PAN disruptor will be any different: “One can imagine applications of this particular tool that may seem reasonable, but with a very few modifications, or even just different kinds of ammunition, these tools can easily be weaponized against democratic dissent.”
A full and proper public debate on whether these kinds of technologies are appropriate for police forces is best done before they are adopted, rather than after. Recent history and recent speculative fiction are both littered with instances of what could go wrong in these kinds of scenarios.
>Employees reportedly cracked jokes about the feature’s inept, and potentially misleading privacy protections in recent years, with one marketing officer reportedly directly emailing CEO Sundar Pichai, basically begging him to make the product actually live up to its name according to recent court documents viewed by Bloomberg. Those jokes and internal criticism comes amid multiple lawsuits questioning Google transparency around the feature.
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>In one email sent to Pichai, Google marketing chief Lorraine Twohill reportedly warned that the current customer confusion around Incognito mode was forcing the company to dance around using fuzzy and hedging language that ultimately risked degrading consumer trust.
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>“Make Incognito Mode truly private,” she wrote in the email. It’s worth noting that Twohill sent that email after multiple users filed a multi-billion dollar class action privacy lawsuit against Google for allegedly tracking users while using Incognito. Those users claim that supposedly surreptitious tracking amounts to privacy violations. The judge presiding over the lawsuit last week refused to let plaintiffs question Pichai in pre-trial proceedings despite the CEO’s connections in Google Chrome’s development and subsequent concerned emails regarding Incognito.
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>Let’s back up for a second. For some clarity, Google Chrome’s so-called Incognito browsing hides your search history from other people using your device but doesn’t actually prevent Google or its advertiser friends from logging and profiting off your search history. Critics of Incognito, like the plaintiffs in the class action lawsuit, and more recently Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton argue Google’s branding and messaging around Incognito makes it appear much more privacy preserving than it actually is. Paxton, in particular, alleges the company’s representations about Incognito mode are “false, deceptive, and misleading.”
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>“We need to stop calling it Incognito and stop using a Spy Guy icon,” one engineer said in a 2018 chat. The engineer reportedly cited publicly available research showing users didn’t really understand how the feature worked. Another employee flippantly responded by posting a wiki to the page for “Guy Incognito” from The Simpsons, who, other than a small mustache, looks identical to Homer Simpson. That low effort disguise, according to the employee, “accurately conveys the level of privacy it [Incognito] provides.”
One thing that tech companies like Google seem to get wrong all the time is the bombastic language they use in their branding and marketing attempts. The challenge here is that the public will take these terms at face value, not understand the fine print, and then suffer the consequences of something that is notably different than what was promised. In addition to 'Incognito Mode' here, another recent offender would be Tesla's 'Autopilot' and 'Full Self Driving'.
>Abstract
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>Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), represents an enormous new threat to our healthcare system and particularly to the health of older adults. Although the respiratory symptoms of COVID-19 are well recognized, the neurological manifestations, and their underlying cellular and molecular mechanisms, have not been extensively studied yet. Our study is the first one to test the direct effect of serum from hospitalised COVID-19 patients on human hippocampal neurogenesis using a unique in vitro experimental assay with human hippocampal progenitor cells (HPC0A07/03 C). We identify the different molecular pathways activated by serum from COVID-19 patients with and without neurological symptoms (i.e., delirium), and their effects on neuronal proliferation, neurogenesis, and apoptosis. We collected serum sample twice, at time of hospital admission and approximately 5 days after hospitalization. We found that treatment with serum samples from COVID-19 patients with delirium (n = 18) decreased cell proliferation and neurogenesis, and increases apoptosis, when compared with serum samples of sex- and age-matched COVID-19 patients without delirium (n = 18). This effect was due to a higher concentration of interleukin 6 (IL6) in serum samples of patients with delirium (mean ± SD: 229.9 ± 79.1 pg/ml, vs. 32.5 ± 9.5 pg/ml in patients without delirium). Indeed, treatment of cells with an antibody against IL6 prevented the decreased cell proliferation and neurogenesis and the increased apoptosis. Moreover, increased concentration of IL6 in serum samples from delirium patients stimulated the hippocampal cells to produce IL12 and IL13, and treatment with an antibody against IL12 or IL13 also prevented the decreased cell proliferation and neurogenesis, and the increased apoptosis. Interestingly, treatment with the compounds commonly administered to acute COVID-19 patients (the Janus kinase inhibitors, baricitinib, ruxolitinib and tofacitinib) were able to restore normal cell viability, proliferation and neurogenesis by targeting the effects of IL12 and IL13. Overall, our results show that serum from COVID-19 patients with delirium can negatively affect hippocampal-dependent neurogenic processes, and that this effect is mediated by IL6-induced production of the downstream inflammatory cytokines IL12 and IL13, which are ultimately responsible for the detrimental cellular outcomes.
