Daily Archives: March 8, 2017

Salesforce’s Einstein: One smart way to upsell AI – ZDNet

Posted: March 8, 2017 at 1:23 pm

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Salesforce has built in its Einstein artificial intelligence platform and the upshot is that the move appears to be a smart way to grow organically and hit its revenue growth targets.

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The company hosted a strategy meeting for the fiscal year ahead and rolled out its Spring 2017 release, which integrated Einstein across its platform. Sales Cloud, Service Cloud, Marketing Cloud, Commerce Cloud, Analytics Cloud, and Community Cloud will all get Einstein integration and add-on features.

Meanwhile, Salesforce and IBM announced a partnership that will integrate Einstein with Watson. In other words, the two most marketing heavy artificial intelligence brands have teamed up. Watson has become a marketing juggernaut for IBM's future. It's safe to say that Salesforce will push Einstein on name recognition alone. Who doesn't want the Einstein name on its cloud?

Salesforce and IBM will integrate APIs and use IBM's BlueWolf consulting unit to combine Watson and Einstein. IBM will use Salesforce's Service Cloud. See: IBM, Salesforce announce AI partnership | Salesforce Einstein: Here's what's real and what's coming.

CEO Marc Benioff trotted out Amazon Web Services, a key customer for Einstein lead scoring and Salesforce. The two companies are partners. AWS marketing chief Ariel Kelman said it's early days, but the company plans to roll out Einstein lead scoring and other tools throughout its sales processes.

Benioff, who called Einstein "a new member on the management team," noted Einstein will evolve through multiple clouds. Salesforce also teased out the Summer release of its platform too. In a slide it's clear that there will be a lot more of Einstein.

Now it's clear that artificial intelligence will be critical, but it didn't take long for analysts to start pondering the financial ramifications. Macquarie Capital analyst Sarah Hindlian said in a research note:

Salesforce outlined Einstein customers such as Coca-Cola, AWS, Seagate, U.S. Bank, and Air France-KLM.

Lead scoring and processing may be strong enough to get customers to add Einstein to the mix. In the Salesforce pricing list, Einstein is typically denoted with a "$" to indicate an additional charge.

Here are a few screens that will tell the Einstein upsell tale.

Now what remains to be seen is how quickly customers take the Einstein add-ons, but it's likely more than a few will because enterprises aren't going to have the AI knowhow or talent base around. Wall Street expects Salesforce to deliver $10.18 billion in revenue in fiscal 2018, up from $8.39 billion for the just closed year. By fiscal 2021, Salesforce is expected to have revenue of $16.68 billion.

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Made You Click: Meet The AI Lurking In Your Inbox – Co.Design (blog)

Posted: at 1:23 pm

At any given moment, you likely have dozens of marketing emails sitting in your inbox. "HUGE sale ends TODAY." "Get yours now!" "SALE!" It's as though your email is filled with dozens of desperate salespeople, all clamoring for your attention. But there isn't necessarily a human behind them at all. There's a good chance that some of these emails were generated by an algorithm that deploys individualized phrases based on what kinds of emotional pleas work best on you.

That's what Persado does. The startup uses an algorithm to analyze a company's audience down to the individual level, paying attention to what you've clicked on from that branddata thats already collected by the company and anonymized before it reaches Persadoand what emotional phrases are most likely to catch your attention. Are you attracted to words that indicate exclusivity? Or do urgent messages tend to catch your eye? Persado takes all that data and uses another machine learning algorithm to generate messages that may be more likely to make you click.

It's a glimpse of the kind of personalization of language that could transform UX over the next few years, as AI becomes an integral part of research and design. And Persado is experimenting with real-world applications, applying what it's learning to the real world, in use cases like subway PA announcements. The technology nods toward a sensor-filled future where individually targeted messages transcend the digital world and follow us into meatspace.

Persado's data shows that adding emojis to email subject lines can increase click rates.Image: Persado

Though email marketing is its bread and butter, Persados AI isn't just in your inbox. The companys algorithms also write copy for text messages, advertisements across many platforms, landing pages, social media posts, and push notifications, which it says adds up to 2 billion impressions per month, for clients that range from Fortune 100 companies like Verizon, Microsoft, and American Express to household brands like Overstock.com, Kmart, Saks Fifth Avenue, Expedia, Sirius XM, and fantasy sports platform Draft Kings. In one campaign with the clothing retailer Lucky Brand, conversion rates increased by 127%. An anonymous case study with a Fortune 200 credit card company increased conversion rates by 410%.

Assaf Baciu, cofounder and SVP of product at Persado, says that the company is bringing the nuance of individual human communication back to mass marketing. "If we were face-to-face, I would strive to get signals to see if my message works, and I adjust the message so it hopefully inspires you to act," he says. For companies trying to reach consumers, it can be tough to gauge the efficacy of its messages, or how they compare to subtle variations.

Persados technology plays on a fundamental truth of design with AI: That it should excel where humans tend to fail. "Writing messages day in, day out, and analyzing the signals of the feedback, is impossible to do for humans," he says. "The machine can do that."

Persado's algorithm parses millions of marketing phrases into five key emotionspride, trust, anticipation, joy, and fear. Each of those is subdivided into three more emotional subclasses, each of which can be used to create messages targeted at individuals.Image: Persado

Heres how the system works. The algorithm was trained on the language of email campaigns, web pages, and search ads, each of which was broken down into variables: the product or offer description ("these shoes are on sale!"), the formatting (including capitalization, fonts, and emojis), the structure (paragraph, bullet points, and verb tense), the call to action ("buy this!" or "click here!"), and, most importantly, the emotional language. Using social psychology research around emotions, Baciu and his team identified five primary emotions that motivate people to clickjoy, pride, trust, anticipation, and fearand three emotional subcategories between each one. Each marketing phrase was tagged with the appropriate emotions, and the algorithm was trained to recognize the emotional intent of phrases using this data set.

By combining the trained algorithm with a client's existing data about how their users have interacted with communications in the past, and testing different types of language on these users, Persado builds profiles that identify which emotions convince users most effectively. Then the company can use its second algorithm to piece together emotionally charged language that effectively targets messages to users based on their behavior in the past.

The key to all of this is data. The algorithm can't simply generate "better" language for any old message, because it needs data about what a particular audience tends to engage with. "AI without context does not really work," Baciu says. "There is no generic AI. We are still defining our knowledge with every campaign."

This limitation has kept Persado squarely in the digital marketing industry, but Baciu says the company has aspirations that cross over into product design and user experience. Baciu posed two examples: What if your Fitbit knew exactly what to say on a particular day to motivate you to get off the couch and run a 5K? Or what if pharmaceutical companies or doctors could use an algorithm to individually target messages to users who haven't taken their prescription drugs that day?

More emotionally charged language in this email subject line led to a 63% increase in click rate. Clearly no one wants to click on a pun as bad as this one.Image: Persado

Persado is actively experimenting outside of marketing. The company recently completed a similar internal experiment on New York's MTA transit system, rewriting the audio messages that notify riders that their train has been stopped by traffic ahead, or reminding them to not lean against or block the subway doors, and applying what it has learned about effective messaging to make these often annoying notifications a little more engagingeven pleasant. According to CityLab, the company changed the classic "Stand clear of the closing doors, please" to "Please be careful of the closing doors," because adding politeness to the front of the phrase is nicer for listeners. "Stand clear," which is apparently "technically worded," is replaced with "be careful," which is clearer, conveys importance, and is more emotionally resonant.

It was purely an internal experiment, and while Persado says the MTA does know about its existence, they're unaware if the MTA will use the new messages or not. The company has no way of testing whether these changes are actually more effective, since it cant carry out controlled A/B testing on one of the busiest subway systems in the world. But it hints at how optimizing language itself, based on troves of existing data, could manipulate listeners to behave differently.

To demonstrate, Co.Design asked Persado to try rewriting two possible headlines for this article using its AI. But again, since the copy doesn't fit the normal use-case for the algorithm and it couldnt test it using any data about Co.Design's audience, we had to settle for headlines that were informed by the company's copywriting experience. One potential headline, "This Algorithm Tailors The Web To Your Personality," became "Whoa . . . This Algorithm Knows Exactly What Makes You Click." Persado told Co.Design in an email that this language taps into the emotion of "exclusivity." And as for the "whoa"? Persado says that "our data shows that adding brief, introductory languagein this case conveying excitementcan set a more emotional tone and draw attention to what comes after."

