Innovations: Elon Musk, Neil deGrasse Tyson laugh about artificial intelligence turning the human race into its pet …

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Elon Musk has already ignited a debate over the dangers of artificial intelligence. The chief executive of Tesla and SpaceX has called it humanitysgreatest threat, and something even more dangerous than nuclear weapons.

Musk publicly hasnt offered a lot of detail about why hes concerned, and what could go wrong. That changed in an interview with scientist Neil deGrasse Tyson, posted Sunday.

Musks fears lie with a subset of artificial intelligence, called superintelligence. Its defined by Nick Bostrom, author of the highly-cited book Superintelligence, as any intellect that greatly exceed the cognitive performance of humans in virtually all domains of interest.

Musk isnt worried about simpler forms of artificial intelligence, such as a driverless car or smart conditioning unit. The danger is when a machine can rapidly educate itself, as Musk explained:

If there was a very deep digital superintelligence that was created that could go into rapid recursive self-improvement in a non-algorithmic way it could reprogram itself to be smarter and iterate very quickly and do that 24 hours a day on millions of computers, well

Then thats all she wrote, interjected Tysonwith a chuckle.

Thats all she wrote, Musk answered. I mean, we wont be like a pet Labrador if were lucky.

A pet Lab, laughed Tyson.

I have a pet Labrador by the way, Musk said.

Well be their pets, Tysonsaid.

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Innovations: Elon Musk, Neil deGrasse Tyson laugh about artificial intelligence turning the human race into its pet ...

The AI Resurgence: Why Now?

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Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been enjoying a major resurgence in recent months and for some seasoned professionals, who have been in the AI industry since the 1980s, it feels like dj vu all over again.

AI, being a loosely defined collection of techniques inspired by natural intelligence, does have a mystic aspect to it. After all, we do culturally assign positive value to all things smart, and so we naturally expect any system imbued with AI to be good, or it is not AI. When AI works, it is only doing what it is supposed to do, no matter how complex an algorithm being used to enable it, but when it fails to workeven if what was asked of it is impractical or out of scopeit is often not considered intelligent anymore. Just think of your personal assistant.

For these reasons, AI has typically gone through cycles of promise, leading to investment, and then under-delivery, due to the expectation problem noted above, which has inevitably led to a tapering off of the funding.

This time, however, the scale and scope of this surge in attention to AI is much larger than before. During the latter half of 2014, there was an injection of nearly half a billion dollars into the AI industry.

What are the drivers behind this?

For starters, the infrastructure speed, availability, and sheer scale has enabled bolder algorithms to tackle more ambitious problems. Not only is the hardware faster, sometimes augmented by specialized arrays of processors (e.g., GPUs), it is also available in the shape of cloud services. What used to be run in specialized labs with access to super computers can now be deployed to the cloud at a fraction of the cost and much more easily. This has democratized access to the necessary hardware platforms to run AI, enabling a proliferation of start-ups.

Furthermore, new emerging open source technologies, such as Hadoop, allow speedier development of scaled AI technologies applied to large and distributed data sets.

A combination of other events has helped AI gain the critical-mass necessary for it to become the center of attention for technology investment. Larger players are investing heavily in various AI technologies. These investments go beyond simple R&D extensions of existing products, and are often quite strategic in nature. Take for example, IBMs scale of investment in Watson, or Googles investment in driverless cars, Deep Learning (i.e., DeepMind), and even Quantum Computing, which promises to significantly improve on efficiency of machine learning algorithms.

On top of this, theres a more wide scale awareness of AI in the general population, thanks in no small part to the advent and relative success of natural language mobile personal assistants. Incidentally, the fact that Siri can be funny sometimes, which ironically is technically relatively simple to implement, does add to the impression that it is truly intelligent.

But theres more substance to this resurgence than the impression of intelligence that Siris jocularity gives its users. The recent advances in Machine Learning are truly groundbreaking. Artificial Neural Networks (deep learning computer systems that mimic the human brain) are now scaled to several tens of hidden layer nodes, increasing their abstraction power. They can be trained on tens of thousands of cores, speeding up the process of developing generalizing learning models. Other mainstream classification approaches, such as Random Forest classification, have been scaled to run on very large numbers of compute nodes, enabling the tackling of ever more ambitious problems on larger and larger data-sets (e.g., Wise.io).

