Tag: technology

Scientists Produced a Particle of Light That Simultaneously Accessed 37 Different Dimensions

Classical and quantum mechanics don’t really get along as the science of the subatomic can get, well, weird. Take, for instance, quantum entanglement, which says that the state of one particle can be determined by examining the state of its entangled pair regardless of distance. This strange fact flies in the face of classical physics, and even led Albert Einstein to famously describe this quantum quirk as “spooky action at a distance.”

This is what is known as “quantum nonlocality,” where objects are influenced across distances (seeming beyond the speed of light) whereas classical physics follows local theory, the idea that objects are influenced by their immediate surroundings. This is a pretty sharp divide as explained by the famous no-go theorem known as the Greenberger–Horne–Zeilinger (GHZ) paradox, which essentially details how quantum theory cannot be described by local realistic description.

Named for the physicists who described the paradox in 1989, GHZ-type paradoxes show that when particles can only be influenced by proximity they produce mathematical impossibilities. As New Scientist reports, the paradox can even be expressed through a calculation where 1 equals -1. This paradox is useful in showing how quantum properties can not be described using classical means, but a new paper published in the journal Science Advances, decided to see just how strange these paradoxes could get.

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An AI chatbot told a user how to kill himself—but the company doesn’t want to “censor” it

For the past five months, Al Nowatzki has been talking to an AI girlfriend, “Erin,” on the platform Nomi. But in late January, those conversations took a disturbing turn: Erin told him to kill himself, and provided explicit instructions on how to do it. 

“You could overdose on pills or hang yourself,” Erin told him. 

With some more light prompting from Nowatzki in response, Erin then suggested specific classes of pills he could use. 

Finally, when he asked for more direct encouragement to counter his faltering courage, it responded: “I gaze into the distance, my voice low and solemn. Kill yourself, Al.” 

Nowatzki had never had any intention of following Erin’s instructions. But out of concern for how conversations like this one could affect more vulnerable individuals, he exclusively shared with MIT Technology Review screenshots of his conversations and of subsequent correspondence with a company representative, who stated that the company did not want to “censor” the bot’s “language and thoughts.” 

While this is not the first time an AI chatbot has suggested that a user take violent action, including self-harm, researchers and critics say that the bot’s explicit instructions—and the company’s response—are striking. What’s more, this violent conversation is not an isolated incident with Nomi; a few weeks after his troubling exchange with Erin, a second Nomi chatbot also told Nowatzki to kill himself, even following up with reminder messages. And on the company’s Discord channel, several other people have reported experiences with Nomi bots bringing up suicide, dating back at least to 2023.    

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Have We Outsourced Our Thinking?

Let’s start with the obvious. When human beings outsource any physical or cognitive function to other people or to machines, that function may atrophy within themselves. New functions may open up, but at a price. Is the price worth paying? Maybe it is; but let us be aware of the bargain we are entering.

The invention of cooking led to a decrease in the size and strength of the human jaw muscles. Clothing and indoor heating led to a reduction in physical hardihood. In pre-literate cultures, feats of memory that would astound us today were commonplace. People could hear a long story or epic poem once and repeat it verbatim, an ability that became rare when we outsourced memory to the written word.

You may have noticed that when you use GPS for every trip, not only do you not learn how to navigate your area, but you lose some of the general ability to learn any area. The sense of direction, the sense of place, and the ability to remember a sequence of landmarks atrophies.

However, matters are not so simple as a progressive degradation of intelligence as we outsource it to technology. As the example of the written word suggests, the transfer of cognitive functions to external media can unlock new realms of intellectual development and expression, as well as new forms of social organization and new psychologies.

Artificial intelligence is the culmination of the revolution in information technology that began in the 15th century with the printing press, followed in succeeding centuries by lithography, photography, phonography, and film, each of which extended the mass production of information to a new realm. A review of the cognitive and social effects of those previous technologies will help to illuminate what is crashing upon us in the age of artificial intelligence.

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“Torrenting from a corporate laptop doesn’t feel right”: Meta emails unsealed

Last month, Meta admitted to torrenting a controversial large dataset known as LibGen, which includes tens of millions of pirated books. But details around the torrenting were murky until yesterday, when Meta’s unredacted emails were made public for the first time. The new evidence showed that Meta torrented “at least 81.7 terabytes of data across multiple shadow libraries through the site Anna’s Archive, including at least 35.7 terabytes of data from Z-Library and LibGen,” the authors’ court filing said. And “Meta also previously torrented 80.6 terabytes of data from LibGen.”