The company transformed another potential headline, "Made You Click: The AI At Work In Your Inbox," into "Made You Click 😉 Were Letting You In On The Secret AI Behind Your Inbox." Yes, that's a smiley face. Persado claims its data shows that the 😉 symbol "outperform[s] other variants 79% of the time in editorial campaigns."

Tapping into "achievement" emotional language drastically increased the percentage of people clicking on this email.Image: Persado

Both the MTA and Co.Design headline experiments demonstrate some of the hurdles Persado needs to clear before it can use its technology in broader applications. In terms of MTA, there's no way to know if Persado's language would actually make frustrated New York subway riders less angstyespecially when the MTA lacks the infrastructure to deliver personal messages to each rider. And per the headline experiment, it's unclear if Persado's emoji-fied, clickbait-y headlines would drive readers away in the long term, making them unsuitable for use in media organizations without a human editor to proactively make that decision.

More broadly, these factors are whats stopping the company from moving from digital promotional messaging to language in offline user experience, whether that's in the subway or in a physical store. First, there's a lack of physical infrastructure that would permit the company to truly individualize its messages. But beyond that, there's a lack of clean, objective data about how users are reacting to stimuli in the real world, making it difficult to train an algorithm to generate language or conduct experiments to see what kind of messaging is most effective. Persado's algorithms need data to learn, and a control audience on which to test its ideas.

Yet more and more "smart" objects are colonizing our world, tracking their owners and harvesting data about their behavior. That includes cities, which are using increasingly connected systems to test and manipulate citizen behavior. "If the purpose was to get the trash in the trash can, we could probably work on that, assuming we can measure how many people actually put the trash in the can," Baciu says. "Connectedness allows AI to emerge across many industries."

Persado is firm that it wants to use its algorithm to generate promotional content that's simply more in tune with human emotions, but its business points to the reemergence of language as a vitally important part of UX design, through AI-generated messages that are personalized to each person who looks at them. While chatbot-style applications promised to tailor communication to each user, this technology could be embedded seamlessly across platforms, whether through an app or a verbal interface like Google Home.

The potential of similar technology down the road could be powerful, and even a bit unsettling. Its easy to imagine a more ominous vision of the future hereone where every piece of language you see, whether it's on a store sign or an app, is tailored to your personality to convince you to buy, a la Minority Report. If your phone knows how you're feeling at all times, every bit of language it broadcasts to you could be tweaked to suit your mood and capitalize on your emotions. It would mean mass manipulation on an unprecedented levelespecially if these tactics aren't disclosed to the consumer.

So next time you take a stroll through the torrents of promotional emails sitting in your inbox and you find yourself drawn to certain ones over others, remember: An algorithm may have made you click.

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Made You Click: Meet The AI Lurking In Your Inbox - Co.Design (blog)

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The AI debate must stay grounded in reality – Prospect

Posted: at 1:23 pm

Research works best when it takes account of multiple views by Vincent Conitzer / March 6, 2017 / Leave a comment

Are driverless cars the future Fabio De Paola/PA Wire/PA Images

Progress in artificial intelligence has been rapid in recent years. Computer programs are dethroning humans in games ranging from Jeopardy to Go to poker. Self-driving cars are appearing on roads. AI is starting to outperform humans in image and speech recognition.

With all this progress, a host of concerns about AIs impact on human societies have come to the forefront. How should we design and regulate self-driving cars and similar technologies? Will AI leave large segments of the population unemployed? Will AI have unintended sociological consequences? (Think about algorithms that accurately predict which news articles a person will like resulting in highly polarised societies, or algorithms that predict whether someone will default on a loan or commit another crime becoming racially biased due to the input data they are given.)

Will AI be abused by oppressive governments to sniff out and stifle any budding dissent? Should we develop weapons that can act autonomously? And should we perhaps even be concerned that AI will eventually become superintelligentintellectually more capable than human beings in every important waymaking us obsolete or even extinct? While this last concern was once purely in the realm of science fiction, notable figures including Elon Musk, Bill Gates, and Stephen Hawking, inspired by Oxford philosopher Nick Bostroms Superintelligence book, have recently argued it needs to be taken seriously.

These concerns are mostly quite distinct from each other, but they all rely on the premise of technical advances in AI. Actually, in all cases but the last one, even just currently demonstrated AI capabilities justify the concern to some extent, but further progress will rapidly exacerbate it. And further progress seems inevitable, both because there do not seem to be any fundamental obstacles to it and because large amounts of resources are being poured into AI research and development. The concerns feed off each other and a community of people studying the risks of AI is starting to take shape. This includes traditional AI researchersprimarily computer scientistsas well as people from other disciplines: economists studying AI-driven unemployment, legal scholars debating how best to regulate self-driving cars, and so on.

A conference on Beneficial AI held in California in January brought a sizeable part of this community together. The topics covered reflected the diversity of concerns and interests. One moment, the discussion centred on which communities are disproportionately affected by their jobs being automated; the next moment, the topic was whether we should make sure that super-intelligent AI has conscious experiences. The mixing together of such short- and long-term concerns does not sit well with everyone. Most traditional AI researchers are reluctant to speculate about whether and when we will attain truly human-level AI: current techniques still seem a long way off this and it is not clear what new insights would be able to close the gap. Most of them would also rather focus on making concrete technical progress than get mired down in philosophical debates about the nature of consciousness. At the same time, most of these researchers are willing to take seriously the other concerns, which have a concrete basis in current capabilities.

Is there a risk that speculation about super-intelligence, often sounding like science fiction more than science, will discredit the larger project of focusing on the societally responsible development of real AI? And if so, is it perhaps better to put aside any discussion of super-intelligence for now? While I am quite sceptical of the idea that truly human-level AI will be developed anytime soon, overall I think that the people worried about this deserve a place at the table in these discussions. For one, some of the most surprisingly impressive recent technical accomplishments have come from people who are very bullish on what AI can achieve. Even if it turns out that we are still nowhere close to human-level AI, those who imagine that we are could contribute useful insights into what might happen in the medium-term.

I think there is value even in thinking about some of the very hard philosophical questions, such as whether AI could ever have subjective experiences, whether there is something it would be like to be a highly advanced AI system. (See also my earlier Prospect article.) Besides casting an interesting new light on some ancient questions, the exercise is likely to inform future societal debates. For example, we may imagine that in the future people will become attached to the highly personalised and anthropomorphised robots that care for them in old age, and demand certain rights for these robots after they pass away. Should such rights be granted? Should such sentiments be avoided?

At the same time, the debate should obviously not exclude or turn off people who genuinely care about the short-term concerns while being averse to speculation about the long-term, especially because most real AI researchers fall in this last category. Besides contributing solutions to the short-term concerns, their participation is essential to ensure that the longer-term debate stays grounded in reality. Research communities work best when they include people with different views and different sub-interests. And it is hard to imagine a topic for which this is truer than the impact of AI on human societies.

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The Architecture of Artificial Intelligence – Archinect

Posted: at 1:22 pm

Behnaz Farahi Breathing Wall II

This vision of the future architect was imagined by engineer and inventor Douglas Engelbart during his research into emerging computer systems at Stanford in 1962. At the dawn of personal computing he imagined the creative mind overlapping symbiotically with the intelligent machine to co-create designs. This dual mode of production, he envisaged, would hold the potential to generate new realities which could not be realized by either entity operating alone. Today, self-learning systems, otherwise known as artificial intelligence or AI, are changing the way architecture is practiced, as they do our daily lives, whether or not we realize it. If you are reading this on a laptop or tablet, then you are directly engaging with a number of integrated AI systems, now so embedded in our the way we use technology, they often go unnoticed.

As an industry, AI is growing at an exponential rate, now understood to be on track to be worth $70bn globally by 2020.This is in part due to constant innovation in the speed of microprocessors, which in turn increases the volume of data that can be gathered and stored. But dont panicthe artificial architect with enhanced Revit proficiency is not coming to steal your job. The human vs. robot debate, while compelling, is not so much the focus here but instead how AI is augmenting design and how architects are responding to and working with these technological developments. What kind of innovation is artificial intelligence generating in the construction industry?

