‘Editor’s Picks’ Podcast (August 21, 2023) – Three essential articles read aloud from the latest issue of The Economist. This week, is Germany once again the sick man of Europe? Also, China’s disillusioned youth (10:50) and why AI could make it less necessary to learn foreign languages (17:35).
Tag Archives: AI
Finance Preview: Barron’s Magazine – August 21, 2023
BARRON’S MAGAZINE – AUGUST 21, 2023 ISSUE:
AI Is the Real Deal—if You Get It. Our 5 Roundtable Pros Can Help.
Five experts discuss the opportunities and risks around artificial intelligence—and the companies most likely to lead the way.
Social Security Benefits Could Shrink in 10 Years. How to Plan.
A new study finds that a typical couple would lose $17,400 in benefits in the first year the trust runs dry.
A Booster Shot for Your Portfolio
Moderna and BioNTech are no longer minting money from Covid vaccines. But both have strong drug pipelines and plenty of cash.
EV Start-Up VinFast Had a Hot Debut. Its Stock Price Is Indefensible.
The Singapore-based company is already worth more than GM or Ford.
Views: Microsoft, OpenAI And The Coming ‘AI Wars’
Chang also speaks with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman to discuss his company (which has some help from Microsoft), its ambitions and the latest on ChatGPT.
Politics: The Guardian Weekly – August 18, 2023
The Guardian Weekly (August 18, 2023) – This issue features ‘Back to the office: Is the work from home revolution over?’; Bangladesh’s ‘lost children’; AI does architecture; Pathfinders – In Ukraine minefields and more…
‘Never again’: is Britain finally ready to return to the office?
With even the big internet firms warning staff they need to show up more often, is working from home over? Or have the attitudes and expectations of employees changed for ever?
‘My mother spent her life trying to find me’: the children who say they were wrongly taken for adoption
For years, Bibi Hasenaar felt rejected because she was adopted aged four. Then she saw a photo that described her as missing – and began to uncover an astonishing dark history
Harvard Business Review – September/October 2023
Reskilling in the Age of AI
Five new paradigms for leaders—and employees
In the coming decades, as the pace of technological change continues to increase, millions of workers may need to be not just upskilled but reskilled—a profoundly complex societal challenge that will sometimes require workers to both acquire new skills and change occupations entirely.
People May Be More Trusting of AI When They Can’t See How It Works
New research looked at the extent to which the employees of a fashion retailer followed the stocking recommendations of two algorithms: one whose workings were easy to understand and one that was indecipherable. Surprisingly, they accepted the guidance of the uninterpretable algorithm more often.
Preview: “On The Verge Of” AI-Generated Short Film
World Economic Forum: Top Stories- Aug 12, 2023
0:15 Scientists discover self healing metals – They have the ability to weld tiny cracks back together again without human intervention. Scientists were studying how microscopic cracks spread through platinum using a machine that repeatedly pulled on the ends of the metal. But after 40 minutes, the damage began to heal itself. The scientists said it was ‘absolutely stunning’ to watch first-hand. The finding revises some of our basic theories about metals.
1:42 Who owns a song written by AI – Music made with artificial intelligence has made headlines this year. In April, an AI-generated track cloned the voices of Drake and The Weeknd. Heart on My Sleeve racked up 20 million streams on Spotify, Tiktok and Twitter before copyright claims by Universal Music Group saw it pulled from platforms. The pop star Grimes has taken a different route, offering to split royalties with anyone who uses her voice on an AI track. The limits of creative copyright were once clear but AI has introduced uncertainty.
4:50 These special microbes kill harmful bacteria – The food industry struggles with persistent pathogens, such as Salmonella which causes fever, diarrhoea and stomach pain. In 2021, 96,000 cases of salmonellosis were reported in the EU. The illness costs up to €3 billion a year in health bills and lost productivity. These phage food safety solutions have been created by Phageguard. Phages are the most abundant organisms in nature and a natural solution to bacteria which they infect and dissipate. As well as being natural and safe, phages are specific to each target pathogen and unlike antibiotics, they don’t lead to side-effects or antimicrobial resistance (AMR)
6:24 Prescribing fruit and veg could save millions of lives – In the US, fruit and veg prescriptions would prevent almost 300,000 heart attacks and strokes and give people an extra 260,000 years of good health if they were offered to people with diabetes aged 40-79.
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The World Economic Forum is the International Organization for Public-Private Cooperation. The Forum engages the foremost political, business, cultural and other leaders of society to shape global, regional and industry agendas. We believe that progress happens by bringing together people from all walks of life who have the drive and the influence to make positive change.
Finance Preview: Barron’s Magazine – August 14, 2023
BARRON’S MAGAZINE – AUGUST 14, 2023 ISSUE:
The Long-Shot Sports Bet That’s Saving an Industry
The popularity of “parlays” means fatter profits for sites, even as gamblers pare spending.
A Smart Bet on Green Energy, With a Rising Dividend Yield
NextEra Energy owns the largest renewables business in the U.S., and the biggest utility. The stock’s selloff offers an opportunity.
As Cable Shrinks, Comcast Just Looks Like More of a Buy
Comcast’s broadband network is crucial to the future of technology. Even so, its stock is cheap compared with buzzier names like Netflix, Nvidia, and Meta Platforms.
Ivy Degrees, Legacies, and Wealth. Where Colleges Should Go From Here.
Brown University economist John N. Friedman discusses the findings of a new study on the economic consequences of elite college degrees.
Research Preview: Nature Magazine – August 10, 2023
JWST spots what could be a quasar from the early Universe
The object’s deep red colour suggests it existed when the Universe was less than 700 million years old.
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has seen what is probably a quasar from the early Universe1.
ChatGPT-like AIs are coming to major science search engines
The Scopus, Dimensions and Web of Science databases are introducing conversational AI search.
The conversational AI-powered chatbots that have come to Internet search engines, such as Google’s Bard and Microsoft’s Bing, look increasingly set to change scientific search, too. On 1 August, Dutch publishing giant Elsevier released a ChatGPT-like artificial-intelligence (AI) interface for some users of its Scopus database, and British firm Digital Science announced a closed trial of an AI large language model (LLM) assistant for its Dimensions database. Meanwhile, US firm Clarivate says it’s working on bringing LLMs to its Web of Science database.
Art & Design Essays: ‘Will AI Wipe Out Architects?’
It’s revolutionizing building – but could AI kill off an entire profession? Perhaps not, finds our writer, as he enters a world where Corbusier-style marvels and 500-room hotels are just a click away
Oliver Wainwright – The Guardian (August 7, 2023): A handful of little green blocks flashes up on the screen, filling a building site with a neat grid of uniform cubes. One second they form rows of towers, next they morph into low-rise courtyards, then they flip back into long slender slabs, before cycling through hundreds of other iterations, in a hypnotic high-speed ballet of bristling buildings.
I watch this while on a Zoom call with Wanyu He, an architect based in Shenzhen, China, and the founder of XKool, an artificial intelligence company determined to revolutionise the architecture industry. She freezes the dancing blocks and zooms in, revealing a layout of hotel rooms that fidget and reorder themselves as the building swells and contracts. Corridors switch sides, furniture dances to and fro. Another click and an invisible world of pipes and wires appears, a matrix of services bending and splicing in mesmerising unison, the location of lighting, plug sockets and switches automatically optimised. One further click and the construction drawings pop up, along with a cost breakdown and components list. The entire plan is ready to be sent to the factory to be built.
Boomers Daily 