Month: November 2014

Human level AI is always 20 years in the future

Steven Pinker highlighted this study which tracks the predictions of when human level AI (artificial intelligence) will be achieved.  According to the paper, the predictions cluster around predicting that it will be achieved in 15-25 years, and they have been doing so for the last 60 or so years.  The paper also notes that expert predictions have fared … Continue reading Human level AI is always 20 years in the future →

How should we communicate with aliens? Should we communicate?

Seth Shostak has a post up at HuffPost asking what we should say if we ever find ourselves in conversation with aliens.  Apparently this was the topic of a recent conference at the SETI institute. Before commenting on Shostak's main thesis, I think he makes an assertion that deserves scrutiny. A decade of research by … Continue reading How should we communicate with aliens? Should we communicate? →

Dark matter might cause neutron stars to collapse into black holes

ratamacue0 called my attention to this interesting article on the possibility of dark matter "eating" neutron stars: Dark matter: Devourer of stars | Ars Technica. Neutron stars are collapsed stars that have used up all of their fusion fuel.  Typically what happens at that point in a star's life is that they collapse, but the extent of … Continue reading Dark matter might cause neutron stars to collapse into black holes →

Digitization is increasing the accessibility of old scientific papers, and of history

Apparently, scientific papers have tended to fade away as they got older, with most papers only getting citations within the first decade or so after their publication.  But a Physics arXiv entry reveals that, with digitization, that is changing. The results show a clear trend. “Our analysis indicates that, in 2013, 36% of citations were … Continue reading Digitization is increasing the accessibility of old scientific papers, and of history →

Religion in Latin America is strong, except in Uruguay

Pew just released an interesting report on religion in Latin America: Religion in Latin America | Pew Research Center's Religion & Public Life Project.  Given our recent discussion on the decline of religion in western societies, I found this report interesting.  Religion and belief in God remains very strong in Latin America, except in one country, Uruguay. … Continue reading Religion in Latin America is strong, except in Uruguay →

HBO will make a Foundation TV series

IO9 has the details.  Apparently Jonathan Nolan, of 'Interstellar' fame, is involved. I'm not sure how I feel about this.  The Foundation series, by Isaac Asimov, is classic golden age science fiction.  It's one of those works that has influenced lots of other science fiction, with many common tropes originating from it.  Galactic empires?  Foundation. … Continue reading HBO will make a Foundation TV series →

The (ongoing) evolution of evolutionary theory

Massimo weighs in on a debate that I'm increasingly starting to view as semantic.  Everyone seems to agree on the actual science, but disagrees whether or not it should be categorized as a new era of evolutionary theory.  Massimo admits in this post that the new proposed paradigm is essentially a super-set of the current one. … Continue reading The (ongoing) evolution of evolutionary theory →