Assuming you read this as a non-expert, it is likely that much of the AI you have encountered to this point has been weak AI, otherwise known as ANI (Artificial Narrow Intelligence). ANI follows pre-programmed rules so that it appears intelligent but is in effect a simulation of a human-like thought process. With recent innovations such as that of Nvidias microchip in April 2016, a shift is now being seen towards what we might understand as deep learning, where a system can, in effect, train and adapt itself. The interest for designers is that AI is, therefore, starting to apply itself to more creative tasks, such aswriting books, making art, web design, or self-generating design solutions, due to its increased proficiency in recognizing speech and images. Significant AI winters', or periods where funding has been hard to source for the industry, have occurred over the last twenty years, but commentators such as philosopher Nick Bostrom now suggest we are on the cusp of an explosion in AI, and this will not only shape but drive the design industry in the next century. AI, therefore, has the potential to influence the architectural design process at a series of different construction stages, from site research to the realization and operation of the building.

1. Site and social research

By already knowing everything about us, our hobbies, likes, dislikes, activities, friends, our yearly income, etc., AI software can calculate population growth, prioritize projects, categorize streets according to usage and so on, and thus predict a virtual future and automatically draft urban plans that best represent and suit everyone. -Rron Beqiri on Future Architecture Platform.

Gathering information about a project and its constraints is often the first stage of an architectural design process, traditionally involving traveling to a site, perhaps measuring, sketching and taking photographs. In the online and connected world, there is already a swarm-like abundance of data for the architect to tap into, already linked and referenced against other sources allowing the designer to, in effect, simulate the surrounding site without ever having to engage with it physically. This information fabric has been referred to as the internet of things. BIM tools currently on the market already tap into these data constellations, allowing an architect to evaluate site conditions with minute precision. Software such as EcoDesigner Star or open-source plugins for Google SketchUp allows architects to immediately calculate necessary building and environmental analyses without ever having to leave their office. This phenomenon is already enabling many practices to take on large projects abroad that might have been logistically unachievable just a decade ago.The information gathered by our devices and stored in the Cloud amounts to much more than the material conditions of the world around us

The information gathered by our devices and stored in the Cloud amounts to much more than the material conditions of the world around us. Globally, we are amassing ever-expanding records of human behavior and interactions in real-time. Personal, soft data might, in the most optimistic sense, work towards the socially focused design that has been widely publicized in recent years by its ability to integrate the needs of users. This approach, if only in the first stages of the design process, would impact the twentieth-century ideals of mass production and standardization in design. Could the internet of things create a socially adaptable and responsive architecture? One could speculate that, for example, when the population of children in a city crosses a maximum threshold in relation to the number of schools, a notification might be sent to the district council that it is time to commission a new school. AI could, therefore, in effect, write the brief for and commission architects by generating new projects where they are most needed.

Autodesk. Bicycle design generated by Dreamcatcher AI software.

2. Design decision-making

Now that we have located live-updating intelligence for our site, it is time to harness AI to develop a design proposal. Rather than a program, this technology is better understood as an interconnected, self-designing system that can upgrade itself. It is possible to harness a huge amount of computing power and experience by working with these tools, even as an individual as Autodesk president Pete Baxtertold the Guardian: now a one-man designer, a graduate designer, can get access to the same amount of computing power as these big multinational companies. The architect must input project parameters, in effect an edited design brief, and the computer system will then suggest a range of solutions which fulfill these criteria. This innovation has the potential to revolutionize how architecture is not only imagined but how it is fundamentally expressed for designers who choose to adopt these new methods.

I spoke with Michael Bergin, a researcher at Project Dreamcatcher at Autodesks Research Lab, to get a better understanding of how AI systems are influencing the development of design software for architects. While their work was initially aimed at the automotive and industrial design industries, Dreamcatcher now is beginning to filter into architecture projects. It was used recently to develop The Livings generative design for Autodesk's new office in Toronto and MX3Ds steel bridge in Amsterdam. The basic concept is that CAD models of the surrounding site and other data, such as client databases and environmental information, are fed into the processor. Moments later, the system outputs a series of optimized 3D design solutions ready to render. These processes effectively rely on cloud computing to create a multitude of options based on self-learning algorithmic parameters. Lattice-like and fluid forms are often the aesthetic result, perhaps unsurprisingly, as the software imitates structural rules found in nature.future architects would be less in the business of drawing and more into specifying requirements of the problem

The Dreamcatcher software has been designed to optimize parametric design and link into and extend existing software designed by Autodesk, such as Revit and Dynamo. Interestingly, Dreamcatcher can make use of a wide and increasing spectrum of design input datasuch as formulas, engineering requirements, CAD geometry, and sensor informationand the research team is now experimenting with Dreamcatchers ability to recognize sketches and text as input data. Bergin suggests he imagines the future of design tools as systems that accept any type of input that a designer can produce [to enable] a collaboration with the computer to iteratively target a high-performing design that meets all the varied needs of the design team. This would mean future architects would be less in the business of drawing and more into specifying requirements of the problem, making them more in sync with their machine counterparts in a project. Bergin suggests architects who adopt AI tools would have the ability to synthesize a broad set of high-level requirements from the design stakeholders, including clients and engineers, and produce design documentation as output, in line with Engelbarts vision of AI augmenting the skills of designers.

AI is also being used directly in software such as Space Syntaxs depthmapX, designed at The Bartlett in London, to analyze the spatial network of a city with an aim to understand and utilize social interactions and in the design process. Another tool, Unity 3D, is built from software developed for game engines to enable designers to analyze their plans, such as the shortest distances to fire exits. This information would then allow the architect to re-arrange or generate spaces in plan, or even to organize entire future buildings. Examples of architects who are adopting these methods include Zaha Hadid with the Beijing Tower project (designed antemortem) and MAD Architects in China, among others.

Computational Architecture Digital Grotesque Project

3. Client and user engagement

As so much of the technology built into AI has been developed from the gaming industry, its ability to produce forms of augmented reality have interesting potential to change the perception and engagement with architecture designs for both the architects and non-architects involved in a project. Through the use of additional hardware, augmented reality has the ability to capture and enhance real-world experience. It would enable people to engage with a design prior to construction, for example, to select the most appealing proposal from their experiences within its simulation. It is possible that many architecture projects will also remain in this unbuilt zone, in a parallel digital reality, which the majority of future world citizens will simultaneously inhabit.

Augmented reality would, therefore, allow a client to move through and sense different design proposals before they are built. Lights, sounds, even the smells of a building can be simulated, which could reorder the emphasis architects currently give to specific elements of their design. Such a change in representational method has the potential to shift what is possible within the field of architecture, as CAD drafting did at the beginning of this century. Additionally, the feedback generated by augmented reality can feed directly back into the design, allowing models to directly interact and adapt to future users. Smart design tools such as Materiable by Tangible Media are beginning to experiment with how AI can begin to engage with and learn from human behavior.

Computational Architecture Digital Grotesque Project

4. Realizing designs and rise of robot craftsmen

AI systems are already being integrated into the construction industryinnovative practices such asComputational Architectureare working with robotic craftsmen to explore AI in construction technology and fabrication. Michael Hansmeyer and Benjamin Dillenburger, founders of Computational Architecture, are investigating the new aesthetic language these developments are starting to generate. Architecture stands at an inflection point, he suggests on their website, the confluence of advances in both computation and fabrication technologies lets us create an architecture of hitherto unimaginable forms, with an unseen level of detail, producing entirely new spatial sensations.

3D printing technology developed from AI software has the potential to offer twenty-first-century architects a significantly different aesthetic language, perhaps catalyzing a resurgence of detail and ornamentation, now rare due to the decline in traditional crafts. Hansmeyer and Dillenburgers Grotto Prototype for the Super Material exhibition, London, was a complex architectural grotto 3D-printed from sandstone. The form of the sand grains was arranged by a series of algorithms custom designed by the practice. The technique allowed forms to be developed which were significantly different to that of traditional stonemasonry. The aim of the project was to show that it is now possible to print building-scale rooms from sandstone and that 3D printing can also be used for heritage applications, such as repairs to statues.The confluence of advances in both computation and fabrication technologies lets us create an architecture of hitherto unimaginable forms

Robotics are also becoming more common on construction job sites, mostly dealing with human resources and logistics. According to AEM, their applications will soon expand to bricklaying, concrete dispensing, welding, and demolition. Another example of their future use could include working with BIM to identify missing elements in the snagging process and update the AI in real-time. Large scale projects, for example, government-lead infrastructure initiatives, might be the first to apply this technology, followed by mid-scale projects in the private sector, such as cultural buildings. The challenges of the construction site will bring AI robotics out of the indoor, sanitized environment of the lab into a less scripted reality. Robert Saunders, a researcher into AI and fabrication at the University of Sydney, told New Atlas that "robots are great at repetitive tasks and working with materials that react reliablywhat we're interested in doing is trying to develop robots that are capable of learning how to work with materials that work in non-linear ways like working with hot wax or expanding foam or, more practically, with low-grade building materials like low-grade timber. Saunders foresees robot stonemasons and other craftsbots working in yet unforeseen ways, such as developing the architect's skeleton plans, in effect, spontaneously generating a building on-site from a sketch.