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The AI Resurgence: Why Now?

Vector Aerospace Contracted to Perform Major Service Inspections

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Langley, BC Vector Aerospace(www.vectoraerospace.com), a global independent provider of aviation maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) services, is pleased to announce that it has been selected to perform a 7,500 hour major inspection (G check) and 12-year inspection on one of the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Departments three AS332L1 Super Puma helicopters. This inspection will also include post maintenance return to service activities and a 10-year calendar fuel hose replacement.

Vector Aerospace is globally recognized as an AS332C, L & L1 MRO provider certified by Airbus Helicopters to perform all inspections up to and including G check, avionics and structural MRO including full-wiring repairs and extensive primary and secondary composite repairs. Vector Aerospace also offers a variety of custom Supplemental Type Certificates (STCs) for the Super Puma, as well as a pay by the hour lease program suitable for operators who have immediate operational requirements that can be fulfilled by leasing an AS332L.

With extensive experience in performing inspections and maintenance on Super Puma helicopters, I am confident that the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department will be pleased with our quality standards and top-notch customer support delivered throughout this contract, said Chris McDowell, Vice President, Sales and Marketing at HS-NA.

Vector Aerospace holds approvals from some of the world's leading turbine engine, airframe and avionics OEMs. Powerplants supported include a wide range of turboshafts, turboprops and turbofans from General Electric, Honeywell, Pratt & Whitney Canada, Rolls-Royce and Turbomeca. Vector Aerospace also provides support for a wide range of airframes from Airbus Helicopters, Bell, Boeing and Sikorsky. Its capabilities include major inspections and dynamic component overhaul, full-service avionics capability including aircraft rewiring, as well as mission equipment installation and glass cockpit upgrades.

About the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department:

The Los Angeles Sheriffs Department is the largest sheriffs department in the world. It is divided into the four main operations of Custody Operations, Patrol Operations, Countywide Services, and Administrative & Professional Standards. Within the four operations, there are thirteen additional subgroups, called divisions, each headed by a Division Chief. From within these divisions are bureaus and specialized units which provide specific services to the county, the county residents, other county, state and federal agencies.

Their Core Values are: Courage, Compassion, Professionalism, Accountability, and Respect. With integrity, compassion, and courage, we serve our communities-- protecting life and property, being diligent and professional in our acts and deeds, holding ourselves and each other accountable for our actions at all times, while respecting the dignity and rights of all. Earning the Public Trust Every Day!

For more information about the Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department, visit their website at http://www.lasd.org

About Vector Aerospace:

Vector Aerospace is a global provider of aviation MRO services. Through facilities in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Australia, South Africa and Kenya, Vector Aerospace provides services to commercial and military customers for gas turbine engines, components and helicopter airframes. Vector Aerospaces customer-focused team includes over 2,700 motivated employees.

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Vector Aerospace Contracted to Perform Major Service Inspections

Bollywood filmmakers hold meeting with I&B ministry over censorship – Video

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Bollywood filmmakers hold meeting with I B ministry over censorship
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Ayutha Ezhuthu – Debate On "Need Of Censorship On Social Media"(23/03/2015) Promo – Video

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Ayutha Ezhuthu : Debate on "Need of censorship on social media"...Watch the Full debate unfold tonight (23/03/2015) 8 PM...-Thanthi TV Catch us LIVE @ http://www.thanthitv.com/ Follow us on...

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Ayutha Ezhuthu - Debate On "Need Of Censorship On Social Media"(23/03/2015) Promo - Video

Justices struggle with free speech case over license plates

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By MARK SHERMAN Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) - In a dispute over a proposed Confederate battle flag license plate, the Supreme Court struggled Monday to balance worries about government censorship and concerns that offensive messages could, at worst, incite violence.

