The Amazing Artificial Intelligence

The Amazing Artificial Intelligence We Were Promised Is Coming, Finally

  We have been hearing predictions for decades of a takeover of the world by artificial intelligence. In 1957, Herbert A. Simon predicted that within 10 years a digital computer would be the world's chess champion. That didn't happen until 1996. And despite Marvin Minsky's 1970 prediction that "in from three to eight years we will have a machine with the general intelligence of an average human being," we still consider that a feat of science fiction.

  The pioneers of artificial intelligence were surely off on the timing, but they weren't wrong; AI is coming. It is going to be in our TV sets and driving our cars; it will be our friend and personal assistant; it will take the role of our doctor. There have been more advances in AI over the past three years than there were in the previous three decades.

Even technology leaders such as Apple have been caught off guard by the rapid evolution of machine learning, the technology that powers AI. At its recent Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple opened up its AI systems so that independent developers could help it create technologies that rival what Google and Amazon have already built. Apple is way behind.

  The AI of the past used brute-force computing to analyze data and present them in a way that seemed human. The programmer supplied the intelligence in the form of decision trees and algorithms. Imagine that you were trying to build a machine that could play tic-tac-toe. You would give it specific rules on what move to make, and it would follow them. That is essentially how IBM's Big Blue computer beat chess Grandmaster Garry Kasparov in 1997, by using a supercomputer to calculate every possible move faster than he could.

  Today's AI uses machine learning in which you give it examples of previous games and let it learn from those examples. The computer is taught what to learn and how to learn and makes its own decisions. What's more, the new AIs are modeling the human mind itself using techniques similar to our learning processes. Before, it could take millions of lines of computer code to perform tasks such as handwriting recognition. Now it can be done in hundreds of lines . What is required is a large number of examples so that the computer can teach itself.

  The new programming techniques use neural networks which are modeled on the human brain, in which information is processed in layers and the connections between these layers are strengthened based on what is learned. This is called deeplearning because of the increasing numbers of layers of information that are processed by increasingly faster computers. These are enabling computers to recognize images, voice, and text and to do human-like things.

  Google searches used to use a technique called Page Rank to come up with their results. Using rigid proprietary algorithms, they analyzed the text and links on Web pages to determine what was most relevant and important. Google is replacing this technique in searches and most of its other products with algorithms based on deep learning, the same technologies that it used to defeat a human player at the game Go. During that extremely complex game, observers were themselves confused as to why their computer had made the moves it had.

  In the fields in which it is trained, AI is now exceeding the capabilities of humans.

AI has applications in every area in which data are processed and decisions required. Wired founding editor Kevin Kelly likened AI to electricity: a cheap, reliable, industrial-grade digital smartness running behind everything. He said that it "will enliven inert objects, much as electricity did more than a century ago. Everything that we formerly electrified we will now 'cognitize.' This new utilitarian AI will also augment us individually as people (deepening our memory, speeding our recognition) and collectively as a species. There is almost nothing we can think of that cannot be made new, different, or interesting by infusing it with some extra IQ. In fact, the business plans of the next 10,000 startups are easy to forecast: Take X and add AI This is a big deal, and now it's here."

  AI will soon be everywhere. Businesses are infusing AI into their products and helping them analyze the vast amounts of data they are gathering. Google, Amazon, and Apple are working on voice assistants for our homes that manage our lights, order our food, and schedule our meetings. Robotic assistants such as Rosie from "The Jetsons" and R2-D2 of Star Wars are about a decade away.

  Do we need to be worried about the runaway "artificial general intelligence" that goes out of control and takes over the world? Yes but perhaps not for another 15 or 20 years. There are justified fears that rather than being told what to learn and complementing our capabilities, AIs will start learning everything there is to learn and know far more than we do. Though some people, such as futurist Ray Kurzweil, see us using AI to augmentour capabilities and evolve together, others, such as Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking, fear that AI will usurp us. We really don't know where all this will go.

  What is certain is that AI is here and making amazing things possible.