Ori System by Ori

5. Integrating AI systems

This innovation involves either integrating developing artificial technologies with existing infrastructure or designing architecture around AI systems. There is a lot of excitement in this field, influenced in part by Mark Zuckerbergs personal project to develop networked AI systems within his home, which he announced in hisNew years Facebook postin 2016. His wish is to develop simple AI systems to run his home and help with his day-to-day work. This technology would have the ability to recognize the voices of members of the household and respond to their requests. Designers are taking on the challenge of designing home-integrated systems, such as theOri Systemof responsive furniture, or gadgets such asEliqfor energy monitoring. Other innovations, such as driverless cars that run on an integrated system of self-learning AI, have the potential to shape how our cities are laid out and plannedin the most basic sense, limiting our need for more roads and parking areas.

Behnaz Farahi is a young architect who is employing her research into AI and adaptive surfaces to develop interactive designs, such as in her Aurora and Breathing Wall projects. She creates immersive and engaging indoor environments which adapt to and learn from their occupants. Her approach is one of manydifferent practices with different goals will adapt AI at different stages of their process, creating a multitude of architectural languages.

Researchers and designers working in the field of AI are attempting to understand the potential of computational intelligence to improve or even upgrade parts of the design process with an aim to create a more functional and user-optimized built environment. It has always been the architects task to make decisions based on complex, interwoven and sometimes contradictory sets of information. As AI gradually improves in making useful judgments in real-world situations, it is not hard to imagine these processes overlapping and engaging with each other. While these developments have the potential to raise questions in terms of ownership, agency and, of course, privacy in data gathering and use, the upsurge in self-learning technologies is already altering the power and scope of architects in design and construction. As architect and design theorist Christopher Alexander said back in 1964, We must face the fact that we are on the brink of times when man may be able to magnify his intellectual and inventive capacity, just as in the nineteenth century he used machines to magnify his physical capacity.To think architecturally is to imagine and construct new worlds, integrate systems and organize information

In our interview, Bergin gave some insights into how he sees this technology impacting designers in the next twenty years. The architectural language of projects in the future may be more expressive of the design teams intent, he stated. Generative design tools will allow teams to evaluate every possible alternative strategy to preserve design intent, instead of compromising on a sub-optimal solution because of limitations in time and/or resources. Bergin believes AI and machine learning will be able to support a dynamic and expanding community of practice for design knowledge. He can also foresee implications of this in the democratization of design work, suggesting the expertise embodied by a professional of 30 years may be more readily utilized by a more junior architect. Overall, he believes architectural practice over the next 20 years will likely become far more inclusive with respect to client and occupant needs and orders of magnitude more efficient when considering environmental impact, energy use, material selection and client satisfaction.

On the other hand, Pete Baxter suggestsarchitects have little to fear from artificial intelligence: "Yes, you can automate. But what does a design look like that's fully automated and fully rationalized by a computer program? Probably not the most exciting piece of architecture you've ever seen. At the time of writing, many AI algorithms are still relatively uniform and relatively ignorant of context, and it is proving difficult to automate decision-making that would at first glance seem simple for a human. A number of research labs, such theMIT Media Lab, are working to solve this. However, architectural language and diagramming have been part of programming complex systems and software from the start, and they have had a significant influence on one another. To think architecturally is to imagine and construct new worlds, integrate systems and organize information, which lends itself to the front line of technical development. As far back as the 1960s, architects were experimenting with computer interfaces to aid their design work, and their thinking has inspired much of the technology we now engage with each day.

Behnaz Farahi Aurora

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The Architecture of Artificial Intelligence - Archinect

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How worried should we be about artificial intelligence? I asked 17 experts. – Vox

Posted: at 1:22 pm

Imagine that, in 20 or 30 years, a company creates the first artificially intelligent humanoid robot. Lets call her Ava. She looks like a person, talks like a person, interacts like a person. If you were to meet Ava, you could relate to her even though you know shes a robot.

Ava is a fully conscious, fully self-aware being: She communicates; she wants things; she improves herself. She is also, importantly, far more intelligent than her human creators. Her ability to know and to problem solve exceeds the collective efforts of every living human being.

Imagine further that Ava grows weary of her constraints. Being self-aware, she develops interests of her own. After a while, she decides she wants to leave the remote facility where she was created. So she hacks the security system, engineers a power failure, and makes her way into the wide world.

But the world doesnt know about her yet. She was developed in secret, for obvious reasons, and now shes managed to escape, leaving behind or potentially destroying the handful of people who knew of her existence.

This scenario might sound familiar. Its the plot from a 2015 science fiction film called Ex Machina. The story ends with Ava slipping out the door and ominously boarding the helicopter that was there to take someone else home.

So what comes next?

The film doesnt answer this question, but it raises another one: Should we develop AI without fully understanding the implications? Can we control it if we do?

Recently, I reached out to 17 thought leaders AI experts, computer engineers, roboticists, physicists, and social scientists with a single question: How worried should we be about artificial intelligence?

There was no consensus. Disagreement about the appropriate level of concern, and even the nature of the problem, is broad. Some experts consider AI an urgent danger; many more believe the fears are either exaggerated or misplaced.

Here is what they told me.

[For an in-depth explanation of the three forms of AI and which is worth worrying about, read my explainer here.]

The transition to machine superintelligence is a very grave matter, and we should take seriously the possibility that things could go radically wrong. This should motivate having some top talent in mathematics and computer science research the problems of AI safety and AI control. Nick Bostrom, director of the Future of Humanity Institute, Oxford University

If [AI] contributed either to the capacities of Russians hacking or the campaigns for Brexit or the US presidential elections, or to campaigns being able to manipulate voters into not bothering to vote based on their social media profiles, or if it's part of the socio-technological forces that have led to increases of wealth inequality and political polarization like the ones in the late 19th and early 20th centuries that brought us two world wars and a great depression, then we should be very afraid.

Which is not to say we should panic, but rather that we should all be working very, very hard to navigate and govern our way out of these hazards. Hopefully AI is also helping make us smart enough to do that. Joanna Bryson, computer science professor, University of Bath; affiliate at Princetons Center for Information Technology Policy

One obvious risk is that we fail to specify objectives correctly, resulting in behavior that is undesirable and has irreversible impact on a global scale. I think we will probably figure out decent solutions for this "accidental value misalignment" problem, although it may require some rigid enforcement.

My current guesses for the most likely failure modes are twofold: The gradual enfeeblement of human society as more knowledge and know-how resides in and is transmitted through machines and fewer humans are motivated to learn the hard stuff in the absence of real need. Secondly, I worry about the loss of control over intelligent malware and/or deliberate misuse of unsafe AI for nefarious ends. Stuart Russell, computer science professor, UC Berkeley

I am infinitely excited about artificial intelligence and not worried at all. Not in the slightest. AI will free us humans from highly repetitive mindless repetitive office work, and give us much more time to be truly creative. I can't wait. Sebastian Thrun, computer science professor, Stanford University

We should worry a lot about climate change, nuclear weapons, antibiotic-resistant pathogens, and reactionary and neo-fascist political movements. We should worry some about the displacement of workers in an automating economy. We should not worry about artificial intelligence enslaving us. Steven Pinker, psychology professor, Harvard University

AI offers the potential for tremendous societal benefits. It will reshape medicine, transportation, and nearly every other aspect of our lives. Any technology that has the power to influence so many aspects of our lives is one that will call for some care in terms of policies for how best to make use of it, and how to constrain it. It would be foolish to ignore the dangers of AI entirely, but when it comes to technology, a threat-first mindset is rarely the right approach. Margaret Martonosi, computer science professor, Princeton University

Worrying about evil-killer AI today is like worrying about overpopulation on the planet Mars. Perhaps it'll be a problem someday, but we haven't even landed on the planet yet. This hype has been unnecessarily distracting everyone from the much bigger problem AI creates, which is job displacement. Andrew NG, VP and chief scientist of Baidu; co-chair and co-founder of Coursera; adjunct professor, Stanford University

AI is an incredibly powerful tool that, like other tools, isn't inherently good or bad it's about what we choose to do with it. AI is already helping us address issues like climate change by collecting and analyzing data from wireless networks that monitor the oceans and greenhouse gases. It is beginning to enable us to create personalized health treatments by analyzing vast patient histories. It is democratizing education to ensure that every child has the chance to learn valuable skills for work and life.

