Google’s powerful AI spotlights a human cognitive glitch: Mistaking fluent speech for fluent thought
Words can have a powerful effect on people, even when they're generated by an unthinking machine. iStock via Getty ImagesWhen...
AI
Why Uber drivers aren’t unionizing in Québec
The Uber model hinders any possibility of drivers acting collectively and generates significant cognitive dissonance among them. (Shutterstock)As of mid-June,...
From AIs to an unhappy elephant, the legal question of who is a person is approaching a reckoning
Happy the elephant’s story is a sad one. She is currently a resident of the Bronx Zoo in the US,...
‘Bet you’re on the list’: how criticising ‘smart weapons’ got me banned from Russia
Pavel Nemecek / API woke up on Friday morning a pawn in a Kafka-esque story. Except I hadn’t been transformed...
Insurance firms can skim your online data to price your insurance — and there’s little in the law to stop this
ShutterstockWhat if your insurer was tracking your online data to price your car insurance? Seems far-fetched, right? Yet there is...
Frankenstein: how Mary Shelley’s sci-fi classic offers lessons for us today about the dangers of playing God
Boris Karloff as Frankenstein's monster. In our Guide to the Classics series, experts explain key works of literature. Frankenstein, or,...
A celebrated AI has learned a new trick: How to do chemistry
Figuring out what makes some proteins glow requires an understanding of chemistry. eLife - the journal, CC BY-SAArtificial intelligence has...
Is Google’s LaMDA conscious? A philosopher’s view
ShutterstockLaMDA is Google’s latest artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot. Blake Lemoine, a Google AI engineer, has claimed it is sentient. He’s...
EU law would require Big Tech to do more to combat child sexual abuse, but a key question remains: How?
European Commissioner for Home Affairs Ylva Johansson announced a set of proposed regulations requiring tech companies to report child sexual...
Facial recognition technology: how it’s being used in Ukraine and why it’s still so controversial
Facial recognition technology is controversial in many countries. ShutterstockFacial recognition technology is being used in warfare for the first time....