Study Proves What You've Known All Along

Study Proves What You've Known All Along: Facebook a Haven for Insecure Narcissists

 Social networking sites such as Facebook provide the ideal environment for insecure narcissists to promote themselves and seek the admiration of others on a grand scale, a study says.

  For the study, the researchers from University of Florence in Italy sought to find what type of narcissists were at higher risk for social networking addiction through a survey of 535 students.

  The researchers found that vulnerable narcissists, who tend to be insecure and have lower self-esteem, are more likely to feel safer in online versus face-to-face interactions, which might lead them to prefer social networking as a means to gain approval and admiration.

  In contrast, grandiose narcissists, who tend toward arrogance and exhibitionism are likely to seek out admiration more openly, rather than through social media.

  The researchers said that no significant differences in social networking addiction were found between grandiose narcissists and non-narcissists.

  "This study suggests that vulnerable narcissism may contribute more to problematic use of SNSs (social networking sites) than grandiose narcissism," the researchers said.

  The study was published online in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking.

New 3D Paper

New 3D Paper-Based Microbial Fuel Cell Developed

  Scientists have developed a 3D paper-based microbial fuel cell that can create electricity in an environment-friendly way without using any outside power.

 Researchers from the Iowa State University in the US demonstrated a proof-of-concept three-dimensional microbial fuel cell (MFC) that could take advantage of capillary action to guide the liquids through the MFC system and to eliminate the need for external power.

 The paper-based MFC runs for five days and shows the production of current as a result of biofilm formation on anode.

  The system produces 1.3 micro Watts of power and 52.25 micro Amperes of current.

  "All power created in this device is useable because no electricity is needed to run the fluids through the device. This is crucial in the advancement of these devices and the expansion of their applications,"said Nastaran Hashemi, assistant professor at Iowa State.

  The biofilm formation on the carbon cloth during the test provides further evidence that the current measured was the result of the bio-chemical reaction taking place.

  This is important because the biofilm plays a vital role in current production of a microbial fuel cell. Increased biofilm size and thickness ultimately leads to increased current production.

  Individual bacterial cells metabolise electron-rich substances in a complex process involving many enzyme-catalysed reactions.

  The electrons are then free to travel to the anode through one of many modes of electron transport.

  Electron transport is very complicated, and evidence suggests that it is unique to each type of bacteria. For the bacteria Shewanella Oneidensis MR-1, the most predominantly known ways of shuttling electrons from the individual cells to the anode are through direct contact, excreted soluble redox molecules, and biological nanowires.

  Of these, it is widely believed that excreted soluble redox molecules serving as extracellular electron shuttles makes up for as much as 70 percent of electron transfer mechanisms from individual bacterial cells to the electrode.

  Moreover, it is shown that direct contact between individual S Oneidensis MR-1 and the electrode has little impact on the current generation, supporting a mediated electron transfer mechanism.

  Biofilm helps with the adsorption of the redox molecules to the electrode, which makes it important to have in high power density microbial fuel cells.

  Without enough time for biofilmto form, the current and power data would predominantly be linked to extracellular electron transfer, which represents does not fully represent electrical producing capabilities of microbial fuel cells.

  This device for the first time demonstrates the longer duration of use and ability to operate individually, a development that could help increase the number of situations where microbial fuel cells can be applied.

Rocket Stage

Isro to Look at Possibility of Recovering Rocket Stage

The Indian space agency is planning to look at the possibility of reusing its rocket stages after a launch by making them re-enter atmosphereand land at a specified location, a senior official said.

  "We are also looking at that programme," K.Sivan, director, Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC) told IANS on the phone from Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.

  The VSSC is a division of Indian Space ResearchOrganisation (Isro).

  Referring to US-based aerospace company SpaceX's attempts in this regard, Sivan said Isro too is planning like that.

  SpaceX, with its two rockets - Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy - offers satellite launch services.

  A rocket stage comprises the engine, fuel and other systems.

  The stages constitute the bulk of a rocket's cost and a saving on that will reduce the launch cost.

  For instance, India's polar satellite launch vehicle (PSLV) is a four-stage rocket. It also has six booster engines strapped on the first stage.

