Artificial intelligence could end mankind: Hawking

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Karwai Tang | Getty Images

Professor Stephen Hawking attends the gala screening of 'Hawking' on the opening night of the Cambridge Film Festival held at Emmanuel College on September 19, 2013 in Cambridge, Cambridgeshire.

Stephen Hawking and a group of top physicists are sounding the alarm on artificial intelligence, writing in The Independent that success in creating AI could be "the biggest event in human history," but also "the last."

The scientists authored the opinion column against the backdrop of the new AI movie Transcendence, which stars Johnny Depp.

"It's tempting to dismiss the notion of highly intelligent machines as mere science fiction. But this would be a mistake, and potentially our worst mistake in history," they wrote.

The physicists cite Google's recent self-driving car announcement, digital personal assistants like Apple's Siri and her new competitors, and more sinister uses of AI like autonomous weapons that can choose their own targets.

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Artificial intelligence could end mankind: Hawking

B/E Aerospace Hires Advisers to Study Options Including Sale

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B/E Aerospace Inc. (BEAV), the maker of seats for commercial and business jets, hired financial and legal advisers to study its options, including a sale, and canceled an investor meeting set for today.

Citigroup Inc. (C) and Shearman & Sterling LLP will assess alternatives, also including a sale or spinoff of some businesses, said B/E, which has a market value of about $9.4 billion. No decision has been made and the boards explorations may end with no deal, the Wellington, Florida-based company said yesterday in a statement.

This is a U-turn from April 23, when Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Amin Khoury said B/E signed important letters of intent to acquire two additional synergistic manufacturing businesses, without identifying the targets. Khoury also said on that call that first-quarter results were the best in the companys 27-year history.

Its unclear what changed since the April 23 conference call, said Howard Rubel, an analyst at Jefferies LLC who recommends buying the shares. They seem to have gone in another direction; from the idea of buying to selling or finding another option to create value.

B/E is an attractive company, which has grown the business much faster than the market, said Rubel, who declined to speculate on who could be the potential buyers.

A spokesman didnt respond to a call and e-mail sent yesterday, outside of regular business hours.

Besides aircraft seats, B/E makes cooking equipment and security devices. Boeing Co. is its largest customer, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. B/Es net income for the period jumped 21 percent to $109 million from the year-earlier quarter, while revenue rose 20 percent to $1.01 billion.

``Interiors are big and profitable these days, both for record new build numbers, extensive retrofits and a focus on premium passengers,'' said Richard Aboulafia, an analyst at Fairfax, Virginia-based aerospace consultant Teal Group.

In the past five years, B/E has spent $1.6 billion in eight acquisitions, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

B/E stock rose less than 1 percent to $88.96 on May 2. The shares 40 percent gain in the past 12 months has topped the 37 percent advance for the Standard and Poors Supercomposite Aerospace & Defense Index.

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B/E Aerospace Hires Advisers to Study Options Including Sale

Signs of Brain Aging Are Reversed in Mice

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Young blood really does rejuvenate the brain, at least in mice, raising hopes that molecules in the blood may be identified to do the same for humans, according to a study stemming from the ongoing research of a young UC San Francisco scientist, Saul Villeda, PhD.

The research, on which Villeda collaborated with scientists at Stanford University, identified anatomical, molecular and biochemical evidence of cognitive improvements and other forms of rejuvenation in old mice when they were connected to the circulatory system of young ones. Results were published online in Nature Medicine on May 4.

In experiments led by Saul Villeda, PhD, old mice that received the blood of young micehad increased activation of Creb, aprotein that is a master regulator of nerve growth in the hippocampus. The hippocampus is a brain region crucial for learning and memory. The deeper staining in the image on the right shows the increased Creb activation as a result of exposure to young blood.

Credit: Nature Medicine

Anatomically, it was clear that these mice formed more structural and functional connections between neurons, or nerve cells, while they also turned on more genes associated with the formation of new nerve connections.

Furthermore, the researchers found that a protein called Creb became more activated in the brain region known as the hippocampus, and that this increased activity was associated with the anatomical and cognitive improvements the team observed.

We know that something in the young blood leads to Creb activation, and the Creb is a master regulator of gene activity in the brain that is associated with the formation of new connections between neurons underlying learning and memory, Villeda said, adding that Creb activation is known to decrease in both normal human aging and in Alzheimers disease.

In the behavioral experiments, old mice were injected with either old or young blood. Cognitively, old mice with young blood coursing through their veins performed better. When immersed in water, they were better able to recall the location of a submerged platform and climb onto it. In a separate, fear-conditioning exercise, they responded more quickly to stimuli normally perceived as threatening, a behavior important for survival.