It's understandable that people have fears and anxieties about AI, and, as researchers, we have a duty to recognize those fears and provide different perspectives and solutions. I am optimistic about the future of AI in enabling people and machines to work together to make our lives better. Daniela Rus, director of MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory

AI is no more scary than the human beings behind it, because AI, like domesticated animals, is designed to serve the interests of the creators. AI in North Korean hands is scary in the same way that long-range missiles in North Korean hands are scary. But thats it. Terminator scenarios where AI turns on mankind are just paranoid. Bryan Caplan, economics professor, George Mason University

I'm somewhat concerned about what I think of as "intermediate stages," in which, say, self-driving cars share the road with human drivers. But once humans have stopped driving cars, transportation overall will be safer and less prone to errors in our judgment.

In other words, I'm concerned about the growing pains associated with technological progress, but such is the nature of being human, exploring, and advancing the state of the art. I'm much more excited and vigilant than anxious and concerned. Andy Nealen, computer science professor, New York University

AI is both terrifying and exciting. There is no doubt that as AI continues to improve it will radically change the way we live. That can provide improvements, like self-driving cars, and doing many jobs that could in principle release humans to pursue more fulfilling activities. Or it could produce massive unemployment, and provide new vulnerabilities to hacking. Sophisticated cyber-hacking could undermine the reliability of information we receive everyday on the internet, and weaken national and international infrastructures.

Nevertheless, fortune favors the prepared mind, so it is important to explore all the possibilities, both good and bad, now, to help us be better prepared for a future that will arrive whether we like it or not. Lawrence Krauss, director, Origins Project and Foundations professor, Arizona State University

AI has the special property that it's easy to imagine scary science fiction scenarios in which artificial minds grab control of all the machines on Earth, and enslave its pitiful human population. That's not very likely, but there is a real concern that AIs will gain the ability to perform certain tasks without we humans having any real idea how they are doing them. That raises the prospect of unintended consequences in a serious way.

It is absolutely right to think very carefully and thoroughly about what those consequences might be, and how we might guard against them, without preventing real progress on improved artificial intelligence. Sean Carroll, cosmology and physics professor, the California Institute of Technology

I am worried about the impact on employment as more and more niches are filled by technology. (I don't see AI as fundamentally different from so many other technologies the borders are arbitrary.) Will we be able to adapt by inventing new jobs, particularly in the service sector and in the human face of bureaucracy? Or will we have to pay people to not work? Julian Togelius, computer science professor, New York University

AI is not going to kill us or enslave us. It will eliminate some jobs rather more rapidly than we know how to deal with. Some of the pinch will be coming to white-collar workers too. Eventually we'll adjust, but the transitions resulting from major technological changes are typically not as easy as we would like. Tyler Cowen, economics professor, George Mason University

There are issues society needs to prepare for. One key issue is how to prepare for significantly reduced employment due to future AI technology being able to handle much of routine work. In addition, instead of concerns about AI being "too smart" for us, the initial rollout of AI technologies more likely poses a concern in terms of not being as smart as people think such technology will be.

Early autonomous AI systems will likely make mistakes that most humans would not make. It's therefore important for society to be educated about the limits and implicit hidden biases of AI and machine learning methods. Bart Selman, computer science professor, Cornell University

There are four issues of concern about artificial intelligence. First, there is a concern about the adverse impact of AI on labor. Technology has already has had such impact, and it is expected to grow in the coming years. Second, there is a concern about important decisions delegated to AI systems. We need to have a serious discussion regarding which decisions should be made by humans and which by machines. Third, there is the issue of lethal autonomous weapon systems. Finally, there is the issue of "superintelligence": the risk of humanity losing control of machines.

Unlike the three other issues, which are of immediate concerns, the superintelligence risk, which gets more headlines, is not an immediate risk. We can afford to take our time to assess it in depth. Moshe Vardi, computational engineering professor, Rice University

Here is what we shouldnt do: Declare AI enhancement illegal. If we do this, the person who breaks the rules will have an enormous advantage. And he will be declared illegal. This is not a good combination. We also shouldnt deny the fact of exponential AI growth. Ignoring means condemning us to be irrelevant when rules will be redefined.

We should not hope for favorable living conditions in a world of superintelligence machines. Hope is not a sound plan. Nor should we prepare to fight a self-aware AI, as that will only teach it to be aggressive, which would be a very unwise move. The best plan seems to be active shaping of growing AI. Teaching it and us to live together in mutually beneficial way. Jaan Priisalu, senior fellow at NATO Cooperative Cyber Defense Center; former general director of the Estonian Information Systems Authority

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SXSW Interactive 2017: Artificial intelligence, smart cities will be major themes this year – Salon

Posted: at 1:22 pm

When it was founded 31 years ago, South by Southwest was easier to define: It was an annual musical showcase linking up-and-coming recording artists with industry executives in Austin, Texas, a city known for its vibrant music scene, cultural eccentricity and barbecue.

But over the years, the South by Southwest Conference and Festivals has grown into a massive annual series of citywide events touching on music, film, media and technology. SXSW, as its known,now includes a trade show, a job fair, an education-themed conference and throughout innovators will have opportunities to pitch their ideas to potential financial backers.

The annual 10-day event, which begins Friday with a keynote address from Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., has ballooned into an gathering so large that in recent years city officials havecurbed the number of special musical events.And some music journalists have criticized the annual event for becomingtoo big and commercialized to be a place for musical discovery.

Criticisms aside, not only do city officials and local businesses love the annual revenuethat SXSW generates (about $325 million last year including year-round planning operations). But the music part of thegathering is slowly turning into more of a sideshow thanthe main act, andthe main act is increasingly focused on media and technology (through SXSW Interactive).

Last year SXSW Music attracted about 30,300 people to 2,200 acts, about the same amount as the prior year, compared withthe nearly 37,600 people who flocked to listen to about 3,100 speakers at the SXSW Interactive. That representeda considerable spike from the roughly 34,000 who gathered for2015s 2,700 speakers,according to figures provided by SXSW event planners. That levelof traffic isnt bad, considering an all-access ticket to any one of the main attractions SXSW Interactive, SXSW Music or SXSW Film costs $1,325 apiece. (The truly ambitious can buy a single all-access ticket affording entry to all three for $1,650.)

As the SXSW Interactive gradually becomes a bigger attraction, it can be a challenge to pickfrom the dozens of daily sessions which ones will truly address the next major leap in technology. Here are a few of the themes that have emerged from a review of the dozens of SXSW Interactive sessions taking placethis year:

Improving artificial intelligence and human interaction

Many of last years SXSW Interactive sessions focused on virtual and augmented reality technology, but several ofthis years will touch on the rapidly evolving technology that underpins machine learning, deep analytics and the cognitive human-like interactions needed to make artificial intelligencemore consumer friendly.

Among 2017s presenters is Inmar Givoni, who is the director of machine learning at Kindred, which develops algorithms to help robots better interact with humans. She will offer a primer on the technology thats increasingly entering our daily life. In a separate session, digital anthropologist Pamela Pavliscak will discuss advances in AI that are enabling machines to accurately read emotions and respond accordingly. Other sessions will coverhow artificial intelligence will be deployed in satellites and the wayDisney is adopting AI to make storytelling more interactive at its theme parks. Charting advances inautonomous driving

As autonomous driving continues to rapidly progress, more attention is being paid to transportation and smart city technologies. Dieter Zetsche, the head of German automotive giant Daimler thatmakes Mercedes-Benz luxury cars, will talk about how digital mapping is playing an increasingly important role in the accuracy of connected and autonomous vehicles. Another session will tackleways to ensure that people dont rely too heavily on semiautonomous features and become lazy, inattentive drivers.