Nearly 150 years after the end of the Civil War, the justices heard arguments in a case over Texas' refusal to issue a license plate bearing the battle flag. Nine other states allow drivers to display plates with the flag, which remains both a potent image of heritage and a racially charged symbol of repression.

Specialty license plates are big business in Texas. They brought in $17.6 million last year and state officials said there are now nearly 450 messages to choose from, from "Choose Life" to the Boy Scouts and hamburger chains.

The state rarely rejects a specialty plate, but it did turn down a request by the Texas division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans for a license plate with its logo bearing the battle flag. The group's lawsuit led to Monday's hearing.

The justices seemed uncomfortable with arguments advanced by both sides - the state in defense of its actions, and the Sons of Confederate Veterans in their appeal for the symbol.

If the court finds the state must permit the battle flag on license plates, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg asked in a series of questions, would it be forced also to allow plates with a swastika, the word "jihad," and a call to make marijuana legal?

Yes, lawyer R. James George Jr., a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall 45 years ago, responded each time on behalf of the veterans group.

"That's okay? And 'Bong hits for Jesus?'" Ginsburg said, reaching back to an earlier case involving students' speech rights.

Again, George said yes, and remained firm even when Justice Elena Kagan added in "the most offensive racial epithet you can imagine."

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Justices struggle with free speech case over license plates

Could Texas have Nazi license plates? Supreme Court hears free speech case. (+video)

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Washington The United States Supreme Court began grappling on Monday with a thorny free speech issue: whether a state government can use its authority over specialty license plates to endorse certain messages while censoring others.

The issue arises in a lawsuit filed by the Texas Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, who complain that Texas refused to produce and circulate a proposed Sons of Confederate Veterans license plate that prominently featured the Confederate battle flag.

A Texas board rejected the license plate because it said many members of the public find the Confederate battle flag offensive.

Only a handful of proposed specialty license plates have ever rejected by Texas.

The state offers more than 400 specialty plates featuring an eclectic range of messages. They include God Bless Texas, Vietnam Veteran, Id Rather Be Golfing, and Mighty Fine Burgers, a commercial plug for an Austin burger establishment of high repute.

The Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) insist that their proposed license plate is not meant to spread fear or hatred. They view the Confederate flag as a symbol of sacrifice, independence, and Southern heritage, and they argue that the state should not be permitted to muzzle that message.

The case is potentially important because it forces the justices to explore a murky First Amendment middle ground between government-permitted censorship of objectionable speech in some limited cases and guarantees of free speech in most cases even when that speech is offensive.

The so-called government speech doctrine allows the government to engage in viewpoint discrimination in its own speech, but it does not allow such discrimination against private speech. Thus, a central question in the case is who is doing the speaking in the production and display of specialty license plates?

Texas approves and issues a specialty license plate containing a particular message. Next, an individual driver pays extra for the plate, attaches it to her vehicle, and displays the message while driving in public.

Is the resulting communication the speech of the government or the speech of the individual driver?

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Could Texas have Nazi license plates? Supreme Court hears free speech case. (+video)

Texas license plate case pits free speech vs. hate speech

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This image provided by the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles shows the design of a proposed Sons of Confederate Veterans license plate. The Supreme Court on March 23, 2015, will weigh a free-speech challenge to Texas decision to refuse to issue a license plate bearing the Confederate battle flag. Specialty plates are big business in Texas, where drivers spent $17.6 million last year to choose from among more than 350 messages the state allows on the plates. TEXASDEPARTMENTOFMOTORVEHICLESAP

WASHINGTON Supreme Court justices on Monday struggled with how far license plates might go if they rule the Sons of Confederate Veterans can get Texas plates imprinted with the Confederate flag.

Pretty far, the Sons of Confederate Veterans attorney conceded, in an exchange that suggested why the group might eventually lose its challenge to Texas denial of its controversial plate request.

Your position is that, if you prevail, a license plate can have a racial slur? asked Justice Anthony Kennedy, a frequent swing vote. Thats your position?