  The rocket is an expendable one, that is, nothing is recovered once it is launched.

  So, recovering for instance the first PSLV stage means making it re-enter the atmosphere safely after it puts the other three stages up.

  The outer shell of the stage should have sufficient heat-resistant materials. The stage should also be programmed to land at a specified location, preferably at the launch pad itself.

  Sivan said recovery of the stage and using it again is completely different from the reusable launch vehicle (RLV).

  He said developing a full-fledged RLV will take quite some time.

  "We have to develop various technologies before finalisingthe specifications for our own RLV," Sivan said.

  On May 23, Isro successfully took the first step in developing a RLV by successfully testing an aircraft like winged structure.

  Called RLV-Technology Demonstrator HEX 01 mission, the winged structure which sat atop a rocket was released into the space at above 70km from the earth.

  The winged structure returned and landed in the Bay of Bengal as originally planned.

China Completes World's Largest Radio Dish

China Completes World's Largest Radio Dish to Let Scientists Hunt for Black Holes and E.T.

  If great power comes at a great cost, the ability to peer deep into the depths of the universe is no exception. For the world's largest radio telescope of its kind, completed in China on Sunday, the price tag was astronomical: the equivalent of about $180 million (roughly Rs. 1,214 crores).

  The radio telescope also took a toll on local communities. Nine thousand people - each compensated roughly $1,800 (roughly Rs. 1.2 crores) - had to be uprooted to make room for the construction. The telescope is almost a mile in circumference and covers an area equivalent to 30 soccer pitches, embedded in a depression that acts as a natural noise shield.

  But, to hear Chinese experts tell it, the radio telescope will be worth every yuan.

  "As the world's largest single aperture telescope located at an extremely radio-quiet site, its scientific impact on astronomy will be extraordinary, and it will certainly revolutionize other areas of the natural sciences," the scientist spearheading the project, Nan Rendong, told the Chinese state news agency Xinhua.

 Known as the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope, or FAST, the telescope claims the title of world's largest from the Arecibo Observatory, a 300-meter device in Puerto Rico. FAST is so large that, were the dish filled to the brim with merlot, it would hold five bottles of wine per person on the planet, a scientist boasted to the Guardian in February. Construction on the Chinese telescope began in 2011, though the delicate arrangement of 4,450 reflector panels meant slow progress - just 20 installations per day. Workers placed the last of the triangle-shaped panels on Sunday.

  Radio telescopes may look quite a bit different than backyard telescopes pointed at the moon, but their operating principle is more or less the same. Instead of magnifying visible light, FAST channels and amplifies radiation in the form of radio waves.

  FAST is, essentially, a giant radio dish. There is a direct relationship between size and sensitivity: The more space a dish covers, the weaker the signals it can detect. Signals are funneled into receivers and then boosted several orders of magnitude for analysis. Because the incoming signals are so weak, cellphone chatter can overwhelm the cosmic waves. (Hence the relocation of residents living near the dish in Guizhou province.)

  "The bigger the telescope, the more radio waves it collects and the fainter objects it will be able to see," University of Manchester astrophysicist Tim O'Brien told the New Scientist.

  With such a fine-tuned ear, FAST will listen for the radio emissions from gravitational waves, black holes and the blinking neutron stars known as pulsars. Even distant molecules, like amino acids, may be found with radio telescopes; the devices are able to identify specific molecules as though they had "fingerprints," according to Caltech astronomers, based on the way they tumble through space.

  The telescope should be fully operational for scientists by September, and it will be capable of sensing radio waves from pulsars up to 1,000 light-years away.

  And FAST will look for aliens. Earthlings, of course, have been leaking radio transmissions from our planet for about a hundred years, which means our detectable bubble is about 200 light-years across. Should there be extraterrestrial radio waves being transmitted within 1,000 light years, the South China Morning Post argued that the telescope might very well be the device that finds them.

  "The telescope is of great significance for humans to explore the universe and extraterrestrial civilizations," said sci-fi author Liu Cixin (once described as China's answer to Arthur C. Clarke), whom Xinhua reported was on hand to witness FAST's completion.