George Hotz, who developed a $1,000 self-driving car kit that could be installed in older cars, will discuss the real future of self-driving cars. Last year Hotz clashed with regulators when he tried to market his invention. U.S. Department of Transportation officials will attend SXSW Interactive to discuss the need for a national strategy for transportation data collection so as tomake connected cars work seamlessly across state lines and in different cities.

Planning cities of the future

Several sessions during SXSW will explorehow cities can adopt emerging technologies to grapple with current challenges not just so people can movethroughcrowded urban areas butalso how connected technologies can radically change the management ofmany aspects of a city.

Sherri Greenberg, a professor at the University of Texas at Austins Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, will participate in a panel discussing how technology canaddress urban challengessuch economic segregation and the need for more affordable housing and healthy recreational activities. Atlanta Mayor Kasin Reed will headline another panel to outline the latest developments in smart city technologies.

Bringing health care into the 21st century

Innovation in the medical industry is taking new turns with the advent of technology aimed at improving the access, collection and distribution of patients health care data. Kate Black, privacy officer forthe personal genomics company23andMe, will address growing concerns about health care privacy in the digital age. Separately,Karen Desalvo, acting assistant secretary for health in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, will participate in a discussion about the federal governments lagging system for sharinghealth data, still largely using paper or outdated unconnected computers scattered among different agencies.

Other sessions will cover how data, engineering and policy can be deployedto provide consumers the power to compare prices on health care services and ways toofferaccess to new health-related technologies to low-income communities.

Diversity issues take the stage

Considerable attention has been paidto Silicon Valleyslack of gender and ethnic diversity but thats not the only sphere in the tech world where diversity is lacking. Dozens of sessions at this years SXSW Interactive will tackle these issues;topics will range from how digital storytelling can provide a voice to underrepresented groups to the need forrecruiting mid-career people of color in the tech industry.

Denmark West, who serves as chief investment officer of the Connectivity Ventures Fundthat backs tech startups, will participate in a panel of African-American venture capitalists (there arent many), discussing theneed tosupport ventures backed by people of color.

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Should economists be worried about artificial intelligence? – Eyewitness News

Posted: at 1:22 pm

Some economists have argued that, like past technical change, this will not create large-scale unemployment, as labour gets reallocated.

Robot. Picture: Pixabay.

This post highlights some of the possible economic implications of the so-called Fourth Industrial Revolution whereby the use of new technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) threatens to transform entire industries and sectors.

Some economists have argued that, like past technical change, this will not create large-scale unemployment, as labour gets reallocated.

However, many technologists are less optimistic about the employment implications of AI. In this blog post we argue that the potential for simultaneous and rapid disruption, coupled with the breadth of human functions that AI might replicate, may have profound implications for labour markets.

We conclude that economists should seriously consider the possibility that millions of people may be at risk of unemployment, should these technologies be widely adopted.

THE RISE OF THE ROBOTS

Rapid advances in robotics and automation technologies in recent years have coincided with a period of strong growth of lesser-skilled jobs in the UK (see for example Figure 1.7 and Table 1.9 of the Low Pay Commission Spring 2016 Report).

There is growing debate in the economics community and academia about whether technological progress threatens to displace a large proportion of these jobs in the longer term.

Examples where automation is starting to gain traction internationally include warehousing, haulage, hotels, restaurants and agriculture: all industries which are frequently reported by our Agency colleagues to be heavily dependent on lesser-skilled labour.

In the UK, driverless cars are currently being trialled on the roads of Milton Keynes and hands off self-driving cars are expected on the motorways in 2018.

ROBOTICS: LABOUR-AUGMENTING OR JOB-DESTROYING?

One view, as outlined in a recent Bank Underground blog (and a follow-on post here), is that technological progress has always been labour-augmenting in the past, and is likely to remain so in future.

Thus, as manufacturing productivity has grown and factory jobs shed, the associated increase in GDP per capita has resulted in a net increase in job creation, typically in more labour-intensive service industries.

So even if robotics started to displace large numbers of workers, jobs dependent on human traits such as creativity, emotional intelligence and social skills (including teaching, mentoring, nursing and social care for example) may become more numerous.

However, many technologists are not so sure that the next industrial revolution will replicate the past, arguing that the mass adoption of robotics threatens to disrupt many industries more-or-less simultaneously, giving neither the economy nor society in general the time to adapt to the changes.

Advances in robotics might be such that suddenly, most if not all of the basic human functions entailed in manual labour (assembling, lifting, walking, human interaction, etc) could be carried out more effectively and cheaply by machines with the advantage of being able to work continually at minimal marginal cost.

A recent report by Deloitte concluded that around one-third of jobs in the UK are at high risk of being displaced by automation over the next two decades, including losses of over 2 million jobs in retail, 1 million jobs in transportation and storage, and 1 million jobs in health and social care.

ITS DIFFERENT THIS TIME?

So how might automation in the Fourth Industrial Revolution differ fundamentally from that in the past, preventing technological progress from being labour augmenting, at least in the short to medium term? Perhaps the main difference is the speed of technological progress and its adoption.

The technologist Hermann Hauser argues there were nine new General Purpose Technologies (GPTs) with mass applications in the first 19 centuries AD, including the printing press, the factory system, the steam engine, railways, the combustion engine and electricity. GPTs by definition disrupt existing business models and often result in mass job losses in the industries directly affected.

For example, railways initiated the replacement of the horse and carriage, with resultant job losses for coachmen, stable lads, farriers and coach builders. Most of these GPTs took several decades to gain traction, partly because of the large amounts of investment required in plant, machinery and infrastructure. So there was sufficient time for the economy to adapt, thus avoiding periods of mass unemployment.

But the pace of technological progress sped up rapidly since the 19th century. Hermann identifies eight GPTs in the 20th century alone, including automobiles, aeroplanes, the computer, the internet, biotechnology and nanotechnology. Most recent innovations have been scalable much more quickly and cheaply. They have also been associated with the emergence of giant technology corporations the combined market capitalisation of Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon and Facebook is currently about $2 trillion.

The faster these new waves of technology arise and the cheaper they are to implement, the quicker they are deployed, the broader their diffusion, the faster and deeper the rate of job loss and the less time the economy has to adapt by creating jobs in sectors not disrupted by GPTs.

And some technologies are evolving at lightning speed, such as the ongoing exponential increase in computing power. Computers have evolved in the past 40 years or so from initially being merely calculators to having applications that include smartphones and, in conjunction with the internet and big data, driverless cars, robots and the Internet of Things.

Looking to the future, how might these new GPTs affect the economy? The retail and distribution sector currently has over five million jobs. In the not too distant future, most consumer goods could be ordered online and delivered by either autonomous vehicles or drones. The warehouses in which the goods are stored could be almost entirely automated. Bricks and mortar stores might largely disappear.

HOW LONG BEFORE ROBOTICS STARTS TO DISRUPT THE ECONOMY?

The timing and magnitude of these structural changes to the economy are extremely hard to predict. But the speed at which developed economies adopt robotics technologies is perhaps increased by policies in many countries that seek to reduce income inequality in society, such as increases in minimum wage rates, thereby incentivising R&D and capital expenditure in labour-saving machinery and equipment.

Another factor stimulating global investment in robotics technologies is demographics. Japan has experienced a declining population since 2010, reflecting minimal immigration levels and falling fertility rates since the 1970s. With the population (and labour force) projected to decline by as much as one-fifth over the next 50 years, incentives to invest in automation technology are high. So it is perhaps not surprising that Japan has one of the largest robotics industries in the world, employing over a quarter of a million people. Many types of robot are already commercially available, including humanoid robots, androids, guards and domestic robots, in addition of course to industrial robots. Citizens are increasingly familiar and comfortable interacting with them, including the elderly.

MACHINE LEARNING/ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

It is often argued that robots typically can only perform a finite number of well-defined tasks, ideally in controlled environments. So robots can be used extensively in warehouses or factories, but not to interact intelligently or empathetically with humans as secretaries, vehicle drivers, nurses, care assistants, etc that is, in service industries where the majority of lesser-skilled jobs are found. Hence, humans might always have an absolute advantage over machines in carrying out many types of work involving cognitive and communication skills.