Yes, replied R. James George Jr., the Austin-based attorney representing the Sons of Confederate Veterans, adding that speech that we hate is something we should be proud of protecting.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg pressed George with similar examples, asking about specialty license plates imprinted with a swastika, an encouragement to commit jihad or the phrases Make Pot Legal or Bong Hits for Jesus. In each case, George said Texas should be obliged to print the plate if requested to.

I dont think the government can discriminate against content, George said.

Texas officials, though, say theyre free to regulate the speech thats conveyed through a government-issued medium.

The government is entitled to select the messages that it wishes to propagate, Texas Solicitor General Scott A. Keller said Texas does not have to associate itself with messages that it doesnt want to and finds offensive.

The Texas specialty license plate program now includes more than 400 permitted messages, Keller reported Monday. Some messages are authorized by the state Legislature and others are applied for through the Texas Department of Transportation.

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Texas license plate case pits free speech vs. hate speech

Justices hear free speech dispute over Confederate flag license plate

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The U.S. Supreme Court takes up a free speech case on whether Texas was wrong in rejecting a specialty vehicle license plate displaying the Confederate flag to some an emblem of Southern pride and to others a symbol of racism. Photo by Texas Department of Motor Vehicles/Handout via Reuters

WASHINGTON The Supreme Court is weighing a free-speech challenge to Texas refusal to issue a license plate bearing the Confederate battle flag.

Specialty plates are big business in Texas, where drivers spent $17.6 million last year to choose from among more than 350 messages the state allows. The Texas Department of Motor Vehicles says nearly 877,000 vehicles among more than 19 million cars, pickup trucks and motorcycles registered in Texas carry a specialty plate.

But a state motor vehicle board turned down a request by the Texas division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans for a license plate with its logo bearing the battle flag, similar to plates issued by eight other states that were members of the Confederacy, as well as Maryland.

The justices are hearing arguments Monday over whether the state violated the groups First Amendment rights.

Texas commemorates the Confederacy in many ways, but it says that putting the battle flag on license plates would offend many Texans who believe the flag is a racially charged symbol of repression. The same image is etched on a century-old Civil War monument on the grounds of the state Capitol in Austin.

The First Amendment dispute has brought together some unlikely allies, including the American Civil Liberties Union, anti-abortion groups, Americans United for Separation of Church and State, civil libertarian Nat Hentoff and conservative satirist P.J. ORourke.

In a free society, offensive speech should not just be tolerated, its regular presence should be celebrated as a symbol of democratic health however odorous the products of a democracy may be, Hentoff, ORourke and others said in a brief backing the group.

The case could be important for how the Supreme Court determines whether the speech at issue belongs to private individuals or the government.

Texas main argument to the Supreme Court is that the license plate is not like a bumper sticker slapped on the car by its driver. Instead, the state said license plates are government property, and so what appears on them is not private individuals speech but the governments. The First Amendment applies when governments try to regulate the speech of others, but not when governments are doing the talking.

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Justices hear free speech dispute over Confederate flag license plate

Justices struggle with free speech case over Confederate license plates

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March 23, 2015: This image provided by the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles shows the design of a proposed Sons of Confederate Veterans license plate.(AP)

In a dispute over a proposed Confederate battle flag license plate, the Supreme Court struggled Monday to balance worries about government censorship and concerns that offensive messages could, at worst, incite violence.

Nearly 150 years after the end of the Civil War, the justices heard arguments in a case over Texas' refusal to issue a license plate bearing the battle flag. Nine other states allow drivers to display plates with the flag, which remains both a potent image of heritage and a racially charged symbol of repression.

Specialty license plates are big business in Texas. They brought in $17.6 million last year and state officials said there are now nearly 450 messages to choose from, from "Choose Life" to the Boy Scouts and hamburger chains.

The state rarely rejects a specialty plate, but it did turn down a request by the Texas division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans for a license plate with its logo bearing the battle flag. The group's lawsuit led to Monday's hearing.

The justices seemed uncomfortable with arguments advanced by both sides -- the state in defense of its actions, and the Sons of Confederate Veterans in their appeal for the symbol.