  FAST's completion comes at a time when China is expanding its cosmic ambitions. In 2015, China announced its intention to land a probe on the far side of the moon, a feat that has yet to be performed by any nation's space program.

  The telescope should outclass anything else constructed for the next two decades, Chinese Academy of Sciences astronomer Zheng Xiaonian argued. For the initial few years, time on the machine will be allotted only to Chinese scientists, before opening up to international researchers later in the telescope's lifespan.

Osmo RAW Camera

DJI Phantom 4 Drone, Osmo RAW Camera Launched in India

  DJI has announced the India availability of the Phantom 4 drone and its Micro Four Thirds (MFT) handheld camera called the Osmo RAW. The products will be available via AVCS Systems India Pvt. Ltd. and is priced at Rs. 1,21,000 (plus taxes) for the Phantom 4 and roughly Rs. 3,00,000 (plus taxes) for the Osmo RAW. AVCS will also handle after sales service for all DJI products. 

  The company launched the Osmo back in November, which featured the Zenmuse X3 camera and now, the Osmo is available with the Zenmuse X5 series which includes the X5 and the X5R. This series brings a Micro Four Thirds sensor to the table along with interchangeable lenses and the ability to shoot uncompressed 4K video (on the X5R). The Osmo RAW also features a built-in 512GB SSD to storing your uncompressed video footage. The X5R gimbal can be fitted to the Osmo's handgrip and is compatible with a variety of lens from Olympus and Panasonic. 

Aadhaar Card Status Online

How to Check Aadhaar Card Status Online

  

  Applied for an Aadhaar card but still haven't received it? You can easily check the status of your application online. All you need is a copy of the acknowledgement slip that you are given after your visit to the enrolment centre. If you have that, then this is an easy process.

   An Aadhaar card is an official government-issued identity card for Indians. Many government institutions accept this card as a proof of identity and some require that you produce your Aadhaar card. The card is issued by the Unique Identification Authority ofIndia (UIDAI) on behalf of the government. It's steadily being linked to a growing number of government functions, and continues to grow in importance, so it's probably a good idea to get an Aadhaar card, even if you don't necessarily need one yet.

  Follow these steps to check the status of your Aadhaar card application online.

1.   Head to the Aadhaar status page on the UIDAI website.
2.  Check your Aadhaar acknowledgement slip. At the top you will see the 14-digit     enrolment number and a 14-digit date and time of enrolment.
3.   Key in these two numbers in the EID and Date/ Time fields respectively.
4.  Type the captcha in the field labelled Enter the Security Code.
5.  Click Check Status.

  This will reveal the status of your Aadhaar enrolment application. This is only for checking the status of a new application. If you have misplaced your card, and want to print out a copy that you can use, then check out how to download a copy of your Aadhaar card.

Nasa's Juno Mission

Nasa's Juno Mission Enters Jupiter's Magnetic Field

  Nasa's Jupiter-bound Juno spacecraft has entered the planet's magnetosphere, where the movement of particles in space is controlled by what's going on inside Jupiter.

  Juno is on course to swing into orbit around Jupiter on July 4.

  "We've just crossed the boundary into Jupiter's home turf. We're closing in fast on the planet itself and already gaining valuable data," said Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator, from Southwest Research Institute, San Antonio, in a statement on Thursday.

  Science instruments on board detected changes in the particles and fields around the spacecraft as it passed from an environment dominated by the interplanetary solar wind into Jupiter's magnetosphere.

  The obstacle is Jupiter's magnetosphere, which is the largest structure in the solar system.

  "If Jupiter's magnetosphere glowed in visible light, it would be twice the size of the full moon as seen from Earth," Kurth said.

  Out in the solar wind a few days ago, Juno was speeding through an environment that has about 16 particles per cubic inch (one per cubic centimeter).

  Once it crossed into the magnetosphere, the density was about a hundredfold less.

  The density is expected to climb again, inside the magnetosphere, as the spacecraft gets closer to Jupiter itself.

