“AI – Artificial Intelligence”

AI is a new front in our civilisational war

The blink-if-you-missed-it four-day drama at the tech firm OpenAI requires deep attention. On the surface it looks like power shenanigans; underneath lies a tale of humanity’s future and geopolitics.

The strange saga began a week ago, when the board of the nonprofit decided to fire its AI guru and cultish leader, Sam Altman. But when the 700+ staffers of OpenAI wrote an open letter saying that they too would go with the ousted CEO, he was swiftly reinstated.

“… Open AI researchers warned the board of directors about a powerful AI breakthrough that could pose threats to humanity, before the firing and rehiring of its CEO Sam Altman.

Several staff researchers sent a letter to the OpenAI board, warning that the progress made on Project Q*, pronounced as Q-star, had the potential to endanger humanity, two sources familiar with Altman’s ouster told Reuters.

The previously unreported letter ultimately led to the removal of Altman, the creator of ChatGPT, and the ensuing chaotic five days within the startup company.”

After Dwayne Ouelette took over the Canadian Tire in North Bay, Ont., last year, he decided to buck the trend and ditch the store’s four self-checkout machines — which had been there for a decade.

“I’m not comfortable using them and I don’t think some of my customers are comfortable [either],” said Ouelette, who removed the machines in July and replaced them with cashiers.

“I’d rather my customers see my cashiers and if there’s any questions or concerns, at least there’s somebody they can talk to.”

My local Shopper’s Drug Mart drove me away with their totalitarian devotion to self-checkout at the expense of customer need.

AI is everywhere these days — even in wars. Artificial intelligence applications have greatly improved this year, and almost anyone can now use standard AI generators to create images that look real, at least at first glance.

Users must “feed” tools such as Midjourney or Dall-E with prompts, including specifications and information, to do this. The tools then convert the written prompts into images.

A man was crushed to death by a robot in South Korea after it failed to differentiate him from a box of vegetables.

The victim, a robotics company worker in his 40s, was inspecting the machine’s sensor at a distribution centre for agricultural produce in South Gyeongsang in the early hours of this morning.

The machine, which was lifting boxes of peppers onto a pallet, grabbed the man with its arm and pushed him against the conveyer belt, crushing his face and chest.

Amazon is experimenting with a humanoid robot as the technology company increasingly seeks to automate its warehouses.

It has started testing Digit, a two-legged ​robot that can grasp and lift items, at facilities this week. The device is first being used to shift empty tote boxes.

The company’s ambitious drive to integrate robotics across its sprawling operation has sparked fears about the effect on its ​workforce of almost 1​.5​ million human​s.

Inevitable.

The AI language model can now see and speak

This week, OpenAI announced that ChatGPT can now “see and speak,” broadening its interactive range. “Settl[ing] a dinner table debate” and “request[ing] a bedtime story for your family” are among the list of potential use cases suggested. OpenAI seems to be positioning ChatGPT to be more than just a tool — perhaps an AI companion.

Artificial-intelligence pioneers are fighting over which of the technology’s dangers is the scariest.

One camp, which includes some of the top executives building advanced AI systems, argues that its creations could lead to catastrophe. In the other camp are scientists who say concern should focus primarily on how AI is being implemented right now and how it could cause harm in our daily lives.

Hundreds of driverless cabs can now be hired in San Francisco but activists are trying to sabotage them, arguing the city should invest more in public transport

Under the cover of darkness, masked vigilantes stalk the streets of San Francisco, waiting for a victim to emerge through the evening fog.

Armed with a traffic cone, the assailants pounce, placing the apparently harmless item on the bonnet of a strange-looking vehicle covered in cameras, bringing it to a dead stop.