If the court finds the state must permit the battle flag on license plates, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg asked in a series of questions, would it be forced also to allow plates with a swastika, the word "jihad," and a call to make marijuana legal?

Yes, lawyer R. James George Jr., a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall 45 years ago, responded each time on behalf of the veterans group.

"That's okay? And `Bong hits for Jesus?"' Ginsburg said, reaching back to an earlier case involving students' speech rights.

Again, George said yes, and remained firm even when Justice Elena Kagan added in "the most offensive racial epithet you can imagine."

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Justices struggle with free speech case over Confederate license plates

Freedom of Speech online: SC verdict on Section 66A Today

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New Delhi: The Supreme Court is likely to pronounce today its verdict on a batch of petitions challenging constitutional validity of certain sections of the cyber law including a provision under which a person can be arrested for allegedly posting "offensive" contents on websites.

A bench of justices J Chelameswar and R F Nariman had on February 26 reserved its judgement after Government concluded its arguments contending that section 66A of the Information Technology Act cannot be "quashed" merely because of the possibility of its "abuse".

Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta had said that the Government did not want to curtail the freedom of speech and expression at all which is enshrined in the Constitution, but the vast cyber world could not be allowed to remain unregulated.

However, the court had said that terms like 'illegal', 'grossly offensive' and 'menacing character' were vague expressions and these words were likely to be misunderstood and abused.

Some of the petitions seek setting aside of section 66A of the Information Technology Act which empowers police to arrest a person for allegedly posting offensive materials on social networking sites.

The first PIL on the issue was filed in 2012 by a law student Shreya Singhal, who sought amendment in Section 66A of the Act, after two girls -- Shaheen Dhada and Rinu Shrinivasan -- were arrested in Palghar in Thane district as one of them posted a comment against the shutdown in Mumbai following Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray's death and the other 'liked' it.

The apex court had on May 16, 2013, come out with an advisory that a person, accused of posting objectionable comments on social networking sites, cannot be arrested without police getting permission from senior officers like IG or DCP.

The direction had come in the wake of numerous complaints of harassment and arrests, sparking public outrage.

It had, however, refused to pass an interim order for a blanket ban on the arrest of such persons across the country.

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Freedom of Speech online: SC verdict on Section 66A Today

Supreme Court to pronounce verdict on validity of Section 66A of IT Act

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New Delhi: The Supreme Court is likely to pronounce its verdict on Tuesday on a batch of petitions challenging constitutional validity of certain sections of the cyber law including a provision under which a person can be arrested for allegedly posting "offensive" contents on websites.

A bench of justices J Chelameswar and RF Nariman had on February 26 reserved its judgement after government concluded its arguments contending that section 66A of the Information Technology Act cannot be "quashed" merely because of the possibility of its "abuse".

Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta had said that the government did not want to curtail the freedom of speech and expression at all which is enshrined in the Constitution, but the vast cyber world could not be allowed to remain unregulated.

The Additional Solicitor General had said that the government did not want to curtail the freedom of speech and expression which is enshrined in the Constitution.

However, the court had said that terms like 'illegal', 'grossly offensive' and 'menacing character' were vague expressions and these words were likely to be misunderstood and abused.

Some of the petitions seek setting aside of section 66A of the Information Technology Act which empowers police to arrest a person for allegedly posting offensive materials on social networking sites.

The first PIL on the issue was filed in 2012 by a law student Shreya Singhal, who sought amendment in Section 66A of the Act, after two girls -- Shaheen Dhada and Rinu Shrinivasan -- were arrested in Palghar in Thane district as one of them posted a comment against the shutdown in Mumbai following Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray's death and the other 'liked' it.

The apex court had on May 16, 2013, come out with an advisory that a person, accused of posting objectionable comments on social networking sites, cannot be arrested without police getting permission from senior officers like IG or DCP.

The direction had come in the wake of numerous complaints of harassment and arrests, sparking public outrage.

It had, however, refused to pass an interim order for a blanket ban on the arrest of such persons across the country.

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Supreme Court to pronounce verdict on validity of Section 66A of IT Act