  The motions of these particles travelling under the control of Jupiter's magneticfield will be one type of evidence Juno examines for clues about Jupiter's deep interior.

Mars Was Once Earth-Like

Presence of Manganese Oxide Indicates Mars Was Once Earth-Like

 Nasa's Curiosity rover has observed high levels of manganese oxides in Martian rocks which indicates that higher levels of atmospheric oxygen once existed on Red Planet.

  The discovery tells that the Red Planet was once more Earth-like than previously believed.

  The hint adds to other Curiosity findings - such as evidence of ancient lakes - revealing how Earth-like our neighbouring planet once was.

  "The only ways on Earth that we know how to make these manganese materials involve atmospheric oxygen or microbes," said Nina Lanza, planetary scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory and lead author on the study.

  "Now we're seeing manganese-oxides on Mars and wondering how the heck these could have formed," she added in a paper appared in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

  To reach this conclusion, Lanza used the Los Alamos-developed ChemCam instrument that sits a top Curiosity to "zap" rocks on Mars and analysed their chemical make-up.

  In less than four years since landing on Mars, ChemCam has analysed roughly 1,500 rock and soil samples.

  "These high-manganese materials can't form without lots of liquid water and strongly oxidizing conditions," said Lanza.

"Here on Earth, we had lots of water but no widespread deposits of manganese oxides until after the oxygen levels in our atmosphere rose due to photosynthesizing microbes," the author noted.

  One potential way that oxygen could have gotten into the Martian atmosphere is from the breakdown of water when Mars was losing its magnetic field.

 "It's thought that at this time in Mars' history, water was much more abundant," said Lanza.

  The next step is for scientists to better understand the signatures of non-biogenic versus biogenic manganese, which is directly produced by microbes.

  If it's possible to distinguish between manganese oxides produced by life and those produced in a non-biological setting, that knowledge can be directly applied to Martian manganese observations to better understand their origin.

Robot That Can Connect Emotionally With People

Sony to Develop a Robot That Can Connect Emotionally With People

  Japanese tech giant Sony announced on Wednesday that it was working on developing a robot which can connect emotionally with people, and expects to launch it soon.

  This will mark Sony's return to the market of artificial intelligence (AI), robots for homes, an area the company pioneered in 1999 when it launched its robotic dog Aibo, which it stopped manufacturing in 2006, EFE news reported.

  At a press conference on Wednesday, where the company unveiled its strategy for 2017, Sony President Kazuo Hirai said they want to make robots capable of winning people's affection.

  Sony is looking to combine its strengths in audiovisual technologies and home entertainment with the latest advances in robotics and AI, to introduce a new business model that will offer new experiences to users, he added.

  Last month, Sony acquired a stake in the US startup Cogitai, which specialises in creating continual AI learning programmes.

  Hirai also said the launch date for Sony's new home robot - which will be directly in competition with Softbank's android robot "Pepper", launched in June 2015 - has not been decided yet.

  He set an operating profits target of over $4 billion for the next fiscal and said the company is optimistic about continuing to grow owing to its entertainment and electronics divisions.

Twitter

Twitter Dashboard App to Help Small, Medium Businesses Connect With Customers

  To help business owners connect with their users, micro-blogging website Twitter has launched Twitter Dashboard - an app to streamline engagement for business accounts.

  Available on iOS, it can also be accessed on the Web. Twitter in its blog post introducing Dashboard said it is a place for businesses to "share news, tell stories, and have conversations that support, educate, and delight their customers."

  The company said Dashboard can help small and medium businesses engage with their audiences by creating a custom feed that shows what's being said about them on the social network. The tool will also help schedule tweets. Twitter will also provide "Tweet tips geared just for businesses," which will help start conversations and engage audiences.

  Earlier this week, Twitter added a new feature that would let a user add virtual stickers to photos by just searching them like hashtags.

  The company is also creating collections of stickers that are linked to the time of year and events such as New Year and Christmas. The new feature was similar to adding a sticker to a Snapchat post where a user can resize, rotate and add multiple stickers to each post.