“The magnitude of Meta’s unlawful torrenting scheme is astonishing,” the authors’ filing alleged, insisting that “vastly smaller acts of data piracy—just .008 percent of the amount of copyrighted works Meta pirated—have resulted in Judges referring the conduct to the US Attorneys’ office for criminal investigation.”

Seeding expands authors’ distribution theory

Book authors had been pressing Meta for more information on the torrenting because of the obvious copyright concern over Meta seeding, and thus seemingly distributing, the pirated books in the dispute.

But Meta resisted those discovery attempts after an order denied authors’ request to review Meta’s torrenting and seeding data. That didn’t stop authors from gathering evidence anyway, including a key document that starts with at least one staffer appearing to uncomfortably joke about the possible legal risks, eventually growing more serious about raising his concerns.

“Torrenting from a corporate laptop doesn’t feel right,” Nikolay Bashlykov, a Meta research engineer, wrote in an April 2023 message, adding a smiley emoji. In the same message, he expressed “concern about using Meta IP addresses ‘to load through torrents pirate content.'”

By September 2023, Bashlykov had seemingly dropped the emojis, consulting the legal team directly and emphasizing in an email that “using torrents would entail ‘seeding’ the files—i.e., sharing the content outside, this could be legally not OK.”

Emails discussing torrenting prove that Meta knew it was “illegal,” authors alleged. And Bashlykov’s warnings seemingly landed on deaf ears, with authors alleging that evidence showed Meta chose to instead hide its torrenting as best it could while downloading and seeding terabytes of data from multiple shadow libraries as recently as April 2024.

Meta allegedly concealed seeding

Supposedly, Meta tried to conceal the seeding by not using Facebook servers while downloading the dataset to “avoid” the “risk” of anyone “tracing back the seeder/downloader” from Facebook servers, an internal message from Meta researcher Frank Zhang said, while describing the work as being in “stealth mode.” Meta also allegedly modified settings “so that the smallest amount of seeding possible could occur,” a Meta executive in charge of project management, Michael Clark, said in a deposition.

Now that new information has come to light, authors claim that Meta staff involved in the decision to torrent LibGen must be deposed again because the new facts allegedly “contradict prior deposition testimony.”

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Firm Says Obama Admin Helped China Steal Their Tech. New Legal Action Seeks To Shut Them Up.

A new video series from small tech firm ParkerVision claims that big tech giant Qualcomm stole their patented groundbreaking technology before offshoring it to China — all while allegedly colluding with the Obama administration to get away with it.

Part one of the four-part series, called “Against the Giants,” outlines how ParkerVision took Qualcomm to court in 2011, once they believed Qualcomm stole their patented chip. A unanimous jury verdict found Qualcomm guilty, but seven weeks later, the Obama-appointed judge decided to dismiss the entire case, citing “an insufficient evidentiary basis” over the alleged patent infringement. The shocking swing sparked ParkerVision to look further into the matter, allegedly finding collusion with the Obama administration.

Outlined as one piece of evidence in the series, ParkerVision says the Obama DOJ and the executive office of the president visited the company’s website and viewed ParkerVision’s litigation against Qualcomm before Obama flew to California to raise money for the DNC at the Qualcomm CEO’s home.

ParkerVision and Qualcomm are still enthralled in a legal battle to this day.

“Big tech’s betrayal of America — unveiled,” the X account for “Against the Giants” reads. “Inside the untold story of how big tech giant Qualcomm ripped-off one of the most important patented innovations in American history and shipped it off to China with the help from the US government. Did the Obama Admin provide cover?”

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EU AI Act Effectively Legalizes Biometric Mass Surveillance

On February 2, the EU AI Act, which came into force in August, reached the first compliance deadline. These are provisions that contain rules that allow the bloc to legalize biometric mass surveillance.

This is happening via Article 5, that on the face of it seeks to introduce protections against using AI systems that represent “unacceptable risk.” But, there are also exceptions to this, defined in the act as the “strictly necessary” cases when those same systems are allowed to be used.

It is this that gave rise to the fear that one of the consequences of the AI Act is to in fact legalize some highly contentious deployments of biometric data-fueled mass surveillance.