Identifying and getting rid of aging factors in old blood, or supplying youthful factors from young blood, might both be worthwhile strategies to combat aging, Villeda says. But dont try injecting yourself with saved samples of your young blood at home just yet.

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Signs of Brain Aging Are Reversed in Mice

Designer Uses Hubble Telescope Images For Her Line Of Fantastically Ethereal Silk – Video

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Designer Uses Hubble Telescope Images For Her Line Of Fantastically Ethereal Silk
Celine Semaan Vernon of Slow Factory has designed line of fantastically ethereal scarves and other silk wares around open-sourced images from the NASA Hubble...

By: photoclub

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Designer Uses Hubble Telescope Images For Her Line Of Fantastically Ethereal Silk - Video

Christie Ally Samson Refuses to Give Documents to Lawmakers

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David Samson, former chairman of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, refused to hand over more documents to state lawmakers probing the George Washington Bridge lane closings, citing his constitutional right against self-incrimination.

Lawyers for Samson, an ally of Governor Chris Christie, questioned the fairness and legitimacy of the inquiry. They asserted his Fifth Amendment privilege amid investigations by U.S. Attorney for New Jersey Paul Fishman and others. Lawmakers want to know which of Christies allies shut access lanes last September to the bridge, which the Port Authority runs.

While Samson has done nothing wrong and has violated no laws, the Fifth Amendment protects innocent men who otherwise might be ensnared by ambiguous circumstances, his lawyers wrote yesterday to the counsel for a legislative committee that subpoenaed documents from him.

The legislative committee is engaged in a political exercise, not an objective fact-finding mission, Samson attorney Michael Chertoff said in a statement. Samson cannot and will not participate in a process that fundamentally jeopardizes his constitutional rights and which stands to wrongly besmirch his reputation for honesty and public service.

Two other figures in the center of the scandal -- Bridget Anne Kelly, a former deputy chief of staff to Christie, and David Wildstein, once a high-ranking official at the Port Authority -- also invoked their right against self incrimination in response to subpoenas for documents. A state judge refused to enforce their subpoenas, saying they were overbroad and amounted to a fishing expedition.

Samson, who initially turned over some documents, will not hand over any more because the committee has repeatedly disregarded its own procedures, wrote Chertoff and his co-counsel Angelo Genova. Fishmans office also has subpoenaed material from the committee, effectively treating the committee as a conduit for its own investigation, they said.

Samson resigned on March 28, a day after a law firms report commissioned by Christie absolved the Republican governor in the lane closings. The report blamed Kelly and Wildstein for traffic tie-ups that crippled Fort Lee, New Jersey, where the Democratic mayor didnt back Christies re-election last fall.

The committee has subpoenaed documents from 28 people and organizations, and will take testimony this month from several witnesses. The Democratic co-chairmen, Senator Loretta Weinberg and Assemblyman John Wisniewski, said in a statement that they were disappointed by Samsons decision.

The best way to get to the root of this abuse of government power is full cooperation by everyone, they said. We will obviously continue forward with this bipartisan inquiry until the people of New Jersey get the answers they deserve.

-With assistance by Terrence Dopp in Trenton, New Jersey.

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Second Amendment group marches in El Paso

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Members of the local chapter of Come and Take It Texas participated in an open carry demonstration Saturday afternoon near UTEP. (Ruben R. Ramirez / El Paso Times)

The local chapter of a state organization that supports the right of people to openly carry firearms participated in a statewide march on Saturday.

Twenty members of Come and Take It Texas walked from Mesa Street and Cincinnati Avenue toward Mesa and Rim Road holding the Texas Flag and openly carrying several rifles, shotguns and pre-1899 black powder hand guns.

They placed the guns in holsters while marching.

The organization's purpose is to educate people about their Second Amendment right to openly carry firearms in public in a responsible manner and encourage elected officials to pass less restrictive open-carry laws, said Jose Alberto Soto, administrator for the El Paso Chapter of Come and Take it Texas.

El Paso Police Department officials said they were aware the group was conducting the march and that the coordinators informed officials about it ahead of time.

Police said no arrests were made because the protesters were not breaking any laws.

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Second Amendment group marches in El Paso

Church Uses First Amendment Protections To Perform Same Sex Marriages – Video

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Church Uses First Amendment Protections To Perform Same Sex Marriages
"The United Church of Christ argues that a North Carolina law criminalizing the religious solemnization of weddings without a state-issued marriage license violates the First Amendment." ...

By: The Young Turks

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Church Uses First Amendment Protections To Perform Same Sex Marriages - Video