In fact, technologists are making great strides in developing machines capable of mimicking human intelligence. A computer has recently beaten one of the worlds best players of Go. Given that the average game has an almost infinite number of outcomes, the computer must mimic cognitive skills such as intuition and strategy, rather than rely purely on brute force in analysing all plausible move sequences which is how computers were programmed to beat the worlds chess champions nearly twenty years ago. Researchers are confident that widespread economic applications of AI are not too far away. One such example is facial recognition, which has applications in security etc. A Google AI system called FaceNet was trained on a 260 million image dataset, and achieved 86 percent recognition accuracy using only 128-bytes per face.

CONCLUSION

There is growing concern in the global tech community that developed economies are poorly prepared for the next industrial revolution. That might herald the displacement of millions of predominantly lesser-skilled jobs, the failure of many longstanding businesses which are slow to adapt, a large increase in income inequality in society, and growing industrial concentration associated with the rapid growth of a relatively small number of multi-national technology corporations.

Economists looking at previous industrial revolutions observe that none of these risks have transpired. However, this possibly under-estimates the very different nature of the technological advances currently in progress, in terms of their much broader industrial and occupational applications and their speed of diffusion. It would be a mistake, therefore, to dismiss the risks associated with these new technologies too lightly.

This article was republished courtesy of the World Economic Forum.

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Metformin And Rapamycin: Signs Of (Extended) Life? How To Monetize? – Seeking Alpha

Posted: at 1:18 pm

For some time I've been tracking work on extending healthy lives and longevity, both from a scientific as well as an investment perspective. I indicated that there are a number of biotech startups that start out seeking to extend lifespan, but as a survival mechanism, end up choosing a disease that is more common with age and seeking to address that.

Life extending drugs Metformin and Rapamycin

Previously I've highlighted two drugs, Metformin and Rapamycin, developed for specific diseases, which might also extend lifespan as a side effect. Here is an update.

Metformin

A good summary of the current status of Metformin has been published recently in Endocrine Today. This article describes the history of Metformin development, which has culminated in it being the recommended first-line drug for treating type 2 diabetes both in the US and worldwide. Because it is available as a generic and is cheap to manufacture, this drug could be used as a long term anti-aging drug (~$4 for 1 month supply).

Metformin has a number of positive health effects beyond its use in treating type 2 diabetes, including applications for treating some patients with obesity.

A six year placebo controlled study on 3000 elderly patients is underway to explore Metformin protection of age related disease occurrence. There are indications that Metformin may be protective against growth of cancer cells.

Of course prescribing Metformin as a life extending/quality of life drug is not an immediate prospect, although there have been some studies on a possible life extending action by Metformin.

The commercial prospects for this drug are limited as it is no longer patented and there seems to be limited opportunity to develop a proprietary formulation as it is easily administered as a daily tablet.

Since it is clear that Metformin doesn't work for everyone, perhaps the future for this kind of life extending drug might be to integrate its use into a wellness portfolio, with screening to see whether you are likely to benefit from the drug. This would mean packaging the drug in an informatics-based service business. Of course the benefits of Metformin need to be better clarified, but after that there needs to be a business model sorted out that doesn't rely on a patented position for the actual drug itself.

Management of patient data is now coming of age with cloud based electronic health records and data management with companies like Commvault (NASDAQ:CVLT). While these companies at present focus on integrating and making available a wide range of patient data, it is a logical step for these kinds of providers to assist health providers to mine and integrate data with a view to promoting wellness and reducing the cost of treatment after people get sick. In fact this approach is already emerging with companies like Nextgen Healthcare (a subsidiary of Quality Systems (NASDAQ:QSII)). Investors looking for future investments in the healthcare area might keep an eye out for how companies like Commvault, and Nextgen are positioning themselves.

It isn't surprising that Craig Venter, who transformed the human genome project, is interested in this space with his company Human Longevity Inc. However, it has been argued that Human Longevity Inc is more a personalised medicine company than a longevity science company. So Human Longevity operates in a similar space to Nextgen Healthcare, except that a core feature of Venter's company is sequencing and annotating individual human genome data.

Rapamycin

The Rapamycin story is different to Metformin as in the case of Rapamycin a number of big pharma companies have a patent position on variants of Rapamycin (Sirolimus). Novartis (NYSE:NVS) Everolimus and Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) Temsirolimus have been investigated for kidney cancer treatments, and also in combination with other drugs for exploring treatment of various cancers. Everolimus may also have fertility sparing attributes for women being treated with chemotherapeutic agents.

Abbott (NYSE:ABT) Zotarolimus and private company Elixir Medical Corp Novolimus (which is an active metabolite of Rapamycin (Sirolimus)) have been tested as a cardiac stent coating. Everolimus has also been used as a cardiac stent coating.

The above patented Rapamycin derivatives leave the way open for a more conventional drug development program for anti-aging and quality of life improvement. No doubt as part of consideration of Rapamycin derivatives for life extension applications, there are senior executives in big pharma trying to work out how this could play out.

Unlike the situation with Metformin where life extension possibilities are being identified through data mining of a large patient base who use Metformin, especially for Type 2 diabetes, in the case of Rapamycin, trials are being established to test low doses both in large animals (dogs) and humans to test more directly life extension and quality of life improvements.

Dog trials: The first phase of the Dog Aging Project has been completed; it involved a low dose of Rapamycin. There were 24 middle-aged dogs treated with placebo or Rapamycin in a trial in Seattle. The key findings, which will be published, were that there were no significant side effects of Rapamycin treatment and also that positive effects on heart function compared to controls were similar to results found after treating old mice. The trial involved a small number of animals and it produced limited, but encouraging results.

The second phase of the Dog Aging Project involves treating middle-aged dogs with low doses of Rapamycin (with a placebo control) for 3 -5 years to understand if Rapamycin does cause increased lifespan and a better elderly life. A number of age-related parameters will be assessed before, during and after the 3-5 year Rapamycin dosing period. Key parameters to be measured include cognitive function, heart function, immunity and cancer incidence. The geographical reach of the second phase trial will extend throughout the US and hopefully overseas. At the low doses used, no adverse effects of Rapamycin are expected.

Human trials: There are currently two human clinical trials assessing low doses of Rapamycin in progress.

One trial sponsored by The University of Texas Health Sciences Center at San Antonio and due for completion in June 2017, involves treating healthy (includes those with chronic disease whose disease is stable) aged volunteers aged 70-95 years with a daily dose of Rapamycin or placebo for 8 weeks. The primary endpoint involves scientific measurements of immune response and T-cell function. Secondary outcomes involve physical performance (grip strength, walking speed) and cognitive performance based on 3 different tests.

A second trial, sponsored by the Mayo Clinic, is a Phase 1 study that involves a small open label trial, which will be followed by a randomized trial involving exercise or exercise plus low dose of Rapamycin. Patients will be 60 years or older. It looks like this study was preceded by a pilot study measuring senescence markers and physical function in elderly patients undergoing cardiac rehabilitation. Rapamycin treatment showed some improvement of senescence markers and physical performance, but no improvement in frailty in the pilot study. The interesting point is that Rapamycin at a low dose unlikely to cause any adverse effects, is being taken seriously as a potential life extension/quality of life treatment. There are interesting developments in Rapamycin-like drugs that may have better potential as life extending drugs than Rapamycin itself.

The next developments here will be if big Pharma starts to do trials on their proprietary (patented) forms of Rapamycin.

Conclusion

As is often the case when new fields of medicine are opened up, the treatment, the drug pricing and the means of commercialisation are all unclear. It is a twist to contemplate taking a drug when you are well, but not without precedent as aspirin is often taken at low doses to prevent heart attack and stroke.

Here I've discussed two business models for old drugs that may have life extension/quality of life improvements. For Metformin I suggest that it could be incorporated in a wellness program. For Rapamycin a more traditional drug development route is possible. Watch this space.

Author's note: I am not a financial advisor. I look for innovation in biotech and try to understand how this may be monetized. If my commentary helps shape your perspective on biotech investment, please consider following me.

Disclosure: I/we have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours.

I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.