>The researchers analysed blood from 36 Covid patients admitted to Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust in London in the first wave of the pandemic. They found that levels of a protein called IL-6, which immune cells release as a rallying call for other immune cells, were more than 15 times higher than normal in infected individuals.
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>But an even more dramatic rise in IL-6 was found in Covid patients with delirium – a state of extreme confusion that can leave people not knowing who, or where, they are. In these patients, IL-6 was six times higher than in other Covid patients. Nearly a third of Covid patients admitted to hospital experience delirium, rising to two-thirds in severe cases.
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>The scientists then investigated how high levels of IL-6 might affect neurons in the hippocampus by exposing lab-grown nerve cells to the patients’ blood. They found that blood from patients with delirium increased the normal death rate of neurons and reduced the generation of new brain cells. The damage caused is thought to drive delirium.
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>The harmful effects were traced back to a cascade of events where IL-6 triggers the release of two related immune proteins, called IL-12 and IL-13. Dr Alessandra Borsini, the study’s first author, said the impact of the proteins on generating new brain cells was “profound”.
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>However, blocking the proteins protected brain cells from damage, the scientists report in Molecular Psychiatry. The work suggests drugs known as Janus kinase inhibitors, which are already used to calm dangerous immune reactions to Covid, might combat delirium and its knock-on effects.
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>Older people are particularly vulnerable to delirium after a range of infections and operations. The state of confusion leads to a substantial rise in the risk of dementia.
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>“We believe these proteins are responsible for the delirium symptoms in acute Covid patients, and in general in long Covid patients experiencing neurological symptoms,” Borsini said. Measuring the levels of the immune proteins in patients could help personalise their treatment, she added.
It will be interesting to see further research in this direction. Hopefully some of the other factors that might be contributing to neurological damage from COVID infections and their relationships with each other can also be determined in short order.
Hrmbee OP t1_iydik85 wrote
Reply to OpenAI upgrades GPT-3, stunning with rhyming poetry and lyrics | Refinement to AI language model generates rhyming compositions in various styles by Hrmbee
>On Monday, OpenAI announced a new model in the GPT-3 family of AI-powered large language models, text-davinci-003, that reportedly improves on its predecessors by handling more complex instructions and producing longer-form content. Almost immediately, people discovered that it could also generate rhyming songs, limericks, and poetry at a level GPT-3 could not previously produce. > >... > >Introduced in 2020, GPT-3 gained renown for its ability to compose text in various styles at a similar level to a human, thanks to extensive training on text scraped from the Internet and data pulled from books. It uses statistical associations between learned word positions to predict the next best word in the sequence while reading from the prompt. > >Of course, generating poetry with a machine is hardly a new pastime. Even as far back as 1845, inventors have been crafting ways to write expressive verse through automation. But in particular, experts note that GPT-3's latest update feels like a step forward in complexity that comes from integrating knowledge about a wide variety of subjects and styles into one model that writes coherent text. > >Beyond poetry, GPT-3 still has its flaws, as some have examined in detail. While its factual accuracy has reportedly increased over time, it can still easily generate false information, limiting its applications. And GPT-3's short-term memory is generally limited to what you've recently fed it within a prompt. But when it comes to purely creative fictional output, GPT-3 hits the mark fairly well.
It will be interesting to see how this technology is initially going to be (ab)used, especially by those in the commercial creative sectors.