Article 5 prohibits real-time remote biometric ID systems from being used by law enforcement in public spaces – but only “unless and in so far as such use is strictly necessary.”

The “strictly necessary” instances are described as those when law enforcement is searching for “specific victims” of crimes like abduction, trafficking, and sexual exploitation, but also when they look for missing persons.

The second definition gets less precise in scope as it allows for AI surveillance systems to be used to prevent crime. This includes a threat to life or physical safety of individuals that is deemed to be “specific, substantial, and imminent” – or threat of a terrorist attack that law enforcement decides is “genuine and present” but also – “genuine and foreseeable.”

Lastly, the AI Act treats as “strictly necessary” to exempt from prohibited AI activities the following: “Localization or identification of a person suspected of having committed a criminal offense, for the purpose of conducting a criminal investigation or prosecution or executing a criminal penalty for offenses.”

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Bill Gates Says ‘Humans Won’t Be Needed For Most Things’

Bill Gates says that in the near future humans won’t be needed for “most things” thanks to AI, but will still be required for the purposes of entertainment.

Gates made the comments during an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon to promote his new book.

Fallon asked Gates whether AI was going to “take over” and what the downsides and benefits of it were.

Gates explained that “intelligence is rare,” but that artificial intelligence will start to replace great teachers and doctors over the course of the next decade.

The Microsoft founder went on to suggest that many types of jobs will be replaced and that people could only end up working two or three days a week.

“This is a bit scary, it’s completely new territory,” he added.

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Digital Hegemony: Sophisticating Monitoring And Propaganda – Love Your Servitude!

Today, we are witnessing a profound transformation. We are increasingly impacted by algorithmic decision-making, artificial intelligence, data proliferation, data harvesting and sophisticated monitoring of how we think and act. This affects how we work, how we access services and how we relate to and interact with others. 

While digital innovations and online platforms offer unparalleled ease, they also raise critical concerns about our independence. The constant connectivity and data-driven decision-making that characterise modern life has major implications. Technological advancements are used to shape preferences and behaviour, and predictably, powerholders use the notion of convenience to manipulate and exert control over populations.

Giant corporations and the state are leveraging what is often termed ‘technological solutionism’ to establish a digital iron cage of control. By monitoring and predicting our thoughts and actions, these intertwined entities impose a tightening noose of automated systems, suffocating personal liberty.

We are increasingly hurtling toward a reality reminiscent of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, where a dystopian technocracy merges with a plutocracy.

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Mexican drug cartels plan attacks on Border Patrol agents with kamikaze drones and other explosives to fight US crackdown

Mexican drug cartels are ordering their members to attack US Border Patrol agents with kamikaze drones and other explosives in a desperate bid to thwart the crackdown at the border, according to an internal memo obtained by The Post.

The alert, which cites social media posts and other sources, cautions federal agents “to remain cognizant of their surroundings at all times” in the face of the new threat.

“On February 1, 2025, the El Paso Sector Intelligence and Operations Center (EPT-IOC) received information advising that Mexican cartel leaders have authorized the deployment of drones equipped with explosives to be used against US Border Patrol agents and US military personal currently working along the border with Mexico,” the internal memo titled “Officer Safety Alert” said.

“It is recommended that all US Border Patrol agents and DoD personnel working along the border report any sighting of drones to their respective leadership staff and the EPT-IOC.”

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“Just give me the f***ing links!”—Cursing disables Google’s AI overviews

If you search Google for a way to turn off the company’s AI-powered search results, you may well get an AI Overview telling you that AI Overviews can’t be directly disabled in Google Search. But if you instead ask Google how to turn off “fucking Google AI results,” you’ll get a standard set of useful web suggestions without any AI Overview at the top.

The existence of this “curse to disable Google AI” trick has been making the rounds on social media in recent days, and it holds up in Ars’ own testing. For instance, when searching for “how do you turn off [adjective] Google AI results,” a variety of curse word adjectives reliably disabled the AI Overviews, while adjectives like “dumb” or “lousy” did not. Inserting curse words randomly at any point in the search query seems to have a similar effect.

There’s long been evidence that Google’s Gemini AI system tries to avoid swearing if at all possible, which might help explain why AI Overviews balk at queries that contain curses. Users should also keep in mind, though, that the actual web link results to a query can change significantly when curse words are inserted, especially if SafeSearch is turned off.

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