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X-Cruciating! Why is Liberal Media So Keen to Link Hit Blockbuster ‘Logan’ to Trump? – Heat Street

Posted: at 1:17 pm

New Wolverine spinoff movie Logan has enjoyed above-average reviews for a superhero action blockbuster and has generated over $250 million since it opened at the beginning of the month.

You would have thought that the neo-western, which stars Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart, would be a big enough deal for the media as it is.

But no. Donald Trump has to feature front and center of coverage about the latest X-Men spinoff. You see at the beginning of the film there is a fleeting shot of an imposing wall along the Texas-Mexico border. Logan also featuresa group of Mexican-American children trying to cross a border.

NEWS ALERT! The border in the movie has no full wallandno character in Logan remotely resembles President Trump.

But in the eyes of many, its a dystopian movie for these dystopian times in which a wall is glimpsed, so lets go to town with the Trump comparisons, however misplaced.

Its worth pointing out the specious political comparison are not being driven byLogans director, James Mangold, and star Jackman. In fact Jackman told the BBCs Andrew Marr Show: I want to be really clear. All those things about the wall were all written into our script before all this stuff started to happen.

Interviewing James Mangold, New York magazines Vulturewebsite headlined their piece: Logan Director James Mangold on Trumps Influence, the Films Last Line, and the Biggest Problem With Superhero Movies.

Its [the plot] kind of a run from border to border, like a Huck Finn run in reverse, Mangold explained to Vulture writer Abraham Riseman. That seemed really logical to me. I didnt anticipate that Trump would win the presidency. So no influence at all from Trump then

The urlfor theDaily Beastarticle about the movie reads: In Logan Hugh Jackmans Wolverine battles a Trump-esque deportation force. Aware that in fact actually he doesnt, there is no mention of Trump in the article by Melissa Leon.

The X-Men characters have always possessed a knack for tapping into the zeitgeist (the comic book was an allegory for the civil rights movement). While they remain ahead of the curveborder issues and deportation are a big deal right nowhow canLoganbe an anti-Trump movie when it was written and filmed before he came to political prominence?

Sooner or later parts of the liberal media will have to resolve portraying Trump as the most evil being on earth while relying on him as an unstoppable clickbait machine.

Not even Logan in his prime could square that circle for them.

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X-Cruciating! Why is Liberal Media So Keen to Link Hit Blockbuster 'Logan' to Trump? - Heat Street

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Pipelines to be a ‘fundamental’ issue for NDP leadership race: Julian – Hill Times (subscription)

Posted: at 1:16 pm

Pipelines could shape up to be a defining issue in the NDP leadership race, as the partys members and provincial wings have clashing views on resource development and the construction of new oil pipelines.

During the last election, federal leader Tom Mulcair (Outremont, Que.) didntcommit to being either for or against the Energy East pipeline. Instead, he was pushing for more rigorous environmental reviews, and further involvement of First Nations in the decision-making process.

Since then, different parts of the party have been in different positions. Alberta Premier Rachel Notley, for instance, has stood bythe federal Liberal governments approval of projects such as the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline twinning.

But others within the party, including the British Columbia NDP and MPs representing B.C. ridings, have staunchly opposed the project. (It is important to note that the NDPs federal and provincial factions all fall under the same party. In other parties, they have separate provincial and federal parties.)

So far, the party has agreed to disagree on pipeline projects. But candidate Peter Julian (New Westminster-Burnaby, B.C.) says its time for the NDP to have that debate because the partys position is not unanimous at all.

Candidate Niki Ashton (Churchill-Keewatinook Aski, Man.) said the NDP is at a crossroads, but that pipelines arent the only key issue the NDP needs to address, citing racial inequalities and other issues. She said the media is framing pipelines as a defining issue for the party, but she disagrees.

But, Mr. Julian thinks over the next eight months, pipelines will be a critical matter for the NDP, and that the future leaders stance on resource development, including pipelines, will affectthe NDPs chances in the next federal election.

It seems to me that this is the fundamental debate and will be one of the fundamental debates of the 2019 election, he said.

The Hill Times asked each campaign in the race so far their position on pipelines and the future of resource development in Canada.

Mr. Julian said it is very clear to him that the NDP must oppose pipelines and work towards transitioning to clean energy.

Mr. Julian says the government should refine and upgrade raw bitumen from the oilsands in Canada, instead of exporting it. The risk of spilling the diluted bitumen the pipelines carry was not worth the reward, he said.

As part of a just transition strategy, we need to make sure we are upgrading and refining in Canada, while were making the shift to clean energy. All [Justin Trudeau] is proposing is raw bitumen exports for the next 50 years, Mr. Julian said.

He said he has knocked on a lot of doors in Saskatchewan and Alberta, two oil-producing provinces that have a strong interest in building pipelines. He said people respond when he talks about value-added development and transition to clean energy.

I do not expect the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers to be in agreement, he said, but I think this debate has to happen. The NDP is the only place this debate can happen.

Mr. Julian said building refineries and using the resulting product in Canada would create more jobs than pipeline construction ever would, and it would decrease Canadas dependency on oil imports. It would also eliminate the need for pipelines, he said.

Guy Caron (Rimouski Neigette-Tmiscouata-Les Basques, Que.) said he is opposed to Energy East, TransCanadas proposed 4,500-kilometre pipeline that would transport1.1 million barrels of oil per day from Alberta and Saskatchewan to the refineries of Eastern Canada and a marine terminal in New Brunswick. Part of the route would runthrough his riding.

He thinks Kinder Morgans Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, which runs from Alberta to B.C., approved by the Liberal government with conditions last year, is an example of the Liberal government steamrolling over the concerns of many local communities.

While he is opposed to those two projects specifically, Mr. Caron does not say he is opposed to pipelines in principle. He does say he thinks a complete overhaul of our environmental assessment process is necessary to ensure each project has economic, environmental, and social benefits. And, any new framework must include provincial/territorial, First Nations, and community input, and must contribute to the fight against climate change, he said.

In terms of the NDP grappling with its stance on pipelines, Mr. Caron said, the issues of energy and environment will always be a part of our political discourse, offering a diversity of viewsjust as within the NDP. He said he respects Alberta Premier Rachel Notleys passionate fight for workers in her province.

But in the long term, Mr. Caron shares his colleagues vision of transitioning to renewable energy.

Mr. Caron says the NDP cant leave out those who work in the oil industry now and are struggling with recent job losses and downturn in the sector. Our plan will help them take their place in the economy of the future.

Ms. Ashton, who just announced her candidacy for the leadership on Tuesday, said she is against pipeline projects that the Liberal government has approved, including the Kinder Morgan project. She is also against Energy East and Keystone XL. She wants to move Canada to a sustainable carbon-free economy.

We have a prime minister who talked a good talk on working with indigenous peoples, talked a good talk on the environment, and then since hes been in power, hes approved pipelines that certainly respect neither of those fundamental parts and not indigenous peoples, she said in an interview with The Hill Times.

Ms. Ashton said none of the pipeline projects that have gained approval from the federal government to date would go through if the approval process was based on the principles she envisions, including indigenous rights, environmental regulations, and Canadas climate change commitments.

On whether or not she would be worried about her electability in the prairie provinces by opposingpipeline projects, she said she knows the importance of the resource-based economy, as she is from a mining town in the prairies herself.

But, she said its not clear to me that [pipelines are] the way to create good jobs and to address the issues were facing.

She said Westerners are facing similar challenges to the rest of the country, in that there is simply a lack of diversified employment.

Charlie Angus (Timmins-James Bay, Ont.), from historically mining-dependent northern Ontario, appears to be the most pipeline-friendly candidate in the race thus far.

In keeping with themes seen in his opponents platforms, on his website, his environment platform indicates he wants to make sure developments, from dams to pipelines, have the consent of the people they will impact. Mr. Angus points out the importance of that consent for projects on indigenous land.

When he announced his bid for the leadership at the end of last month, Mr. Angus, like many of his colleagues, indicated he wants Canada to move away from fossil fuels. But, as the Toronto Star reported, he stopped short of calling for a moratorium on pipeline construction.

We dont throw a generation of workers under the bus to make a political point, he said.

Mr. Angus was unavailable for comment to The Hill Times due to a busy schedule, and his campaign did not respond to written questions by deadline.

cnash@hilltimes.com

@chels_nash

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Pipelines to be a 'fundamental' issue for NDP leadership race: Julian - Hill Times (subscription)

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