  Twitter's management has been doing everything to get the company back on its feet.

  Recently, it acquired 18-month-old London-based startup Magic Pony Technology to expand its capabilities in machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI).

  The announcement came a week after Twitter invested $70 million in popular music streaming serviceSoundCloud to push its stalled growth amid rumors that technology giant Google might soon acquire the company.

  The 10-year-old Twitter has been facing stalled user growth and growing competition for quite some time. A sequential decline in its monthly active users (MAUs) base triggered a sharp fall in Twitter shares as the company announced its fourth quarter results recently.

Breast Cancer

Nasa Technology Reveals Bacteria's Role in Breast Cancer

  Using planetary protection techniques that ensure Nasa spacecraft do not contaminate other worlds, researchers, including one of Indian-origin, have found a link between bacteria in breast ductal fluid and breast cancer.

  The breast ductal system contains the glands that produce milk and naturally secretes a substance called "nipple aspirate fluid".

  For the study, the researchers at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, employed the same sequencing and analysis methods used for examining bacteria in spacecraft assembly rooms.

  "We applied these planetary protection techniques in the first-ever study of microorganisms in human breast ductal fluid," said Parag Vaishampayan, scientist in biotechnology and planetary protection at JPL.

  The researchers found differences between the ductal fluid bacteria found in women who have experienced breast cancer, and the bacteria present in those who have not.

  The findings were published in the online journal Scientific Reports.

  The research team found that the community of microorganisms in breast ductal fluid differed significantly between two groups - 23 healthy women and 25 women who had a history of breast cancer and had gone through treatment.

  It was then analysed with next-generation genomic sequencing, which has also been used for examining bacteria in Nasa spacecraft assembly facilities.

  For the study, Nasa scientists collaborated with cancer researchers from different institutions.

  "Collaboration between JPL space technology experts and medical researchers will continue to propel groundbreaking discoveries," Vaishampayan, who earned in PhD from University of Pune in Maharashtra, said.

  "This publication represents a success for JPL's Medical Engineering Forum Initiative, which focuses on applying Nasa technology for medical needs here on Earth," JPL's Leon Alkalai, who is spearheading the initiative said in a statement.

  Though the study found a correlation between specific species of bacteria and women who have gone through breast cancer treatment, the cause of the bacterial population difference is unclear.

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Water Sites on Mars

Nasa to Drive Curiosity to Potential Water Sites on Mars

  The US space agency is planning to drive the Curiosity Rover towards water sites on the Martian surface to further investigate the long, seasonally changing dark streaks briny water in the hope of finding evidence of life.

  "It is not as simple as driving a rover to a potential site and taking a scoop of soil," said Jim Green, Nasa's director of planetary science.

  "Not only are these on steep slopes, we need to ensure that planetary protection concerns are met. In other words, how can we search for evidence of life without contaminating the sites with bugs from Earth?," he added in a Nasa statement.

  After approval of mission extension, Nasa's Curiosity Mars rover would continue to climb to higher and younger strata on Mount Sharp - mountain in Gale crater - to investigate how the ancient, water-rich environments found till now persisted as the red planet dried out.

  A stroll on these destinations would help the one-tonne rover closer to locations where dark streaks are present on slopes and allow it to capture images of the potential water sites from miles away and see if any are the seasonally changing type.

  Nasa's High-Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has observed many features of interest. They appear as dark lines that appear to ebb and flow over time.

  "Planetary scientists think these gullies or recurring slope lineae (RSLs) may appear seasonally as a form of briny water at or near the surface of the Red Planet under warmer conditions," Nasa said.

  Nasa is also worried about how close could the rover safely get to an RSL?

  "In terms of coming much closer, we need to understand well in advance the potential for Earth organisms to come off the rover and that will tell us how far away the rover should stay," said Catharine Conley, Nasa's planetary protection officer.

  The darkish streaks are considered "special regions" on Mars, where extra precautions must be taken to prevent contamination because of the suspected presence of liquid water, considered a prerequisite for life.